If It's Thursday, It Must Be Van Meter!

On Thursday, October 5th my day took me to Van Meter, IA the home of Cleveland Indians hall of fame pitcher Bob Feller. So before heading to the school on my way into town, I stopped by for a quick couple of photos of the Bob Feller Museum. For more information on the Bob Feller Museum, visit http://www.bobfellermuseum.org/.

Once into the Van Meter School, UniServ Director Jim Crotty and I met up with Bill Miller, Van Meter EA President. President Bill (pictured at left) teaches Junior High Science and High School Biology and Psychology. Bill shared he instructs 160 students each day with 4 preparations. Bill headed up the effort to host a morning breakfast of giant muffins and fresh brewed coffee for folks to come meet Director Crotty and me. Dozens of teachers, support staff and several administrators stopped by the school gym to welcome us to Van Meter.

President Bill Miller set up a great schedule for me to get into a number of classes. Our first class visit and share a read aloud was in Cindi Byrnes’s 4th grade class. Pictured at right is Mrs. Byrnes, teacher associate Jim Bragg and their 4th grade class.

Our next class visit was in Elaine Merical 5th grade classroom. Elaine (at left) described the activities students were engaged in around the classroom. One group of 5th graders was working on selecting articles for the front page of their classroom newspaper, Elementary Paw Prints. Students were involved in at least 6 different areas of the classroom. There were such exciting things going on, I would have liked to have stayed the entire day! Here Ms. Merical (at right) is pictured with her 5th graders. When I told the students that I was giving them each a pencil to remind them the Iowa State Education Association is working hard so that all Iowa students have great public schools—several students jumped up and gave me a pencil. Their pencils were also “mood” pencils—but their pencils had paw prints on them that changed colors. Really cool, kids!

We next hot-footed it around the hallways, up the stairways, down more halls and finally into the High School building. I had the chance to address Brent Jorth’s Government class (pictued at left) filled with members of the junior class. Mr. Jorth (pictured at right) shared with me that he has 4 different prepartions for his High School day—teaching 1 Government class; 3 U.S. History classes, 1 Psychology class and 1 Geography class. He also shared with me a great picture book that his wife had purchased for him as a gift, D is for Democracy, a Citizen’s Alphabet, by Elissa Grodin and illustrated by Victor Juhasz. It looks like a great book! I always loved to read alphabet books to my students then have them write their own version, following the same modeled pattern.

Back to the elementary building and to Ann Volk’s 3rd grade. Ann is pictured here (at left) with her 3rd graders. They really seemed to enjoy the read aloud of The Relatives Came.

Our final classroom visit was to Rodie Dawson’s 1st grade. What a wonderful classroom and such delightful students! Mrs. Dawson is pictured here with her 1st grade homeroom (on the right).


Thanks Van Meter EA for your hospitality! You have so many awesome things going on!