Drawing up their dreams: Grade 2 students reimagine their school

Grade 2students at L.M. Montgomery School have some ideas for itsexpansion and they've putthem on paper.

Theymade drawings of what they'd like to have in their new space, drawn to scale more or less in full colour crayon.

"We talked about where we could possibly add 10classrooms, and some of them had some realistic ideas, and some of them had some other interesting ideas," said Becky Newson, the students' teacher.

L.M. Montgomery is one of several schools to be expanded in coming years. The work is set to start in the 2018-19 fiscal year and the addition of 10 classrooms at the school will cost about $5.3 million.

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The students made these drawings a few weeks ago when they thought that they might get the expansion.

'Places to play'

The primary concern of the students seemed to be around "places to play,"Newsonexplained, though some did have more practical suggestions.

"l wrote down that I think we need more washrooms in the school because we're going to get more teachers and more students at the school," said MaisieMacDonald, one of Newson'sGrade 2 students.

A couple of drawings show the old gym turned into a new hockey rink.

Seven-year-old Matthew Murray takes it even further:He put in two hockey rinks, indoors and out.

And wherethe front stairs use to be, he drew a slide, all the way to the parking lot.

"So I can catch the bus quicker," he said.

'We want to get to play all of our games'

Nearly all the drawings include lots of outdoor playground equipment.

And inside, sketchafter sketch shows the gym is the centrepiece. School staff have taken note, acknowledging that gym space is in short supply.

"Right now our gym is being split for a portion of the day to accommodate all our classes," said Patti Davidson, vice principal of the school.

"I know that's a reality in a lot of schools. So Ithink the students see that and perhaps a little wishful thinking ...wouldn't it be greatif we had a full gym to ourselves and could use that space all the time."

Kids say they do need more space.

"We would need more gym space because then we would have to share the gym and we want to get to play all of our games," MacDonald said.

Thoughit's unlikely the final plans will include replacing the gym with a hockey rink, or building a slide out the front door, the designs were seen by some of the top decision makers in the province.

School officials say they showed thedrawings to the premier and education minister earlier this week.

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