Winning is more fun when you get to celebrate with your peers – at least that’s how Haley Schafer’s first grade class at Eugene Field Elementary seems to feel.

Garrett Swon, one of Schafer’s students, was awarded second place for his grade level in the KMOS PBS KIDS Writers Contest. He and the rest of the class have been celebrating this achievement, telling everyone in school how well he did.

“They all wanted to win, but when we found out that Garrett did place in this contest, they were so proud of their classmate,” said Schafer. “ It’s nice to see them team up and cheer on one of our own.”

Eugene Field’s mission is to empower futures, said Carolyn Lewis, Commitment to Community site coordinator. She learned about the competition and shared it with the teachers, encouraging all students to participate, but it was not a requirement.

“In order to empower futures, we need to be able to have opportunities to explore what the children’s futures may look like,” Lewis said. “Everybody has a story. Everybody has a book within them, but how many times do you get the opportunity to write that story?”

Schafer opted to do a class initiative where all of her students created either personal narratives or fairy tales for the contest.

Garrett’s tale, titled “Yetis are so Cool,” tells the story of Goblin who, despite everyone telling him yetis are interesting, sets out on a mission to prove yetis are not. Goblin finds the yetis in the North Pole and, much to his surprise, has a lot of fun with them.

“I kind of based it kind of off a book,” said Garrett. “Half myself and half off a book.”

Garrett’s tale was inspired by the book, “Yetis are the Worst,” by Alex Willan, which Schafer had read to her class earlier that week.

“I try to pair a lot of things with literature so we read a lot of read-alouds before writing to get kids interested and get kids exposed to different experiences before they’re asked to write,” said Schafer.

All of the students who participated earned a book from PBS kids, a bookmark and a sticker pack, and because of her class initiative, Schafer was entered into a contest of her own.

“I partnered with the city of Mexico parks and recreation and we will be giving swimming packages to the participants as well,” Lewis added.

Writing can be one of the more difficult subjects to get students interested in but contests like these can put an engaging spin on the day-to-day.

“Just being recognized, I think, is the most beneficial thing that a child could ever need,” said Lewis. “It’s giving them the attention and acknowledging their individuality.”

And if recognition wasn’t enough, the first place prize this year was a tablet.

“It was really engaging for students; they were really excited about it,” said Schafer. “They were very motivated and very engaged the entire time so that was exciting.”

While a new tablet would have been nice, Garrett wasn’t only in it for the prizes.

“I just like telling stories a lot,” he said.

As the school year comes to a close, Schafer is preparing to say goodbye to a class who will certainly be leaving on a high.

“I have so many fun personalities and it’s always fun just getting to know each group of kids and this is definitely a great one that I am sad to see move on to second grade,” Schafer said. “They’ve grown so much academically. I know they are going to be successful as they continue through elementary school.”

As for C2C, Lewis said they will continue to work with the community and their students outside of the classroom throughout the summer while brainstorming new and exciting ways to keep kids learning.