By Mary Ellen Zangara, Special Writer
The younger children at Christ the King School and Weston School were treated to a puppet show from a state Clean Communities grant.
The show was on April 14 for Christ the King and April 15 for students at Weston School.
A Clean Community cleanup day is scheduled for Saturday and younger children are not allowed to participate due to safety regulations, but were included in the grant to be entertained by a puppet show from Mariah’s Amazing puppets. The environmental education show, “The Giving Tree and The Selfish Litterbug Giant,” was performed at Christ the King and “No More Litter in Oz” was performed at Weston School.
Christ the King Principal Christine Benson said that “We are blessed to be able to live on such a beautiful planet and we are going to think of ways that we can conserve and take care of the place that God has given us to live on. This program is given to us by the Manville town through the Clean Communities program and they paid for this so that we could have it. We are very thankful and grateful to them.”
Mariah Newborne and the puppets taught the students about how to stop littering and reduce, reuse and recycle. She spoke about nature, the earth and puppets. Ms. Newborne asked the students questions, such as: If people see a garbage can and they throw their garbage on the ground but why would they do that? And the answers included that people didn’t care.
Some of the students even participated in the show by helping Ms. Newborne with the puppets. Helpers included Sofiya Pitula, Alexandra Nowak, Madison Koslowski, Quintin Gibbs, Connor Budd and Luke Angello.
”We are really excited and fortunate that we were able to do our program today. Our students have a keen awareness about the importance of preserving and taking care of this beautiful planet that God gave us. So thank you again to Manville for sponsoring this for us. Our kids were thrilled and we are very grateful, thanks so much,” said Ms. Benson.

