What was one of your favorite assignments from this year?

Matthew: I have always wanted to learn how to create my own website and for an English assignment I got to create one that described my family’s recent trip to Europe.

Abby: I really enjoyed reading The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald and Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston for Advance Placement English.

What is something that you learned this year that you will never forget?

Matthew: I’ll never forget learning about the Stock Market in Economics.

Stephen: I learned a very personal lesson. The most important thing is not getting a perfect score on every assignment. The most important thing is giving my best effort towards each assignment.

What is something you will do during the summer break?

Abby: I am going to America to visit universities and get a summer job so that I can earn money and save it for college.

Stephen: I am also going to America. I will spend two weeks at Harding University’s Honors Symposium which will help prepare me for university life.

In what area do you feel you made your biggest improvements?

Aidan: I worked hard on improving my daily attitude and showing more respect towards others.

Stephen: Over the past semester, I have brought up my English grade by over 20 points!

Summarize your year at VVA with one word.

Aidan: Endurance

Matthew: Perseverance

Stephen: Joy

~ Julie Reagan

We have learned so much this year in the 6th grade and we are learning and creating right up to our last day! For our final project of the year, the students are creating their own “Choose Your Own Adventure” stories. In these stories, when you get to the end of the first page, you get decide what path you choose next, and throughout the whole story, the reader is the one making the choices! The boys have had a lot of fun using their creativity to write these stories, and it’s been a great cumulative project! We’re using so much of what we learned this year. They’re using story structures, elements of fiction, grammar, spelling, revising and editing all in one big project! Hopefully this project will not only teach them about literature and writing, but will also remind them that they have the ability to make choices in their own life, they can choose the paths that they take! They’ll publish these projects in book form and on computers so that they can send them to their friends and families to read.

~ Sarah Wheeler

This was the response of my class when I explained that the school year is almost over.

It is hard to believe that this school year is already coming to an end. What an amazing year it has been! Students who came to preschool as classmates now come as friends, one class became two and broken English has turned into questions, comments and stories. Here are a few of their favorite things from this year: getting to be the classroom helper, reading stories, writing and drawing in their personal journals, “letter races,” celebrating Birthdays, playing with their friends, learning about the human body, learning about insects, music Wednesdays, and their current favorite, playing baseball! When I asked them what they liked about school, these were a few of the responses. Leon: “I like the Imagination Center.” RaeAn: “I liked making fun birds. And making the plants!” Romeo: “Play futbol with so many people!” It has been so much fun to watch these children grow and learn throughout the year and I am so honored to call them my students!

~ Mary Clayton

When I look back on this school year, and think of all that our students have studied, learned, and done, I can truly say that God has been in it all. One of our goals at VVA is for God to be central to all that we say and do, but sometimes that just happens without even realizing it. When I see the older students at recess playing with the preschoolers and pushing them on the swings, God is in those kind friendships no matter their age. When we study about plants, animals, stars and our amazing bodies, we can see that God is in all of those things-showing us what an amazing Creator He is. In Math class I have been amazed at the concepts that the students have learned and the games they enjoy playing as I clearly see that God gives them wonderful minds to absorb all that information. When our students write creative stories or even struggle through hard spelling words or reading lessons, God is there to give them imagination and perseverance. As we learn about other cultures around the world, we see that it’s God that cares for each person in the whole wide world. During our chapel times when we sing songs of praise to God, He is smiling down on us as a loving Father to His children. As the teachers and staff meet to pray and plan activities and lessons for the students, God has given us strength for each day.

It’s the end of the school year, and my heart is thankful for God’s faithfulness and presence through it all!

~ Love, Mrs. Andrea

If you stopped by VVA on a Tuesday or Thursday afternoon, you might be surprised at the various sorts of creative art projects the high-school student are working on under the direction of Art Teacher (and Preschool Teacher) Miss Mary. Their first major project was drawing self portraits using only pencils. Ninth grader Aidan Miller explains, “we started by dividing a printed photo of ourselves into a grid. Then we drew a another grid on white paper. We completed the self portraits by shading each grid box on the white paper to match the corresponding grid box on the printed photo. I really enjoyed the slow and steady pace of this project. It was extremely fulfilling when we completed each square and finally saw the end result.” Currently, the students are working on stop-motion projects. Ninth grader Matthew Crowson explains, “First, we wrote a story. Then, we broke that story down into small scenes and then into smaller individual movements to photograph. Using drawings, legos, and digital images from a video game, we created over 2,000 individual pictures. These pictures will be loaded into a stop-motion computer program which will rapidly combine the pictures into a movie.” ~ Julie Reagan

In our Preschool 1 class we have teacher-facilitated playtime. Playing allows children to develop oral language and oral language comprehension. It also provides children with an opportunity to use symbolic thinking and problem-solving skills. During play, children use props to symbolize experiences and create their imaginary world. Play is also a time for them to learn to relate to peers and work together. Recently the children played “restaurant”. They took turns taking orders, cooking and then serving. While some cooked and served, the others sat together at a table pretending to share a meal. Although I facilitated the playtime, I chose to observe them playing rather than joining in. This gave me an opportunity to watch them cooperating and sharing as well as talking to one another. The servers also pretended to write as they took orders from those at the table. As I observed, I could see the value of play as an important tool for learning.

~ Mrs. Christine

In 6th grade history, we’ve learned about a lot of interesting people. We’ve talked about the important things they’ve done and how they’ve shaped our world’s history. However, it’s hard to really understand a person when you just look at one part of their life, so this week we’ve decided to dig a little deeper into the people that we’re studying. We just finished learning about the Great Depression that occurred in the 1930’s in the US, and this week we’re learning about the two presidents who were in office during that time, Herbert Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt. We’re researching in books and on the Internet, trying to find as much information as we can to give us full pictures of their lives. Asher says, “Learning all this new information about the presidents helps us know more about what they were like, and that helps us know why they did what they did as presidents.” We’ve combined our English and History classes together into one class this week, so that we can use what we’re learning in History class to write biographies about the presidents in English class. It’s been fun to use what we’re learning in two separate subjects for one big project!

~ Sarah Wheeler

This month in Science our big project was to do an animal report. We studied vertebrates (animals with backbones) and invertebrates (animals without backbones). The students each chose a vertebrate animal that they were interested in. It was a long project that involved many steps. First, they spent time researching different books and websites to find information. Then they wrote down notes about different aspects of the animals of the animal’s life and habitat as well as interesting facts. Next, they compiled their notes, wrote a rough draft and then wrote a final draft. The last thing they did was to draw a picture. The reports were orally presented at our school Open House and they did a great job! Here’s what they have to say about this process: Kethia said, “I liked learning about what tigers eat and how they survive. It was interesting to learn that orange tigers have yellow eyes and white tigers have blue eyes. The hardest part of the report was learning how to take notes and combine them into a report. Anna Marie was excited about this report because, “I really like birds and wanted to learn about a new bird. I chose hummingbirds because they are SO colorful. I didn’t know that they can flap their wings over 70 times a second and that they can fly backwards! The hardest part of this report for me was doing neat handwriting for the final writing.” We are so blessed to be able to learn more about God’s amazing creatures! Always learning together.

~ Mrs. Andrea

Each school day begins with a short (15 minute) Bible class.  The High School (9th – 12th Grade) and Middle School (6th – 8th Grade) meet together on the school’s back porch and read the Bible.  Stephen Crowson explains the class routine, “Each morning we read 5 verses from Proverbs and then we read a chapter of another book of the Bible.  So far, we have read the entire books of Daniel, Esther, and Joshua.  Now we are in Judges and we hope to also read through the book of Ruth before the end of school.” After reading a section of verses, the students restate those verses in their own words, and apply the verses to their everyday lives.

“I’ve enjoyed reading Proverbs.  The book emphasizes that a wise person accepts correction and discipline, and that a wise person always, always tells the truth,” said Aidan Miller.  Asher Miller added, “I really liked the book of Joshua! It tells the story of the Israelites fighting and winning battles to conquer the Promised Land as the Lord had commanded.  It’s a book about obedience and victory.”

~ Julie Reagan