Dear Parents, Students, and Friends,

NEBO JR. THEATRE FESTIVAL

Emily Wessman is a writer. When she heard about the opportunity to submit a poem to UVU's Write Outside Yourself Journal, she submitted a poem called "Illuminate the Forgotten." This beautifully written poem met the criteria of "Tales Throughout TIme," "exploring or reinventing different eras in history or presenting possible futures."

Mrs. Kelly’s FACS students were given an opportunity in their child development unit to see preschoolers learn. She separated them into seven groups. Each group was then assigned a topic that corresponded with the things they were learning about; the activity they planned was based on that topic. The greeting group made bunny shaped name tags. The large motor group’s activity was a bean bag toss. The small motor group let the preschoolers play with Play Dough. The snack group made little crabs with crackers, pretzel sticks, and cheese.

On April 13 Ms. Warren’s class looked at strawberry DNA. It was a part of learning about Watson and Crick and their discovery of DNA. We learned why it would be important to know this in agriculture, specifically when we were learning about plant, animal, and soil scientists. “It was so cool! I loved being able to see the DNA strands,” a student said. Others agreed that the DNA strands were interesting and fun to see. “It was interesting with a strawberry. What do you think would happen if I tried this with an orange!” a student mentioned.

Students in Mr. Whiting’s science class watched as he dissected squids to learn about the different cool adaptations and traits that the octopus has. They also learned some of the anatomy of the octopus. Mr. Whiting showed students some of the external anatomy, like the eyes, and he told us about the chromatophores which are things on the skin that make it so the squid can camouflage. Then he cut the squid open with some suture scissors. He showed students things like the gills, ink sack, and the squid pen which gives support to the squid. It was interesting and fun.

Sam Whitaker, an aspiring writer here at Spanish Fork Jr. High, was delighted when his submission was accepted for publication in one of our local newspapers. Congratulations, Sam!  

http://servedaily.com/education/nebo-students-find-the-good-in-the-world/

On March 29th, twenty-one SFJH 8th graders participated in the state science fair at BYU.  These students had previously competed at the school and district levels and were finalists at both levels.

A new tradition was started at SFJHS this year by the student council. We celebrated the first annual Kindness Week. There has been so much going on in our world lately, and it is scary to think about what kids these days go through as they grow up. The best way to combat these types of events is to show kindness, acceptance, and love to our peers every day. We all have strengths and gifts to share, and that is what Kindness Week is all about.