Bonner Springs High School

Principal's Newsletter for Parents


	Classroom Highlights

Steve Miller

In his direct instruction classes students are making money. As part of his positive behavior classroom management system students earn Monopoly money for starting on time, having their materials, following instructions, and actively participate in class. As he is teaching he circulates the room in search of students doing the right thing. Quietly he places dollars on their desks and students cash them in at the end of the hour. Reciprocity is a must, so if a student is off task, needs to go to their locker or restroom, they forfeit their dollar. On Fridays, the students have the option to cash in their money at the Miller Market for treats, or bank their money for a class pizza party. In addition, in this math class he was paying 10% interest on money banked, and students calculate their balance each week. Pictured below are a few proud students with money they earned.

Tara Kemp

In her Culinary Essentials class her students were completing a sandwich invention project. Students first created a recipe for their sandwich creation, then were directed to a nutritional label website where they created a nutritional information label that appears on the back of all packaged food, finally they created a QR code that could be scanned to take them to their marketing plan and advertisement for their creation. To finalize the project the students then made the sandwiches in class to became food critic judges giving feedback to one another on some very interesting sandwiches. Some were as simple as peanut butter on bread to a more exotic bacon creation with chocolate sauce. Pictured below are some students and their creations.

Rob Marriott

The earth is shaking in Earth & Space Science. Students were using virtual lab software to simulate the earthquake size, severity, and duration to make predictions about future earthquakes. The student uses the software to identify the location of an earthquake, tells the program the magnitude and duration, and the simulation gives them seismic readings they record as data. Enclosed is a data table from the lab. The student's can then use that data to make future predictions about what will happen with future earthquakes. Virtual labs allow students to change variables easily and play with the scientific method to create meaningful data to be used in other settings. A great way to study earthquakes!

Jason Romanishin

Throughout the last few weeks of September and the first few weeks of October, Jason Romanishin's Art Comprehensive students participated in a project to benefit Mosaic. Mosaic is a non-profit organization committed to providing support and services to people with intellectual and developmental disabilities in Wyandotte county. The project required high school students to paint pumpkins and then donate them to Mosaic's pumpkin Picasso contest. On October 7^th, during third hour, Amanda Nolen, Community Relations Manager for Mosaic, brought a few of her staff as well as several individuals with disabilities to Mr. Romanishin's classroom. Mr. Romanishin's students paired off with a disabled individual to assist them with mixing and applying paint to their own pumpkins. All pumpkins were then put up for sale at Mosaic's Chili Feed and Pumpkin Silent Auction event last Friday the 14^th. Mr. Romanishin and his students donated over 50 pumpkins to Mosaic and helped raise a total of $300 for their program. Sophomore Shelbey Taylor was awarded a $100 visa gift card for winning first place in the contest. Please take a look at some great examples of student work including Shelbey's first place pumpkin.

Allii Augustine

Dallas Clayton

Sasha Bingaman

Shelbey Taylor

Steff Isley

Madison Hurla

Clay Oakes
In his biology class students experienced the highest form of learning, they became teachers. Their assignment was to create a story about paramecium, volvox, and euglena to teach to the 5^th Graders at Bonner Springs Elementary. Some students used a poster, others an illustrated book, and one puppet show. Mr. Oakes set up a three classroom rotation so each group could share their story with the class and rotated the 5^th graders out to use microscopes to see the unicellular organisms they heard about in the story. Students were given a note-catcher to use to collect some information about the lesson and the "wow" factor was high when were able to see it in action. This is another great example of collaboration, differentiation, and relevance to make an impact on both the high school students as well as the 5^th graders.

Student Centered...Skill Driven...Post-Secondary Minded