Repulse Bay (May 03/06) - Flat Stanley now has certified documentation that he visited the Arctic Circle.

The main character in a book by Jeff Brown, Stanley gets squashed flat by a falling bulletin board, which allows him to visit friends by travelling in an envelope.

A group of teachers are using the premise as a way to encourage students to write more.

Students make paper Flat Stanleys and begin a journal with him.

The two are then sent to another school, where students treat Stanley as a guest and complete the journal.

Stanley and the journal are then returned to the original sender, allowing students to plot his travels on maps and share the contents of the journal.

Stanley also often returns with a souvenir.

Tusarvik Grade 2 teacher Marie Premi says Flat Stanley was introduced to the Repulse kids by Capt. Tad Nichol of Yellowknife.

Stanley was sent to Nichol from a Grade 2/3 class in Niagara Falls.

The class wanted Flat Stanley to travel somewhere in the North, so Nichol decided to bring him along when he came to Repulse this past month.

"When we got Flat Stanley, we thought it would be great to take a photo of him right on the Arctic Circle," says Premi.

"Then we came up with the idea to make him an official certificate for travelling to the Arctic Circle.

"We also sent him back with a piece of sealskin."

Premi says the kids had no exposure to Flat Stanley before Nichol's arrival.

She says one of the nice benefits of the visit is that the class now talks about Flat Stanley and the whole concept, at a Grade 2 level, of the project.

"We wrote a letter back to the Niagara Falls class telling them not only did he visit the Arctic Circle, but he is now a cold-weather traveller as it was -26C with the windchill during his stay.

"We all signed the letter and sent it along with his certificate and photos.

"We plan on learning a bit more about Stanley in case we get a letter back from the school in Niagara Falls.

"The kids were really excited about Stanley coming to visit and thought his stay here was really a great thing."