Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - June 23, 2004, Winnipeg, Manitoba A6 province Winnipeg free press wednesday june 23, 2004 pupils website wins school Surprise award students workplace math project noticed by Ontario securities body by Nick Martin g Rade 9 students at Sargent Park school who put together a website on workplace math use were pretty surprised to discover that the Ontario securities commission was on their Case. Fortunately the powerful regulatory body was Only selecting the West end school from among More than 1,200 across Canada for a National award. Eight schools nationally were singled out for Money marts prizes of to shirts mugs pens school bags and widespread recognition. The students project had been posted on the schools website and the organizers of the securities commis Sion a investment education fund had spotted it said principal Fatima Mota. The word math must have attracted someone a interest Mota said. I did to really enter it. I just got a Call from these people saying wed won said Ricki Syrota the schools special education resource teacher who handled the project with 32 Stu dents As an extracurricular activity. The project involved students inter viewing a variety of workers about How they used math on the Job then creating a website and posting the interviews As text or video. Many kids do math and they never think they la use it at All Syrota said. The kids said Why Don to we go out and interview people at their work place ? she said. Sargent Park got on the phone to set up interviews then dispatched the Stu dents. I asked my friends dad a Bunch of questions said student Stephen Dun can. He takes pictures on a Mac com Puter and puts them together for Magazine and flyer advertisements and this requires Many measurements. There was a cashier a seamstress someone who worked at Silver City Heather Krygier said. Diane Bayle said the students inter viewed a firefighter who used math to measure the length of ladder needed to fight a fire. Firefighters also need math for angles the pressure of the Hose tank capacity Heather said. That surprised me said Joseph Pilapil. The students already had Learned on their own How to build a website. I Learned from my mom said Diane. I Learned from scratch Joseph added. We did to even think about winning awards ? we just wanted to do it Diane said. We just wanted to learn said Joseph. You can Check out the award win Ning website at also this year the school was one of Only 27 throughout North America to receive the exemplary Reading pro Gram award from the International Reading association. The organization of More than 80,000 Reading educators in 100 countries lauded Sargent Park for developing a Reading strategy that involved All 75 teachers and teachers aides at the school. Sargent Park teachers spent two years of in service sessions working out the Best ways to improve students Reading ability at each Grade then started putting a wide Range of Strate Gies to work. ;