As we were doing the art project with our students, we were asking them if they eat turkey for Thanksgiving dinner. Expecting a yes, I was surprised when I hear one student say, “No, we eat duck” This made me realize that we have a lot of assumptions about Thanksgiving Festivities and how people celebrate them! I mean after all, what’s better than a nice roasted turkey infused with rosemary, mashed potatoes and green bean casserole? Well, after reading the book “Duck for Turkey Day” by Jacqueline Jules, we realized that there are many yummy meals that people around the world eat during Thanksgiving. The book is about a girl named Tuyet. In her class, right before thanksgiving they make turkeys out of pinecones and sing turkey songs. When she learns that her family will not be eating turkey for their holiday dinner and that they would be eating duck instead, she felt sad. She even gets her piggy bank’s money to try to buy a turkey. The story goes on and Tuyet has a lovely evening with her family, eating duck and being together. However, she was nervous to tell her classmates on Monday that she did not eat turkey on Thanksgiving. To Tuyet’s surprise most of her friends raised their hands saying that they too did not eat turkey during their Thanksgiving dinner but instead had dishes like lamb, enchiladas and tofu turkey. What a beautiful picture of diversity and community!  

The reason I share this story with you today is because as a culturally diverse school, our goal is to create environments where children from all their different cultural backgrounds feel seen and celebrated. We want each student to know that regardless of what their families eat during Thanksgiving dinner, they belong in our school. I think as parents and caregivers we have the power to sow this little seed of awareness in our kids, to help them live in a world where they can embrace diversity. However, above all this we want our students to grow into generous adults that live with such an attitude of gratitude that they can be attuned to the needs of the people around them. This was demonstrated this week as we conducted our Pantry pack/Food Drive for the Lake Washington Schools lunch program. Each family brought food to bless other families in need.  Together as a school, we collected 8 large boxes filled with food that were donated to the Hope link organization who will then distribute them to students and families in our area.  That’s a pretty cool thing! And it all happened because of your generosity! We are so blessed to be part of a school that cares about its community and practically supports it.  

 During this holiday season may we remember that the most important thing is to be grateful and to spend it with people we love and care for. Thanksgiving is all about generosity and gratitude. These two terms go hand to hand! When we are grateful for the little or abundance that we have, we then live from a position that allow us to be generous and live with an open hand. We hope you will have an amazing Thanksgiving week and that whether you eat lamb, chicken, tofu turkey, enchiladas or the traditional turkey meal, or if you don’t celebrate it at all, may you be able to sit with your family and share with each other how grateful we are to be together as a family.