Page 1

Hatboro-Horsham School District

December 2012

Volume 1, Issue 3

The Simmons Star

Upcoming

Events

Winter break: De-

cember 24– January

1; School resumes

January 2, 2013!

Discovery time sign

up January 8,9 and

10th in Simmons’

cafeteria.

By: Tristan Farnell and Ben

Nesbitt

Photo By: Parker Farnell, Tyler

Warren and Christopher Varallo

On December 12th from

6:30-8:30 pm, Simmons spon-

sored a spirit night at Barnes

and Noble Bookstore. At the

kids zone they had a table

where you could make a book-

mark. There was also an awe-

some scavenger hunt. The

kids were given a list of a few

items to find around the store.

The winners of the scavenger

hunt were Christian P., Anya

R. and Taylor H. Also, there

was a raffle. The prize of the raffle

was a Nook. The winners of the

raffle were Alex and Christina

Bender. The classes who won an

ice cream party for having the most

attendance of the evening

were Miss Aloan, Mrs. Bar-

onett and Mrs. Hower.

There were also teachers

who volunteered to read to

kids. Two of the teacher

readers were Mrs. Ehling

who read The Mitten and

Mrs. Hower who read poems

from Something Big Has

Been Here. The best part of

the evening was that you

could buy awesome books

with great deals. That was

the great spirit night at Bar-

nes and Noble.

Barnes and Noble Spirit Night

Mrs. Hower sharing poetry with the

kids.

Story & Photos by: Caitlin Brown, Sarah

Lessig, Jordan Brown and Nicole Rausa

Everybody should have a waste-free

lunch! Waste-free lunches started at

Simmons in October, but never caught

on. Waste-free Wednesdays is how it

all started.

You should reuse, it’s important and

easy. Here are a few tips… Instead of

napkins you could use a cloth. Instead

of a plastic bottle you could pack a re-

usable one. Instead of plastic baggies

you could use a small container.

People should not buy premade

food items. Tell your parents to pack

what you will eat at lunch. Humans are

starting to get lazy. Kids will just throw

everything away because they don’t

know that trash becomes landfills and

that someday it might end up in their

backyard.

You should bring a lunch bag be-

cause if you take good care of it, it

might last a few years. If you use a pa-

per bag, you throw it away after just one

use. It would be better if your family

buys just one item instead of buying a

pack of paper bags every month.

If you see someone about to throw

away, for example, a half eaten

salad, go up to them and tell them

one of two things. Tell them to either

dump out what was in it and reuse the

container, or tell them if they have a

plastic container to just simply toss it

in the recycling cans which are lo-

cated around the cafeteria.

Everybody needs to recycle! It’s so

important to recycle, or else the world

will be filled with trash. Landfills don’t

get smaller they get larger. If we keep

throwing things away there won’t be

an outside or any parks left for play-

ing!

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle Time

Recycling during lunch time!

Americans throw away enough office writing paper

to build a wall 12 feet high, stretching from LA to

NYC!

5 recycled plastic bottles makes enough fiberfill to

stuff a ski jacket!

Every Sunday the US wastes nearly 90% of the

recyclable newspaper. This wastes nearly 500,000

trees!

Page 2

By: Kailey Abraham and Maggie O’Neill

Wreck-It-Ralph was a Walt Disney

Studio Production by Rich Moore

(director). It got a four star rating and

was the #1 comedy in America for

three weeks in a row.

Ralph is tired of being the bad

guy and he is tired of being over-

shadowed by Fix-it-Felix Jr., star of

the game who always gets to save the

day. After decades, he is tired of play-

ing the role of the bad guy. He takes

matters into his own massive hands

and sets off on a game –jumping jour-

ney across the arcade. He’s trying to

prove he’s got what it takes to be a

good guy. You can see the rest of the

movie in theaters. That’s our sneak

peek on Wreck-it-Ralph.

Movie Review: Wreck-It Ralph

The Amazing Shekkie

Rocks, Rocks Everywhere are sedimentary, conglomerate, sand

stone and shale.

The most popular rock in third grade

is obsidian because it is shiny and black.

The least common rock in third grade is

sedimentary rock because all of them

look alike and there are a lot of layers.

At the end of the video conference,

six or seven third graders went up to the

camera and got to ask questions. One

pupil asked, “What is the shiniest rock?”

The answer is diamond. Another ques-

tion was “How thick can a rock be?” The

answer is six feet thick.

What type of rock do you like?

The third grade is learning about

rocks. They engaged in a video con-

ference with a man named Mr. McKay

from Carnegie Mellon. Mr. McKay

showed the third grade kids about the

different types of rocks. He also

showed cards with the different

names of the rocks and their descrip-

tions.

Do you know what a rock is? A

rock is a naturally occurring solid con-

sisting of minerals. Here are some

types of rocks: sandstone, sedimen-

tary, quarts, pumice, lime stone, ba-

salt, granite, plus many more. The

most popular rocks in Pennsylvania

By: Jill Halpern, Noah Gremo, and

Bridget Morina

Photo By: Meghan Harnett and Carly

Valen

Reading to The Amazing Shekkie

their quotes. First, Paige said, “It is nice

to read to Shekkie all the time.” Next,

Alexandra said, “He helps you be a bet-

ter reader.” Then, Sonia said, “He is

funny when we cheer the word wall

words.” After that, Justin said, “He was

a CCI dog so he knows how to do a lot

of tricks.” Then Ava said, “When Shek-

kie comes here, he makes me very

happy.” Last but not least, Danielle said,

“I like when he shares at morning meet-

ing.”

Shekkie is one of the best dogs in

the whole entire world! If you see him,

you should be glad that he is here in

this school. If you are in kindergarten or

first grade, maybe you will have Mrs.

DiPasquale as a teacher with Shekkie in

your classroom.

and his birthday is March 26th. The pur-

pose of Shekkie being at Simmons is

that he is a reading therapy dog.

We decided to get some quotes

from kids about why they like Shekkie

coming in. In Mrs. DiPasquale’s class

the following students wanted to share

By: Madison Tocci, Stephanie Mao and

Ava Basile

Photo By: Ben Kollmar and Madison

Hayek

We decided to write about Shek-

kie, a dog, who Mrs. DiPasquale

brings in to school every Friday.

Shekkie was supposed to be an as-

sistance dog to help people with

physical disabilities. Mrs. DiPasquale

raised him for this purpose. Shekkie

was released by the program and is

back living with Mrs. DiPasquale.

Now, he is a Therapy Dog. He stays

at Simmons all day and the kids read

to him.

Shekkie is a yellow Labrador Re-

triever. Right now he is four years old

Third graders observing rocks.

Page 3

By: Sophia Rosciolli and Veronica

Zhang

Do you celebrate Hanukkah? Ha-

nukkah is a holiday that Jewish peo-

ple celebrate.

Hanukah took place over 2,300

years ago in the land of Judea,

which is now Israel. It started be-

cause the Jewish Temple was

seized by the Syrian- Greek soldiers

and dedicated to the worship of the

god, Zeus. This upset the Jewish

people, but many were afraid to fight

back for fear of revenge.

Then, in 167 B.C. the Syrian-

Greek emperor, Antiochus made the

observance of Judaism an offense

punishable by death. He also or-

dered all Jews to worship Greek

gods.

The term (Chanukah) stands for

“dedication” in Hebrew and recalls

the Maccabees rededication of the

Holy Temple in Jerusalem, after they

won the battle with the Greeks for

control over their holy site. Hanukah

started by, somebody lighting a can-

dle and it lasted for eight days. The

candles used for lighting the Hanu-

kah Menorah are supposed to burn

for at least half an hour after the

stars come out.

By: Maddy Murphy and Maggie Clark

Christmas is a holiday celebrated

on the 25th of December. Christmas

is celebrated because Christians

believe that on that day Jesus was

born.

People also have different tradi-

tions to celebrate Christmas. Read-

ing The Night Before Christmas on

Christmas Eve is one tradition fami-

lies have. Other people have family

members over for a divine dinner

before Christmas. A lot of families

listen to Christmas music and put

cookies and milk out next to their

fireplace for Santa. Kids like to go on

the internet and track Santa to see

where he is. On Christmas morning

kids open the presents Santa

brought and see that the cookies and

milk are gone.

Christmas is also called Noel,

Nativity, Yule, and Xmas. Christians

have a Christmas tree because the

branches look like your praying, and

the presents under the tree symbol-

ize the presents given to Jesus when

he was born. That is why Christmas

is celebrated!

Kwanzaa Hanukkah Christmas

By: Sara Beth Cusatis and Eliana Oden

Kwanzaa was created in 1966 by

Maulana Karenga. He created Kwan-

zaa to give African Americans a holi-

day. The name Kwanzaa is from Swa-

hili meaning first fruits of the harvest.

Simmons’ very own Mrs. Lampkin

celebrates Kwanzaa and this is what

she said about the holiday, “We have a

special candle holder called a Kinara.

There are 7 candles. Three red ones,

three green ones, and one black one.

The black one represents our culture

(African American), the red ones repre-

sent our blood, and the green ones

represent our land. My favorite part is

making the gifts. You have to either

make a gift or buy a book, nothing

else.”

There are seven days of Kwanzaa.

Here are the days and what they

mean:

Umoja (which means unity)

Kujichagulia (which means self-

determination)

Ujima (which means collective

work and responsibility)

Ujamaa (which means cooperative

economics)

Nia (which means purpose)

Kuumba (which means creativity)

Imani (which means faith)

The festive holiday of Kwanzaa

always begins on December 26th , the

day after Christmas.

“I want an itouch 5.” ~Ben Lerner

“I want a remote control airplane.”

~ Max Heurtgen

Enjoying winter parties at Simmons.

Page 4

Story and Photo by: Na Hoffmann, Alyssa

Benjamin and Anna Kruidiener

The first graders were very excited

to meet their eighth grade buddies!

When the first graders arrived they

went to the cafeteria in Keith Valley to

meet their eighth grade buddies. They

were going to play a game of Bingo.

Before the game started, the an-

nouncer announced the prizes you

could win if you won a round. Some of

the prizes were stuffed animals along

with a blanket, jar of candy and many

more.

Bingo Buddies

By: Natalie Schildt and Avery Miller

Its holiday time again… look at the graph to see what other kids want for

their holiday!

Favorite Holiday Gifts

After that, the game of Bingo

started. The first pair of buddies who

won were really surprised. The first

grader got to select the prize. Her

name was Nyla. Nyla’s buddy was

Veronica. Nyla was quoted saying, “I

really like having Veronica as a

buddy!” The announcer told all the

eighth graders and their buddies that

the game was still going on, so every-

one except for the pair who already

won, had a chance to win! Surely,

everybody was glad about that, but,

nobody left empty handed. Everyone

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

3.5

4

4.5

5

puppies other animals phones itouches other electronics

hot tubs food other

got a pencil and a tiny eraser to bring

home.

After the game ended, they said

goodbye to their buddies. Thankfully

this isn’t the last time they will see

each other, because the buddies meet

up four times a year.

It’s fun to get out once and a while

to see their buddies!

Mark your

calendars for

Literacy Night-

February 8th!

Fun for all ages,

come to celebrate

reading! Activities

will include:

Reading Relay

Races

Word Games

Flashlight Read-

ing

Reading Olym-

pics Jeopardy