"They're not going to remember who taught them 2 plus 2, but they'll remember this," said Kaylea Mullen, a kindergarten teacher at Lewis and Clark Elementary school, as she watched her students decorate aluminum-foil covered shoeboxes.
"Kindergarten should be fun and as teacher it's our job to make it fun," she said.
Whether it was the students in her class who glued heart cut-outs or foam stickers with the words "love" and "hearts" on them, or second-graders in Kim Bannister's Riverview Elementary classroom who turned oatmeal containers into mailboxes, teachers have tried to make Valentine's Day a learning experience as well as fun.
"You're learning about friendships," Mullen said. "Valentine's Day is all about love and friendships."
In Bannister's classroom, they took the oatmeal containers and laid them on their side. They then folded a piece of construction paper over the top, and taped another piece of construction paper at the bottom to make the mailbox shape and flap. Using popsicle sticks, students attached flags to the sides of the boxes with their names on them.
"Since the beginning of the year we've been bringing in oatmeal containers," Bannister said. "It's something that they can take home and keep for years to come."
She said the lesson for her students was two-fold. They had to follow along and pay attention to directions, and she even squeezed a little geometry lesson into the mailbox making.
"Boys and girls: What shape is the oatmeal container?" she asked.
They hesitated for a moment and then said in unison, "a cylinder!"
In Jessi Tucker's fifth-grade classroom at West Elementary school, students brought in boxes of all different sizes last week that they could turn into mailboxes.
Cooper Johnson brought in a Wheaties box while others, like Alexis Kobasa, had a shoebox to decorate.
Tucker said as soon as she told the students they could bring in boxes — instead of decorating paper bags like they have in years past — they started brainstorming all the different kind of boxes that could be used.
"This is something I always made when I was little," Tucker said. "It is fun to do things we don't always get time to do."
She also will be incorporating healthy eating into their Valentine's Day celebration as they plan to eat fruit pizza, which will also serve as a lesson in fractions.
But for the students in these classrooms, it's all about giving out the right Valentine's this year.
Alexis Kobasa, a fifth-grader in Tucker's classroom, said this is her favorite holiday and she'll be giving everyone in her classroom cards. But she said her friend is getting a special Valentine: a shirt she made her. She picked out glow-in the-dark cards to give her classmates this year.
"You get to watch your friends when they see your Valentine's," she said.
And as the years have gone one, the Valentine's cards have gotten more sophisticated.
For kindergartner Emily Hutton, it's all about the pop-up cards.
"We even have boy ones," she said.
Tristin Bennett, also a kindergartner, is excited he gets to eat candy and give away Valentine's cards with candy.
"It's about loving people and making friends," Tristin said.
He said he plans to give his best friend A.J. two candies.
Bannister said she doesn't require her second-graders to give everyone a Valentine, but most do anyway.
This year, second-grade girls have the Justin Bieber fever, according to Tori Mudd.
"I give them to everyone — including me," Tori said. "And then I'll bring motorcycle ones in for the boys."
And this year, she plans on giving something a little extra to her special Valentine, her friend Sterling.
"I'm going to give him two," she said.
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