On Nov. 4, Chagrin Falls Middle School seventh-graders participated in the second annual Greek Olympics.
Student Battle to Get The Gold at The Greek Olympics
By CFMS Tiger Tales student reporter Frankie Ashkettle
On Nov. 4, Chagrin Falls Middle School seventh-graders participated in the second annual Greek Olympics.
Seventh-grade language arts teacher Jessica Johnson said, “The Greek Olympics is a full day event that captures the spirit of Greek Mythology, which all of the seventh-graders have been studying this year in English class. The ancient Greeks started the Olympics centuries ago.”
Johnson explained that the event prompts friendly competition among students as they face various challenges throughout the day. “Some of the mental and academic challenges involved creating constellations, building and constructing a tower, participating in reader’s theater, practicing logical reasoning, engaging with roman numerals and visiting ancient Greece. Later in the day, the students participated in physical ‘hero challenges’ such as chariot races, Medusa freeze, defeat the Minotaur, rebuild the Pillars of Heracles, and defeat the cyclops. Prizes were awarded at the end of the day for teams that achieved gold, silver and bronze after their points were tallied,” said Johnson.
A favorite event was the Chariot Race where students would pull their teammates up and down the gym floor. They also had to do a puzzle at one end of the gym floor before finishing the race.
All the seventh-grade teachers spend many hours planning this fun day for the students. Many of them even come in the Sunday before to set it all up.
“I learned a lot from The Greek Olympics, and it was a really fun day,” said seventh-grader Cooper Ryan.
“It was a fun learning experience,” said Lizzie Frank.
Alexander Burnight, who was part of the winning team, said, “It felt so amazing to win The Greek Olympics.”
Severance Hall Performance
Students at Chagrin Falls Intermediate School attended a Cleveland Orchestra performance at Severance Hall on Nov. 1. Music teacher Susan Smith organizes this experience for the students every three years. The concert was titled, “Music That Tells a Spooky Story.”
Students heard music from many different composers including pieces by Gounod, Grieg, Mussorgsky, Prokofiev, Saint-Saens, Wagner and Williams. Students learned about the four families of instruments as they saw and heard the world-renowned Cleveland Orchestra perform.
Collage Concert at University of Akron
On Nov. 6, Chagrin Falls Middle School orchestra students attended The University of Akron School of Music’s annual Collage Concert. This concert features all of the students and faculty from The University of Akron. More than 1,400 students from 17 local schools enjoyed the performance. Students heard many different ensembles including the wind symphony, trombone choir, chamber choir, concert choir, jazz ensemble, percussion ensemble, steel drum band and symphony orchestra.
Next year’s concert will take place on Nov. 4. Join in the fun and reserve tickets now at https://www.uakron.edu/ej/.
Write Place Sponsors Halloween Writing Contest
By Chagrin Falls High School Write Place interns
Mitchell Chapic and Hannah Clark
This October, Chagrin Falls High School Write Place held a story contest to celebrate Halloween. The contest drew more than 50 submissions, each scored on grammar and structure by the Write Place Creative Team. Then, the stories were filtered to find the funniest, scariest and most original works.
Creative team interns Mitchell Chapic, Hannah Clark, Camron O’Connor, Bella Dalessandro, Adelaide Doman and Luke Volpe selected the best from each category and awarded these spooky writers with special Halloween candy baskets. Winners included: Funniest – Robbie Quinn with Toe Chase; Scariest – Collin Struk-Marn with The Witch’s House; and Most Original – Lauren Eickhoff with Skeleton Baseball.
The Write Place is thrilled about the success of this contest and will be hosting a Holiday Poetry Contest. The interns hope to receive even more submissions as they eagerly await the poetry talent of Chagrin writers.
CFIS Begins New Buddy Bunch
Under the direction of Karen Appell, school counselor at Chagrin Falls Intermediate School (CFIS), a student/counselor advisory and action group has begun.
“We are so excited to finally get this group up and running,” said Appell, as this concept has been something that she has been discussing with her students for a couple of years.
The group is called Buddy Bunch and is purposely named to sound like the well-known Buddy Bench.
“Buddy Bunch is designed to be a deeper extension of the Buddy Bench’s purpose,” said Appell. “We are all aware that the intention of a Buddy Bench is to give students who are feeling alone a place to express their loneliness and connect with others. However, as students move into later childhood and adolescence, we know the Buddy Bench no longer serves that purpose effectively. There needs to be something deeper and more meaningful in place to meet the needs of lonely and isolated students.”
The purpose of Buddy Bunch is two-fold: to build a school-wide culture of inclusion and acceptance by promoting healthy student relationships and to “be the eyes, ears, and voice” for the social/emotional needs of students. Students in Buddy Bunch will work closely with the school counselor to identify student needs, provide social support to students, organize events and activities, help new students transition into the district, provide feedback about how our school functions and help create solutions to student concerns.
“Buddy Bunch members must have the desire to help others, patience to work through the inevitable challenges, and a willingness to come out of their comfort zone,” said Appell. “I had such a phenomenal response to my call for volunteers, but had to cap the number at seven students per grade level. It was a difficult choice, as every student that applied would have been a perfect fit for this group.”
Interested students had to fill out an application and get a teacher referral to be considered for participation.
Buddy Bunch students will meet at least twice a month in their grade-level teams and about once per month as a whole-school team. Meetings will consist of supporting and training members on how to navigate various situations, identify students in need, and overcome the barriers they will likely encounter as they strive to help their classmates.
“Loneliness and isolation are complicated human conditions,” said Appell. “Buddy Bunch members will need to have some understanding of the roles that human psychology, social/emotional development and our culture play. Lonely students need so much more than a bench to sit on … they need meaningful human connection. I am so excited to see the trails that our Buddy Bunch members will blaze this year in our quest to make CFIS a place where every student feels welcomed, noticed and included.”
