School Snippets – March 4, 2016

Published March 4, 2016

The information below is provided by each school. Schools are listed in alphabetical order according to grade level.

Elementary Schools

Allendale Elementary

Allendale Elementary will be hosting Encore camp for the weeks of June 13-17 and June 20-24. This is a great opportunity to come and experience learning through challenging, creative and interactive educational classes. Any student who has completed grades kindergarten through fifth grade is welcome to attend the camp. The cost of the camp is $170 per week and a $50 dollar deposit must be paid at the time of registration. Don’t miss out on the chance to explore genealogy, construct the solar system, turn the ordinary into extraordinary, taste snack creations and so much more. For more information contact Joanna Salce.

Bethesda Elementary

Bethesda Elementary had their father daughter dance Saturday, February 27. The students had a wonderful time with their fathers. They dressed up and curled their hair for this special occasion. The smiles on the student’s faces tell they had a night they will never forget. It was a fairy tale come true for most of these students. In other news, on March 1, all the third grade students went to all the kindergarten classes to read a book. This is a picture of Georgia Tedder a third grade student in Mrs. Kirsten Peck’s class reading to Abby Smith a kindergarten student in Mrs. Karen Waddell’s class.

Chapman’s Retreat Elementary

Cheetah Pals is an initiative that pairs General Education students and Special Education students in order to create and strengthen friendships. Once a month the students will participate in activities together that allow them to get to know their buddy and form a relationship. These same students attend the Special Olympics together at the end of the year. It is the staff’s hope that this program will bridge the gap that too often separates our Special Education Students and General Education Students. The students art project on Wednesday morning was Leprechauns.

Clovercroft Elementary

Clovercroft Elementary kindergartner students are collecting food for Graceworks as a service learning project. The items that are collected will be used for Fuel Bags for students throughout Williamson County. In other news, during PE classes with Lance Pearcy and Jimmy Clark, the third, fourth and fifth grade students are learning how to play Hand Tennis while kindergarten, first grade and second grade are rotating through sports stations.

College Grove Elementary

College Grove Elementary is doing a great job this year recycling. Our green team is working very hard this year making sure everyone is recycling. On Friday’s, the Green Team goes around the school and collects all the recycle items. They are doing an awesome job. Keep up the good work Green Team!

Crockett Elementary

Tree-Wise Middle Tennessee representatives recently spoke with Kindergarten students at Crockett Elementary. Middle Tennessee Electric representatives Jeremy Godsby and Jay Sanders, along with Jennifer Gosciniak with Keep Williamson Beautiful, educated the students about the importance of trees and the importance of preserving our natural environment. In addition, students were given a seedling tree and taught how to plant and care for trees properly. In other news, mothers and sons had a great time at the mother-son event at Above All on Thursday night. Also, fifth grade students enjoyed a field trip to the Children’s Theatre to see Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Coming up, there will be an Internet Safety Community Summit at St. Philip’s Catholic Church from 6:30 p.m. until 8 pm on March 8 and volunteer badges will be made on March 10.

Edmondson Elementary

Thirteen students from Edmondson Elementary gathered at the Frist Center on February 27 to celebrate the beginning of the Williamson County Art Show. Lana Su, a fifth grade artist at Edmondson, focused on the importance of words and image as a way to communicate a purpose in her poster art. Art teacher Elizabeth Perthel feels it is important to make visual connections with the student’s artwork.

Fairview Elementary

On Wednesday, March 2, Fairview Elementary celebrated the great Dr. Seuss’s birthday. Kids all throughout the school worked on activities, reading and writing and had a great time! The fifth graders spent time reading to the kindergarteners and second graders. They read stories and then worked on writing activities including rhyming words and brainstorming about what Thing One and Thing Two would do if loose at their house. First graders also worked on writing about what mischievous acts they had gotten into at home in honor of Thing One and Thing Two. Then they colored a picture of themselves looking like a Thing! In other news, the FES PTO also celebrated raising over $12,000 for our school at our auction last Saturday. It was an awesome time and lots of fun was had by everyone!

Grassland Elementary

In music class this week students at Grassland Elementary had the opportunity to learn about and play instruments from Bali. GES parent Mrs. Tamara Horne brought her beautiful Gamelan instruments to our school for our boys and girls to enjoy. Using Google Maps students could see the country of Indonesia and then beautiful pictures of the island of Bali. Students in all grades learned about the Balinese people including their interesting music and dance traditions.

Heritage Elementary

Heritage Elementary is celebrating Read Across America. There have been some fun events including Monday Many Colored Day, Tuesday Truffula Lorax Day, Wacky Sock Wednesday, Thing 1 & 2 Thursday and Friday Cat in the Hat Day! Students have had a great week. The Heritage Elementary PTO has moved Spring Fling to April 2 from 4 p.m. until 7 p.m. Heritage Elementary students have the opportunity to enjoy the Eagle Exchange book exchange through the month of March. Students donate books and get to pick one in exchange. The HES Pre-K class enjoyed the Exchange and were excited to pick a book for the first time.

Hunters Bend Elementary

This week, fourth grade is heading to the Hermitage, home of Andrew Jackson while fifth graders had fun competing in the fifth grade Olympics representing USA, Philippines, Haiti and Tajikistan. Classes coming to the library are solving a mystery crime scene involving Dr. Seuss characters as suspects.

Hillsboro School

Mrs. Ofner’s second grade classroom recently had a visit from two elves who are extremely busy in their off-season. Our Elf Sparky was a shoe maker but he and his friends wanted to switch to be baker elves. He asked if we would build them some simple machines that would help them bake and we were happy to oblige.

Kenrose Elementary

Kenrose Elementary awarded students from every grade with an award for citizenship. Congratulations to all involved.

Longview Elementary

Longview Elementary celebrated Read Across America Day with a visit from Independence High! Indy the eagle, the cheerleaders and members of the football team joined various classrooms to read with the students.

Nolensville Elementary

Nolensville Elementary is celebrating Read Across America Week with a Book Fair, dress-up days and Literacy Night. Students enjoyed shopping for their favorite books at the Book Fair. For the first time ever, the Book Fair was made available online. The Book Fair raises money to purchase books with library grade binding. Students dressed up for Mustache Day, Crazy Sock Day, Wacky Hat Day, Character Dress-up Day and Pajama Day. Literacy night offered a variety of activities such as a book swap, poetry readings, a living wax museum, photo booth and a gallery walk. Everyone had a great time observing Read Across America Week.

Oak View Elementary

On Wednesday, kindergartners celebrated Dr. Seuss’ birthday. They read books by him and created adorable Cat in the Hat pictures. First graders just finished learning about government. They had a visit from Mayor Moore and had lots of great questions for him. Third graders read to kindergartners on Read Across America Day. Everyone enjoyed the event. Fourth graders were visited by Ranger John. He taught them about the program Every Kid in a Park. He shared with them that the goal is to provide an opportunity for each and every fourth grade student across the country to experience their federal public lands and waters in person throughout the 2015-16 school year. The fifth graders enjoyed a visit from Mr. Gentry. He shared with them information from World War II.

Pearre Creek Elementary

Pearre Creek Elementary celebrated Read Across America by having a children’s author, Jessica Young, come and read to students. About 55 students who were in the Million Word Club were invited to have breakfast with her in the library. Students and faculty celebrated Dr. Seuss’ birthday by wearing crazy socks on Wednesday and participating in Stop, Drop and Read on Friday.

Scales Elementary

Kindergarten learns about friendship with the Kids on the Block.

Sunset Elementary

This week at Sunset Elementary the kindergartners have been celebrating Dr. Seuss’ birthday by having different dress up days.

Trinity Elementary

Students in Mrs. Trubey’s ELA rotations have been reading novels set in the era of the Great Depression. To culminate this activity, they created posters telling about their books. Students in Mrs. Trubey’s class also worked on a teamwork activity called Saving Fred. They had to get the gummy worm (Fred) into the life preserver using only a paperclip and teamwork.

Walnut Grove Elementary

In art this week, fourth and fifth graders are exploring ways in which fiber artists create decorative or practical artworks by hand from natural materials, such as cloth and yarn. Cheekwood’s Craft Outreach Program will be visiting Walnut Grove on March 4. Our students will experience the creative process up close as three professional artists demonstrate their crafts. Students will learn the art of marbling, how to use a potter’s wheel by seeing a bowl being thrown as well as the beautiful history of paper art. These interactive art demonstrations will inspire our students to explore their own creative potential and reinforce what they are learning in art here at Walnut Grove.

Westwood Elementary

Westwood Pre-K students learned about Native Americans this week. We talked about how Native Americans shared, built homes, communicated with each other, and traded goods and services.

Winstead Elementary

Winstead Elementary had a fantastic day on Wednesday celebrating Read Across America Day with author Michael Shoulders. He shared his love of reading and discussed the importance of writing, the artist’s work and how a book is made. He used magic and humor to hold student interest and draw them into the presentation. All grade level classes participated in several literacy activities surrounding Dr. Seuss books! Last Friday night, Winstead had its first Daddy/Daughter Dance. It was a very special night for our Winstead girls and their special guys.

Middle Schools

Grassland Middle

Ms. Keith’s eighth grade drama students are busy creating original films using comedic timing, musical support and a Silent Film component. Open Mic Night will be Tuesday, March 8 in the commons. Come for Family Night at the Book Fair and stay for some entertainment! Many club yearbook pictures will be taken next week during power Monday. Please be here by 7:30 a.m. on Monday, March 7 if you are a member of the art club, French club, mathletes, model UN, newspaper, JROTC, color guard, NJHS or if you participated in Tribute.

Heritage Middle

On March 1, Mr. Samuel Kirk, Sr, CEO of Youth About Business, gave a speech called There is a King in You during our Black History Month Assembly.

Page Middle

Seventh grade students from Ms. Deason, Ms. Rathbone and Ms. Galo’s Language Arts classes participated in a simulation of The Ceremony of 12 in the book, The Giver. Dr. Lifsey presided and passed out job assignments for each child. These assignments are their assigned jobs for the rest of their lives. Students will compare and contrast their assignments. Then they discussed salaries/value of the work and see if they agree with the rank and position certain jobs hold within our community. In eighth grade U.S. History class, students pulled some seeds from a cotton plant by hand. They were learning about the impact of Eli Whitney’s cotton gin invention on the growth of cotton production and slave labor in the South. Congratulations to seventh grade student, Jacob Williams. Jacob was the winner of the Page MS Geography Bee and has now qualified with 100 students from Tennessee to participate in the State Geography Bee. The Bee will take place on the campus of Tennessee State University in Nashville on April 1st. We wish you much success, Jacob!

Spring Station MiddleSixth graders at Spring Station Middle are participating in Ancient Mesopotamian projects in Mr. Jones’ Social Studies classroom.

Sunset Middle

The character focus for February was Citizenship. Each month teachers nominate two students from each grade level that stand out regarding the assigned trait. Congratulations to the following students for being selected as Student of the Month: Kiara Carter, Matthew Durr, Kaylin McCarter, Connor Moody, Ryan Stallsmith and Avery Young. Sunset Middle students also delivered “Boxes of Love” and visited with the residents of Claiborne Hughes Assisted Living.

Woodland Middle

Congratulations to the Woodland Science Olympiad team! Woodland is very proud of its performance on Saturday at the Regional Tournament at MTSU. Students medaled in 15 of the events. The competition was challenging through the nature of how broad the scope covers, as well as the other schools within the competition. The team will advance to compete in the State Tournament held at the University of Tennessee on April 9. The Science Olympiad team members are Bryce Alford, Nathan Bigham, Joshua Mi, Raka Mukherjee, Kevin Joseph. Mithul Nallaka, Ankush Dhar, Shree Kypa, Sheeline Yu, Ethan Eisenhauer, Ashwin Jain, Joshua Cortez, Samarth Sharma, Andrei Gaylord, Carleton O’Neil, Karina Sheth, Zeke Engel, Nandita Arulmurugian and Keerthana Pradeep. The team is sponsored by Mrs. Sharon Kinnard.

High Schools

Brentwood High

A team representing Brentwood High finished fourth out of 56 schools at the Tennessee State Science Bowl Tournament on February 27 in Knoxville. The tournament is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Topics in the competition range from ecosystem dynamics to fundamental particle physics. BHS defeated top-performing teams from Farragut and Hume-Fogg Magnet, only to lose to the eventual state champion, Cedar Springs. The BHS team is made up of Ben Levine, Deven Bhuva, Harry Westbrook, Chiraag Kaushik and captain Shreyas Kumar. The fourth place finish is the best in school history at the state tournament.

Centennial High

Centennial High National Spanish Honor Society students are working on a volunteer project known as The Path Project. The Path Project is a tutoring program for younger children from predominately Spanish speaking homes. The CHS volunteers help these elementary students with their homework, practice reading and writing skills and work on good study habits. They also enjoy building friendships that they know will be a benefit to all involved. The students are already looking for additional ways to be involved with their new Path Project friends.

Franklin High

Then $77 graduation fee is now due and payable to FHS through the bookkeeper, Mrs. Adams (tamula.adams@wcs.edu). The payment covers graduation costs such as cap & gown, tassel, diploma & cover, and ceremony expenses. Check with Mrs. Adams if you’re not sure if you have paid. The fee may be made in person or online here. Rebel Roundup is scheduled for July 27 and July 28 for upper class locker/parking pass pickup. In the music world, please join us in congratulating the Franklin High School Chamber Choir and Women’s Ensemble. Both groups received superior ratings in performance and sight reading and will advance to the State Choral Festival in April. Reminder, there are less than 300 yearbooks left. To purchase a yearbook, go to www.yearbookordercenter.com (code 421). Please contact Mrs. Butler if you have any questions. And in sports news, the Rebels Basketball team ended a great season last night against Hillsboro with a final score of 63 to 52 in favor of the Burros.

Independence High

Student athletes from the football and basketball teams were joined by the drumline, cheerleaders and Indy the Eagle at Longview Elementary where they read to students in honor of Read Across America Week.

Page High

The Patriot Swim Team had a wonderful year. At the Williamson County High School Championship Meet, Laine Alexander won first place in the 100 Back and third place in the 100 Fly. Brooklynn Friel placed fourth in the Free and fifth in the 100 Fly and Amanda Justice placed fourth in the 200 Free and the 500 Free. In the Regional Championships Laine Alexander took fifth place in the 100 Fly and Back, and he was a State Finalist in the Men’s 100 Fly, where he placed 14th. Those with the honor of qualifying for the State Championship Team were Laine Alexander, Brooklynn Friel, Haley Haney, Amanda Justice and Alsycia Schneider. Congratulations to students and Coach Julie Allen on a great year!

Summit High

Congratulations to senior Jailah Grimes for being the Girls Wrestling State Champion. Also, congratulations to Esteban Remillard for placing sixth in the State Wrestling Tournament. Their coach, Pete Miller, was named the National High School Wrestling Coach of the Year. In other news, the Summit High spring production of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast is coming up. The play will run March 10-12 at 7 p.m. and March 13 at 2 p.m. All tickets are $10 at the door and children six and under are free. You can also join the cast at Mrs. Potts’ Tea Party on March 12 from 10 a.m. until 11:30 a.m. Children can meet the cast, get a preview of the show and participate in various activities. Tickets are $10 per child.