South Side's Fastest

South Side's Fastest

My little sister, Carly, is a 15 year old sophomore at South Side High School in Rockville Centre. She is on the varsity cross country team, and both the winter and spring track teams. Her strength is in distance running. When she was 13 she ran in the Rockville Centre 5K (5 kilometers) and won first place for the women with a time of 19:18. Ever since that race she has only ran more an improved her times. She holds the school's record for woman's cross country 5K, and she just keeps breaking her own record. Recently, she won 1st in Nassau County in her division, and her team won the best team in the County overall in their division.

Yesterday, Carly ran in the state qualifiers at Bethpage State Park. Due to the South Side girls' team win at counties, the entire team was allowed to run in the state qualifiers race. The race was so exciting, our entire family was there to cheer Carly and her team on, the principal of South Side was even there to watch the girls. Carly came in first, breaking her personal record by nearly 30 seconds with a time of 18:52! She never ran a 5K in under 19 minutes, so it was a huge accomplishment. The rest of her team finished their 5Ks all before the 21 minute mark. The entire team's overall amazing performance led them to win the state qualifiers as a team, which means they will all be going to compete at the State Championship. On Thursday the girls will make their way up to Rochester to compete as a team, for the first time in 20 years!

Vocabulary

sophomore (noun): a student in his or her second year of high school or college
varsity (noun): the main team of a sport for a school or college
record (noun): a performance or achievement that is the best of its kind
division (noun): a group of people who are similar in age, size, etc. and who compete against each other (division in math means: the process of finding out how many times one number is contained in another)
cheer (verb): to shout with joy or excitement
principal (noun): the person in charge of a public school
accomplishment (noun): something done or achieved successfully
championship (noun): an important competition that decides which player or team is the best in a particular sport, game, etc.

Vocabulary Exercise

Directions: Use the word box to fill in the blanks in the sentences below.

sophomore                  varsity             cherish             principal            

championship             division           record              accomplishment

1. The biggest ______________ Nicole made was graduating from college, she successfully completed 4 years of College at SUNY Geneseo.

2. When the boy got in trouble at school, he was sent to the ______________ office.

3. People are always trying to break different ______________ from the Book of World Records, they will stop at nothing until they achieve greater than the person before them.

4. My second year of college was the most fun, I loved being a ______________.

5. The county ______________ was last week, all the schools from Nassau County were at Bethpage State Park competing.

6. There are 3 ______________ for women's cross country in Nassau county, these are based on school size and the size of the cross country teams.

7. The cheerleaders ______________ on the football team, the shout words of encouragement in hopes that the team will win!

8. The athletes on ______________ teams are the main athletes for the school and usually take their sport the most seriously.


Grammar Point

Plural nouns

Singular nouns represent one person, place, thing, process, concept, or idea, while plural nouns represent more than one person, place, thing, process, concept, or idea.

Singular à Plural Rule	Plural Examples
Add ‘s’ to most nouns	goatàgoats, tableàtables, organgeàoranges, conceptàconcepts
If a noun ends in s, sh, ch, x, or z add ‘es’	boxàboxes, wishàwishes, beachàbeaches, messàmesses
If a noun ends in a consonant followed by y, change y to i and add es	cherryàcherries, puppyàpuppies, countyàcounties, countryàcountries
If a noun ends in f or fe, as s to some or change the f to v and add es to others	chiefàchiefs, beliefàbeliefs, loafàloaves, leafàleaves, halfàhalves
Some nouns do not change when they are plural	sheep, deer, pants, mail

Irregular plural forms:

childàchildren

gooseàgeese

mouseàmice

toothàteeth

oxàoxen

personàpeople

Grammar Exercise

Directions: Write the plural form of the words below on the line, then write the number of the rule used to find each word's plural form.

Rule 1: add s to most nounds
Rule 2: if a noun ends in s, sh, ch, x, or z add ‘es’
Rule 3: if a noun ends in a consonant followed by y, change y to i and add es
Rule 4: if a noun ends in f or fe, as s to some or change the f to v and add es to others
Rule 5: some nouns do not change when they are plural

Singular	Plural	Rule Number
1. rake
2. trolly
3. wish
4. baby
5. holiday
6. pants
7. half
8. reef
9. dish
10. watch
11. orange
12. child