Schools Make 9/11 Meaningful for Students Too Young to Remember

The student journalists at had an important assignment this week: Interview staff members at their Plainfield school about their memories of Sept. 11, 2001, and create a news broadcast to air Friday morning.

The students at the school, which serves sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders, were mere toddlers when the terrorist attacks occurred.

Through the eyes of the school’s teachers, instructional technology specialist Donna Hebreard and eighth-graders Desiree Hill and Nathan Lang, the entire school got a special history lesson and a message of hope for the future.

Hebreard said she approached the students who create 15-minute Friday broadcasts for the school’s Falcon News show about doing a segment on the 10th anniversary of Sept. 11, and they were eager to get to work.

“Our eighth-graders were 3 years old; our sixth-graders were 1 (in 2001),” she said. “I wanted them to get first-hand accounts of that day. I wanted to show the uncertainty of that moment, how frightening it was that you didn’t know what was happening.”

In one interview, JFK social studies teacher Gay Gallagher remembers being frustrated that the TV was not allowed to be turned on during school, which added to a greater sense of confusion and chaos.

Lang, 13, said the events of Sept. 11 and knowing that some bodies of people who died in the World Trade Center were never found made him feel upset.

But he appreciates the memorials and museum that are being created at the Ground Zero site.

“It made me think about (Sept. 11),” Hill, 13, said of her interviews. “It made me feel sad knowing what happened. It made me think, ‘Why would anyone do this to us?’”

Both student journalists say they believe their classmates will feel informed about the terrorist attacks as the 10th anniversary is remembered Sunday.

Hebreard said she also wanted to leave the students with a message of hope and focus on the memorial efforts.

“Sept. 11 has such a big impact for us as adults,” she said. “For the children, (the world after Sept. 11) is the only world they’ve ever known. I hope they have a deeper understanding of what it was like that day and why it is a big deal.”

Throughout the district, teachers incorporated lessons about Sept. 11 in age appropriate ways.

Many elementary students wore red, white and blue colors on Friday, gathered around flag poles, made homemade flags and learned patriotic songs.

At , students in language arts teacher Agatha Valenti's classes created a memory quilt containing about 2,900 panels in honor of those who lost their lives Sept. 11. The students decorated the panels, and the quilt will eventually be displayed in the gym.

In the district's high schools, teachers weaved lessons about Sept. 11 into their own curriculum.

Students wrote about what it means to be a hero and looked at the economic, historical and cultural impacts of Sept. 11. Some staff members also shared their own memories with the students.