“S” today is for both sickness and success. I refuse to dwell on where I’m stuck at the moment and instead would prefer to immediately start with our race stories. Currently, Sam Paperman, and Sadie are both resting in Ruby. Sabin has left Ruby on his way to Galena. Sydnie is resting along the trail somewhere between the two. Stoddard is taking a break in Galena and both Shelley and Sam Martin have left Galena for their push to Kaltag. The sun has been shining on our mushers all Saturday despite the soft and slow trail along the Yukon. The ever-smiling Jeff Deeter explains that his team is having some soreness issues but he’s still hanging in. He’s happy about where he is sitting so far in 10th place. Ryan Redington is staying healthy now and is really having fun. He said that Iditarod is something he looks forward to every day of the year and while he’s sorry to his sponsors and supporters for not doing as well as he’d like, he is really enjoying the race. Bailey Vitello has been struggling with sickness of a different kind. His team has been under the weather and is helping them with Selenium capsules that improve gut health. He is stopping in Galena for six hours to give them time to rest. He felt it was the sensible decision because it would also give them the sunset, the nighttime sky, and the sunrise to keep the dogs interested. He stated that their safety and strength is way more important to him than any single race standing. We are all still speculating on how our leaders will come and go into these next checkpoints. Jessie Holmes won the Fish First Award, a stunning wooden Sockeye Salmon along with $2,000 and 25 pounds of fish for being the first to arrive in Kaltag. We are certainly not counting out those smiling from behind. Paige is a mere 20 miles back, and like Jessie, has 13 dogs. Mille, Travis, and Riley are barrelling ahead, 15 dogs strong. It will certainly be interesting to see what happens rounding out the top 10 as Wade Marrs, Michelle Phillips, and Matt Hall have yet to finish their 8 hour layover, but Ryan and Jeff have. Only time will tell as these spirited and strong-willed mushers make the turn at the Bering Sea coast on their way to Shaktoolik, Safety, and the screaming and shouting in Nome!
Soooo… try some sequencing!
- Sequence the Trail- Use masking tape to map out the trail on the floor. Put the names of checkpoints on cards and try placing them on the trail in sequential order.
- The Sequence of Making a Dogsled- Watch the video of “How a Dogsled is Made” twice. The first time for comprehension. The second time, pause and write each step on the template below. When done, add connecting words such as first, next, then, also, and last to the space in front of each step.
- Story Sequencing- Take any Iditarod story and create sequencing cards to students to put in order. Younger students can be given picture cards to sequence such as what mushers do at checkpoints or the sequence of what the dogs do at checkpoints.
