November 17th News

We have received our trophies for the fifth and sixth grade Quiz Bowl teams. The fifth grade had a great first place finish and the sixth with a second place. The fifth grade will be in today, so will get to see the trophy and then we should put it in their school trophy case.

The seventh and eight grade Quiz Bowl teams also finished first ! We have done this for a number of years and this is the best finish ever ! The students did a great job of answering quickly and accurately and deserve a great deal of credit for besting the other teams in Iowa. There were 30 total teams in the seventh grade competition and 40 in the 8th grade. Their trophies will arrive soon. What an accomplishment !

The highest scorers in First in Math for first quarter had a party yesterday for their achievement. We had chicken for lunch and then they received gift cards as well. Now the competition is on for second quarter. Those students were Emily Robinson - 1st place, Kyle Jennett - 2nd place, Jay Wolfe - 3rd place, Audrey Fyock and Itzayanna Rubio - 4th place. All great workers !

In Math this week, the 7th grade is finishing a chapter on Number Theory and will be working on scientific notation today. They will have to do some research on how scientific notation is used in regard to space which should be interesting.
The 6th grade Math will be finishing a unit on Decimals before Thanksgiving and we are trying to make sure that the dividing is clear and will be retained.

Eighth grade Reading students are finishing "Murder on the Orient Express". Agatha Christie stories are still interesting even today - especially with a twist at the end.

The 7th graders are exploring some Mark Twain stories this week and the 6th grade is finishing some reading and research on Thomas Edison as they are going to a program in Des Moines on the inventor. They will be reading "Elephant Run" next by Roland Smith - an interesting tale that takes place mainly in Burma during World War II. I actually got interested in elephants after reading this book. I hope they will like it as well as the students last year.

I am working on finding funding to bring the author Gordon Korman to Creston next fall. We have been corresponding about his writing and as he is a nationally known author, the students are excited to hear him speak. I am hoping to locate some grants to help fund this speaker. He has written some of the "39 Clues" books and has several series of books that the kids love.

That's all for now !