Hi Parents and Students

Some of this news is repetitive for you if you are up to date with your blog reading and school news, so you may want to skim and scan. Notes have been coming to me from all directions this week and I have saved them up until my desktop was full, so here goes…

Are you ready?

Several members of the class are spending some of their home time working on a piece of writing to enter a competition in Little Star Magazine. I commend their efforts and look forward to hearing of their success. Although many of the students are motivated by the possible prize money and ipad at the end of the rainbow; I am sure they will also have some of their own great moments actually writing their story, titled “The Decision”, and discovering their great writing skills along the way. Good Luck and see below for more details.

In other writing news, our Essays have been published and we look forward to sharing them with Ms. Lau’s class tomorrow morning as her class just finished theirs too. Hooray for S.A.S. writers everywhere!

The K-12 Visual Art Department is having an art magnet sale called “Points to Pakistan”. All art classes K-12 created these magnets with the intent to sell and donate the profits to the country of Pakistan to help them recover from the devastating flooding that occurred in August and that is still destroying lives today. Students can purchase magnets during the week of Mon. Feb. 14th – Friday Feb. 18th.

Each magnet is 25 RMB.

In Math… we are working steadily through Unit 7: Exponents and Negative Numbers. Besides learning about exponential notation and negative numbers, we will also learn the order of operations (PEMDAS).

In Writer’s Workshop… we will start working on our Literary Essays next week; these are essays about reading, and as we have a class of wonderful readers, I believe they will enjoy this unit. They did a terrific job with their first 5th grade essays and I also loved their recent book reports to the class. This unit will be like a combination of both.

In Reader’s Workshop… the kids were excited to choose their book club groups yesterday to study four different social issues books together in groups of four. The novels chosen were A Jar of Dreams, which you can read about in more detail on Kyra’s blog, Red Scarf Girl, Blubber (which I loved reading as a child), Juneboy and Go Fish.

In Social Studies… we are working through migration with Mr. Power. I love the conversations we are having in this unit and I hope your child has told you something about our read-a-loud accompanying this unit, Home of the Brave, if not, please ask them what it is about.

Please also read this note below from Ms. Schroeder, from the S.A.S. Pudong Student Council

My name is Jessica Schroeder, and I am writing to you regarding a school-wide service project that Student Council is hoping to initiate this year. In brief, we would like to get involved with the Lions Club International Eyeglasses Collection Project, which donates used eyeglasses to children who cannot afford them on their own. From February 21 to March 4, we would like to set out a few boxes across the school that will collect eyeglasses for the Lions Club. The Student Council will regulate, empty out, and be responsible for these boxes, but would like to request permission to place them around the elementary building during those two weeks.

Here are the details about the Little Star Writing Competition, it is not compulsory do join up but I encourage you if you wish to.

Theme: The decision

Entry Requirements:
SHORT STORIES: 2500 words maximum (no minimum), the title is NOT included in the word count. Entries must be entirely the work of the entrant and must never have been published, self-published, published on any website or public online forum, broadcast nor winning or placed in any other competition.

Eligibility:
The competition is open to all international school students in China, competing in three age groups:
Group I: Under 12 years old;
Group II: 12-15 years old;
Group III: 16-18 years old.

Prizes:
1st = 3000 RMB (prizes), 1 winner in each group.
2nd = 1000 RMB (prizes), 2 winners in each group.
3rd = 500 RMB (prizes), 3 winners in each group.
5 supplementary prizes of 100 RMB (prizes) in each group.

LittleStar Award:
One Apple IPAD for its most favored student writer and internship at LittleStar Magazine.

Entry Format:
All entries must be submitted online: http://www.internationalschool.info/littlestar/competition/shortstory
Entries must be in English, single sided, with pages numbered and a word count noted at the top of the first page. The filename of online entries must be the title of the entry and it must be either a .doc or .docx file.No corrections can be made after receipt. Failure to comply with the entry requirements will result in disqualification.

Deadline for submission:
Closing date for receipt of online entries: February 28, 2011 Receipt of entries will be confirmed by LittleStar via email.

Judging:
This year’s lead judge will be a published author in the US or UK (to be confirmed later), who will also do a workshop on “how to get published?” with the kids on the Award Ceremony. Other judges may include LittleStar editors and international school librarians. Judging is fair and unbiased. Experienced readers assist the named judges in selecting the shortlists for the final. The judges’ decision is final.

Results:
Final results and winners list of the competition will be released on LittleStar website before March 15, 2011. Winners of the competition will also be notified through emails from LittleStar Magazine.

Anthology:
A special anthology of winning short stories will be printed out before the Award Ceremony in March 2011. Each entrant for the competition and participating schools will receive free copies.

Prize Winners/ Award Ceremony:
All winners are invited to and prizes awarded at a grand Award Ceremony in Beijing in March 2011.
The list of prizewinners will be displayed on the Little Star website www.internationalschool.info after the award ceremony.

Copyright:
Worldwide copyright of each entry remains with the author, but LittleStar Magazine will have the right to publish the winning poems and stories, (including runners up), in the annual anthology and any relevant promotional material.