As a part of the third grade curriculum at Sloan-Hendrix Elementary the teachers have combined the Social Studies unit of Arkansas History with Reading.
Flat Stanley is a story about a boy who is flattened during the night when a bulletin board fell on him. While he is flat, is able to travel via mail to visit friends across country.
After finishing the book, Flat Stanley, the third graders created an Arkansas Flat Stanley that represented a typical person who would live in Arkansas. Along with the paper doll, they completed an Arkansas Flat Stanley Journal, which told about about many aspects of our wonderful state. The students then sent their Arkansas Flat Stanley to an address of a friend or relative who lives in another state. When the students receive their Flat Stanleys back, they get to learn about another state in our great country. They also map all of Stanley’s travels on a large U.S. map.
One of the third grade students at Sloan-Hendrix Elementary, T.J. Son, chose to send his Arkansas Flat Stanley to his television hero, Turtleman Ernie Brown, From Animal Planet’s: Call Of The Wildman. To T.J’s surprise his Arkansas Flat Stanley came back with a lot of words of wisdom to live by from the Turtleman himself. Turtleman, helped us remember to always be respectful, help others, and care about the world around us. In the package that contained Flat Stanley came other goodies for T.J. and his classmates. It included many signed autographs of Turtleman, the Turtle Gang, and Lollie Dog. Bookmarks, photos with Flat Stanley visiting a fire station with Turtleman, and information about what Turtleman does and why were also enclosed in the package. We learned a lot of ways to become good citizens through Turtleman’s words of encouragement. T.J. wanted Turtleman to know his dreams had come true with the arrival of that little package. We all wanted to thank him for taking time from his busy schedule to help us with this project, and helping to make a difference as well. The effort was truly worth it for this third grade student. In T.J.’s own words “That was the best day of my life!”
