October 4, 2010 Volume 1, Issue 1 Inside this issue: Updates 1 Counselor 1 SHS Life 2 SHS Life 3 English Dept. 4 Art Work 5 Special points of Interest: Oct. 11th School Holiday Oct. 13th PSAT Oct. 15th Homecoming Homecoming pep rally @ football field 1:30 P.M. Oct. 18th UIL Band Marching Contest Red Ribbon Week Oct. 25th-29th Early Release Oct. 27th Parent Conferences Oct. 27th S T O C K D A L E H I G H S C H O O L SHS Updates & More By: Mrs. Lynn The first six weeks of school have flown by in the blink of an eye. Students have been busy in classes with various projects, exams, and so much more. As a campus, we continue to strive to incorporate more technology in education as often as possible. This year, students will have Promethean Boards in their classrooms. The Promethean Boards are an interactive white board that will engage students in lessons. We will also introduce the Active Expressions that will allow students to respond to questions and receive data from the entire class within seconds. Counselor s Corner By: Mrs. Pruski I am so excited to be home in the hallways of Stockdale High after a 15 year teaching career in San Antonio, Texas! I welcome parents to stop by my office to visit about their child or to ask questions about college, financial aid to help pay for college or even information about applying to college. My door is always open to help in anyway that I can! I am excited to tell you on September 29 th, we had all 10 th graders take the PLAN! This test helps students get ready for college entrance exams. The test is timed just like the ACT and SAT test and many of our students have never completed a timed test before in Just a reminder that progress reports will be issued at 6 weeks and at 9 weeks report cards will be issued. Please monitor your child s grades carefully through our parent portal system (details available at office) and encourage him/ her to attend tutoring if needed. Most teachers are available until 4:00 P.M. Monday Thursday to help any student who may need additional assistance. It is imperative that your child passes all of his/her classes so that he or she will be eligible to participate in extracurricular activities, earn credits and not have to their life, so by offering this PLAN testing it eases the nerves of our students and builds their confidence for future College Entrance Exams. All in all, it was a good experience. The PLAN also has a section to find their Career Interest for the future. It tells them what areas they have strengths in and also tells us where their weaknesses are so we can work on building or changing their weaknesses to strengths! We will gain lots of insight with each student from the test data. We are also gearing up for the October 13, 2010, PSAT testing. We will have 11 th graders attempting the test for the chance of becoming a repeat courses. SISD will have a school holiday for students and staff on Monday, October 11 th. On Friday, October 15 th we will celebrate Homecoming. On Wednesday, October 27th we will have early release for students and have parent conferences. Please mark your calendars now and come to visit with the teachers to discuss your child s performance. I am looking forward to an outstanding school year. Our campus earned a TEA rating of Recognized last year,and we made gains in many areas. I know that we have an outstanding group of students and can t wait to see the wonderful things we will do this year!! National Merit Scholarship winner. Students had to sign up by September 20 th and pay a fee of $13.00 to be eligible to test for the PSAT testing. We have a large group who are working hard and studying for this test. I am very excited for these students, and I know they will do their very best and make the community of Stockdale very proud! There are many great things going on at Stockdale High, we have our very first group of Virtual Drivers Ed Students working hard to earn their drivers licenses. The class is online so we are using technology to enhance their learning environment. School clubs are holding their elections, students are involved in keeping their grades up so they may participate in all the programs we have here at Stock-
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English The English department is off to an exciting start for the 2010-2011 school year. The students are busily working on different novels, projects and of course, writing. Mrs. Miller s English IV class is reading The Canterbury Tales and will be incorporating the new Active Inspire software in conjunction with the new Promethean boards. Each student will have to write his/her own tale and teach it to the class. Mrs. Marrou s English II classes have also been busy working on different genres of literature. As part of fulfilling the technology plan at Stockdale High School, they have learned how to incorporate tables and charts on the Apple Macs. Each student then made brochures to teach the different rules associated with capitalization. Her English III classes currently read Far North and will be required to bring a project constructed outside of class to go along with the reading. These projects include rafts, waterfalls, planes and even food such as bannock (the bread of the north). Mrs. Akin s Pre AP and AP English classes just finished up their summer reading projects which consisted of either a CD playlist of songs (to go along with their novel) and a CD case complete with front cover, inside and credits on the back or a Facebook page where they had to create a profile, a photo album, friend s profile and home page for one of the character s in their novel. These were showcased to the class and the students did an excellent job. PreAP English I just recently read The Cask of Amontillado and they are making plaster cast masks to go along with the carnival theme of the short story. PreAP English II is in the process of reading The Blindside and writing a research paper over football. They are required to keep up with their NFL team and research the different aspects associated with that team. AP English III is reading Tuesdays with Morrie and will be working on a project that involves the nursing home in early October. In addition, they are learning how to analyze poetry and have even learned how to write their own poems. AP English IV has been studying rhetoric and how it is used in many different ways. Not only is it commonly found in politics, but also they recently completed an imovie project where they found rhetoric in movie clips and they illustrated how these devices were used. They are also reading The Kite Runner and learning the customs of other countries such as Afghanistan. The students are working hard and learning that school is not all about books and writing but technology plays an important role too. Page 4
Brahma Creativity By: Giuliana Templeton By: Andy Cano By: Andy Romero By: Alex Hernandez By: Kristy Vela By: Lawrence Ogle By: Randy Lynn By: Patti Lerma Volume 1, Issue 1 Page 5