Photo: NAEC's new young authors

Each year, radio station 98.9FM The Drive gets money to promote Canadian music. The station has decided to put the money into music programs across the Limestone board, and is donating $1000 each to 13 schools. North Addington Education Centre was lucky to be one of them and on April 4, Joe and Jenn-O of The Drive, presented the music department with a $1000 cheque. Beth Lindsay of the music department says the department is very grateful for the donation and plans on using it towards repairing many of the instruments so they will continue to have the resources to run a successful program at the school. Nick Smart, Mike Deshane and Daryn Bolland played two rock songs for their classmates and the DJs. The clip should be aired on Friday morning.

Photo: NAEC's new young authors

Students in Ms. Buck’s grade 5/6 class at the North Addington Education Centre in Cloyne were feeling quite proud this week, and with good reason. All 27 students were celebrating the arrival of their very own, newly bound, hard cover, one off copies of a non-fiction book, which each had authored by themselves.

The book project was the brain child of their teacher, Ms. Buck, who is a first year teacher at NAEC, and it was geared to cover the non-fiction section of the language curriculum. “I thought this project would definitely be a lot more fun than writing a test. My goal was to really engage all of the students, especially those who might otherwise be lukewarm about the thought of writing, researching and creating an original piece of writing.” By choosing their own topics, the students had a chance to be creative while learning how to research, write, design and lay out a work of their own making. The finished product gave them something tangible at the end, something indeed worthy of celebration.

Ms Buck provided the students with a check list of what they needed to include: a table of contents, a glossary, at least four sub headings, fact boxes, at least one photo per page and a biography.

The class worked on their books on and off for about two months and when they were completed, the individual pages were printed off before Ms. Buck sent them off to be bound in hard cover at Smiths Fall Book Binding. She was as surprised and delighted with the finished results as her students were. “The finished books are truly amazing.” The cost of $10 per book seems nothing compared to the pride each title has bestowed on its author, many of whom say they never thought they could have accomplished such a undertaking.

One proud author, Max, chose fruit as his subject because of his love of pie and he included in his book all kinds of exotic fruits, where and how they are grown and what they are used for.

Grade six student Emma's book titled “The World of Polar Bears” explores a subject that is near and dear to her heart. Other titles included “Blob Fish”, “A Walk with Brock Throughout Canada”, “Extreme Sports” and “In the Life of a Moose”.

With the new books in hand the students will now prepare presentations to the class and will also have a chance read their books to the younger students at the school.

Ms. Buck was pleased with the enthusiasm her students showed for the project and plans to repeat it again next year. “This is something that motivates the students and gives them a real sense of accomplishment.” Judging by their faces and their intent desire to speak about their new works, these first books might not be the last ones created by the students in this class.

While most teachers are enjoying their summer vacations, Sarah Sproule and Darren Sissons from North Addington Education Centre in Cloyne have been making the rounds of local councils, Lions clubs and sports groups, looking for money to support an initiative they would like to get underway this coming fall at their school.

“North Addington is unique in the Limestone Board because not only does it have an outdoor classroom, it has 88 acres of land as well,” Sarah Sproule told Addington Highlands Council this week.

Sproule and Sissons are Physical Education teachers at NAEC. While they have brought their students to the Outdoor Learning Centre that the Limestone Board has in place at Gould Lake near Hartington, they find transporting the students to be expensive and access to the Gould Lake Centre to be an issue as well because it is shared with the entire board.

“We would like to establish something for our students and for other students in the north,” Sproule told Council.

The two teachers are preparing an application to the Limestone Learning Foundation for multiple-year funding of their project, which they are planning to submit in the fall.

“The foundation would like to see us have community partnerships in place first, so we are doing that this summer,” she added.

There is something in it for the local townships, Darrel Sissons pointed out.

“Like most northern schools in our board, we are seeing declining enrolment at NAEC. We need to establish something that is unique in order to keep the students engaged, keep the school going, and keep the student base there. If we keep the students we keep the parents, and the township will have a healthier tax base,” he said.

In addition to seeking funds for upgrading trails on the NAEC lands, and developing the land for educational purposes such as pond and eco-system studies, the two are hoping to raise money to purchase equipment, such as snow shoes, canoes, camping gear, etc., which are items that the school board will not fund.

“There is a lot of potential here for something that can make use of our greatest asset, the unique environment. Kids of all ages, from elementary to secondary, will benefit from learning science in the world instead of from a book, and from learning how to interact with the outdoors. This is a long-term project that we are totally committed to, and we want to get it started this coming year,” Sarah Sproule said.

Sissons and Sproule are seeking at least $2,000 from community partners, including both Addington Highlands and North Frontenac townships (they attended a North Frontenac Council meeting on June 27).

“I think that's really encouraging to have someone out there working on something on this,” said Addington Highlands councilor, Tony Fritsch. “I'd like to support it if we could.”

“We did do our budget earlier this spring, so we need to see if there is any money available,” said Reeve Henry Hogg. “Perhaps we should defer this to our next meeting on August 2, and give you an answer then. How much was it that you wanted?”

“We'll take as much as we can get,” said Sproule.

North Frontenac Council also said they will consider the funding request at their next meeting, which is slated for June 18.

Photo: NAEC students gather core samples from Lake Mazinaw. Courtesy of Dave Deacon

Grade nine students from North Addington Education Centre in Cloyne had a chance to get to the bottom of things when on Feb.23 they assisted Queen’s University geographer Scott Lamoureux and Professor Robert McLeman of the University of Ottawa in extracting core samples from the bottom of frozen Mazinaw Lake near Bon Echo Provincial Park. The research is part of a multi-university project aimed at understanding what impacts climate change may have in store for people of this region. The samples will be used to reconstruct the environmental changes in the Eastern Ontario Highlands over the past several centuries. By involving local communities in the project, the researchers hope to raise awareness of environmental issues and to encourage students to pursue post-secondary training in environmental research.

Participating students from Mr. Hasler's, Ms. Snider's and Ms. Lloyd’s classes at NAEC used an auger to drill holes into the lake ice, into which they inserted metre-long plastic tubes. The tubes were then lowered down to the lake bottom and a weight was used to pound the tubes into the sediment there encasing a core sample in each. The layers in the cores show a history of the environment going back hundreds of years, to pre-European settlement. Two samples were obtained, which students then took back to their classrooms, where they were studied.

Professor Robert McLeman explained what exactly the samples showed. “We saw in both samples, about mid-way through, a large grey streak which points to an event that likely occurred roughly 100 years ago. The streak demonstrates that there was large-scale erosion going on, likely the result of the clear cutting of the forest around the lake.”

McLeman explained how this type of information would give researchers the information they are hoping to gain to get a better understanding of climate change. ”With this research we are hoping to get a better understanding of the trends of long-term environmental trends in the region. We will use the findings to help us plan for the future and help us to adapt to climate change. Similarly, because so many people live downstream from Mazinaw Lake it’s also important for us to understand what changes are happening from a water management point of view.”

Researchers plan to take more core samples from the lake, which will be sent to laboratories for further study. The results will also be sent to the students at NAEC for further learning opportunities.

Professor McLeman was pleased to provide the students with such an exciting and valuable hands-on learning tool. “By allowing the students to practice hands-on science in their own backyard we are hoping to get them excited about the environmental sciences and are also hoping to encourage them to pursue environmental studies later on, either at college or university.”

North Addington Education Centre took a stand against bullying on April 13, by declaring it a Day of Pink. Students and staff in the school sported pink shirts, ties, hats and scarves, amongst other items of clothing.

Day of Pink is an international Day against Bullying, Harassment and Homophobia in schools. It was started by two Grade 12 students in a Nova Scotia school after a Grade 9 student was harassed for wearing a pink shirt. The two students went and bought 50 shirts and distributed them to students as a protest against the incident.

Elementary and Secondary staff promoted the event, and Student Council President J.R. Lee designated the 13th as Day of Pink in the Spirit Week schedule. School Houses were awarded points on the basis of the number of students wearing pink.

Principal Angela Salmond was particularly pleased with the turn-out, as she was hosting the secondary principals’ meeting at the school. Other principals were impressed by NAEC’s participation. “It was wonderful to see the whole school participating in this event. I was proud of our students for showing that they are against harassment of any kind. I am hoping for an even bigger number next year,” said Mrs. Salmond.

People interested in finding out more about Day of Pink can consult the website www.dayofpink.org

While some people find math very difficult, Ms. Shepherd’s Grade 9 Applied Math class has been having fun. They used their math skills to design and construct some mini-putt holes. Each student designed a mini-putt hole, then the class voted on the five designs they wanted to make. Students worked as a classto construct their mini-putt holes. The whole process took five days, to the accompaniment of a lot of hammering, and by October 1, the students were ready to test their projects out. They laid them out on the playground, and took turns trying to sink a ball. The designs proved very challenging, and the chances of a hole-in-one seemed to be nil. Ms. Shepherd hopes to have the mini-putt course laid out for Parent’s Night on October 10, so that the students’ parents can admire the workmanship and try to sink a ball.