Celebrating success in W. Chicago Dist. 33
Three students representing West Chicago Middle School recently won highest honors in this year's WordMasters Challenge - a national language arts competition entered by approximately 220,000 students annually, which consists of three separate competitions held at intervals during the school year.
Competing in the very difficult Gold Division, eighth-graders Michelle Franch and Matt Pietura and seventh-grader Cristal Quinones all earned perfect scores in the contest.
In the entire country, only 237 eighth-graders earned perfect scores at this level.
Other students that earned outstanding results in the competition were Marissa Borchering, Vicky Cantu, Jacqueline Fabiszak, Mae Elizabeth Gimre, Yesenia Gonzalez, Bryce Knight, Nayeli Lara, Keelyn O'Brien, Alexis Ortiz, Rachel Rahman, and Emily Robinson. Pat Pentek, Gifted and Talented Education teacher, is the coordinator for this program.
The WordMasters Challenge is an exercise in critical thinking, encouraging students to become familiar with a set of interesting new words (considerably more difficult than grade level) and then challenges them to use those words to complete analogies expressing various kinds of logical relationships. Working to solve the Challenge analogies helps students learn to think both analytically and metaphorically. Though most vocabulary-boosting and analogy-solving activities have been created for high school students, the WordMasters materials have been specifically designed for younger students, in grades three through eight.
For more information on this program, contact Mrs. Pat Pentek, Gifted and Talented Education teacher, at pentekp@wego33.org.