vp04.04.13

PRESSKIDS
®
6 Bridgewater Road
Grandview Farms Equestrian Center
280 South Road, Harwinton CT 06791
Under new ownership
MOORELAND HILL SCHOOL
Strong Academics - Inspiring Arts - Competitive Athletics
Small Class Sizes - Advisor Program
OPEN HOUSE
Friday, April 5 at 9-11 am
Join us for refreshments
and conversation with
administrators, faculty
and current families.
The Goddard Schools ® are operated by independent franchisees under a license agreement with Goddard Systems, Inc. Programs and ages may vary.
Goddard Systems, Inc. program is AdvancED accredited. © Goddard Systems Inc. 2013
Mooreland Hill School is an independent, co-educational, non denominational
day school for grades Kindergarten through 9.
Located in central Connecticut, minutes away from Hartford.
166 Lincoln Street, Kensington, CT 06037
Mooreland Hill admits students of every race, color, creed, ethnic and national origin.
14 The Valley Press April 4, 2013
Summer weekly riding programs
June-August • 9am- 1pm or extended day 9am-5pm
English riding and horsemanship beginner to advanced(Trail Blazer)
Call for more information 860-485-0079
or www.grandviewfarms-ct.com
Dressage, Eventing, Hunter/Jumpers, Vaulting, Western,
Leasing, Training, Boarding and Pony Parties
Kindly RSVP
860.223.6428
or online at
www.mooreland.org
Students’ drawings published in School Arts
By Jennifer Senofonte
Staff Writer
Katie Ransom’s fifth-grade art
students used their artistic talent
to enhance a social studies lesson
about the Colonial era.
e young artists did narrative
drawings that were later published
in a national art magazine
along with an article written by
Ransom explaining the process.
Ransom has been an art
teacher at Kelly Lane Intermediate
School in Granby since 2006 and,
three years ago, a social studies
field trip to Sturbridge Village
sparked an idea to carry the subject
of Colonial times across disciplines.
“I wanted to come up with a
project that incorporated Colonial
culture and Colonial art,” she explained.
She used local Colonial architecture
like the Abijah Rowe
House, c. 1732, to teach the students
about different features of
the architecture of Colonial times.
e students also discussed Native
American architecture like wigwams
and how the features were
a product of the culture of the time
period.
e process, which took
about three months to create the
HJMS team takes second place at Mathcounts
By Jennifer Senofonte
Staff Writer
Two local middle school mathletes
teams prevailed at this year’s
MATHCOUNTS state competition.
Henry James Memorial
School of Simsbury won second
place overall for the team competition
and King Philip Middle
School of West Hartford came in
third place.
Twenty-six teams from
around the state competed at the
MATHCOUNTS state competition
March 9 at the University of Hartford
in three different rounds.
e first round was a spring
round where individual students
competed without using calculators.
e next round was the target
round, also an individual competition
but with calculators. e last
round was the team round where
teams of four students worked together.
e results from the three
rounds contributed to the overall
rankings.
“en there’s a countdown
round with the top 16 individuals,”
explained Henry James coach and
math teacher Paul Smith. “We had
two that made the top 16 and one
of them came in fourth place in the
countdown round, which is like a
head-to-head bracket like March
Madness.” A total of 176 individuals
competed.
One of the student’s drawings that was featured in School Arts, a national
art magazine. This drawing is by Lindsay Browning. Courtesy photo
ending product, included choosing
a house on which the young
artists would focus.
ey then made two Styrofoam
block prints, which were
added to a bigger landscape scene,
incorporating colonial landscape
design elements.
“It really helped them to
process what they learned in social
studies and at Sturbridge Village,”
Ransom said.
She wrote the article and sent
in 10 photos of different students’
From left to right are Coach Paul Smith, Hali Cai, William Shaw, Carson Drew,
Akash Kaza, Thomas Vasko MATHCOUNTS representive. Courtesy photo
Henry James has been competing
since the start of MATH-
COUNTS in Connecticut in the
mid-1980s and Smith has been the
coach of the team since 1997.
He said five of the 18 students
who practice after school participated
in the state competition this
year. e group as a whole practices
once a week after school
using the MATHCOUNTS problems,
which develop problem-solving
skills that go beyond the
middle school grade level math
curriculum.
“We worked really hard after
the chapter [qualifying competition
in February] and it was great
for the kids to be able to finish sec-
projects to School Arts, a nationally
published magazine for art
teachers. “It’s the best of the art education
publications,” she said.
e magazine chose work
from three students: Anna Wilson,
Abby Phillips and Lindsay Browning,
and it was published two years
later. Anna and Abby, now in
eighth grade, attended a recent
Board of Education meeting with
Ransom to discuss and share the
Colonial villages project and the
magazine.
ond in the state, especially competing
against both public and private
schools,” Smith said.
e Henry James MATH-
COUNTS team included the following
students: Hali Cai, grade
seven; William Shaw, grade eight;
Carson Drew, grade eight;
AkashKaza, grade eight; and Ryan
Chen, grade eight.
e competition is organized
by the Connecticut Society of Professional
Engineers, hosted by the
University of Hartford and sponsored
by engineering firms, businesses,
educational institutions
and individuals throughout the
state, as stated in a press release
from the university.