In the ANR Spotlight this week:

Afternoons have become an exciting time for Amy Wilson’s preschool classes at Giltner. Since early February, at about 2 p.m. every day, valentines from all across America have been pouring into her classroom as part of her Hearts Around the United States effort. 
Wilson started the program with her morning and afternoon classes as a fun activity which grew out of connections she has made with teachers around the country.
“I belong to a teacher Facebook group,” Wilson explained. “That’s where we learned about it and we decided to do it kind of amongst us (as a group) back and forth.”
The class has created their own postcards which they have sent out to different classes across the country, and in return they have received Valentine’s Day postcards and gifts from all over. The goal is to collect at at least one card from each of the 50 states.
“We’ve sent out probably close to 30 valentines that initially started within that teacher group that we’ve sent back to other classes across the country,” she said. “As we get them specifically from schools or classes, we’ll send back to those classes.”
With the help of her students’ parents and others at Giltner schools, the students have so far received more than 70 cards from across the country.
“I was pleasantly surprised,” Wilson commented. “It’s been an overwhelming response. Everybody wants to help and once it hit social media, it just exploded.”
Wilson said when the mail comes in each day the valentines are delivered to her classroom by head custodian Tina Sok. She said that event has become a highlight of the day as much for her as for her students. 
“As soon as Tina walks in, they’re always super excited,” she commented. “Sometimes we have to break it up. Like the other day, I think we got 27 cards in the mail, so we had to break it up into tiny bits of time.”
On the day of the afternoon class’s Valentine’s Day celebration, three postcards were delivered. 
“This one is from South Carolina,” Wilson told her class as she opened up the first card.  
“I saw that you guys are wanting to hear from all 50 states,” Wilson read from the card. “I wanted to wish you all a very happy Valentine’s Day all the way from South Carolina and keep up all your hard work.”
In addition to the help she has received from teachers in her Facebook group, the community of Giltner has also helped by reaching out to people around the nation.
“We’ve gotten a bunch of valentines from alumni who have reached out,” she said. “That’s fun because we get to go down to the composite pictures and find them.”
In addition to the cards, the class has also received a variety of gifts and senders have shared interesting facts about their states.
“We have a package coming from a baker in Utah,” Wilson commented. That was a connection with a local lady here.”
Wilson’s pastor helped the class connect with a person from Alaska who sent a stuffed animal to class.
“They sent us a stuffed moose and asked us to adopt him into our classroom,” she explained. “They’ve had like 110 inches of snow in Alaska, so they sent the moose here because he was not faring well with the snow. So we get to take care of the moose and they sent the state flag and they sent a match game all about Alaska.”
After reading their cards and opening up their new gifts, the class made its way out into the hallway where Wilson posts all of the collected postcards. There’s also a map decorated with stickers. After adding three new stickers to their map, they had only seventeen states to go to meet their goal.
“We want to keep going until we hopefully can get all 50 states,” she said. “I know the kids are going to be bummed once the mail stops, because they look forward to it every day, but hopefully we can keep going.”
Wilson said the project has created a fascination with the mail system in her students. 
“We’ve made a post office in our classroom just because they’re so infatuated with mail right now,” Wilson explained. “There’s stamps and the soft envelopes from the post office where they can write letters and postcards and put stamps on them. We have a mailbox in our classroom. They’re just totally wrapped up in mail right now.”
The project hasn’t been confined to only the preschool classes, according to Wilson, but has spread throughout the entire school at Giltner.
“It’s kind of a whole school project now, because I know the big kids come and their teachers are showing them our map and they’re all invested in how many we have and what’s left,” Wilson commented. “I definitely think it’s been great for the whole school.”
Based on the success of the program, Wilson said she plans to continue Hearts Across the United States for her future classes and for other grades at Giltner.
“I think it’s great just seeing how my littles have reacted,” Wilson stated. “I think it could be something that all teachers could do, even kids of older ages would be excited about it.”