Fifth grade students in Mrs. Ruhnke’s class used Quizlet.live to get to know their new teacher. This program places students into teams and they work together to answer questions. The winning team is the first team to answer all the questions correctly in the shortest amount of time.
Kids are naturally creative. Whether they’re using pen and paper or a stylus and an iPad, kids find surprising ways to build, craft, and design. Help foster their interest in art, science, music, and construction by offering them a variety of tools to inspire and delight. These hand-selected educational apps, games, and websites each have the potential to unleash creativity, especially with the support of a parent or teacher. Have fun!
…While students are getting excited about their summer freedom, some parents and teachers might be worried about kids forgetting all they’ve learned during the school year.
This loss of academic skills over the summer months is what teachers refer to as “summer slide.” Some studies have shown kids can lose nearly two months of grade-level equivalency in reading and math over the summer break. Think about it: The brain is a muscle, and if you don’t use it, you can lose it!
But remember, though kids are taking a break from school, they can still keep learning. One way is for them to be enriched by pursuing activities that promote the 4 Cs: communication, collaboration, creativity, and critical thinking. Media and technology can help kids build these skills, and summer is a great time for this kind of exploration.
We’ve put together a great list of apps, games, and websites that help kids build the 4 Cs, perfect for undercover summer learning. Share this list with your students’ parents so they can beat the summer slide!
Help kids express their opinions and emotions and connect with others with tools for video talks, podcasts, and storytelling.
TED/TED-Ed: Easily find, download, and view inspiring talks on a variety of topics
Youth Radio: A stellar take on the news from diverse kid journalists
Shadow Puppet Edu: Resource-rich video slide show creator a gem for elementary classrooms
Toontastic: Writer, actor, director: Kids play all parts in riveting storytelling tool
Kids can work together and take on the role of producer as they make multimedia productions.
Explain Everything: Powerhouse tool for creating stellar multimedia presentations
Educreations: Enliven lessons and presentations with easy-to-use tool
VoiceThread: Easily collaborate and create with voice, video, or image
Wikispaces: Powerful tool for creating collaborative websites
Give kids the space to use their devices to become artists, musicians, or designers.
Paper by FiftyThree: Beautifully designed digital sketchbook for any age
Canva: Create snazzy designs in seconds with flexible, cloud-based tool
GarageBand: Amazingly powerful music workstation unleashes the musician in us all
DIY/Instructables: DIY communities empower kids to design, build, and share new things offline and online
Encourage strategy, ingenuity, and sharing of ideas with open-ended digital-creation tools.
Tinkercad: Amazingly simple yet powerful and flexible online CAD tool
MIT App Inventor: Fun programming site gets kids to build their own mobile apps
Scratch: Jump-start future programmers with adaptive sandbox tool
Minecraft: Spiraling sandbox of adventure and creation gets kids to dig deep
We had 22 seventh grade girls and 12 eighth grade girls participating in track this season. The girls improved so much throughout the year. We recognized improvements after each track meet as well as the girls who placed in events. To date, we have had 117 improved marks! We have had two seventh grade records broken and one eighth grade record tied. Ellie Ohlde broke the pole vault record with a vault of 8’3” and Mikwena Lierman broke her sister’s 1600 record with a time of 5:45.49. Claire Shumard tied the 8th grade pole vault record of 7’6”.
The girls have competed well in the track meets with team finishes as follows.
Thayer Central Invitational (combined grades) : 3rd
Thayer Central Triangular: 7th graders – 1st and 8th graders – 1st (tied with Crete)
Aurora Invitational : 7th graders – 2nd and 8th graders – 3rd
Fairbury Invitational: 7th graders – 1st and 8th graders – 1st
We also participated in a dual with Beatrice, but no team scores were kept. The Crete quad was cancelled due to weather. We will concluded our season with the Beatrice Invitational on May 6.
Some individuals may have an opportunity to participate in the Nebraska State Junior High Track meet in Gothenburg on May 14. The top 24 individual performances and top 16 relays as of May 5 will be invited to participate. Go Jeffs!
The 4th Graders had their last long distance learning class for the year. Dave, the Science Guy from ESU 5, came out in-person to visit the 4th graders. All three classes had the opportunity to make a marshmallow structure with toothpicks and marshmallows. They had about 20 minutes to construct their structure. The student with the highest structure measured 13 1/2 inches. The 4th graders really enjoy having Dave come and visit.
Five journalism students brought home medals from the NSAA State Journalism Competition Monday, April 25, helping the school finish seventh in the State Competition.
The competition provides an avenue for journalism students across the state to compete in timed competitions to determine top finishers in 21 events.
The publications department had nine students qualify to compete in the competition with five bringing home medals in four different categories including a State Champion and State Runner-up.
Tanner Novotny brought home the gold in Sports News Writing and Mary Lawrence finished runner-up in Photo Illustration. In addition to these top two performances, Paige Patton finished third in Yearbook Feature Writing; Shaye Stall placed fourth in Newspaper Layout; and Partrick Ondrak finished fifth inSports News Writing.
Along with the five medalists, seniors Michaela Bartels, Brooke Eisenhauer, and Halle Knigge qualified for the State Competition helping the school finish seventh in the team sweepstakes.
Personal Finance students embarked on an expedition to gain real-life knowledge and experience evaluating real estate. Realtor, Justin Schultis from Redstones Wolverhampton, met students at a home for sale in Fairbury to discuss the buying process, home values, and the importance of having a home inspection. Students gained a better understanding of the difference between the assessed, appraised, and market value of a house.
Students enjoyed the opportunity and learned a great deal from the excursion. Senior Brooke Eisenhauer described the experience by saying, “I think going on an actual visit made it easier to understand the process of buying a home. It made it easier to determine the things that you need to inspect before making a purchase of a home. The initial visit was a great way to apply what we know, and learn more about the house buying process. It was helpful to have a real estate agent there with us to answer our questions because he deals with this type of work on a daily basis. The overall experience helped a lot in making house buying more relatable.”
The Jeff Golfers competed in the Fairbury Invite on April 20th. The Jeffs placed 2nd as a team. Individual medalists include: Nick, 3rd with a 78, Justin Peterson, 6th with an 81 and Zach, 10th with an 85. Good Job Golfers!
Current research shows that the incidence of Autism Spectrum Disorder in children is 1 out of every 68. There are many factors that have been identified as contributing to this number. Fairbury Public Schools takes pride in ensuring our teachers, support staff and administrators understand and meet the unique learning needs students with Autism Spectrum Disorders have. 24 FPS teachers, para-educators, and administrators, along with 13 parents attended the 2016 Nebraska ASD Network State Conference in La Vista. The two day conference was filled with entertaining, informative and educational keynote speakers and breakout sessions. Our local ESU 5 Interim-Administrator and Interim-Special Education Director, Dr. Brenda and Dr. Matt McNiff were the keynote speakers on Thursday evening. They gave their presentation from the perspective as both a parent of a child with ASD and educators. The conference was capped off with an AWESOME keynote presentation from Adolf Brown. His ability to inspire, entertain and move participants is truly unique and well received. Please contact Central or Jefferson Intermediate if you would like further information about this conference.
