By Lisa Sator
Family Day is often described as “the most anticipated event of the school year.” With a year-long pandemic that has shifted school activities to online platforms and a surge in COVID-19 cases bringing more restrictions, putting up an online Family Day seemed an intimidating prospect. Parade of Colors. Team parade and cheerdancing. Games and family activities. Entertainment. How on earth were we going to pull this off? The answer of the Woodrose Student Council and Team Captains was short and simple: “We got this.” And they certainly did.
The day began with something very familiar—the Parade of Colors. But instead of cheering on each team as they entered the Woodrose Gym, we watched a video that humorously recreated the Parade of Colors. Captains and Mommies held up their laptops displaying Zoom screenshots of their pep squads as they marched to a rock version of the traditional Radetzky March. Parade of Colors – CHECK!
What followed was one of the highlights of Family Day—the Team Parade and Cheerdancing competition. How were the cheerdancers and pep squads from grade school to high school going to perform dance steps in unison to a specially prepared mix? In a truly amazing way. Each team parade opened with a video introduction masterfully conceptualized and edited by the props committee. The performance of each team was a video-editing marvel of basic dance moves performed individually by the pep squad interspersed with the more sophisticated choreography of the cheerdancers, all in time to a mix of new songs and old team favorites. From our homes, our hearts were filled with pride and joy for our favorite teams, and we cheered each other on (in the YouTube live chat, that is). Team Parade and Cheerdancing – CHECK!
The rest of the day went by with each scheduled event carried out as planned. Grade school students enjoyed games with their high school Mommies in the team Google Classrooms. High school students played against their batchmates in Zoom meetings. But what made these games so special was the element of family involvement: parents helped their grade school daughters look for items during the Bring Me game, while siblings joined their high school sisters play Pictionary or do the Yoga Challenge. Other activities were held in the afternoon, starting with the Carpool Karaoke, then moving on to the other afternoon events, such as the Talent Show, online games, Family Dance Fitness Party, Movie Showing, Mystery Mingle, and Family Bingo, all which the Woodrose Community was able to follow on the livestream via YouTube.
Right before the awarding ceremony later in the afternoon, we were treated to a special video that took the place of the very popular and extremely exciting Father-Brother Basketball game. It was a “basketball game” featuring our team captains and their dads dribbling furiously, shooting and missing some hoops, and putting their competitive spirit on full display. During the awarding ceremony, winners were announced for the grade school and high school team games, for the family activities, and for the new Team Awards (TEAMWORK, TEAM SPIRIT, FAMILY PARTICIPATION, and CREATIVITY). And the ceremony ended with the highly anticipated and much-coveted Team Parade award, which went to the Gold Team.
At the end of the day, our first online Family Day was a success! We knew from the beginning that it would be difficult to replace or replicate the “real thing”, but we also knew that what the students had in mind was not going to be a simple online event of pre-recorded activities. The Woodrose Student Council and Team Captains took their vision of Family Day and led the high school student body in making it real and turning it into something more than we could have ever expected. They took their creativity and talent to a whole other level, learning new skills and making new friends along the way. In the three months it took to organize an Intramurals season, our students showed the best part of themselves and worked wonders. In those small hours during Family Day, their lives were made.
