Babylon Teacher Takes Students on a ‘Kindness Journey’

Babylon Junior-Senior High School English teacher Lindsay Jones recently published a book, which she created with her life skills students. The book, The Kindness Journey of Sam the Snail, was a collaborative effort; she and her students sought ways to tell a story about the many ways they could all perform acts of kindness for each other.

The book emerged out of an assignment. Life skills students came up with lists of various kind acts they could perform for each other both in and out of the classroom. Then, students workshopped various characters they could use to showcase their kind acts in story-book form. In the end, they decided on Sam the Snail as their title character, and through additional assignments, collaborated on the different stories they could tell using Sam.

Sam is a snail who begins his journey with a bad habit of telling others “no,” After refusing to do things for others, Sam loses the color in his shell, and embarks on a journey to help others, make new friends, and find a new home. Each student wrote a different part of Sam’s journey, and spent months working on both writing Sam’s story and also illustrating it.

The finished product was published by Studentreasures, with the BHS PTA generously donating funds to purchase copies of the book for both the students in Ms. Jones’ class and Babylon administrators.

“Ms. Jones is a talented teacher whose passion for literacy and the literary arts is inspiring,” said ELA Director Teresa Collins. “The only thing that supersedes that passion is her dedication to her students. The Kindness Journey of Sam the Snail is a testament to both.”

For more information about the Babylon Union Free School District, please visit the District’s website at www.babylon.k12.ny.us. Exciting activities happening throughout the District and programs celebrating student achievement can also be found on the District’s Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/babylonschooldistrict/.