Grant Amounts and Projects

Grants from the Cedarville Middle School Junior Youth Advisory Committee were awarded to the following Les Cheneaux Community Schools staff for the projects described here:

Joanne Baker, Les Cheneaux Community Schools - $98.80 for laminating paper for various school projects. Students' work and projects can be preserved and saved if they are laminated. Teachers will be able to preserve maps, posters, and book pages, allowing them to be used year after year.

Kate Ter Haar, Les Cheneaux Community Schools kindergarten through 12th grade - $260 to buy supplies for five sets of Speed Stacks, a competitive cup stacking game that develops hand-eye coordination and reaction time. Speed Stacking cup sets will be at the library, and can be checked out during lunch or during designated times of the school day, such as in physical education class.

Rebekah Meyers, elementary special education/resource room - $125 for teaching tools that will help students learn better reading and spelling skills. Tools, including cards, boards, teaching trays, and vocabulary materials, are all based on the Orton Gillingham remediation technique, which helps students who have been unable to learn reading and spelling through traditional methods. The materials will help as many as 16 elementary students, and will be used by two teachers and one paraprofessional. Mrs. Meyers uses the approach in the resource room now, so the materials will complement the work she has started.

Laurie Pearson, first grade - $500 for a creative cooking class. She will connect cooking skills to the curriculum through activities like learning to read recipes, and measuring to fortify mathematics lessons. In the first year, about 14 first grade students will benefit from the cooking appliances, utensils, and supplies she will purchase with the grant, including an electric skillet, extension cord, hot plate, small microwave, hand mixer, storage tubs, bowls, cookie sheets, towels, aprons, and other basic kitchen supplies.

Cristi Smith, fourth grade - $300 toward an overhead projector and bulbs for the fourth grade classroom. Mrs. Smith will match any remaining cost with the rest of her classroom expense budget.

Kathy Tassier, fifth grade - $205.43 for science equipment that will teach principles such as buoyancy, density, solar power, laws of motion, and simple machines. Twenty-five to 30 fifth grade students will use these materials including a solar bag, solar bottle boat kit, and building kits. They will supplement the science textbooks by providing interactive learning catered to younger students' learning styles, Mrs. Tassier said.