Holiday plays, songs make learning fun

Students in Lisa Reitz’s class at Bellefonte Area High School spent most of December celebrating holiday traditions that also tied into class curriculum by putting on a performance of “A Christmas Carol” and learning about “The 12 Days of Christmas” song. For nearly a month, they prepared for the play by learning roles using emotions, and experiencing what goes in to creating a performance. The performance was then held exclusively in the life skills classroom. “They did an amazing job,” Reitz said.

The students also spent two weeks on a math project that focused on the song “The 12 Days of Christmas.” By listening to the song repeatedly, Reitz said students figured out how many presents the “true love” gives, and also explored the current cost of each item and the total cost per gift, the total cost per day and the total amount. Additionally, they researched the history and origin of the song, and found that there are several ideas that all the gifts are actually birds, which the class determined wasn’t necessarily realistic gifts.