This was no April Fools joke.  On April 1, 2009 Dewey Halverson, a nine time Iditarod racer came to Tampico Elementary School for an assembly about his life as a dog sled musher.  The Iditarod race takes place in Alaska every March with a team of 16 dogs and a driver of the sled.  It's a 1200 mile adventure through the snowy, stormy Alaskan landscape.

Dewey delivered a great message to the students as he talked about never giving up in life.  He gave the example of completing all nine races he was in.  He stressed to read books for adventure.  For example, Call of the Wild, by Jack London, inspired him in 5th grade to live the life that he's living today.  He explained to students how drugs and alcohol can ruin their lives as they grow up, but doing good deeds for others can only help them to grow.

Echo, the husky dog that came along, was the hit of the show.  His blue and brown eyes were so beautiful to look at. The students were able to pet him after the show.  Dewey also brought a sled, his trophies from his top finishes (2nd place was his best), and many more interesting pieces to make the Iditarod real in everyone's eyes.

In Mrs. Miles' PE classes every student and staff member was given a musher to follow for the 10-16 day race.  The standing were posted daily, and the students were anxious to see where they musher was for the day.  The students in grades K-5 were all able to do a "Tampico Iditarod" during PE class in the TES gym.

In the 3rd to 5th grade technology classes with Mrs. Hinrichs, the students tracked how their musher was doing online and created a page with the picture and facts about the musher.  The top ten finishers were posted on the wall in the gym and the students and staff members were given prizes after the Red Lantern Winner (last place) finished.

A lucky student was chosen to wear Dewey's clothes.  Cherokee, a 5th grader, was proud to put on the clothes.

I'm sure next March the students will be even more excited to follow the Iditarod after living a piece of it with Dewey.