News from Saint Leo the Great School Volume 8, Issue 2 December 2017 March 2018 Catholic Schools Week 2018 Catholic Schools Week! by Caitlin Raineri and Jordan Terefenko Catholic Schools Week started on January 28, 2018 and ended February 3, 2018. This year s theme was Learn. Lead. Serve. Succeed. Each year a new theme is chosen. During Catholic School Week we attended Mass and held an open house on Tuesday. On Wednesday it was Teacher Appreciation Day and on Friday, it was Student Appreciation Day. Catholic Schools Week started in 1974 when National Catholic Schools Week began to celebrate in the US. Through these events, schools focus on the value that catholic education provides to young people and its contributions to our church, our communities and our nation. Page 1 Paw Print
Show Us Some Spirit! by Isabella Furnari and Caitlin Raineri The Saint Leo the Great School pep rally is a great way to encourage the winter and fall sports teams. This pep rally is held in our school s AAC. It shows a demonstration of the fall sports. Each year the middle school students dress down in school colors. The cheerleaders give out contest tickets. Some of the students in the younger grades are able to participate in our school s fun contests. It is a great way to include kids who do not participate in the pep rally. We also have some of the girls and boys in eighth grade who are on the basketball team have a brief basketball game. It is a very good way our school shows our school spirit! Did you know that the entire school completed Iowa testing in the first week of March? This standardized testing is meant to test students knowledge of basic topics. Page 2 Paw Print
Second Grade Holiness by Alex Haugh On Saturday, February 3, 2018 the second grade students made their first penance. Penance is a sacrament about forgiveness and confessing to God what you are sorry for. Their first Penance is very special because the children are all growing closer to God by confessing their sins. They had to dress up in very nice clothes and look very proper, because they were walking into the church. Penance is about forgiveness and growing closer to what really matters, God. All of the children went up to each of the priests and made their confession. Lastly, we hope the children understood the true meaning of why they confessed their sins. Wonderful Writing by Matthew Battista On Friday, December 1, 2017, the author Dan Gutman came to our school. He is a well-known children's author that has written great series, including My Weird School, The Genius Files, and Flashback Four. For the lower grades, he talked about the daily life of an author. For the upper grades, he talked about how he writes his books and about all of the rejections he had. He told the students to never give up... and he never did! He also gave writing tips to all the grades and talked about his new series Flashback Four. Mr. Gutman hopes that his books will encourage kids all around the country to read. The assembly was very interesting, and we thank Mr. Gutman for his time. DNA Models! by Alex Haugh and Isabella Furnari The eighth grade is studying genetics. They made models and displayed them for the upper level. They constructed a model to understand how a person inherits genes. 99% of genes make us all the same. We all have the same features. The 1% left over makes us who we are. Students worked in groups of 4-5. The materials they had to work with were popsicle sticks, Styrofoam balls, and pipe cleaners. One of the models, shaped as a palm tree, was used to represent marine life at the beach. Another DNA model represented the DNA of a dog. The students had a great time building their models. Now, the eighth graders know all about DNA analysis and the way that certain genes work together to make us who we are and give us our unique traits. Page 3 Paw Print
Handwriting for Everyone by Skylar Zolek and Riley McNamee December is an exciting and busy time of the year! Have you ever heard of the Zaner-Bloser National Handwriting Contest? If you did not I would read this article. The idea of this article is for students to showcase their cursive skills. Students that participate in the handwriting contest will get a chance to compete for the honor of representing their school as a grade level winner. Winners move on to state then national levels! Each national champion receives a cash prize and a trophy. This contest is only open for grades K-8. If you have a special need, don t worry, there is a category for you! Students who enter this category must have a cognitive, intellectual, physical, or a developmental disability. Hopefully many students will participate in this handwriting contest. Internet Safety! by Alex Haugh Detective Godley from the Middletown Township Police Department came to our school on January 8, 2018 to speak to us about Internet safety. She was talking about how dangerous the Internet can be. She used a PowerPoint and showed us some YouTube videos on the negative side of the Internet. Detective Godley said that people do bad things and they post it; the people who they sent it to can save it and show it to other people. I think Detective Godley showed us what the Internet does to us and how it can harm you and everyone around you if you are not careful. She warned us about being very careful with any personal information. Egg-cellent Egg Drop by Jordan Terefenko On January 29, 2018, Ms. Lamberti s science club did an egg drop. An egg drop is a creative approach to protect an uncooked egg which is dropped from different heights. Everyone survived the first round. In the second round, everyone survived except Team 1. Team 1 failed to protect the fragile shell of the egg. In the third round everyone survived except Team 4 but the closest to the target was Team 2. The winners were Juliana Lucas, Anna Martin, and Maebh McCarthy. In the first round, you had to drop your protected egg from about 6 to 7 feet from the ground and see if it survived. In the second round, you have to drop the egg out the window to the ground. This was done in the AAC link. In the third round, you had to drop it from the window and who ever s egg is the closest to the target wins; the target was two yard sticks crossed. The egg could not be cracked at all. Some of the questions that we asked the winners were On a scale from 1-10, how do you think you did? The answer we received was 9. The next question was What materials did you use? The materials they used were was a cardboard box, squishies, pillows, sponges, socks, and tape. This exercise certainly stimulated creativity and problem solving. This was definitely an interesting experiment. Did you know that March 14 is known as Pi Day because it symbolizes the first three digits of pi, 3.14? The students celebrated this day by eating pie in the cafeteria at lunch. Page 4 Paw Print
Christmas Corner Winter in 2 nd Grade by Ava Pannone We all know that Christmas is the most wonderful time of the year for second grade! December was an exceptionally busy month for them. 2A, 2B, and 2C worked on an All Around the World Christmas reading activity. The activity involves a reading passage, questions, and more! They also had to share an opinion on Christmas traditions around the world. The entire second grade made gingerbread houses. They took milk cartons and secured it with graham crackers for the walls. To finish they used candy to decorate it. They used candy such as Mike and Ike, peppermints, gumdrops and licorice. Christmas Time is Here by Christopher Montalvo On December 3, 2017, the annual Christmas Bazaar was held in the school. There were raffles in the cafeteria. The grand prize was the new iphone X made by Apple. Some of the other raffle prizes included the Xbox One X, a Kristaps Porzingis signed jersey, a giant teddy bear, designer pocketbooks, an Amazon Echo, razor scooters, food gift packages, a Nintendo Switch, Game 7 basketball camp, and Fingerlings. They had lots of food in the cafeteria including a McLeo sandwich, eggs, donuts, and bagels for breakfast. The lunch menu included a meatball sub, fries, chicken nuggets, and sandwiches. They had many vendors spread out within the first level. They played Christmas music while people were shopping. There were a lot of great vendors with many gifts to choose from. People had a great time and there was a big crowd. All in all it was a great day. Christmas Doors! by Riley McNamee Every year around Christmas time teachers from 4 th grade through 5 th grade decorate their classroom doors for the holidays. Some doors have a funny theme and others are a more serious meaning of Christmas. Each teacher puts a lot of time and effort into their doors. Students love the decorated doors and know that Christmas is quickly approaching. Students sometimes even get to help decorate! Page 5 Paw Print
Paw Print Exclusives Paw Print Exclusive Art Show Works Page 6 Paw Print
Page 7 Paw Print Paw Print Exclusives Paw Print Editorial Attention Gamers! by John Lakeman If you have a console or a computer, you probably spend some of your free time playing games on it. From speaking to my classmates, I discovered that the average time spent playing games is 1 hour. There are many types of consoles including the Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and PS4. One of the most popular games is Fortnite. The goal of the game is to be the last player standing. You can play with your friends or you can play solo. There are two modes - Save the World and Battle Royale. Battle Royale is a 100 player free-for-all where you try to be the last player or group standing. Save the World is a multiplayer mode where you survive a zombie apocalypse. I highly suggest that you download the free Battle Royale game on your console or computer. So what are you waiting for? Finish your homework, get a squad, and start gaming! Paw Print Editorial Snow Day Fun! by Isabella Furnari and Skylar Zolek What do you do on your snow day? This is a question we posed to about 200 students. We wanted to know what people did on a snow day. Mrs. Higgins kindergarten class loves to play in the snow. They sled, have snowball fights, and even make snow cones! The first grade class loves to play outside and some even like to play on their Nintendo Switches. Second and third graders love to play outside. They also like to watch movies. The fourth grade loves to go sledding. Some of them read or watch movies. The fifth grade likes to go sledding but they also like to have snowball fights. The most favored thing in sixth grade is to play video games. Some people also like to play in the snow. The seventh and eighth grades like to watch movies and like to take naps. Overall, Saint Leo the Great students love to play in the snow and play on their electronics. Thank you to the entire Paw Print Staff! Moderator: Mrs. Shute Newspaper Formatters: Matthew Battista and Christopher Montalvo Reporters/Photographers (6th Grade): Alex Haugh, Ava Pannone, Chris Montalvo, Matthew Battista, John Lakeman, Jordan Terefenko, Riley McNamee, Skylar Zolek, Isabella Furnari, and Caitlin Raineri On behalf of the entire 2nd Trimester 2017-2018 Paw Print Staff, we hope you enjoy this issue of the Paw Print!