Vol. 2 Issue 14 - January 10, 2014 |
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A Look Ahead
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Mark Your Calendar:
Jan 14-17 LS/MS MAPS Testing
Jan 18 Robotics Tournament (see below)
Jan 20 MLK Day - School Holiday
Jan 21 K-2 Field Investigation (Chick-fil-A)
Jan 21-24 US MAPS Testing
Jan 22 MS Spelling Bee (8:30-10 AM)
Jan 23 LS Spelling Bee (8:30 AM)
Voci di Volo/Recorder Resumes
Jan 24 US Presentations of Learning (6-8 PM)
Student Council Election (Lunch)
Jan 28 LS Field Investigation
Feb 13 STEMnovation Expo (6-7 PM)
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Special Request!
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One of our scholars needs to use a "Fitbit" tracking device for a STEM experiment. (This device tracks sleep and activity levels.) Please let Mrs. Raymond know if you have a device or know someone who does who might be willing to either participate or let one of our scholars borrow the device for a month!
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| PTO Announcement |
 Don't forget to participate in the Winter Labels for Education Contest. The three schools will be competing against each other! The school that turns in the most Labels for Education, per scholar, will win. The winning school will receive Root Beer Floats, compliments of one of our generous parents.
The Labels for Education program is a fundraiser where families and members of the community work together to earn free merchandise for the school. By collecting the "Labels for Education" on participating products, our school earns points that can be redeemed for art, athletic and academic merchandise. Participating products can be found here. A few are Post, Bic, Pace, Pop Secret and Dannon.
Rules: The contest will run from January 6th until February 17th. Each label turned in will count as one point, regardless of the points listed on the label. The winning school will be the one with the most points, per scholar, per school. This method will level the playing field. A school must have at least 25 points to win the contest. A chart, with weekly updates, will be posted on the parent's bulletin board. Labels should be placed in a bag or envelope, with the school clearly marked, and then left in the Labels for Education box in the school office.
If you have any questions, please feel free to contact Anne Pfluger. Thanks so much for all your help! Every little bit helps!
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Spanish
La Anciana Venerable, Pam Kaatz, MA
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Last week in the background on the news about the Olympics, I noticed signs written in the Cyrillic Alphabet. Deciding to "broaden" the scholars' minds by exposing them to that other way of writing, in all of the Spanish classes except the K-2 group, I gave them a copy of simple drawings that illustrate all of the sounds of that alphabet. The Russian language is written quite phonetically. Unlike English, except for a few words and sound changes based on the letter's location in the word, "what you see is what you hear." Nothing like the following situation would ever happen in Russian (or Spanish):
I thought he was tough enough to make a thorough search for the throw rug, though I doubt that he looked through all of the things that he threw away. He ought to cough up the dough.
Ask your scholar to tell you what this means:
СОЧИ
(It is what I saw in the background on TV that inspired this lesson.) I also tried to show them how to write their names in this sound system. I say "'tried" because some sounds simply are not available. For example, there is no "th" sound, so we have to use the closest sound, which is "d." We were doing a process known as "transliteration" not "translation." Transliteration is writing something in one language but using the alphabet of another. For example, I wrote this Spanish word in Russian letters
ХАЛАПЭНЁ
to see of they could figure it out. Most of them could!!
While this topic is not specifically related to the study of Spanish, it is broadening the scholars' concept of language in general. So much of learning another language is learning
(1) how languages developed
(2) the mental processes involved in acquiring a language
(3) how to "rewire" thought patterns
(4) accepting that your language is not the only way that humans developed to communicate.
One of the most amazing things about learning another language is how it increases your knowledge of your own language. We "foreign" language teachers love to preach this thought: What does he know of English who only English knows?
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Upper School
Marilu Rosales, MEd |
 Upper School students are not above Duplo blocks at lunchtime.This week went by so fast, for some reason it felt like the weekend since Monday! There was a lot of energy and eagerness to get back on track with everything, which was great to see. Students worked all week on creating their prototypes, finishing documentaries, and developing the base to their presentations. I can not believe that we only have next week before presentation week. It is definitely crunch time for all students, deadlines to be met, and preparations to take care of. It's exciting to see their projects come to life and to meet with each and learn about all the knowledge they have acquired in these four short weeks. Our ornament activity is hanging in our room, and is serving as a great daily reminder of the goals we made. Our Imagination Lab and Crinnovation Studio have been in full swing...even though we are still tying up loose ends here and there, the students have been using the Lab and Studio for interviews, photos, projects, prototyping, etc. I'm excited for the potential when it is 100% complete!
Please don't forget to join us on Friday, January 24th for the Presentations of Learning. It is a great way to see what the upper school students are up to. Until next time!
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| INTERcurricular Activities | |
MATHCOUNTS Team at UT-Arlington for a scrimmage on Saturday morning.
Recorder Ensemble will resume Thursday, January 23rd. The Robotics Tournament has been rescheduled for January 18th at the Harmony School in Fort Worth. If you have not done so already, please view the Hidden Valley Avalanche's team website and take the survey included on their site!
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Follow EA Young Academy on Pinterest
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Welcome to The Talon, our weekly newsletter highlighting the amazing activities of our Young Scholars and source of other important information. |
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Lower School
Megan Hitchings, BA & Alison Sheffield, BFA
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HUMANITIES: We are wrapping up our book club groups for this session. The Firebenders will be presenting their information in the form of object studies. Be on the lookout in the front lobby for their displays! They are also working on writing and editing stories, Texas history, and analogies. The Eyas are preparing for their many trips around our community. They continue to check out just-right books, write sentences, and develop good language arts habits.
Please send headphones or earbuds to school for MAPS testing beginning next Tuesday! STEM: Welcome back! This week, the students built their own ecosystem in STEM! Our ecosystem includes a soil area with seeds that we've planted and a water area with an aquatic plant. Soon we will add a snail to the aquatic area. The snail will eat the algae that forms. We will observe the ecosystem for changes. The Firebenders played a game of "Life Science Taboo" to review all of the vocabulary that they've learned. All of the students have started a unit on geometry.
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Carol Raymond, MEd; Betsy Modrezejewski, MA; Melanie Lewis, MA
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STEM: Students will begin shooting their REEL Math videos next week. They have some fabulous ideas and I am so excited to see their productions! Students should begin bringing items to school for their STEM projects. We are looking for a few more science experts to evaluate our scholars' STEM work on February 13. Evaluators will be given guidelines to give scholars feedback on the quality of their research design and presentation. Please contact Mrs. Raymond if you have anyone in mind that you would recommend (or recommend yourself!)!
HUMANITIES: It was a productive week in Social Studies. We dove head-first into researching our National History Day topics. Each scholar is working alone or in a group to research a historic topic that addresses the theme of "Rights and Responsibilities." On Tuesday, we learned about primary and secondary sources and scholars are now working hard at finding these for their topics. Scholars will be participating in many exciting activities that are planned for the coming weeks as we continue our exploration of Colonial America and the Revolutionary War. The virtual field trip we took prior to break entitled "Founders or Traitors" was a huge hit, so I am looking into similar resources from Colonial Williamsburg.
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The Arts . . . They Are So Fine
June Johnson, BA
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One of the Eyas' Stamp Projects from this week.
Voci Di Volo practices will resume on Thursday, January 23rd.
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Making TREKS Through Research
Carol Raymond, MEd | |
What is TREKS, exactly? TREKS centers around our scholars' personal lifelong learning journey. The acronym, which stands for "Training, Research, Exploration, Knowledge and Sharing" encompasses the essence of this class period. Through the TREKS journey, students learn important thinking and research skills as they explore their personal interests in unique ways. This journey will culminate in scholars completing authentic research in areas of their interest.
SAVE THE DATE FOR THE STEMNOVATION EXPO!
Students will be working on STEM projects during their TREKS times for the month of January. The students in grades 2-4 should have come home with a list of supplies for their projects. These items will not be needed in class until Thursday of next week at the earliest. We could definitely use some volunteer assistance as students are carrying out their projects. Please contact Mrs. Raymond if you are available in the afternoons to assist.
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| The Prize Winners of EA Young Academy! |
 We were proud to have Dr. Steven Cobb from the Center of Economic Education at UNT on campus to present certificates and a cash prize to one of our fabulous Stock Market Game teams! The "Fire Stawks" [Cadie, Diego, Tanner, William, Zane (with special advisor Abigail)], finished in SECOND place out of 91 teams in the 4th & 5th grade division in our region. This is ESPECIALLY fabulous as we received special permission to have third graders on our teams, and even had a second grade "advisor." The Fire Stawks earned $15,341.46 on their $100,000 investment during the ten week period. The top scoring Middle School team was the "Flaming Enchiladas" (Erin, Lauren and Riley), who finished SIXTH out of 238 Middle School teams in our region. ALL of the teams earned money over the 10 weeks, with an average return of $7,210.83 on their $100,000 investment. The teacher's team finished first out of the teacher teams in the region!
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Health Promotion & DI
Robyn Folmar, BA |
Please note that the Destination Imagination Regional Tournament will be held Saturday, February 22, 2014 at Heritage High School in Colleyville. Challenges may begin as early as 7:00 am and the Awards Ceremony will likely last until after 9:00 pm. More information can be found here.
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Wish List
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- Mrs. Raymond is looking for a bowling expert for an upcoming project - specifically someone with an understanding of the PHYSICS behind bowling if at all possible!
- Old pillows, Old t-shirts, duct tape
- NERF-type soft, squishy balls for Health Promotion ("Gator" brand is preferred)
- Construction of Quidditch Hoops. http://tinyurl.com/3fzgw3u
- Mentors in engineering, programming or natural disaster planning/relief (contact Megan Hitchings or Carol Raymond)
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