A Learning Tradition
"A dragonfly landed on Liy's hand," were the first words out of Angeli Perrow's mouth when she read her book Many Hands to the Fairmount School students in Bangor.
Many Hands is a book about a young girl who loves making baskets. One day she has a dream were she meets her grandmother who had recently died. When she awakes she makes a beautiful basket. As she is showing her family and friends, she learns exactly what her grandmother told her in her dream. That many hands make the basket.
It's been a tradition to have Maine authors come to Fairmount School. This year the special guest was Mrs. Perrow and Pam Cunningham, a Penobscot master basket maker. The two worked together in the making of the book Many Hands. Perrow, while talking to the student body, explained the difficulties of being a writer. She told students that to be successful you had to be able to persevere and believe in yourself.
Many students that day learned the troubles and joys of basket making. Cunningham explained and showed the students the process of making a correct basket. The children learned a great deal from their visit. Even when they weren't listening to the presentations of the special visitors, they were all doing some sort of activity relating to Many Hands or writing. Some classes wrote poems, while others made paper baskets and dragonflies. Young Authors' Day was definitely an experience for everyone at Fairmount.
Young Authors' Day, at Fairmount School, was modeled after the day when the University of Maine invited a few children from schools in the area to come to the college and meet Maine authors. When they gave the day up 18-20 years ago, Fairmount continued the special day. They found that the students got excited and looked forward to Young Authors' Day. So now, every year, the teachers invite a Maine author to come to Fairmount to tell the students about being a writer. Every year it is a success. The students learn and have fun during this event, and the young author inside of them grows.
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