SCHOOL NEWS 

Chatham Elementary School

            Second grade students delivered the non-perishable food items they collected at their production of “December in Our Town” to the Chatham Food Pantry. Each student delivered a bag of canned or boxed items to the pantry. Marge Witherell met the second grade students and gave them a tour of the pantry. Students then learned how to find the sell by date on the food they brought. Only food that had not expired is put on the shelves. Chatham students delivered about 500 food items. Thank you to Chatham Monomoy Services for supplying their vans for transportation.   

Spencer Rushnak and Brandon Willis dissect owl pellets.

          Second grade students participated in an art lesson lead by Mrs. Susan Logsdon from Adventures-in-Art. Adventures-in-Art is an art appreciation curriculum for grades K-8 based on reproduction prints and artifacts acquired through funding by the Chatham PTA and private gifts. Students viewed numerous prints and discussed the color contrast, the outlines, the line and shapes of figures. The artists featured were Pablo Picasso and Paul Klee. These artists’ style of painting was cubism. Cubism paintings have objects that are broken up, analyzed, and re-assembled in an abstracted form instead of depicting objects from one viewpoint. In culmination, students in Ms. Julin’s class used a dark crayon to make a squiggle design without lifting up their crayon. Afterwards, they analyzed their art to see if there was a hidden design in their artwork. One student saw a woman holding and playing the harp. Then students did the same activity using a cubism design; the squiggle was made with squared off designs.  This time students saw a pirate ship.

            A representative from Cape Light Compact visited the fourth grade recently. The hour-long class was extremely engaging. It allowed hands-on opportunities for each student as many demonstrations were presented on the different types of energy. They learned about exothermic and endothermic reactions and how these chemical changes occur in real world situations.  Other demonstrations included solar energy, heat energy and electricity. The lesson concluded with the lighting of an energy ball. The ball, about the size of a ping pong ball, contained two metal contacts.  While standing in a circle one student held the ball while the remaining students interlocked fingers. Creating a closed circuit, electricity conducted by the water in their bodies was able to travel from one of the metal contacts to the other lighting up the energy ball. 

            In the library at Chatham Elementary, fourth grade students launched their studies about the Civil Rights Movement with the commemoration of the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  As we progress into Black History Month, we will be reading about the achievements of many African Americans and their contributions to our history, culture, and country.  Historical figures such as Rosa Parks and Ruby Bridges have been highlighted in our studies, and the students will have the opportunity to view the movie “Ruby Bridges” in the library.  This Disney produced film is unrated.  Based on the book “The Story of Ruby Bridges” by Robert Coles, the film is an excellent portrayal of the experiences of desegregation of public schools, and a very accurate depiction of the events of this time.  In the past, we have found this film to stimulate appropriate and compassionate discussions.

            Second grade students were visited by Mrs. Amy Ferreira from the Audubon Society to discuss owls.  Students learned what different owls sound like, the length of their wing spans, and what they eat in the area.  All the owls located on Cape Cod are nocturnal and have a great sense of smell and amazing vision.  Students learned the smallest owl on Cape Cod is the saw whet owl and the largest in the snowy owl.  Groups of students dissected owl pellets to discover what they had eaten.  Owls can digest everything from their prey except the fur and bones, which they then cough up.  Students used tweezers to pull apart the owl pellets and find what types of animals the owl had eaten.

            Fourth graders organized a school-wide bake sale last week to raise funds to aid in the recovery of those affected by the recent earthquake in Haiti.  Students made posters to advertise the sale, baked all the treats and sold them during blocks of time to students in grades K-4. They raised $750 to send to Partners in Health, an organization that has been working in Haiti for over 20 years bringing health care services to poor communities. We are very proud of our committed and compassionate fourth graders!

            February is Heart Month. What better way to exercise the heart than through jump rope! This month, the youthful hearts of Chatham were put to the test. Students, grades K-4, got their hearts pumping through a variety of jump rope exercises. The most popular challenge was Wall of Fame. More than 50 students made the Wall of Fame this year.  The honor was reserved for students who recorded 50 or more consecutive jumps over the rope. This year’s most famous jumper, Marcus Juliani, set a new school record with a score of 2,721 consecutive jumps without a miss. Congratulation Marcus!           

 Chatham Middle School

            Students in seventh grade were treated to a Middle Eastern feast as a part of their world geography and culture studies in seventh grade humanities.  Students created board games using facts about the Middle East, read the book “Habibi” by Arab-American writer Naomi Shihab Nye, and tasted the foods described in the book.  Goat cheese, stuffed grape leaves, baba ghanoujj, and sumac were some of the many items available for tasting.  A special thanks goes to high school junior Kipling Chase, who designed the games project for the students.

            On Tuesday, Jan. 26 students in Mrs. Barnes grade eight humanities class performed the play “Good Masters, Sweet Ladies” by Newberry Honor recipient Laura Amy Schlitz.  The play is comprised of monologues from the perspective of teens living during the Middle Ages within the same village.  Students selected and interpreted their monologues, found appropriate costumes, and performed for their families and fellow students.  The play was a culminating activity for their study of Medieval Europe.

            Students in grade seven put on a “Hindu goddess fashion show” last Friday to demonstrate their understanding of the role of deities in Hinduism. Groups of students researched the common postures and imagery associated with various goddesses, and shared what they learned on the runway! This activity was developed to meet the standards for Central and South Asia in the History and Social Science curriculum frameworks.

            Mrs. Haven’s sixth grade science students practiced engineering design using the technology of electromagnetism (making temporary magnets with electrical energy).  Students designed and tested their prototypes, then shared the finished products in an electromagnet showcase.  Maybe we’ll be seeing some these inventions used in the future!  

 Chatham High School

            The students and faculty of Chatham High School, through their various clubs and classes, have combined their resources to make a donation of $3,700 to UNICEF’s Emergency Fund for Haiti. This donation to help the children of Haiti in the wake of the terrible destruction caused by the recent earthquake has been made in honor of the present and past students of our school who are of Haitian descent. In the weeks to come, other student groups will be undertaking additional fundraising and other efforts to continue to support the people of Haiti. The groups which were involved in funding the donation are as follows: The classes of 2010, 2012, 2013; the art, animal welfare, recycling, and performing arts clubs; the student council, SADD, Interact, and the Devils’ Advocate. In addition, the athletic department and Booster Club donated the gate from a recent Friday night basketball game to the fund.  

            Dr. Aucoin’s culinary arts classes have ended the fall semester with a community outreach project for Noah Shelter.  Seven trays of corn bread, carrot cakes with cream cheese frosting, and triple cherry chocolate bars were delivered to the shelter on Winter Street in Hyannis just in time for Friday night’s dinner for the clients, with notes and their good wishes for “better days ahead.”  In addition, the student chefs have shipped “brownie” packages with copies of the school newspaper, Devils’ Advocate, to L.Cpl. Jeremy Flynn, CHS alumnus who is presently serving in the war zone in Afghanistan.

            In addition, several of the culinary students have been logging their exercise miles in support of Flynn and his family in a program titled “walking warlords,” the name of Jeremy’s unit.  The goal is to log in 7,500 miles, the distance from their deployment base in North Carolina to Afghanistan, and back. Together with all the families, our students have helped achieve the first goal of walking the distance from Camp Lejeune to Afghanistan.  As Of Jan. 20, all walkers combined have logged in 7,524 miles; we are now on our way back, which is the second goal!           

Harwich School Notes 

Harwich Middle School

            Spotlight on grade six: Sixth grade Harwich Middle School students have begun their study of Ancient Egypt in social studies. They started the unit by understanding how the physical geography of the Nile River affected the growth of the Egyptian civilization. Students made Nile River booklets labeling important areas and geographic features and wrote essays detailing information about this important river. Recently the focus turned to Egyptian pharaohs and their individual accomplishments. Students are currently designing Egyptian headdresses with their likeness.

            Language Arts and Reading classes have begun reading “Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry” by Mildred Taylor. This novel was awarded the Newbery Medal along with several other awards. The novel is about a black family living in the racist South during the Depression. Currently all sixth graders are reading and writing various types of poetry and will be creating their own poetry books.

            Science classes are wrapping up the unit on astronomy. We are finishing off our unit with the study of stars, galaxies and the universe. We are learning about the different types of stars and the star’s “life” cycle. The students participated in a challenging lab using random sampling to understand how astronomers estimate that there are over 100,000,000,000 stars in our Milky Way Galaxy. The students were assigned a constellation to research and they orally presented their findings to the class. The constellation project involved research, a visual poster of their constellation, a word search or word finds to create about their constellation, and an oral presentation. As always, there is much discussion about whether there is life on other planets or in other galaxies!

            Math classes are focusing on fraction concepts and properties. They are learning divisibility rules, finding the LCM and GCF, and making equivalent fractions using fractions circles and squares for hands-on understanding of fractions.  Students are using these skills to add and subtract like and unlike fractions.

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2/25/10