NEWPORT BEACH : Students’ Starfish to Adorn National Tree

It was difficult for Kenny Rakeshaw, a kindergarten student at Newport Heights Elementary School, to imagine that the shiny starfish he was making Monday would end up on the nation’s Christmas tree in Washington.

“It is going to somebody’s house,” Kenny guessed, while gripping his thin copper cutout, complete with five tentacles.

The 620 students of Newport Heights on Monday made the ornaments to decorate the Christmas tree to stand on the grounds of Capitol Hill. Throughout the school day, classes were shuttled into the cafeteria, where each student was given a paper-thin sheet of copper, a pair of scissors and the contours of a starfish as a guide.

Kenny’s starfish and 600 others like it were a bit bigger than his hand and were textured with small indentations made with the point of a pencil. The tentacles of each cutout were bent around students’ fingers to give it a three-dimensional look.

Though the starfish were designed with the same pattern, each looked different from the others and included a name tag to identify its maker.

This year’s national Christmas tree--a 125-year-old white fir--was chosen by the U.S. Department of Agriculture from a forest in Big Bear. According to tradition, students from the region the tree originated get first chance to decorate it.

“We wanted to do something that represented the community,” said Newport Heights Principal Shele Tamaki. “So we came up with starfish. . . . When they are out in the sun, they really shimmer.”

The school will ship boxes of copper starfish to Washington on Wednesday.