Taylor’s sailors hard at work

Mike Sciacca

The classroom was awash in activity as students, spread to all four

corners, diligently worked on projects.

Although fifth-grade students in Susie Taylor’s class at Eader

Elementary School were a day away from the weekend, the class session

just before the morning recess break indicated otherwise as these

students were fully emersed in a couple of activities. In one spot, Laura

Potter was emersed in her state report project while in another, where

another class event was taking place simultaneously, Justin Croom stood

before his classmates and carefully enunciated what he hoped to be the

correct answer.

He happened to know his stuff, too.

Generally in Mrs. Taylor’s class, Friday is a day set aside for

spelling tests for the students. But on this particular day, due to the

fact that Taylor was coming off recent foot surgery, she had a special

activity planned: a spelling bee.

Students were divided into six groups for the spelling bee and, as the

competition progressed through three rounds and roughly 90 words,

participants were whittled down to a handful of students who continued to

correctly spell their given word.

The classroom was a sea of blue as they all wear blue shirts on

Fridays, which proclaim them Taylor’s Sailors.”Today has been fun,” said

10-year-old Justin, who was one of the last students left standing after

correctly spelling faux pas.

But the spelling bee wasn’t the only thing going on in class. The

students were also working on a state report, which is due in the spring.

Back in September, the students had a say in which state they’d like

to report on. They were each assigned a different state -- with the

exception of California, and began contacting their respective state’s

chamber of commerce. As part of their report, they were to work on

stitching a piece of cloth depicting a map of their state and stitch in

anything else pertinent to that state.

Nicole Beltramo, 10, selected Georgia because her favorite cousin

lives there and comes to Huntington Beach each year to visit her. She put

the finishing touches on her well-designed stitchery just before the

Christmas break, which included an outline of the state, the capital and

the fruit most associated with Georgia, the peach.

“This project has taught me such things as the state capital, what the

state flower is and what is important to the people who live in Georgia,”

Nicole said.

Jaime Nosek, 10, continued to do the stitch work on her state,

Michigan. Kyle Soscia knew nothing about stitchery. Yet, not unlike his

other male classmates, he took pride in the work he has done.

Soscia is responsible for a report on the state of Nevada.

“I didn’t even know how to do stitchery, and now I’m getting better at

it,” Kyle said.

* MIKE SCIACCA is the education and sports reporter. He can be reached

at (714) 965-7171 or by e-mail at michael.sciacca@latimes.com.