2018 has already been a busy and engaging time for Laureate Park Elementary. In February, we held our first 5th Grade Level 1 Oration Contest. The classroom finalists delivered powerful speeches about “Inventions That Have Improved the Quality of Life.” We are proud of each of our finalists and are proud to announce our top three winners. Congratulations to our third-place winner, Alannah Lower, our second-place winner, David Rodriguez, and our first-place winner, Peter Dang.
Thirty-five 4th and 5th graders were honored in early February as they were officially inducted into the first chapter of the Laureate Park Elementary School National Elementary Honor Society. Students were selected for membership based on the four pillars of Honor Society: scholarship, leadership, service, and responsibility.
In January, Laureate Park Longhorns celebrated Literacy Week with lots of fun activities. Some of the activities included meeting Sunshine State author Taryn Souders; Drop Everything and Read (DEAR) Reading Buddies, where the older grades are paired with the younger grades to read together; creating bookmarks for the library; and a performance by professional storytellers. Throughout the week, our Longhorns logged more than 20,000 minutes of extra reading time and had a great deal of fun doing it.
Our first Spelling Bee took place in early January. We are proud of each of our classroom finalists who did a commendable job! Congratulations to our school-level finalist, Olivia Venezia. She represented LPE at the Orange County Public Schools (OCPS) Spelling Bee on Feb. 23 at Windermere High School.
In our classrooms, the students are finding creative ways to learn. In third grade, students donned surgical masks and conducted a text feature surgery. The students had a blast searching for text features in their Science Weekly magazines.
Our first-grade students put their informational text skills to use! The students first picked an animal to research. Then, they used a variety of technology tools, such as Lightbox books and online tools, to help research animals and their habitats. This will prepare them to build their animal exhibits.
Using STEM skills, fifth graders created a unique way to deliver their valentines this year. During the February Einstein hour, valentine carriers were made, using limited supplies, to be delivered via a zipline.