Exhibit Q, R, S

“So, Lainie. How do you know you’re working with gifted kids?”

I present to you an obituary for…wait for it…

an EXPO marker.

People, I can’t make this stuff up.

Earlier this week, we read Leo Lionni’s obituary to learn more about him as an artist and as a person. To understand that text, we had to discuss what exactly an obituary is. It just so happened that day we had to deep-six an EXPO marker that had gone south.

Today, my kiddos surprised me with the above gem. What do I love so very much about this? How do I know my fourth graders have already won 2020?

For starters, they’re completely true to form. I mean, c’mon. After a single day of exposure, they included the ACTUAL TEXT FEATURES of an obit:

• “Photos” of the deceased
• *”Send flowers/Send a letter”
• *Information about his life
• *”He was survived by”

And did you catch the “skinny purple” adopted child?

Or maybe you’d like to see how the “funeral” went down:

Or, if you are in our classroom, you’d like to visit poor Purple Expo’s grave:

Days like these, I am immeasurably grateful for my students.

Know who else I’m grateful for?

Their homeroom teacher.

Their classroom teacher actually allowed all of these hijinks to take place, trusting her instincts that they were up to something interesting. She is the one who knew that even though the kids were a little noisy, even though the kids were a little giggly, even though the kids were a little silly, that they were up to something good.

We know they were.

And stuff like this is 100% worth the price of admission.