REGION — Students of the Crescent Park Early Learning Center are doing their part to brighten the holiday season for residents of Market Square Assisted Living and  the Rumford Community Home.

During their art table activities, a group of 20 in-person learners between preschool, pre-K collaboration, and public pre-K classrooms, made 175 cards total for the two facilities. The total amount may not jump out as too large, but Community Concepts Site Manager Tonya Edgerly is looking at it from a different angle.

“While 175 may not seem like a huge number in general, when you pause and think about it, it means 175 individual people may not be in the best health and with COVID, many of the people may be prohibited to celebrate in person,” Edgerly said. “Keeping that all in mind translates to: 175 hearts to warm, 350 eyes to light up and an uncountable number of smiles to come from residents, caregivers and family members. That 175 now looks a lot bigger.”

Edgerly said the children were excited by the project, which took a week to finish. Kids used bingo dobber’s, cutting and pasting, basic coloring, drip painting and watercolor to decorate their cards.

Outside of delving into their creative side, the project also broadened many of the children’s vocabularies. Over the course of the week, students repeated back words like “kindness” and “delivery” to their teacher and also learned a little bit on how to write a letter. A lot learned in just a week for students who are between ages three to five, and the lesson did not end there.

“These children in Bethel have learned so much about giving without receiving and being kind to those we do not even know because when it comes down to it, we need to instill these characteristics in our future generations,” Edgerly said. “A little bit of kindness can go a long way.”

The Christmas cards will be dropped off at the two locations next week.