St. Mary School celebrated Catholic Schools Week by highlighting its STEM education program and the Catholic faith...
Catholic Schools Week
St. Mary School celebrated Catholic Schools Week by highlighting its STEM education program and the Catholic faith. The week kicked off with the school’s annual Sunday Mass and open house, but this year featured special pancakes printed with a 3-D pancake printer donated to the school by the Ohio Catholic Federal Credit Union. Junior high students worked during the week to create design codes that would then be sent to the printer for baking. Students and community members enjoyed watching and eating from this new technology.
While two snow days at the start of the week cancelled some special events, the students did not let it dampen their spirits. Wednesday brought pajama day and focused on the topic of health and wellness, featuring a special guest appearance from Liz Conroy for a Jazzercise class. The kids loved dancing and working out to the music and the plank challenge. All were sweaty and re-energized when they returned to class.
Kindergarten and junior high students invited their parents and community members to classes to be a student for the day. Parents participated in music and science experiments and took turns doing classroom jobs. The kids loved seeing parents do what they do everyday.
Thursday brought the Potato Olympics and a focus on the science of sport and football. During the Potato Olympics, individual potato contestants created by the junior high students were worked through various events and judged by the lower grades on performance and appearance. Students gave each potato a biography including its background, country of origin and habitat as a part of social studies grades. Most potatoes made it through the competition unscathed, but some required medical intervention after the hockey stick challenge.
The week ended with an all-school Mass that finalized a week of prayer intentions collected by students from the community. The students participated in random Prayer Alerts throughout the week where they were asked to drop everything they were doing and pray for the intentions left by our parishioners. Following Mass, the school hosted 15 Career Day speakers from throughout the community. Students rotated through speakers and were able to hear from six different careers, most featuring STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) careers.
Gone are the days that all the little girls announce they want to be princesses or rock stars. When asked what they wanted to be when they grew up, kindergartners Stella Scanlon and Katja Cobb said they want to be scientists as they skipped away down the hall.
Catholic Schools Week is an annual tradition that students and faculty look forward to each year that helps to celebrate all that is going on in the school and Catholic education. This year, the emphasis on STEM education highlights the school’s upcoming STEM designation application that will take place in March. The school is very excited to be able to include both innovative learning and spiritual and service related education together in one place.
St. Mary School is now accepting registration for the 2017-18 school year for students preschool through eighth grade.
For more information, visit www.stmaryschoolchardon.org or call the office at 440-286-3590
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Ryan Zielinski discusses a career in computers with Mr. Steve Wayne during Career Day.
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Junior high students created potato contestants for the Potato Olympic challenge.
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St. Mary students participate in a Jazzercise class in their pajamas during health and wellness day.
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Kindergarten parents gather around a learning station to experience “A Day in the Life of Kindergarten.”
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Students Riley Ford, Gabe Virant and Liam Ptasnik watch as the 3-D pancake printer creates a pancake.
