Schools fielding questions about shuttle tragedy
Published 12:00 am Tuesday, February 4, 2003
As people around the world watched in horror as news that the space shuttle Columbia disintegrated, many of those watching were children.
Some local schools spent the day handling questions from children and even making it a part of their lesson plans.
"We're telling the children that we're honoring the astronauts who gave their lives. They are heroes." Shelly McGraw, principal of Kingsbury Elementary, said.
When the children arrived at school in the morning, McGraw said many of them had questions,. Teachers talked with them about the tragedy, telling them how important it is for scientific programs such as the space program to continue. For a project, one student even brought in a poster he had made in honor of the astronauts. Because the disaster happened over the weekend, most parents answered many of their questions and calmed any of their fears at home.
A secretary for Rock Hill Elementary School said the teachers are dealing with their classes on an individual basis.
At Whitwell Elementary, third grade teacher Carol Brown said her students came to her as they arrived in the morning asking her if she saw the television news coverage about the shuttle. Otherwise, they said nothing else.
"We didn't say a lot," she said. "If you get too involved with children at this age (grades 1-3), they get upset easily."
Monday morning, students at Symmes Valley High School observed a moment of silence and their flag, along with the other schools' flags, were lowered to half staff. Principal Tom Bartee said some of the students have talked about the tragedy, but because it happened over the weekend, most have had time to adjust before coming to school. Also, high school students tend to deal with events such as this better than younger students, he said.
Throughout the day, students at South Point Elementary have been participating in classroom discussions about the disaster and even doing assignments relating to it, Principal Nancy Shuff said. Some students have been viewing pictures and maps while others in upper grades have been writing summaries of newspaper stories. One of the third-grade classes was already working on a space unit, so discussion about Columbia was very timely, she said.
Also, students have written journal entries about the disaster and reflected on the history of the space program. The classroom discussions have helped calm the fears the children had, Shuff said.
"Most of them were not even born (when the Challenger exploded in 1986)," she said.