By Elizabeth Richardson
Photos by Lisa Allmendinger
What do goat, biodiversity, salmon, banana, photosynthesis and waffles have in common?
The definitions and spellings can all be found in “A Student’s Dictionary,” a copy of which was given to Wylie Elementary School third-graders by the Chelsea Kiwanis Club Wednesday morning.
Oh, and those words were examples of some chosen by the Dexter students as their favorites.
In a more than 5-year tradition, the Chelsea Kiwanis gave each third-grade student a dictionary they could keep, and it’s something that’s long remembered by students in both the Chelsea and Dexter School Districts years after they’ve graduated. (Here’s a link to the Chelsea dictionary give-away that took place this fall.)
So Wednesday morning, after meeting with the School Principal Mary Cooper and school secretary Vicki Allie, the five Kiwanians were off into the hallways pushing a cart filled boxes of dictionaries.
“Our staff and students are so grateful for the generosity of the Chelsea Kiwanis and the kids love their dictionaries,” Cooper said.
In total, Kiwanis members visited nine classrooms where they talked about Kiwanis – how it was established to help people in need, especially children. And, one classroom of children were interested enough that they asked their teacher if they could start a K-Club, for kids.
Bob Milbrodt took the lead, explaining all the special sections of the dictionary, known as a gazetteer, while Kiwanians Joe Scheuring, president-elect, Fred Model, Neil Horning and Ray Kemner handed out the books.
The group visited the classrooms of Rebecca Mann, Jennifer Steele, Jill Ringlein, Brian King, Lisa Suomala, Jennifer Johnson, Kate Boynton, Megan Hendricks, and Sarah Nolan.
Students were instructed to put their names on the first page where it read, “This dictionary and all the words inside it, belong to” They proudly wrote their name on that title page while Milbrodt asked them if they knew what a dictionary was.
With wildly enthusiastic hand-raising they said, “A book of words that tells people about the words”, “words in alphabetical order”, “how words are pronounced”, ”easier than a website, you just pick it up and find the word”.
Milbrodt then told them that this dictionary was much more than just a place to look up words, it had information about the presidents, states, weights and measures, the periodic and multiplication tables, “The Declaration of Independence,” maps, planets, sign language and much more.
He ended his talk by showing the kids the longest word in the English language, which has 1,909 letters and was on the back page of the book. (There was also discussion with the teachers who joked that the students might find it on their next spelling test.)
Before the Kiwanis members left each classroom, students were asked about their favorite word. Hands flew up in the air and wonderful, sometimes crazy words, were given.
Thank you’s were yelled with great enthusiasm to the Kiwanis members as they left each classroom. And, a glance back inside revealed students excitedly flipping through the book’s pages.
Oh, and some of the other favorite words? Spartan, Dexter, archeologist, microscopic, baseball, chocolate, fuzzy, Michigan, rocket, doodle, dictionary, zebra, orange and pneumonia.
Please enjoy the slideshow below.
