A Little Something Different Today

I want to show you something else besides Cedarmore Farm that Andy and Lizzie are working hard on (as well as the rest of the community) since right now not too much is going on at the farm....the lull before the storm I guess you could say.

CEDAR HILL SCHOOL

I don't know why but I am so excited about this little school.  When you are sitting at the kitchen table at Andy and Lizzie's you can see the school on the hill on the other side of the pasture from the house.  I think the last time I was visiting Andy, Lizzie and the kids I remember seeing men putting on the roof.  I have been asking to see the school so today Lizzie surprised me with a visit.  She had to get the okay I guess from the Bishop and the school teacher, who just happens to be the Bishop's 21 year old daughter.  I have had the chance to meet her yet but I hope to really soon.

The front door of the school is actually in the back of the school, just like on Little House on The Prairie.  The back add on is what I would consider a mud room.  If you look really close there is a chair with a white bucket. That is where the children was their hands before lunch.

The wood for the wood stove.  Lizzie says that this should last them until the end of the year.  There is probably this much stacked under the schoolhouse.

There are two children that ride their horses to school.  This is the horse stall that they have for them.  She also told me that the children bring food and water everyday for their horses.  There are lots of buggy tracks in the mud as you enter the gate from the road.  As I was driving home I started to wonder who cleans out the stalls...all the boys do.

And of course the outhouse.  One for the boys and one for the girls...facing opposite directions.

When I walked into the backdoor I felt like I was walking back in time to a one room schoolhouse like the one that I hear my father-in-law describe.  And then the smell.  It smelled like a school...books and clay is what I could smell.  I stood there for the longest time just taking it all in.

The wood burning stove.  It has really two purposes...heating for warmth and heating the children's 'foils' that they bring from home (sandwiches wrapped in foil can be placed on a wire rack on top of the stove).  I must admit I has to ask what the pot was for.  I was thinking that it was for heating water for washing hands.  No...come to find out that it is filled with water and put on the stove to add moisture to the air because the wood stove is so drying.

From the teachers view point.  There are 14 children in the school...grades 2,3,4,5,7, and 8.  School begins at 8:30AM and is out around 2:30PM.  Monday thru Thursday everything is written and spoken in English.  On Friday everything is in German.

I found this chart very interesting...letter combinations written in Gothic style lettering but examples for the sounds were in English using English words and pronunciation.

The floor is 4X8 sheets of plywood finished in oil.  There are window coverings.  Student papers on the walls.  A huge blackboard.  Three different types of lettering...printed alphabet, cursive and Gothic alphabets.  See the small table to the left of the teachers desk.  This is where she calls the individual grades up to explain what their assignments are for the day.  The students are then expected to go back to their desks and get their work finished.

I had a desk just like this when I was in 6th grade.  I loved that desk.  I walked around the room and breathed it all in.  I could have been Laura Engalls.  As  walked by each desk I touched it and prayed for the one sitting in it.  I have a teacher friend and she does that every year before her students enter her room.  And if I know her, she does it throughout the year too.

So today I am going thru all of my 'teacher stuff' and games, puzzles, crayons and markers to see if I have anything that the school could use.  I will put it all in a box and the next time I am out to Cedarmore Farm I will let Andy and Lizzie got thru it to see if the school can use any of it.  Shoot, I might even take an apple to the teacher.