Students stack cups, develop physical and mental dexterity
Sport Stacking. Cup Stacking. Speed Stacking. The activity
goes by many names. And it‟s popular!
Many Trumbauersville students love cup stacking. Physical
education teacher Ellen Bonk
introduced it during gym class
and students now flock to the
gym to stack during recess. Early
this week, four students started
stacking on the gym floor. Very
quickly the crowd grew to 26
students. Each grabbed a stack of
colorful cups and set up on the
floor to join Bonk in stacking in
various maneuvers. They upstacked and downstacked with
varying speeds. Some students
struggled to make smooth movements but no one expressed frustration. They just kept trying.
“It teaches perseverance,” Bonk said. “It teaches patterning,
sequencing, ambidexterity, eye-hand coordination, focus. It
helps bilateral brain development.”
Sport stacking originated in the early 1980‟s in southern California and received national attention in 1990 on a segment of
the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. Elementary teacher Bob
Fox watched that show at home in Colorado and was hooked.
He founded Speed Stacks and promoted the activity across the
country to phys ed teachers. He and others have developed
more than 70 fitness based activities.
The Sport Stacking website claims that students who sport stack
on a regular basis have shown increases in test scores and levels of
concentration. When students sport stack they are crossing the midline of their bodies and developing new connections in their
brains. These
new connections
help to spur
brain growth
which in turn
promotes greater
academic
achievement.
The World
Sport Stacking
Association
(WSSA) holds a world championship every spring in Denver, Colorado. It draws stackers from 8 countries and at least 34 states. Kids
can set world records for speed.
Cassidy, one of the more agile stackers in the Trumbauersville
gym, said she feels “powerful” when the cups stack smoothly. She
and her dad bought a set of cups at Target. “A video comes with it.
That‟s how I learned to do it a couple years ago,” she said. “I‟ve
learned a lot of eye-hand coordination and I‟ve learned to be gentle.
It‟s very fun. It helps with lots of things, including learning to never
give up.”
Sixth Grade Picnic
Seventh and eighth graders organized games,
staff members supervised and Principal Derek
Peiffer grilled hamburgers in the rain ... all to
make sure sixth graders know they are welcome members of the Milford Middle School
family.
Let’s get organized for success!
Is your email inbox overflowing? Are your desktops
(computer and furniture) out of control? Do you feel overwhelmed because you just can‟t get organized?
Beginning today, the QCommuniqué will run a periodic
feature with tips about getting organized. We can teach our
students to be organized, which will help their success. The
tips can help families who read the QC.
Organization takes daily effort. Some people are natural
organizers. Others (including this writer) need help. So far,
research has shown that we need to set up a system – either a
“box” or “file” in which to put each item BEFORE we receive
it. And we need a way to remember WHERE we put the
items!
If you have a suggestion about how to organize something, please send an email to [email protected].
Let‟s start with that overflowing inbox. Technology Director Tom Murray has one of the emptiest inboxes in the district. (QCHS teacher Steve Kimball has the other!) Yet Tom
receives hundreds of emails a day and he responds to all of
them. Here are his tips to keeping up with email.
*Think of your inbox as a „to-do‟ list. Sort the rest by organizing messages into folders. Make your folders work for
you!
*Keep your inbox smaller than one screen length. Whoever
responds to an email on page 4 of the inbox anyway?
*Reduce unwanted email by utilizing junk filters.
*Institute the 24 hour rule. Respond to emails within 24
hours, even if it‟s an “I‟ll get back to you.”
* Keep colleagues productive. Only utilize the „reply all‟
when necessary, and keep emails relevant!
Field trip: QCHS captains learn
from psychologist about leadership
by Graham Fox, QCHS Senior
On Thursday September 22, six QCHS students attended a symposium for leadership and sports psychology for high school athletes at DeSales University. Athletic Director Sylvia Kalazs took
along team captains Monica Bickford, Megan Renn, Lindsay Tennis, Austin Sobota, Graham Fox, and Jake Barlow. They conversed
with student athletes from other schools surrounding the Bucks
County area.
Each team leader shared a personal leadership moment, a time in
which they found themselves disagreeing with another leader, and
what they believed to be their strongest quality as a leader. Additionally, the student-athletes watched a presentation by Dr. Jarrod
Spencer, a sports psychologist best known for his creation of a T.V.
show called The Mind of an Athlete, about the Five Hurdles of
sports. He talked about leaders and the impact of followers.
When asked if they would recommend the trip to future leaders,
it was a unanimous thumbs up from all the QCHS students.
QCSD-TV
Watch student-produced videos on Comcast 968
and Verizon 34. You can also watch them at
www.qcsd.org, under Get Your News Here.
Social Studies teacher Kevin Laboski helps a student at the
Freshman Center, where students recently received their netbooks.