8th graders create trains in tradition for kindergartners
SARANAC LAKE — The eighth grade students from Saranac Lake created mini wooden trains for the Petrova Elementary kindergarten students recently.
This year’s toy featured holes to hold crayons.
“I give the students a chance to pick what toy they would like to give to the kindergarten. This year they chose to make a train. It was just an added bonus that we were able to find a place to add in some crayons,” middle school technology and engineering teacher Joseph Merrihew said.
Merrihew told his eighth grade students that this was a project that had become more of a tradition. They had to make 68 toy trains, which seemed to them like an unattainable feat with a class of only a dozen students. They persevered and they did it just in time for the deadline. Every student worked in assembly line fashion to make this happen.
“We run it like a business. Every student did the same job over and over increasing the quality and limiting the mistakes,” Merrihew said.
“I really enjoyed making the toys, and it was especially fun spending time with the kindergarten kids,” Dayna Bearce said.
“It was really great to see all the smiles that we got when we gave the toy trains to the little kindergarten students,” Lea Kidd said.
In past year, eighth grade students have created cars, helicopters, robots, tractors, whales and trains.
This is the sixth year that Merrihew has had his classes create a toy to give to the kindergarten class.