I miss the days of making hand turkeys. The boys traced their hands to make a turkey and decorated it with paint, feathers, and googly eyes. They might still humor me when I corner them the day before Thanksgiving and plead with them to step back in time and do something crafty with me. They’ll more likely show me how to make a turkey in Minecraft.
Gone too are the days of school plays and pageants. Our school has no such thing as a Thanksgiving play or a Christmas pageant. There aren’t even decorations anywhere. I played a Native American in my elementary production of the story of Thanksgiving. As the only brown girl, I didn’t even have to audition. I played one of Santa’s elves in my boarding school Christmas pageant. As a girl not yet 5’0 tall, I was a shoe-in for the part.
These days school seems to be more about tests and assessments than celebrations and fun. Personally, I don’t think learning and having fun are mutually exclusive. My sons don’t bring home school artwork anymore. There are no more holiday themed drawings or craft projects to adorn the holiday table. Perhaps it’s just that they’re getting older. But I hadn’t expected this sort of stuff to abruptly halt in the midst of elementary school. Bird and Deal are 10 and 8, surely they have a lot of craft making years ahead of them, no?
Holiday parties at school are a thing of the past. The boys haven’t had class parties for holidays since preschool. I find it odd that we can’t/don’t even celebrate Thanksgiving, the most American of holidays. What gives? What has happened to the fun celebrations and interweaving of story telling and history in our schools? Where have the trappings of childhood gone? Not just hand turkeys are missing from my sons’ backbacks — I’m talking about pilgrim hats and bonnets, brown construction paper cornucopias, crayoned leaf rubbings, and Native American headdresses. As the holidays approach, kids are unsettled and antsy anyway so why not use this time to put on a construction paper Pilgrim hat and tell the story of the first Thanksgiving (historically inaccurate as it was back in my time)?
Why not munch on some candy corn, popcorn, and sliced apples to give thanks with the class? Why not hang up some fall wreaths around school? Why not have a holiday service project for the kids? Why not at least make a lousy hand turkey?
Yes. Yes. Yes. We’re taking away the innocence and fun of childhood in an effort not to offend anybody even if their offenses are probably ridiculous.
Is it wrong that I teared up when I read this?