Students Learn About Greeting Cards, Empathy
Students Learn About Greeting Cards, Empathy
Milbank Elementary School students are spending the last two weeks of March working with artist-in-residence Lawrence Diggs from the South Dakota Arts Council.
Diggs, a poet, is teaching students about creating and sending cards for various occasions. Lessons cover the full process, from brainstorming creative ideas, designing the card, writing the message, folding the card and addressing the envelope.
Diggs also emphasizes the social importance of cards to acknowledge birthdays, big events or gratitude. “Keep this practice up. This is not the first time you’ve heard of this and it should not be the last,” Diggs told the second grade class during a discussion about thank you notes on Friday, March 24.
Over the week of March 20 through 24, Diggs worked with students in kindergarten through third grade. From March 27 through March 31, Diggs is working with fourth and fifth graders. In total, each class spent one and a half to two hours in sessions with Diggs.
Diggs believes that starting students young is important in connecting them to their feelings and to one another. He noted that the older students have expanded vocabularies to express their sentiments with multi-sentence cards. “The first [sentence] says one thing and the other makes it more powerful. We can start to play around,” Diggs explained.
As a Buddhist chaplain at the South Dakota State Penitentiary in Sioux Falls, Diggs has experienced firsthand the power of poetry in prison and was energized to take poetry into area schools. He has been available as an artist-in-residence for approximately 10 years.
Diggs believes that art creates bonds in the community and forges connections between people. “It doesn’t have to be the most beautiful thing. The beautiful thing is that you got the community together to do something together,” said Diggs.
Diggs is a scholar for the Humanities Council and is on the board of Arts South Dakota. He works as an artist-in-residence with three to four South Dakota schools per year. Diggs also partners with Lutheran Social Services to talk with kids in detention about music, art and poetry.
Originally from San Francisco, Diggs came to South Dakota in 1989. He is now based in Roslyn, where he played a key role in founding and sustaining the International Vinegar Museum.
Diggs notes that his work in the vinegar field is flexible, which he appreciates. “The reason I’m blessed is so I can do something for somebody else,” said Diggs.
A selection of the cards made by the students was on display at the school’s Title Night on Thursday, March 30, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. in the elementary school gym.
–Emelia Enquist
