Jason Arndt, jarndt@shawanoleader.com
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Leader Photo by Jason Arndt Teacher John Tierney instructs students during the Messin’ with Clay class Wednesday at Shawano Community High School.
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Leader Photo by Jason Arndt Wyatt Braun, left, and Elliott Lowney work on a project using a drill press during the Tool Time class Wednesday at Shawano Community High School.
Summer school classes in the Shawano School District encourage students’ creativity to help avoid the dreaded “summer slide.”
Experts agree that children who read and stay involved in educational opportunities during the summer gain skills, while those who do not often slide backward.
Several unique summer school classes help students maintain their edge over the three-month break from classes.
“The summer slide slows down a little and their brain doesn’t shut off for two months,” said Curt Angeli, summer school principal at Shawano Community High School. “They get a chance to be creative.”
The high school hosts 500 students from third to eighth grade during summer school, which lasts until July 18. Jessie Hanssen is summer school principal at Hillcrest Primary School, which hosts the younger students.
At SCHS, mythology is one of the newest additions to the summer term.
“It was a way to expose students to some of the newer literature,” Angeli said. “It is a good class for students to learn about mythology while enriching their reading.”
The mythology students, for example, are reading “Sea of Monsters,” written by fantasy-adventure novelist Rick Riordan. It is the second novel in the “Percy Jackson & the Olympians” series. The books chronicle the life of Percy, a seventh-grader as he explores magic and overcomes mythological monsters.
In Messin’ with Clay, students tap their creativity to make pottery and other ceramic crafts.
Angeli said summer school puts an emphasis on unique courses to expose students to diverse interests.
“You are getting an opportunity to learn something that is not usually available before,” Angeli said. “There are so many choices this year, and I had one kid tell me they want all of the classes.”
The summer curriculum also include classes that encourage physical activity, including a walking club.
“We do have kids that come in here to take gym classes to stay active,” Angeli said.
Dancersize, which combines dance and exercise, also is among the more popular classes this summer. Stephanie Glaser, 2008 SCHS graduate who is an eighth-grade language arts teacher in the Marinette School District, is the teacher.
“Dance is something that I really love, and this is a really great program and I want to be a part of it,” Glaser said. “When I was in summer school I was in a Dancersize class. … This is not something that they have in Marinette.”
Some of the other classes students are exploring over the next several weeks include scrapbooking, sewing and cooking, video game creation and digital imagery classes, and Tool Time, a woodworking class. Basic math and reading courses are also available.
Angeli notices a difference when students attending summer school return in the fall.
“It really helps when they come back in September because these students are not sitting at home for two months,” he said.