We ended up with sleighs that made it look like Santa was flying a barcalounger, a bumpercar or one of the Jetson's space-age flying saucers along with a new species of reindeer that I privately named Cat-a-corns (half caterpillar/half unicorn). One student adorned Rudolph with a red "nose" on both the east and west side of the deer causing me to wonder if the animal suffered from an unfortunately-placed zit or hemorrhoids. It gives the word "tail-light" new meaning, anyway.
Without (much) comment or criticism, I handed each student two picture images; (1) a cartoon saluting soldier and (2) him- or herself to cut and glue so as to look as though they are riding right along with Santa. Instructed to cut each figure at the waist for perspective, student after student hotly objected. "He's not real, Matthew," I explained for the thousandth time, "For goodness sake, I'm not asking you to cut a REAL soldier in half." Out of all the people represented in that sleigh, I never thought we'd be debating about the reality-status of the military guy! This instruction also gave us a lovely opportunity to discuss the meaning of the word sacrilegious. Letting the flag touch the ground. Yes-sacrilegious. Swearing in church (or anywhere, for that matter). Yes-sacrilegious. Cutting a paper image of a soldier in half so it looks as though he's riding in Santa's sleigh. NO! Not sacrilegious! Some students did cite religious reasons to avoid this perceived desecration of a clipart image so many cards ended up looking like the veteran and the student were dangerously clinging to the side of Santa's speeding sleigh: Mission Impossible-style. "This is why people just buy their cards," I muttered to myself as I observed a cat-a-corn with a Quasimodo-inspired hunchback rear up on his hind-legs like a mighty stallion. Making cards with 4th graders takes too much patience and preparation. Or, in Rudolph's case...Preparation-H.
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