One School Takes Their Service-learning Project a Step Further

Oh, the places that the internet can take one!

Our SCORES team at Knapp Elementary decided to do some internet research for their service-learning project. They discovered a library in Zambia, Africa called the Kala Peace Library that was requesting donations. The goal of the Kala Peace Library is to increase literacy and educational opportunity in the Kala Refugee Camp by providing the only access to educational and informational materials.

The team at Knapp implemented a penny campaign at their school and ecouraged their fellow classmates to bring their pennies in to help out the cause. The result...they raised over $1,000 in pennies!!! As a team they made the donation online to the library and wrote letters to the people who use the library and sent the letters to the library's manager. Congratulations to Knapp on their outstanding effort!!!

A community is a group that helps one another and they work together. More over I think about my team, America SCORES Denver, and how we use our leadership, committment, and teamwork to support one another.
~ Andrea O.

A community is when you are part of something like America SCORES Denver. A community is like a neighborhood. A community is when you have a little group helping people. A community is sharing with friends. A community helps your hood.
~ Jose V

A community is a group of people that work together and are nice to each other. A community is also people that work with one another, never fight, and are not rude to each other. They never say bad words to each other and respect others, so that others will respect them.
~ Jesscia M.

I am part of a big community, there are a few adults and most of them are students. My community is called America SCORES Denver and I am lucky to be on Knapp's SCORES team because we learn about teamwork and sportsmanship. We also help other communities out like when we raised money for the Kala Peace Library.
~ Juan V.

Eagleton Team Reflection

The Eagleton Girls Team project story
Our soccer team's service-learning project was cleaning up Paco Sanchez Park. We made the park cleaner so everyone can go often to a beautiful and clean park. We walked to Paco Sanchez from our school and our coach, Ms. Gold, gave us gloves and bags. Then we picked up trash around the park and river. The next day we sorted the garbage from the recycling and put the items into the proper dumpster at our school.

In addition to cleaning up the park, the girls team took a training on visiting nursing homes through Bessie's Hope, which is an organization that works with community groups on what to expect and how to best interact with nursing home residents. When the girls visited the nursing home they brighten the hearts of the residents through their poetry and companionship. The boys team worked on planting trees around their school to offset carbon dioxide and learned about solar panels.

Clean Parks

We like to clean up the parks

That is the funnest thing to do

We help the world because we

RECYCLE

We also clean up graffiti on the playground

Let's say, if you litter you are

not helping the world

We are cleaning the Parks so

DON'T LITTER or GRAFFITI

You can help the world too

WE ARE THE PARK PROTECTORS

~ Adleana N.

Community is where you live. A community is where you take care of your neighborhood and outside of your neighborhood. For example, you can help the elderly cross the street, be respectful to others, and you can recycle and pick up trash around your house.
~ Jaime M.

A community is a neighborhood or city. A community stands together to help support each other. A community has trees, buildings, and much more. A community is a good, no great thing!
~Claudia R.

Community is where you live, your environment, the street you live on. A community is also a park, school, pool, or your neighborhood. Community is what is going on in your environment. Community can be a library or it can be the people who protect you like the police, stop sign people, and the fire department. It can be the teachers and principal since they all keep the community nice and safe for others.
~ Manuel D.

The Best Day Ever!

Sunny morning, no drizzle nor rain,

Seem to wake up feeling no pain,

So I get up and put on my clothes,

I look out my window, it's the crack of dawn

I go outside into the sunshine,

It's marvelous light was very divine!

I walk through the park,

though it is still dark,

End up on the bay,

What a wonderful day.

~ Claudia R.

Beautify Barnum

This Spring the Barnum SCORES team spent their time thinking of ways to make their community better. As a team they decided to go out into their community and pick up trash particularly at homes of elderly people who were unable to do so. They also cleaned up around their school and planted a garden.


Barnum Reflection on Community
I am part of a clean, respectful community that helps clean up graffiti and litter. The community that I am a part of is always clean and if someone throws litter on the ground or does something to make the community look bad, our SCORES team can go clean it up.
This year our SCORES team was helping our community by cleaning up litter and planting a garden in front of our school. Our service-learning project was to "Beautify Barnum" by making our school look cleaner. Our community has also helped by erasing graffiti and getting people to recycle. This is the kind of community I live in.
~ Jose G.

A community is quiet and respectful. A community is where people live and schools are with parks and kids playing. A community is where people help their neighborhood by keeping it clean and are committed to helping the community. A community is a bunch of neighbors that respect one another and respect the community.
~ Nayeli M.

My community is an amanzing place and has gotten more beautiful because we planted flowers in front or our school. This was part of "Beautify Barnum." That means Barnum is going from blue to green, that is why I am part of a community.
~ Diego B.

A community is a home, a place you feel safe in. A community is a place that is filled with people you love, your friends, neighbors and even pets. A community is a place that cares for you because a community is a place filled with love. Whenever I hear the word "community" a good pretty picture comes to mind because when I hear that word I think of home. And my home is my community where I feel loved, cared for, and safe. That's what a community is.
~ Rebecca H.

Newlon Team Reflection

Newlon Elementary's SCORES team spent the spring season learning about homelessness and what they can do to help out. Jessica Johnson from the Gathering Place gave a presentation to the students where they learned what the Gathering Place accomplishes and how the students' contribution from their food drive will be used. The Newlon team also participated in the Shout! Day of Action, where they planted trees in Loveland, Colorado and visited the Community Garden on 1st Ave and Lowell st, to help weed out plots to prepare the soil for planting.

Please enjoy some individual reflections and pictures on what Newlon accomplished through their service-learning this spring.

A community is a large group of people that get along and works as a team. My community is exactly the same but to keep it nice we did lots to help. We picked up trash on Earth Day, which felt so good to do. Yet there was still more things to be done. We needed to help the homeless so we had a food drive at my school. Still that was not enough so my soccer team went to our local garden and pulled weeds. And that warmed my heart. I enjoyed working as a team with my community. All of our hard work will soon pay off. Now my community is a better place to be in.
~ Selina S.

The community that I am part of is America SCORES because we are all a team. We help each other when we need help and we cheer each other on. Not only that but we helped the poor by holding a food drive. We also helped plant trees and cleaned up a Community Garden. This is one of the best communities I have had!
~ Julio N.

A community is a wonderful place. We first picked up trash on Earth Day to make it clean, beautiful, and strong. We are also collecting food for the homeless. Then we went to a beautiful Community Garden and pulled out all the weeds. We all worked together as a wonderful team. I think that this will help our community grow big and strong. In my opinion, the best thing in the world is helping out our community.
~ Alondra S.

A community is a big place where everybody gets along. My community and I pulled weeds and cleaned up a garden. We did it because it is nice to help out. It made me feel so good that I helped somebody out. We also are doing a food drive for the homeless. Even if we can not go and give it to them, we can still imagine what there face will look like when they receive our gift. This is just the way my community is.
~ Kayley L.

A community is a thing that makes a big difference in your life. My soccer team helped our community by having a food drive to help the poor and my whole school helped out by bringing in canned food to school! Our team then went to plant trees and we helped Mother Earth because those trees will last 1,000 years. After that my team went to a garden and picked up all the trash so the garden won't be dirty. All in all, helping the community made a big difference. ~ Ray L.

Cheltenham Team Reflection

The Cheltenham Girls Team spent the spring season learning about recycling and implementing a recycling program at their school. They had a presentation by Becky Gorton from Denver Recycling. She presented beneficial information on the importance of recycling and all the different types of items that can be recycled. The girls really enjoyed the presentation especially the slideshow. They were surprised to find out that everything comes from nature; especially that plastic comes from oil!


Below is the team's reflection on their project and some poems they wrote about recycling.

- I liked it when we worked together. It was fun! (Jasmine)
- I feel like I started a new life because I starting saving the world. (Alijah)
- I think this project is really really good because we are helping the earth. We are helping the earth by recycling and leaving good footprints. This project was really cool. The best part was when we got to work with water. (Leslie)
- I feel good about our project because we are helping the children in the future now that we did it in the past. (Jennifer)

Yes We Can
Yes we can!
We the Scorpions of Cheltenham elementary
Will tell you that our words can convince you to recycle
By telling people to recycle.
Yes We Can!

For too long our community has seen littering on the street.
It’s a problem because it destroys the earth.
Yes We Can!
If we get more people to recycle it would be a beautiful place to live in.
We are writing this letter because people don’t recycle..
Yes We Can!

For too long our community has seen trash on the street .
It makes more pollution.
Yes We Can!
It will be a beautiful place.
We are writing this letter because people don’t recycle
Yes We Can!

We will use our strength and our powers
To show the world that it can be wonderful.
Sincerely,
Athletes

I Am Green
I am green, are you?
I am green because I recycle my cans. Do you?
I am green because I recycle paper. Do you recycle paper?
I am green because I reuse things that can be used again.
Do you reuse things that can be used again?
I am green because I don’t let the water run. Do you let the water run?
I am green because I turn off the light so we could save electricity. Do you save electricity?
Do you?
I THINK GREEN!!!!!
~ Hillari

Paper
Where does paper go?
I don’t know.
When it’s all used and done
If you use it all, it will be gone.

SO if you think about it,
Take care of earth.
Make sure you recycle
If you don’t, I really care.

If you don’t recycle,
Do you know where your trash goes?
It goes to different landfills.

You should have a bin
to put your recycling stuff in.

So please recycle, people,
It’s good for the earth.
~ Jailene

Three types of injuries youth athletes face

As the years go by more doctors are treating more kids for overuse injuries, instead of the normal trama injuries that occur on the field. The increase in overuse injuries has been attributed to youth playing only one sport and training year round for it.

An article on KidsHealth.org gives more details on children sports related injuries and how to prevent them. For the full article click here.

Common Types of Sports Injuries
Three common types of sports injuries in children are acute injuries, overuse injuries, and reinjuries:

Acute Injuries
Acute injuries occur suddenly and are usually associated with some form of trauma. In younger children, acute injuries typically include minor bruises, sprains, and strains. Teen athletes are more likely to sustain more severe injuries, including broken bones and torn ligaments.

More severe acute injuries that can occur, regardless of age, include: eye injuries, including scratched corneas, detached retinas, and blood in the eye; broken bones or ligament injuries; brain injuries, including concussions, skull fractures, brain hemorrhages; and spinal cord injuries.

Acute injuries often occur because of a lack of proper equipment or the use of improper equipment. For example, without protective eyewear, eye injuries are extremely common in basketball and racquet sports. In addition, many kids playing baseball and softball have suffered broken legs or ankles from sliding into immobile bases.

Overuse Injuries
Overuse injuries occur from repetitive actions that put too much stress on the bones and muscles. Although these injuries can occur in adults as well as kids, they're more problematic in a child athlete because of the effect they may have on bone growth.

All kids who play sports can develop an overuse injury, but the likelihood increases with the amount of time a child spends on the sport.

Overuse injuries can be caused or aggravated by:
•growth spurts or an imbalance between strength and flexibility
•inadequate warm-up
•excessive activity (for example, increased intensity, duration, or frequency of playing and/or training)
•playing the same sport year-round or multiple sports during the same season
•improper technique (for example, overextending on a pitch)
•unsuitable equipment (for example, nonsupportive athletic shoes)

Reinjuries
Reinjury occurs when an athlete returns to the sport before a previous injury has sufficiently healed. Athletes are at a much greater risk for reinjury when they return to the game before recovering fully. Doing so places stress upon the injury and forces the body to compensate for the weakness, which can put the athlete at greater risk for injuring another body part.

Reinjury can be avoided by allowing an injury to completely heal. Once the doctor has approved a return to the sport, make sure that your child properly warms up and cools down before and after exercise.

Sudden exertion can also cause reinjury, so your child should re-enter the sport gradually. Explain that easing back into the game at a sensible pace is better than returning to the hospital!

Valdez Girls' Sestina poem

A sestina poem contains six six-line stanzas, where the same set of end words are used in a rolling pattern throughout the stanzas. The line pattern is below.

1 - ABCDEF
2 - FAEBDC
3 - CFDABE
4 - ECBFAD
5 - DEACFB
6 - BDFECA

Five girls from Valdez, Sheyla, Jessica, Ana, Griselda, and Angelia and their writing coach, Andrea wrote the below sestina after taking a walk around their community.

A - Ants
B - Trees
C - Clover
D - Grass
E - Murals
F - Sprinklers

I see small red ants.
Who gives us oxygen? The trees.
I like to see beautiful clovers.
Outside you see green grass.
There are beautiful murals.
To get the grass green we turn on the sprinklers.

Oh, I see sprinklers.
What's up ants!
I see a mural.
I see a big tree.
I like green grass.
I like four leaf clovers.

Always the cool things are clovers.
My yard has sprinklers.
In the park there is always grass.
The dirt has a lot of ants.
Some leaves are always on trees.
In our school there are murals.

There are beautiful murals.
Angelia loves clovers.
There were mostly big trees.
There were a lot of dirty sprinklers.
There were a bunch of red ants.
There was usually a little green grass.

The color of green is the color of grass.
I saw all kind of murals.
I hate ants.
I love clovers.
I saw sprinklers.
I hate small trees.

I saw an egret land on the trees.
He dropped an egg on the grass.
A man wearing a red shirt turned on the sprinklers.
The water poured all over our murals.
I made a necklace out of clovers.
Then I fed it to the ants.