65.0°,
Mostly Cloudy and Breezy Hewlett-Woodmere's good deed doers
National recognition for Ogden second-graders charitable work
By trying to make a difference with their good deeds, nearly 100-second graders at Ogden Elementary School in the Hewlett-Woodmere School District earned national recognition and won $10,000 for the charity of their choice.
AnnMarie Castrogiovanni, one of four second grade teachers at the school, along with colleagues Melissa Duhl, Jennifer Hamilton and Stephanie Fleming, and Duhl’s teacher assistant Nina Livingston, guided the students through a “good deed-a-thon,” where the students performed such chores as cleaning the dishes at home, reading to a younger sibling or helping someone and through their sponsors collected money.
In total, the second graders raised $1,300 and donated it to the Plainview-based Morgan Center, which is a pre-school for children with cancer. A friend’s 5-year-old child who attended the center and died last fall inspired Castrogiovanni.
“Jack always had a smile on his face,” said Castrogiovanni, who noted she was flipping through the USA Weekend Magazine when she saw the article about “National Make a Difference Day,” and decided to do something in Jack’s memory.
The magazine as an annual celebration of neighbors helping neighbors created the day, which is the fourth Saturday in October. “The students did whatever made a difference in someone’s life that was the idea,” said Castrogiovanni, who has taught for 25 years.
Second-grader Mia Perkell said she helped her mother do the dishes; something she never did before and a chore she continues to do. “Always make a difference in someone’s life,” Perkell said is what she learned by participating in the good deed-a-thon.
Classmate Jordan Salazar helped his younger brother with his homework, opened doors for people, visited his grandparents and helped them and included other students in games at lunch.
“If they were feeling bad I would cheer them up and ask them to come and play,” Salazar said.
After the children donated the money to the Morgan Center they received bracelets from the center. Castrogiovanni also entered what the students did into a databank on the USA Weekend Magazine website.
