Jessie Holmes did it! He was the first musher to guide his team under the Burled Arch in the wee hours of Friday morning. Of the 33 teams that started the race, Jessie’s team is the only one that I was able to see at every checkpoint I have been to. It was so fun to see his team and how strong they all looked (musher and dogs) throughout the race. Jessie is a passionate musher who loves his dogs more than anything. He has so many unique strategies that he has discovered over the years and he uses what works best for him and his team at any given time.
As teachers, we are always celebrating successes and each student has their own individual triumphs and tribulations. If a student always forgets to put their name on their paper, we celebrate when they remember. When a student constantly blurts out, we celebrate when they raise their hand before speaking. While Jessie’s race is over, there are still many mushers on the trail who have a goal and an upcoming reason to celebrate. As of late Friday night, we are waiting for the 6th place musher to reach Nome. Just as we see in the classroom, hard work pays off!
Lesson Idea: To help students better understand the individual goals of the mushers, have students choose one important goal that they would like to achieve before the end of the month. After students determine their goal, have them come up with a list of ways they can reach their goal, highlighting important steps along the way. They should determine a timeline for the amount of time needed to reach each step, allowing them to still reach their goal on time. Mushers have a plan for each race with a predicted timeline for each step (checkpoint), but just as we saw in this year’s race, plans don’t always play out as expected. The last time the race took longer than 10 days was in 1994!
Questions? I’d love to hear from you! Send me a message at emailtheteacher@iditarod.com
