The Pirate Treasure
NOVEMBER 11, 2022
PRIMARY CLASSROOMS
Mrs. Storms' class put their observation skills to the test on their annual Nature Walk.
Ms. Pickett’s class had a great time dissecting pumpkins! The students identified and sorted each part of the pumpkin and talked about a pumpkin’s life cycle.
We had so much fun during Red Ribbon Week! Students dressed up and had so much fun saying No to Drugs!
Fall Fest 2022 was one for the books. Our petting zoo, face painting and duck pond were so much fun! Our whole campus participated in our school's annual nature walk to explore the changing leaves and autumn colors.
Upcoming Events
Thanksgiving Break
November 21-25 - We are grateful for all of our little Pirates
Big Kahuna Party Bus
November 29 – Cici’s Pizza for those students who sold 15 items or more.
Big Kahuna Delivery
November 30 from 9:00 am – 4:00 p.m. at the Primary Gym
BIRCH ELEMENTARY
Students and teachers participated in Red Ribbon Week. Dress up days included Neon Day (too bright for drugs), Superhero day (We have the power to be drug free), and a storybook parade where students and teachers dressed up as their favorite Storybook characters,
PTHS Leadership and Student Council are collecting letters to Santa for the Make-A-Wish organization. This year will be Macy’s final year to donate to the Make-A-Wish Foundation, and they will be donating $2 for every letter collected to commemorate their last year. We invite you to make copies of the letters attached to help us surpass last year's donation of 8,665 letters!
Attached is a letter template, but letters can be handwritten, typed, or printed on any type of paper. If you plan to send them through school mail send to Caity Rutledge at the high school by Monday, December 5, 2022, or we are happy to pick them up from your campus!
FALL BOOK FAIR - We had a record amount of families visit during our special events. Excited students shopped for new books and the kindest volunteers donated their time to help our students. Birch Elementary sold over $1500 more than the previous set book fair record.
FALL FEST 2022- Birch participated in the Fall Fest with lots of fun booths including a ghost grab, beanbag toss, photo booth, pumpkin toss, and a fun dance off!
PARKWAY ELEMENTARY
Bean seeds vs Corn seeds
Mrs. Fobell’s class did a science experiment with corn and bean seeds. They were trying to figure out which seeds grew the fastest. They all collaborated to make up a hypothesis on which one that would be. They all picked the corn seed. Their hypothesis was correct!! Also the coolest thing was that the corn seed also grew 10 inches long!
El Día de Muertos
Last Wednesday on November 2nd, Mrs. Muñiz’s class celebrated El Día de Muertos or The Day of the Dead. They made posters, ate pan de muerto, and played lotería. Mrs. Smith and Mrs. Keoun joined in on the fun as well. The students shared their ofrenda about their loved ones who had passed away. An ofrenda is the offering placed in a home altar. Afterwards, they listened to a book about Día de muertos.
November Pirates of the Month
1st LA'NYCE HOGAN- SNEED
2nd MIA MARTINEZ- ROSEN
3rd ZACHARY GARCIA- RICHARDSON
4th BRAEDEN COOK- TOAL
MIDDLE SCHOOL
Pine Tree Middle School awarded many students at our first 9 weeks awards ceremony last week. Watch for more information coming soon about the next award ceremony.
PTMS met their goal of winning the canned food drive once again. The title and trophy has come home to Middle School. Our campus collected over 2000 cans for the November food drive. Ms. Hicks’ 6th Graders collected the most cans to win a free breakfast. While Mrs. Wiley’s 5th grade group brought in the second highest number of canned goods. We appreciate all who helped our campus win our goal of helping others in our community.
Our students also had a great time at Fall Fest this October. We had several booths set up for students to enjoy. Our Reading Team passed out rocking tattoos at their Tattoo shop. Our Fine Arts Team played Capture the Ghost, while our Science teachers hosted Plinko for some fun candy and smiles.
Our campus enjoyed Red Ribbon Week and enjoyed dressing up like Minions and more. Pine Tree Middle school also welcomed a new book vending machine to award students with free books. We are thankful for Ms. JoJean Arnett and Mrs. Sage as they designed our machine and worked out all the details. More about our Book vending machine will be coming soon.
JUNIOR HIGH
PTJH ROBOTICS
More impressive accolades from our PTJH Rockstars! Mrs. Dalston's robotics team competed in their first competition of the season in New Diana. They placed 3rd, 7th, 14th, and 15th out of 25 teams. Great job Pirates!!
Attendance Celebration
On Friday, November 4th, we celebrated our students with outstanding attendance! The weather held off long enough for us to welcome Kona Ice and enjoy some much needed free time for our students who have put in the hard work to be at school everyday and get to class on time! Great job Pirates!
CONGRATULATIONS, MATH SCIENCE TEAM!
Math/Science
Mrs. Randall’s amazing middle school and junior high Math & Science Team traveled to Atlanta, Texas on Saturday, November 5th and brought back TONS of medals! Pine Tree won 43 individual medals and the 1st place trophy.
Number Sense 7th Grade Division:
2nd place, Raiden Gaw
3rd place, Gabriel Cabudoy
4th place, Josiel Hernandez
5th place, Alex Rios
Number Sense 8th Grade Division:
1st place, Alex Chen
2nd place, Mae Shen
3rd place, Ashlyn Dunn
4th place, Clark Medin
Calculator 7th Grade Division:
1st place, Amy Orona
4th place, Mauro Gonzalez
Calculator 8th Grade Division:
1st place, Alex Chen
2nd place, Morgan Rue
3rd place, Clark Medin
5th place, Ashlyn Dunn
Math 7th Grade Division:
2nd place, Gabriel Cabudoy
5th place, Zachary Lee
Math 8th Grade Division:
1st place, Alex Chen
2nd place, Mae Shen
3rd place, Clark Medin
4th place, Ashlyn Dunn
Science 6th Grade Division:
2nd place, Aubrey Klein
3rd place, Devlin Foster
4th place, Landon Warner
5th place, Josie Cunningham
Science 7th Grade Division:
2nd place, Gabriel Cabudoy
3rd place, Raiden Gaw
5th place, Zachary Lee
Science 8th Grade Division:
1st place, Alex Chen
2nd place, Morgan Rue
5th place, Will Jordan
Regional Choir
Congratulations to our Texas Music Educators Association (TMEA) Region Four choir members: Bailey DeHart, Lailah Rosemond, Emma Beekman, Lexie Cowan, Amelia Jennings, and Daxin Light. These students performed on November 5th at Sulphur Springs High School and did a fantastic job!
Emma Beekman, Bailey DeHart and Lexie Cowan had the opportunity to work with Mark Burrows who was also the composer of one of their pieces. The top three chairs in each part were selected to sing a special small group during the performance.
HIGH SCHOOL
November 4th was Senior Night. Prior to the game, 84 seniors were recognized for their efforts over four years in football, football training, band, color guard, drill team, cheerleading, BUCS, culinary, yearbook and stadium audio visual. Each senior and their escorts were introduced and given the chance to walk on the field in front of the home crowd and be acknowledged.
Also, before the game, three students, all seniors, who have attained high academic honors, were recognized with their parents. Noah Sims, Grant Beakley and Asyiah Bray were all introduced and honored for high scholastic achievements. Sims is the only East Texas student to attain a semi-finalist ranking for the National Merit Scholarship, while Beakley and Bray are both commended students in the same area. This is a very high honor and one that is not given but to a select few students across the nation. All of the students and their parents were thanked by Superintendent Steve Clugston and High School Principal Dr. Cleo Wadley and given a plaque.
With marching season over, band is now into concert season and color guard is now preparing for winter competitions. Also, these organizations plus Precision, Cheer and BUCS will be marching in Christmas parades in December.
Precision is now getting ready for winter competitions and so is Cheer. Cheer will enlist the help of the BUCS to wave flags during its performance in January in Fort Worth.
With football over, that means basketball comes to the forefront. Boys and girls have begun scrimmages and will tip off the regular season this week in grand style. Both teams are forecast to do very well this year, bringing excitement to PT and its student body. Soccer is also on the horizon, and Coaches Jose Rocha and Chris Yoder feel both the boys and girls teams for soccer will be near or at the top of the district standings this year. Also, Cody Ellis and Roderick Portley are beginning Powerlifting practice on November 28, and they will begin meets just after the first of the year as well.
UIL Academics is heavy into the fall schedule and will then take a short break before getting into an even heavier spring schedule. Pine Tree will host a UIL academic meet on January 14, one of the biggest in the eastern half of the state.
Wayne Gaddis and Lee Branson headed to McAllen this week to accept the TAEA District of Distinction award for the Pine Tree High School art program. Gaddis and all art teachers at PTISD were honored earlier this fall for their work and their curriculum of excellence.
Danielle Warren has the choirs warming up their pipes for the annual Christmas Concert at Trinity Episcopal Church on Tuesday, December 6 at 7 p.m. This is annually one of the best concerts in the Longview area, and the church is always packed to hear our excellent choir and talented accompanists.
The Band is making plans for its annual Christmas concert. Dates and times are still being planned as the group is beginning rehearsals for the event now.
Precision will present Christmas Extravaganza in the Pine Tree Theatre. Watch for additional information on that event.
Besides all of these things, students are attending classes and have just completed the first three weeks of the second nine weeks. Classes are going well and students are heading toward the end of the first semester and exams right before Christmas. The work is hard and the schedules are tight for a lot of students as they balance school, extracurricular activities and jobs or duties to watch younger brothers and sisters, but the atmosphere around school is good and everyone is diligently working toward successful goals in the classroom.
Have a happy holiday season, and be aware of the high school activities so you can see our talented students perform on stage or on the basketball court or soccer field over the next month.
EXCEL
ExCEL would like to acknowledge the Student of the Month for October, Juan Garcia. Juan is a repeat Student of the Month as he also received the award in the 2021-2022 school year.
Juan is a junior but came to ExCEL as a sophomore. Juan has remained focused on his desire to graduate early and enter the workforce and go to college. Last year he earned 10 credits towards that goal. This year he has already earned 4 credits since August.
Juan says he wants to be able to help his family financially as soon as he graduates but he doesn't want to pass up further educating himself. When it comes to hobbies he admits he has many but what he likes the most is playing soccer. While in Mexico he played soccer but once he came to Texas he says the opportunity to play for a team didn't open up for him.
When asked about his values, Juan credits his parents with teaching him to always be honest and be responsible. He says they taught him that every action has a reaction. Staff at ExCEL describe him as being a hard worker who is dedicated and motivated. Congratulations to Juan and may he stay on the path to success!
PACE ALTERNATIVE CAMPUS
Pine Tree PACE students and staff along with Central Office staff participated in the Stuff A Bus Event. The final count was 430! Thank you to the Health Science students for counting and to the Longview Dream Center for transporting the cans!
Mrs. Stark loves teaching PACE Elementary students in the PACE Promise Garden. Time in the garden provides the opportunity for character building, social skills, and allows the students to develop pride in their abilities.
UIL
The PTHS UIL academics team will compete in the Whitehouse Fall Invitational November 12th. This will be the final competition of the fall season before teams continue their weekly after-school practices in preparation for Pine Tree’s annual meet on January 13/14. Parents should be on the lookout for ways they can volunteer for the meet.
Individual competitors are diligently tracking their own progress and have already marked success. The Literary Criticism team placed first in the Lindale Fall Invitational. Ready Writing team members have earned first place at both the Lindale and Carthage meets, hoping to continue the momentum. The Science team kicked off their season in great stride at their first meet with sophomore Cread Ray netting the Top Biology score and senior Noah Sims netting the Top Chemistry and Top Physics scores.
The UIL team will end the fall with letter jacket fittings and a Christmas social.