Good News: Fourth-graders excited to meet their senior pen pals for first time

Excitement was in the air at Jane Addams Elementary School in Palatine last week, when fourth-graders met their pen pals for the first time after writing each other since October.

Students pounded on their cafeteria tables as if to give a drumroll before their pen pals were introduced.

"I knew it was you!" exclaimed 9-year-old John Koenig when he met his pen pal, Nancy Schmidt of Schaumburg.

Schmidt was one of nearly a dozen pen pals on hand that day, all of them volunteers through Senior Corps - RSVP, a volunteer program for those 55 and older sponsored by Arlington Heights-based HandsOn Suburban Chicago.

The senior pen pals and the class of 25 students worked on a service project together that involved - what else? - writing notes. Working side by side, they filled "bags of kindness" for clients of the Wheeling Township food pantry and its meal delivery services.

Walt Riesing of Mount Prospect joined the pen pal program when it started three years ago, and he always enjoys the final meet and greet.

"I remember having pen pals when I was growing up. I didn't know they still existed," Riesing said. "To be honest, I wasn't sure the kids would be interested. But they're always so excited to meet us."

Carolyn Roberts, project director for Senior Corps-RSVP, runs the program. This school year it has included 45 students from Jane Addams and another 40 at Tarkington School in Wheeling. Many of the children involved are bilingual or English Language Learners.

Roberts sees benefits for both the youngsters and their senior pen pals.

"Studies have shown that the act of hand writing letters increases mental agility as we age," Roberts said. "Additionally, letter writing engages students in creative thinking and the writing process, as well improves their reading and comprehension."

Suzanne Poeschel of Hoffman Estates, a retired English teacher, could see the improvement in her pen pal's writing with each letter.

"(She) started out with short sentences, but each month her sentences would get longer," Poeschel said. "By the end, she could have been writing a children's book, she was that descriptive."

Teacher Brianna De Silvia said back in the fall she instructed students on the mechanics of writing a letter and offered some grammatical tips, but her fourth-graders took it from there.

"The seniors have so many life experiences that they share with our students," De Silvia said. "Our students become so curious, they just want to know everything and they become so invested in learning."

Jennifer Costa, a bilingual and ELL teacher at Tarkington, described letters her students wrote to their pen pals last month, around Presidents Day.

"Students asked their pen pals who their favorite president was," Costa says. "This led to students researching about presidents that they had never heard of, like Harry Truman."

All of the teachers involved described the excitement when the big packet of letters comes each month from the pen pals.

"One student cried tears of joy after reading his letter," said Heather Howard, a bilingual teacher at Jane Addams. "Another said, 'This is better than Christmas!' To be honest, I teared up a bit myself."

Janet Issacman has been an intergenerational pen pal to students at Tarkington for three years, and has found it so rewarding she worked to expand the program.

"Children have not changed; rarely do you get anything but honest responses from them," Issacman says. "They are open to adults who care about them and return whatever support you give them tenfold."