Urban LegendVolume 14 Number 2 Thursday, December 18, 2014

Page 2 Christmas Time Holidays

Written By: Grafton Smith

Page 2 Winter Activities

Giant African Land Snails

Do you find unusual thing fascinating? There are many things I find interesting. Things

that a 7th grader usually wouldn’t even think about. When I was trying to think of something to write about for the Urban Legend, I asked my mom, and she suggested that I read about the giant African land snails. I had no idea about what she was talking about so I looked them up on my iPad and found them fascinating. Here is what I learned. People in Miami have been looking for insur-ance companies that cover damage done by these giant African land snails because these snails have infiltrated their community. The Giant African Land Snails also known as achatina fulica, are an invasive species. They eat the stucco (which is rich in calcium) to build their huge shells. Stucco is a mortar mixture used for siding. Stucco can be made by mixing sand and lime (contains calcium) with water and various other ingredients, most often cement. Another interesting fact about GALS (Giant African Land Snails) are the largest known type of land snail. However, they are not only big, they are also dangerous. They carry Rat Lungworm, a parasitic nematode that causes angiostrongyliasis. Angiostrongyliasis is an infection that affects the brain and spinal cord. This illness is not contagious. It is a type of meningitis. Symptoms include severe headache, stiffness, tingling, nausea, and temporary paralysis of the face. These symptoms usually show one to three weeks after exposure. The infection can only be contracted by eating raw or undercooked snails and slugs, or eating raw produce with a slug or snail or part of one on it. As you can see eating a raw or uncooked snail can make you quite sick, and because GALS have huge appetites, they could eat you out of house and home. So, we come back to the same question, would insurers cover the damage caused by the stucco-eating Giant African Land Snail? Hope you are as fascinated by these creatures as I am.

Urban's PLTW/Technology Education After School

Program!Written By: Ben Wierzbach

I am here to tell you about the Technology Education/PLTW (Project Lead the Way) after

school program. Mr. Peterson, advisor of the club, will be the teacher who is leading students in growing and developing skills within the tech. ed. field. One of the clubs biggest projects is to create items for sale this holiday season. They are making acrylic Christmas ornaments that double

as a refrigerator mag-net and wood candle holders. All profits will be put back into Tech. Ed./PLTW class-rooms to benefit stu-dent learning oppor-tunities. They are also making plastic urban knight keychains for the Urban PBIS store!

Comment By Mr. Peterson: Students are gaining experience in real world and career opportunities on an everyday basis. That would explain their slogan, ‘’Your Future Starts Here!’’. The focus of the after school program is production and manufacturing but, they also work on other projects and machines typically not seen in regular classes. Students are excited for the unique opportunity and more stu-dents are joining every week! Make sure to check out their items for sale and their website at: https://sites.google.com/site/urban-middleschoolpltwteched/home.

Mario’s Mushroomy QuestWritten By: James Zajkowski

Christmas Time

HolidaysWritten By: Sophie Nguyen

Illustrated By: James Zajkowski

Mario, the Italian plumber explores an underground cave while hunting for mushrooms. Inside the cave, he finds a Goomba (a short, little, tubby, brown mushroom-looking thing) who challenges him to a duel. After showing off and trash talking to Mario

multiple times, saying things like, “You are no match for me!” and “Just try and stop me!” Mario, thinking that the Goomba is a mushroom because it looks like one, eats it and is satisfied.

Christmas is just around the bend for a lot of people. But I know not everyone celebrates

Christmas. The classic American Christmas usu-ally includes, being with family and exchang-ing gifts. Although the original reason for Christmas was to cel-ebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. In other places and cultures people celebrate different holi-days, around the same time. In the African

culture they celebrate the holiday of Kwanzaa. In the Jewish religion they celebrate the holiday of Hanukkah. While in Latin America and Spain they celebrate a holiday called Three Kings Day. The holiday, Kwanzaa is quite interesting. It starts on the 26th of December and ends on January 1st. This holiday was created by a Dr. Maulana

Karenga. He was a professor of black studies in 1966. He wanted to make this holiday to celebrate the values of African culture. The word Kwanzaa comes from the Swahili phrase "Matunda ya kwanza" which means first fruit of the harvest.

Photos and Comment Submitted By: Mr. Petereson

Student crafted wooden candle holders Acrylic Christmas ornaments/refrigerator magnets

Illustrated By: James Zajkowski

Continued on Page 2Credits: http://stjschools.org/emccurdy/ChristmasWebquest/

Urban Legend Page 2

Mike's Popcorn has been making popcorn since 1968. On team 7-1 the seventh grad-

ers were doing a popcorn fundraiser with Mike's Popcorn, out of Appleton. The popcorn cost $15 per bag. The popcorn is gluten free and peanut free. The items for sale were popcorn balls, cheeselicious pop-corn, caramelicious popcorn, white supreme pop-corn, home packets (unpopped original popcorn), party mix (cheese and caramel) popcorn, drizzel-scious (caramel and chocolate) popcorn, triple mix (white, caramel, and cheese) popcorn, and firelis-cious (taste of jalapeño) popcorn. The due date for the fundraiser was December 2. For each sale the team earned 50% of the of pur-chase price. They donated 10% of the money raised to the Sheboygan's Food Pantry. The remaining money will be used for future field trips and activi-ties for 7-1 students. In addition, for each student

The Urban Legend The official newspaper of Urban Middle

School, The Urban Legend, is published by its students for its students, their fami-lies, the Urban staff, and the community of Sheboygan. We are open to questions, comments, or concerns from any of these groups.

Advisors:Mrs. Deb Pilz and

Mrs. Cassie Wolfert

If you know about the mobile and computer game Five Nights At Freddy’s, you possibly

know about the new mobile and computer game Five Nights At Freddy’s 2. That’s right, it’s here, and it’s brought some interesting theories, new characters and many more jump scares. So as a proud owner of both games it is my duty to tell you what I mostly know about the game. In the first game you sit in an office and close the door if the animatronics come. Animatronics are kind of like Chuck E. Cheese they are those toys that sing and dance on stage. So anyway, then you turn on the already turned off lights to check if they are there. But in FNAF 2 (Five Nights At Freddy's 2) there are no doors. If you know in the first game there are five animatronics in FNAF 2 there are 11. Old Chica, Old Freddy, Old Bonnie, Old Foxy, Toy Bonnie,Toy Freddy,Toy Chica, Mangle Foxy, Balloon Boy, Marionette Doll, and Golden

Written By: Efren Martinez

Five Nights At Freddy’s 2Freddy are the eleven animatronics. So that makes the game a bit harder. I hope you don't think I'm ruining FNAF 2 for you. I'm actually helping you know the story better. FNAF 2 should be a prequel to the first game. If you own FNAF 2 and beat it, you know you get the check for working and it takes place in 1987. If you have played the first game you know the bite of '87 but if you don't Foxy sup-posedly bit a kids frontal lobe off. Coincidence I think not. How would the second game take place 1987 and the first too.The game is a pre-quel. I would bore you with facts but you don't want to hear that now because there are so many theories I couldn't fit it in here. So If you're looking for a game with plenty of jump scares, a interesting story and a couple of weird characters then FNAF 1 and 2 are the perfect games for you. Also be on the look out for FNAF 3.

that sold popcorn their name was entered to win a prize. Last year the total amount raised was $200. The goal for this year was to match the $200 or to beat it. Team 7-1 has been doing the popcorn fund-raiser for a year. This year team 7-1 raised over $400 and was able to donate more that $50 to Sheboygan’s Food Pantry. Way to go! They will continue to keep

doing Mike’s Popcorn fund-raisers in the future. If you want to have Mike's Popcorn go to http://mikespopcorn.com or go to Piggly Wiggly, Festival Foods, Woodmans, Sentry, or Roundy's in Wisconsin. You got to try Mike's popcorn or you

are missing the pop in the popcorn.

Team 7-1 Popcorn Fundraiser

Written By: Alexis Fredericks

Credits To: http://www.tv.com

Kwanzaa is generally celebrated by African-Americans. Each of the seven days of Kwanzaa honor a different principle. The seven principles of Kwanzaa are unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, a sense of purpose, creativity, and faith. There are also seven symbols of Kwanzaa. They are the unity cup, the candle holder, fruits, nuts and vegetables, the seven candles to represent the seven principles, the mat, an ear of corn and gifts.The colors of Kwanzaa are red, green, and black. The green represents the

fertile land of Africa. The black represents the color of the people and the red represents the blood shed in the struggle for freedom. In fact almost all African country flags have one of the three colors, except Somalia and Liberia. A family feast usually happens on the 31st of December. This feast is called karamu and it includes traditional African dishes. Hanukkah has a lot of history to it. It is generally celebrated by the Jewish people. Hanukkah spans eight days and this year, 2014, it starts on the 16th of December. Although Hanukkah actually is the 25th of the Jewish month, Kislev. The word Hanukkah in Hebrew, the jewish language, means dedication. In the story of Hanukkah the Jewish people were forced to act against their religious beliefs, eating pig and bowing to an idol, by Greek-Syrian soldiers. After defeating the Greek-Syrian soldiers the Jews attempted to purify their temple by lighting a meno-rah with ritual oil for eight days, but there was only one day worth of oil left. The Jews lit the menorah anyway and the one day's worth of oil lasted the full eight days. It is this miracle that led to the creation of Hanukkah. Hanukkah's importance has grown in the United States. Because of it's proximity to Christmas, Hanukkah has become a major holiday. Just like in old tradition, a special menorah is lit for eight days. On each of the eight days of Hanukkah a gift is given, but I think it is just so Jewish children won't feel left out of the Christmas gift giving and get-ting. They also play a game with a dreidel and make latkes, which are potato pancakes.Don't forget about Three Kings Day. Also known as El Dia De Los Reyes, which is celebrated by people in Latin America and Spain. This holiday falls on January 6th and it celebrates the three wise men giving gifts to baby Jesus. This day closes Christmas festivities. In Mexico, they make a bread for this day. It is known as Rosca de Reyes which means wreath of kings. It is shaped like a wreath, and is covered with dried and candied fruits. There is a small doll hidden in the bread; whoever gets that slice will host a party for the next celebration. The children who celebrate this holiday put their old shoes and a wish list out before bed for the three kings. The next morning the shoes will be filled with toys and gifts. So remember that not everyone celebrates Christmas. Some of the other holidays during that time are interesting and represent more than meets the eye. You know I think that some of these holi-days are just as fun as Christmas despite the fact that they are not as well known. All winter celebrations are good way to stay warm and be with family. For more information see, http://www.infoplease.com/spot/kwanzaa1.html; http://judaism.about.com/od/holidays/a/hanukkah.htm; or http://parade.com/248853/yvettemarquez/what-is-dia-de-los-reyes-three-kings-day-and-how-do-you-celebrate-it/.

Christmas Continued...

Winter is here! There are so many things to do at Urban, there is something to do for

everyone. Art Club meets the third Monday of each week. Everyone is welcome, meetings are from December through May. Try your hand at sculpting clay or painting and drawing. If technology is your interest you can learn new skills and even help other Urban students. This is a specially designed program to bring technology into Urban classrooms and it

meets every Thursday in the East Lab, come and join. Are you a Math whiz? If your answer is yes then join the Math Counts program. You may have a chance to compete in a regional Math competition. This is open to 6th, 7th and 8th graders. Meetings are held November through February, please con-tact your Math teacher for more information. Are you a Geography Whiz? If you are, Urban offers the Geography Bee in Social Studies. Improve your knowledge and join the fun, you may even be able to compete at the state level if you try. Boys and Girls bas-ketball is here for every-one that wants to improve their skills and have a lot of fun doing it. If bas-ketball is not your game, how about volleyball or wrestling? Check our school website for details or talk to your gym teacher and remember to try something new, you will not be sorry.

Winter Activities At UrbanWritten By: Matthew Haefke

Credits: https://openclipart.org

Credits: http://kishaschiclessons.com/2013/12/10/tuesday-ten-9/

Credits: http://pixabay.com/