The patch was Cathy Walter’s Target® Iditarod 2009 Teacher on the Trail™ patch.  It was sitting on my desk at school after I returned from the Winter Teacher’s Conference in Anchorage.   A second grade student saw it and asked about it.  I explained the tradition started by Diane Johnson of the Teacher on the Trail creating a unique patch for his/her sleeping bag.  Her eyes lit up, “We should make patches for the mushers for their sleeping bags.”  The rest, as they say, is history.  Within a week twenty-four kids from grades two through five were signed up for the “Lunch Buddies:  Idita-Patch Project.”

The Iditarod had recently finished but the students’ excitement level was still high.  The younger students had the early lunch period and started by making a list of which mushers should get a patch.  When the older students came in during the later lunch period and saw almost thirty names on the board, they knew the list had to be reduced.  An interesting conversation ensued about who to pick.  Should it be favorite mushers, mushers who did something special, rookies, the top ten?  One thing for sure, was that Lance Mackey was on the list, as well as Hugh Neff who would be visiting our school in May.

When presented with the selection problem at the second session, the younger students wanted more information.  What would they put on the patch?  Would they all start looking the same?  They didn’t want that!  So, they researched the mushers on the list and left the information for the older students to consider.  The older students selected nine more mushers they thought had a “story” or who won an award during this year’s race.  Each student selected a musher that interested him or her and created a patch design for the next session.

A week later, individual patch designs were shared and morphed from the input of the group until we had eleven working designs everyone agreed upon.  Then the fun began.  No one knew how to make a patch.  Well, almost no one.  It turned out that one little girl’s mother had a fancy sewing machine that could do “embroidery.”  She came in with Hugh’s Neff’s patch and it looked professional.  She explained how she found the dog sled design online and helped her mom stitch it.  Everyone was impressed, but knew that every patch couldn’t be made that way.  Anyway, they wanted to roll up their sleeves and make the patches themselves.  After finding a few “how-to” websites (see resources below), it was decided that students would hand stitch the wording on fabric, cut out bigger pieces of felt, and iron them to the patch.  We would, however, use the fancy sewing machine to make the stitched edging.

Students worked at home and in class for the next couple of weeks until the patches were finally ready for final stitching.  “Sewing mom” came in and showed students how to iron the cut outs onto the patches with special paper and then how to sew the edging (even though she did all the stitching for safety reasons).  Letters were written to each musher to accompany the patch.

The Idita-Patch project was a success.  Students came together around a common passion and worked together as a team to create a memento for people they considered celebrities.  Hugh Neff received his patch when he came to our school and the other patches were mailed out in early June.  Hopefully in September, the students will have some responses from the mushers .  Even if they don’t, they were very proud of their work and hope to see a patch or two on a sleeping bag or jacket during the 2010 Iditarod.

Resources for Patch Making

*How to Make a Custom Patch:  http://www.ehow.com/how_2258862_make-custom-cloth-patch.html

*How to Iron On Patch Appliques:  http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080304185310AAKHnhl

*How to Create an Embroidered Patch:  http://www.instructables.com/id/Create-embroidered-patches-from-digital-images/

*How to Make an Iron On Embroidered Patch:  http://www.ehow.com/how_4814151_embroidered-ironon-patch.html

View this article in the original version sent to us by Sally Simon.

Click here to read a lesson idea from Cathy Walters—  (about the Teacher on the Trail sleeping bag.  You will  some of the patches that are on the sleeping bag.)

We have tracked his progress from Anchorage-Nome using a statistics form and the internet website at iditarod.com.   Students have felt connected from the beginning and have learned the life values of commitment, integrity, respect, responsibility, tolerance, and fairness through the interaction of the project at large.

This has been my first year using the race; however, it will not be the last as it has been a remarkable teaching tool for teaching life values.

My students are my true heroes.   They may not think so at times, but they are my “team” that lead me to the finish line every year. Without my student’s remarkable abilities and diverse personalities I would have a very boring life.   I too have learned many lessons through following Iditarod 2009.

I cannot imagine a better way to involve students in learning geography, math, science, and reading.

This lesson has provided an enriching experience for all my students.

Penny

Florida

Finalist, 2010 Target^® Teacher on the Trail

The trail to Nome is filled with unknowns.  At every step along this thousand-mile journey, a musher has to make decisions.  Some call this risk assessment.  What obstacles might be encountered, and how to best prepare for them are the decisions constantly floating around inside the head of every musher on the Iditarod Trail.  Do I stop at this checkpoint?  Do I have to drop a dog?  Does my leader need a break?  Can my team make it to Nome? Isn’t that the way it is in life?  Buckling up, wearing sunscreen, or locking our doors at night are some simple decisions made daily by responsible adults.  As teachers we want to help our students in their decision-making skills as well.  Our goal as educators is to provide whatever tools necessary to help our students make the right choices, choices that might even one day save their life.

Most teachers want to protect their students from negative influences that occur on a daily basis. Children are continually exposed to messages about the supposed acceptability of drug use through television, the Internet, movies and radio. There is no other time in a person’s life when peer pressure is greater than during adolescence. During the 2009 Winter Iditarod Educator’s Conference, the Alaska National Guard presented their “Stay on Track” Drug Demand Reduction Program.  Now, here is a teacher tool with some real meat behind it.

Stay on Track is a free research-based program targeted at middle school students.  It is an innovative, fun, and comprehensive approach to preventing substance abuse. The units are broken up into health education, decision-making, improving communication, and media influence.  Each of these units has activities that help your students with trust building, communication, and risk assessment. Chief Warrant Officer Scott Frickson and his Guard team had us participate in many of the activities included in the curriculum.  We played a trust game where we had to hold hands, and wait for a hand squeeze before we got to grab a chicken (no way to do this game justice, so just go with me here). We had to use analytical skills and determine in a pile of string which one string we could pull that would be attached to the rest of the strings to test our problem solving skills.  Then there was the game where we stood on a dot and had to nonverbally communicate with another person in the circle that we wanted to switch spots with them, without letting the person stuck in the middle get our spot.  All of these activities came with reflection at the end with the decisions we made and why we made them.  The great part about this free program is that your local National Guard, no matter where you live, can come in to teach the program, or you can teach it yourself.

It is no wonder the National Guard is such an important collaborator with Iditarod Education Department. The Army National Guard is an elite group of warriors who dedicate a portion of their time to serving their nation. Each state has its own Guard, as required by the Constitution; in fact, it is the only branch of the military whose existence is actually required by the Constitution. According to SSgt Jen Theulen, the Alaska National Guard does the most rescues of any National Guard.  This is due to the high volume of high-risk sports in this state.  They rescue pilots, snow machiners, climbers, hunters, photographers, hikers, rock climbers, and occasionally boaters.  Now their goal is to help students evaluate the risk assessment with using tobacco, drugs, or alcohol.

The Iditarod Education Department’s goal is to provide teachers with standards based lessons that will hook kids on to the Iditarod and become lifelong fans.  When our students are excited about what they are learning, and have the skills necessary to make good decisions both in and out of the classroom, then you can see why the National Guard’s partnership is such a powerful tool.  Together we can help our kids make it to Nome!

If you would like to find out about the Drug Demand Reduction program for the National Guard Unit in your city or state, please visit http://www.alaskadrugeducation.com.  Even though this is the Alaska site, they will put you in contact with your state’s unit.