Mineola Elementary puts newspapers to good use
By JOSH LANDThe Monitor StaffIf anyone is wondering, elementary students in today’s digital, fast-paced world do know what a newspaper is.
Thanks to Mineola Community Bank, the students of Mrs. Howard’s 5th grade English Language Arts class get a chance to use editions of the Monitor during their class on a daily basis.
Nova McGuire studies the Monitor closely during their writing station Wednesday morning.
Before getting a chance to use the newspapers, students began working on freewriting to get students warmed up.
Numbering paragraphs, composition books, grading pens and summarizations – one forgets how much fun the fifth grade is.
“Can I have your autograph?” a student asked, “You’re Josh Lark, right?” No, that’s not my name, but close enough young man – got to love fifth graders.
After the warm-up activity, everyone made their way to the carpet before moving on to the “Newspaper Center” to grab Monitor copies to begin their summaries.
Captions, headlines and paragraphs aren’t terms you would think a fifth grader would know, but students continue to be sharper than ever – thanks in large part to teachers like Howard who incorporate the newspapers into their weekly activities.
Students pick any article they wish from the stack of Monitorsfor their writing stations and give a summary. When asked what his favorite part of using the newspaper during their daily writing activities Alex Barriga said, “I like the whole thing really. We get to pick and choose what we want which is nice.”
Barriga chose to give his summary of the Student of the Week ad, which happened to be his sister Claudia. Barriga said he learned some new things about his sister after reading the article and doing his summary, but don’t let that fool you into thinking he was too interested in his sister. “She drags me to the mall and I don’t like walking.”
Mineola 5th grade teacher Kim Howard gives instruction to Alex Barriga, who chose to summarize his sister’s Student of the Week ad in the Nov. 4 edition of the Monitor Wednesday.AT LEFT: Mineola 5th grader Kylie Hester writes her summary of an article she found in the Monitor.
This led to a classmate saying, “You said yesterday you liked the mall!” Well Barriga was quick to point out, “I said I like GameStop, which is in the mall.”
Nathan Turner also picked something sister related – as his sister, Madi who was recognized in the Nov. 18 edition for being named Key Club Division 34 lieutenant governor. However, this wasn’t news to Turner. “I already knew she won. She talked about it a lot and still does.”
The class worked frantically against the clock to get their summaries finished, as it was almost lunchtime.
Howard said, “We are so thankful to be able to incorporate these into our activities and will continue to use them in a variety of ways in the future.” Next she will have her students make a wish list for Christmas and add up the cost of the items based on the ads from the newspaper.
In a flash, writing stations were over as the University of Texas Fight Song began to play, which to these students was the “clean up song.”
Some things can’t be done digitally and through the efforts of Howard and other teachers like her students will continue to know newspaper terminology and perhaps even see a picture of their sister along the way. Is this good or bad?
Although they may not admit it, it appears Barriga and Turner were proud to see their sister’s pictures in their local newspaper. Brothers can’t be too proud of their sisters out of fear of being dragged to the mall to shop, unless of course the destination is GameStop.
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