Fall arrived in Herrin not with falling leaves but with fluorescent color — a sea of glowing pumpkins crafted by first graders at North Side Primary School and their teachers: Teresa Snyder, Samantha Cook, Morgan Ashford, and Whitney Houseworth.

Each October, Snyder’s class participates in Green Earth’s Pumpkin Glow at Oakland Nature Preserve in Carbondale, a fundraiser that supports environmental education and trail maintenance. This year, 45 students from three classrooms took part, each decorating a pumpkin to donate to the display.

“The kids have to give their pumpkins away,” Snyder says. “They don’t get them back, and that’s hard for them at first. But it’s such a good lesson — you can create something beautiful, share it with others, and feel proud without having to keep it.”

Across the hall, Cook’s class buzzed with what she fondly calls “organized chaos.” Paints, brushes, and teamwork filled the tables. “They learned how to compromise,” she says. “You could see it happening — one would have a plan, another would want to add to it, and they’d figure it out together.”

Ashford’s students explored color in their own way, mixing paints to see how primaries become secondaries. “They were amazed that yellow and blue made green,” she says. “The pumpkins became a hands-on science lab.”

Because of limited pumpkin supplies, Whitney Houseworth’s class took a different route. Her students turned their art into literacy, creating book-character pumpkins instead. “We studied the difference between physical and personality traits,” she says. “They had to think about what really makes a character who they are.”

The students’ creative joy was as bright as their paint. Keelyn Kohl painted a smiling ghost “because ghosts are yellow too.” Cora King made a tie-dye pumpkin “to show all the colors I could mix.” Kieran Smith gave The Poky Little Puppy a red tongue because “he’s always hungry.” Bryson Fann and his partner Lennox worked together on The Pigeon Finds a Hot Dog, carefully adding a speech bubble that read, “Mine!”

And Owen Burgrabe, while showing his classmates how to make their own color blend, offered what may have been the day’s most memorable line: “You did not come out of your mom knowing everything!”

The teachers still laugh when they recall it. “That’s first grade in a nutshell,” Cook says. “They’re confident, they’re funny, and they’re learning that trying something new is part of the fun.”

By the time the last pumpkin was loaded for the trip to Carbondale, the classroom looked like an artist’s workshop — streaks of color everywhere, paint-stained smocks, and smiles to match.

For Snyder, the project’s magic lies in what it teaches. “It’s about giving, working together, and seeing how your effort connects to a larger community,” she says. “When those pumpkins glow on the trail, our students know they helped make that happen.”

Whether their creations lit the path at Oakland Nature Preserve or stayed in the classroom as book-character art, each child saw their imagination come to life. And that, every teacher agreed, is what makes learning glow brightest of all.