Santa’s Elves Give, Get, High-Tech Help on Wish Lists

It’s an American Christmas tradition: children painstakingly writing to Santa Claus. But now the long-familiar holiday ritual has taken on a high-tech look.

Nearly 800 elementary school children in California have abandoned their crayons and paper for keyboards and video display screens to send their wish lists to the North Pole via computer modems.

And sure enough, Santa has replied in high-tech fashion.

“I remember when I was little my mother helped me write a letter to Santa Claus and I remember how anxiously I waited to get something back from him,” said April Joy, 13, an eighth-grader at Jefferson Junior High School in Oceanside, who helped answer letters to Santa.

Santa’s Helpers

“That’s why I wanted to make sure I did a good job. I know how important this is,” said Joy, who assumed her Santa role as part of an innovative computer class that encourages teen-age students to write while tapping their creative skills.

As educators lament the deteriorating writing ability of American school children--and of greater concern, students’ apparent abhorrence of writing itself--San Diego teachers Dennis Cowick and Yvonne Andres added an electronic spark to an age-old holiday custom to lure students into the realm of creative writing.

The “Santa Connection,” which began three years ago, invites children from kindergarten to second-grade to write letters to Santa Claus on computers and, in turn, has junior high school students answering them.

Cowick, a teacher at Mark Twain Jr. High School, coordinated the letter-writing campaigns of 60 teachers from 40 schools and helped exchange nearly 1,500 letters between youngsters and junior-high students this year.

Many of the schools that participated in the computer exchange through the Free Educational Mail Network--FrEdMail--were California schools, including those from San Diego, Los Angeles and San Leandro. Cowick even helped students at San Diego’s Wilson Junior High School exchange computer letters with youngsters at Mountain View Elementary School in Hickory, N.C.

FrEdMail, a computer network that includes more than 80 schools in the United States, was established a few years ago in San Diego to help educators improve student writing. Teachers stress that the Santa Connection is more than just a fun holiday assignment. They maintain that it is an exemplary example of a successful writing program. Unlike traditional writing assignments, in which student interest is at times tepid at best, teachers say the pupils tackle the project with enthusiasm; they learn writing skills and, more important, the satisfaction of writing.

The writing program benefits teachers as well as students: for once, teachers say, they get teen-age students to participate in a writing program without twisting their arms.

“Anytime you can get this kind of overwhelming cooperation from junior-high students, it has to be a good program,” said Andres, a computer resources teacher at Oceanside’s Jefferson Junior High School. About 150 of her students exchanged letters with youngsters from Ocean Knoll Elementary School in Encinitas.

“I don’t like writing, but if I have to, I can do well,” said Sean Browne, a Jefferson student, who said he prefers mathematical challenges over the anguish of matching nouns and verbs.

But the mandatory writing assignment--where students must answer such questions as “what does the North Pole look like?” and “why do you use reindeer, instead of horses?”--surprised even Browne, who said he actually enjoyed writing the Santa letter. “I don’t think I’m learning, but I know I’m having fun.”

But teachers assure parents that their children are indeed learning. And teachers and students alike agree that the only thing better than learning itself is learning painlessly.

Unlike standard writing assignments, such as compositions and essays, Cowick said the computer Santa letters offer students several incentives. He said familiarity with the subject--most students know something about Santa Claus--gives students the confidence to do well, and working on computers makes the writing process easier. More important, Cowick said, the students know that they’re not just cranking out another assignment for a teacher but are writing to a real audience.

Writing for Real Life

And Cowick, an English and computer resources teacher at Mark Twain, knows more than most people about needing incentives to encourage teen-agers to write. Students who attend Mark Twain are often troubled, street-smart youngsters who have had truancy problems.

“Trust me, these kids are not writing for their teacher,” Cowick said. “They do it because it’s not a regular assignment. It’s real life. All of a sudden they have become Santa Claus. And they know Santa Claus is an adult, who has a real job to do. They are role playing as adults and they accept the responsibilities that come with being an adult. It’s amazing, they say, ‘I’m doing a job. Now, please pass the dictionary.’ ”

Cowick admits that some of his “tough” students, who have become cynics at a tender age, scoff at the assignment at first, but then willingly accept Santa’s responsibilities.

“When they start, they’ll say, ‘Big deal,’ but then there’s peer pressure from students who accept the project, and then suddenly they seem to realize the responsibility that’s been placed on them,” Cowick said.

“They realize that a childhood fantasy is on the line,” he said. “Look, the common denominator of my students is that they have had a very tough life. But I think even they remember the time when they believed in Santa Claus, and, sadly, when they found out he doesn’t exist. It’s like they know how neat it was to believe in Santa and by writing these letters they hope they can keep them (the youngsters) believing a little bit longer.”

And, teachers say, computers alone are often enough to lure students to write.

“If I didn’t have computers, I’m not sure if I could get them to write,” Cowick said. “If I tell them to go back and correct an assignment they have hand-written, they know they have to do the whole assignment over. And they dread that. But on a computer all they have to do is fix and their mistakes disappear.”

Cowick isn’t concerned that the relative novelty of computer use in the classroom will wear off.

“Did people get tired (of) using the pencil because it replaced carving in rock?” Cowick said. “No. It was a useful tool and they’ve continued to use it. Well, a computer is a very useful tool, too. And more and more people are going to use them.”

sh Lesson Will Last

Educators lament that this assignment can only be used during the holiday season, but say the writing skills acquired--such as organizing, outlining, revising--will carry over when students take on more traditional assignments.

But the Santa letters do more than polish the writing skills of junior high school students, said Cindy Moser, a media technician at Mountain View Elementary in North Carolina. Moser said the letters allow her young charges to get acquainted with computers and work on basic skills like spelling and reading.

By using a computer program called “Write to Read,” Moser said, Mountview’s kindergartners, first- and second-graders typed their letters to Santa themselves.

“They type on their own and spell the best way they can,” Moser said. Besides asking for gifts, Moser said her students were encouraged to tell Santa about themselves and their school.

“This was a wonderful program because it made the children put their thoughts down on paper. Well, in this case, on a computer screen. When they sound out their thoughts, they learn to talk better, think better, write better.”

And there’s nothing like getting a letter back from Santa.

Several students watched the letters come across their screens on Thursday, to which they responded, “This is my first letter from Santa!”

“You should have seen their reaction,” Moser said. “There wasn’t a single skeptical child who didn’t believe that Santa was actually writing back to them. Lots of them thought Santa has his own computer and that he told his elves what to type.”

Like many students, April Joy said she preferred this writing exercise over the standard classroom essay. But Joy expressed concern about high-technology’s impact on age-old Christmas rites.

Wouldn’t youngsters who struggle with pencils and crayons expect a handwritten letter from Santa, rather than a computer printout? How could a computer possibly match Santa’s scrawl?

“I think it’s artificial,” Joy said. “At least when you get a handwritten letter, you know it’s really from Santa.”