Our afterschool class decided to have a NO TV day. The following are just a few of the responses of what the students and their families did:
Iris – played games with my family.
Jocelyn – played “Steal the Bacon” with my sister.
Lucas – read books with my mom.
David – I played with my brother and built a castle.
Noah – I played with my cars and my puppy.
Carolyne – I helped mommy bake cookies and we played together.
James – I drew letters and wrote my numbers.
Taylor – I went make believe shopping with my mom and dad.
Lauryn – I played and read with my family and cousins.As you can tell, everyone had a great time. Try a day with NO TV. You may really enjoy it!
Bake Sale – Fifth grade broke the record with the most successful bake sale in the history of ECS! This helped them raise money for their Spruce Lake trip in June. Fifth grade explored and delighted in God’s creation while at Spruce Lake. They also were challenged by participating in a 30 foot power swing, found frogs in the pond and did the wall climb.
March – Bowling. In honor of African American History, combined with Women’s History, 5th grade went bowling at Harlem Lanes, which is owned by two African American women.
February – Focus on the Family – Underground Railroad. Who said children need television, MP3 players, DS, I-pods. Fifth grade proved this theory wrong as they were engrossed in listening to the struggle to freedom of the Ress family, an enslaved family. The cassette provided an educational, fascinating study which originated from Focus on the Family.
Six students took World Civilization I as an elective for NYACK credit this year. Together we explored ancient history and the foundations of civilizations. We also explored our ancient ancestry as far as we could – tracing roots back to Africa, Europe, Asia, and the Americas.
The second half of the year we focused on major changes in Asia, Europe, Africa, and the Americas. We studied exchanged of ideas and goods through migration and conflict. Throughout the year we took lunch trips getting a taste of various civilizations through their cuisine. We also watched modern movies portraying ancient times, such as 10,000 BC and Apocalypts.
11th grade has finished going through the 1900’s war, peace, depression, prosperity and change. We have seen how history has set the stage for the present.
12th grade took a four day trip to Elim Bible Institute over Winter vacation to help clean and do various service projects. We enjoyed a time of fellowship and camaraderie as we worked hard and learned about our classmates. We are looking forward to what lies ahead in college!
This school year has been a tremendous blessing. Students were exposed to fun ways of writing poetry, the explorations of different genres of literature and drafting for classroom publications. We were definitely able to travel through different time periods in literature. We went from the Holocaust to the Reconstruction Era to the world of C.S. Lewis’s fantasy. If you come to our room, you can read limericks – short fun poems that reveal some silly things about us.
What an awesome year in Bible! As a class, we have learned about our weaknesses, our strengths and our struggles. We are so happy to have a Savior that fights on our behalf. We learned how God has gifted each and every one of us. We prayed and encouraged each other in the Word. As I lectured, I even shared stories of many young people who stood up for Christ. Some students decided to give extra credit presentations for a last chance to share an encouragement with their classmates. May our Lord guide and protect our students as they move on to high school.
This last quarter, we picked up one of my favorites: Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. I divided the play into four weeks and the students have done an awesome job approaching the Elizabethan text. We acted out the assassination of Julius Caesar and watched as students pretended to hurt the main character “Caesar”. Poor Caesar, died while the conspirators shook hands and stood proud of their betrayal. The students got a good understanding of how themes unfold in the play. Themes such as: friendship vs. betrayal, superstition vs. intuition, good leadership vs. bad leadership were covered and were discussed in class. It’s good to see student interest in how the themes can be related to modern times. What an awesome way to end the year.