Week 37

As we are winding down the school year, there are just a few notes and announcements for you this week.

Students have been finishing up their memory letters and working on their finishing their stories.  We were so excited to see our published class book this week!  I hope you all enjoyed reading through it too!

While I am still finishing up assessing students reading levels, we did finished the last of our formal testing of the year this week, with first graders taking the PNOA on Thursday.  

We had the last last spelling test of the year this week, so there will be no spelling homework next week. As you can imagine, the students were not disappointed to hear this new!  

On Friday we participated in a virtual Memorial Day Observance along with the Morrisville Schools.  It is a Vermont state Law that all schools Observe Memorial Day on the last Friday in May.  

Our last library class will be Tuesday, June 1st.  ALL LIBRARY BOOKS and BAGS need to be returned! Students will be coming home with books on Tuesday, which they will be theirs to keep.  

I would also like to ask that any classroom books that have made their way into your homes over the school year be returned in this next week.  

Our last day of school is Friday, June 11th.  Dismissal is at 12:00.  Our Third Grade Graduation and End of Year Family Picnic will be that afternoon beginning at 5:00 at the Elmore State Park Pavillion.  I'm looking forward to see you all there!

Please let me know if you are able to help with watering the gardens at the School over the summer.  I would like to put together a schedule of volunteers.  If it continues to be this dry, watering will be a must!

I know some of you are planning to travel out of the state this weekend.  Students who travel out of Vermont are permitted to attend school upon their return, but they will need to have a Covid Test within three days of their return.  We appreciate your attention to this requirement as we wind down this unprecedented school year.  

Wishing you all a wonderful long weekend!  

Week 36

Students make a garden plan

The school year is quickly coming to an end, with just three short weeks of school left.  We are finishing up assessments, tying up loose ends, and slowing down just a bit.  While there still seems to be so much to do during these last day of the year, we are focusing on our school community, working together, and supporting one another.  

While third graders were finishing SBAC this week, the rest of the class was worked on memory letters.  Students also continue working on writing their fiction stories, and I am working on assessing reading levels.

During math first and second graders have both been learning how to simplify addition and subtraction problems by converting problems into more friendly problems to more easily solve them.  While these strategies may seem more complicated, they are important in building flexible thinking and conceptual understanding. 

This week we began our final science unit of the year: The Changing Sky.  This week we focused on how our shadows are affected by the sun.  Students worked with a partner to trace their shadows in the morning and observed where the sun was positioned in the sky.  They revisited their shadow outline during the middle of the day and noticed their shadow had changed.  Not only was their shadow smaller, but the direction of their shadow changed.  Again, the traced their shadow outline and noted the direction of their sun.  This laid the foundation for understanding that the sun is positioned differently in the sky throughout the day (many students also connect this to the rotating earth).

Third graders transitioning to MES next year visited fourth grade classrooms on Thursday afternoon.  

We ended the week with an amazing day outdoors on an unusually hot, summer-like day. 

On Friday morning we had our last Farm to School session with Miss. Molly.  Students worked together to fill our raised bed garden box with soil and compost, then they met to plan what would go in the garden.  Students worked to plant a combination of flowers and vegetables in our garden.  We will also have a few smaller pots for herbs and other flowers.  We are all excited to see our garden grow...and we will need your help!  Over the summer I will need some students / families to volunteer to water our garden.  I would like to come up with a rotating schedule so our garden is cared for regularly.  I'm working with Molly to get a rain barrel installed so there is an outdoor source of water.  More on that later!

After spelling quizzes and some reading and writing time, students applied sunscreen and prepared for our Beach Day!  What an amazing and fun afternoon we had.  After walking to the beach, we ate our lunches in the shade of some trees.  Students were eager to play!  They made sandcastles, played Drip Drip Drop (a wet version of Duck Duck Goose), played with balls and Frisbee, and ring toss.  The afternoon concluded with a huge water fight where everyone got wet and everyone had fun!  This was our final reading reward of the year, and what a fun way to celebrate our reading efforts.  Students collectively read over 20, 000 minutes at home this year!  

This week was our last week of checking out library books for the school year. Our last library class will be Tuesday, June 1st ( as there is no school that Monday that week). Please make sure all library books are returned.  Some students have had some books out for a while, so we want to make sure that these books are found and returned by June 1st.  Please take a look around to see if there are any forgotten library books at your home.  

First graders will be doing the PNOA (math assessment) on Thursday, May 27th.  This will be the last of our end of year assessments.  The PNOA is administered 1-1 (teacher -student) and is an interview style assessment.  It usually takes about 45 minutes per student, so these will happen throughout the day. 

Next Friday, May 28th, students will view the Memorial Day Observance at PA.  This will be a virtual ceremony this year and we will be watching from our classroom via Google Meet.  

• There is no school Monday, May 31st (Memorial Day).
• Our last day of school is Friday, June 11th - dismissal at noon.
• 3rd grade Graduation and end of year Celebration / picnic - June 11th from 5-7 at Elmore State Park

Here are a few photos taken Friday!

filling our Raised Bed with soil

Planting our garden

Students each got their own plant to take home!

Some students playing tag during our Beach Day.

Building Sand Castles

Making friends!

Drip, Drip, Drop!

Week 35

We had a busy week as students completed assessments, wrote memory letters to classmates, drafted their stories,  and practice using various map features.  The weather cooperated this week for us to spend more time outdoors as we ate outside each day and worked in a few extra recesses.  

This week we began the week with the STAR assessment, which all students took for both reading and math.  This assessment is used across the supervisory union as one of the tool to to help us know where students are along the continuum of learning in both reading and mathematics.  It is given in the fall, winter, and spring and measures students' growth over the year.  

Third grade practiced for the math SBAC on Tuesday and then took the ELA SBAC test on Thursday and Friday.  The ELA assessment is broken into two parts: reading, and writing.  Next Monday and Tuesday they will do the Math SBAC test.  Please assure that iPads are fully charged for Monday morning!  If you find your chargers are not working, please let me know.

There is one more big assessment to do before the end of the school year, and that will be with the first graders as they take the PNOA (Primary Numbers and Operations Assessment).  My plan will be to administer this is assessment the week of May 24th.  

We finished up our unit on Maps, Landforms, and Communities.  We will end the year with one last science unit on the Changing Sky.  

Over the next couple of weeks students will finish their stories and writing their final drafts.  It has been a tradition for many years to have an Author's Night at the end of the school year year where students share their written stories.  As with most everything, things are different this year, and I do not foresee us having an Author's Night.   Hopefully this is something we will be able to continue next year (though this may look different than in the past).

3rd Graders who are going to MES next year will spend the afternoon shadowing a current Elmore 4th grader at MES for the afternoon on Thursday, May 20, 2021.  Students will leave the Elmore School around 12:50.  They will ride to MES with Chris Jolly.  At the end of the day, students will either take the bus (home or back to The Elmore School) or they can be picked up by a parent at 2:55.  Please return permission slips found in your child's Friday Folder, on Monday.

The children have rocketed to 20,000 reading miles (minutes) this school year have earned their "Beach Day"!  We will look ahead at the weather to pinpoint a day for us to go to Elmore Beach for a picnic, games, and sand castle building.  If the weather cooperates the week of May 24th, I would like to go then as this is prior to the park officially opening.  

Thank you for completing the End of year Celebration form.  Plans are in the works to make this a fun and memorable event to celebrate our 3rd graders and the completion of a unusual but great school year.  There are a few surprises planned, which I hope everyone enjoys!  

Other Announcements

• Library is Monday!  Remember to bring your Library books and activity bags!
• Tuesday and Thursday are PE at 8:00.  Students need their sneakers!  It is helpful to have extra shoes to put on after PE!
• Students should have "indoor" shoes to put on after recess.
• Mrs. Leopold will be visiting our class in the next couple of weeks to have a music class in person!
• 3rd Grade SBAC (math)  Monday, May 17th and Tuesday, May 18th
• Thursday, May 20th : 3rd grader going to MES next year visit 4th grade for the afternoon.
• NO School on Monday, May 31st to observe Memorial Day.
• The Last day of school is Friday, June 11, 2021. Dismissal is at 12:00
• 3rd Grade Graduation and Family Picnic/Potluck: June 11th from 5-7 at the Elmore State Park Pavilion.
• Please email me any lunch orders 

Week 34

As Mother Nature was catching us up on some much needed rain this week, we still managed to have outdoor recess everyday. We ended the week with a glorious, sunny day allowing us to squeak in an extra recess and eat lunch outdoors.  

This week we began planning for our last writing unit where students will write an imaginary, fiction story.  We also spent time doing some special letter writing for mom's,  And students began writing memory letters to classmates as we prepare Memory Books given to each 3rd Graders at they leave the Elmore School.  

In Math, first graders continued using the "take from ten" strategy as they solved number stories, second graders used the "arrow" method to subtract within 1,000 using units of hundreds and tens, and third graders applied strategies to solve word problems involving multiples of 9.

Elmore 3rd Grade Graduation and Family Picnic/Potluck

 

I'm happy to announce that we will end the year with an in person 3rd grade Graduation and family picnic/ potluck for all Elmore School Families on Friday June 11th from 5-7 pm at the Elmore State Park Pavilion.  More information on this celebratory event will be coming in the near future, but please mark your calendars now!

Attention parents of 3rd graders:  SBAC: May 13, 14, 17, and 18

Third graders spent time on Thursday practicing for the Literacy SBAC.  Plans to practice math SBAC math test have been postponed until Tuesday, May 11th. They will be taking the SBAC literacy tests next Thursday and Friday. One test will focus on reading, while the other will focus on writing.  Please assure that you student iPad has a full charge each day.  The test is quite lengthy so they will be on their iPad for a while each day.  Breaks will be built in as needed during the test.  Homework expectations will be lighter next week, and third graders will have their spelling words to practice for two weeks (so no spelling test next Friday for them).  As the test is quite rigorous, students should be well rested and fed prior to the test so they are at the best.  Keeping a regular bedtime routine and making sure your child has a good breakfast (and snack) will help their stamina and focus.  

Other Announcements

• Library is Monday!  Remember to bring your Library books and activity bags!
• Tuesday and Thursday are PE at 8:00.  Students need their sneakers!  It is helpful to have extra shoes to put on after PE!
• Students should have "indoor" shoes to put on after recess.
• Mrs. Leopold will be visiting our class in the next couple of weeks to have a music class in person!
• 3rd grade SBAC Practice (math): June 11th
• 3rd grade SBAC (literacy) Thursday, May 13th and  Friday, May 14th
• 3rd Grade SBAC (math)  Monday, May 17th and Tuesday, May 18th
• NO School on Monday, May 31st to observe Memorial Day.
• The Last day of school is Friday, June 11, 2021.
• 3rd Grade Graduation and Family Picnic/Potluck: June 11th from 5-7 at the Elmore State Park Pavilion.
• Please email me any lunch orders 

Wishing all the Mom's a very Happy Mother's Day!  

Week 33

 Students were back in full swing this week after what I hope was a nice April Break despite the snow and somewhat cooler temperatures.  We are in the home stretch for the end of the school year now.  We still have much to accomplish, and experience tells me the time will pass quickly.  Next week third graders will begin practicing for the SBAC assessments which we will begin taking the following week. In May All students will doing the STAR assessment in reading and math, and first graders will be doing the PNOA.  Additionally we will be assessing all student's reading levels. We still have one more science unit to complete, one last writing unit to do where students will write imaginary stories.

We completed our class book this week with all students finishing their final illustrations.  Thursday, I packaged the final work and shipped it out to the publishing company.  We even got Mrs. Anderson to submit a page! Thanks you to everyone for returning your envelopes and for all the orders that were placed.  I'm excited to see our published book!

In Math, third grade explored arithmetic patterns when working with multiples of 9.  They also discovered some handy ways to check their answers.  Second Graders began a new Module focused on adding and subtracting within 1,000 using their place value knowledge.  First graders began subtracting 9 from from a 10 when solving story problems.  

During Theme students have been exploring maps.  On Tuesday students learned about map features and how to make a map.  Students created maps of their bedrooms on Wednesday, and Thursday we examined various maps of Elmore (tax map, survey map, water depth map) to demonstrate the variety of purposes maps have.  

On Friday we had Farm to School again.  Students planted more seeds for our garden, and they painted a flower pot which we will use to grow herbs.  In the next couple of weeks Miss. Molly will be delivering our raised bed which will become our school garden.  Later in May students will be planting the garden. 

We are close to earning our next reading reward!  This week students voted to have a "Beach Day". We will wait until we have a warm day in the forecast.  We will go to the Elmore Beach where we will have a picnic and play games on the beach and build sand castles.  Students will be invited to wear beach clothes but we will NOT be swimming.

In Art this week our focus was Figure Drawing.  Students used small wooden mannequins which they posed to show an action.  Then students learned how to break the figure into smaller shape units as they worked to draw/ sketch what they saw.

Announcements

• Library is Monday!  Remember to bring your Library books and activity bags!
• Tuesday and Thursday are PE at 8:00.  Students need their sneakers! As  the weather allows PE will be outdoors.  It is helpful to have extra shoes to put on after PE!
• Students should have "indoor" shoes to put on after recess.
• Mrs. Leopold will be visiting our class in the next couple of weeks to have a music class in person!
• 3rd grade SBAC Practice next Thursday and Friday
• 3rd grade SBAC (literacy) Thursday, May 13th and  Friday, May 14th
• 3rd Grade SBAC (math)  Monday, May 17th and Tuesday, May 18th
• NO School on Monday, May 31st to observe Memorial Day.
• The Last day of school is Friday, June 11, 2021.
• Please email me your lunch orders 

*Sorry...No Pictures this week!  I forgot my camera!

Week 32

The week began with Spring temperatures in the 70's and ended with a wintery snow storm!  As we do with everything...we rolled with it.  

Last week students worked hard on writing our class book pages about The Elmore School.  We wrote second and the third drafts before writing a final draft.  Then we began drafting our illustrations.  Students are learning that authors do many drafts before their book is ready to be published.  It takes perseverance and a growth mindset.  If you have not returned an order form (even if you don't order), please do so Monday, April 26.  Our book gets mailed out to be published on April 30th!

In Math, third graders started the week with a mid-module assessment.  Second graders finished Module 3 and took an end of module assessment.  First graders continued working on making a ten to solve addition problems when one of the addends is 7, 8, or 9.  Using this strategy helps students become more flexible and fluid in their computation.  

Our new Theme is Communities, Maps, and Landforms.  This week we focused on map features, such a cardinal directions, compass rose, and Map Keys.  We listened to a read aloud of the book Me On The Map by Joan Sweeney.  In this book readers learn how to find where they live and how they fit into the larger world.  (our home is on a street, in a neighborhood, in a town, in a state, in the United States, on a continent, on Earth.)  On Friday students explored various maps with a partner to discover the various map feature on the map and then presented their findings to the rest of the class.

We ended our week before vacation with a surprise!  Students were treated to the animated movie "The Lion King" and popcorn.  

Last week brought new Covid-19 guidance. Please click here to read about the new guidance. If you need access to the Health Screening From click here.  If you are not able to do the screening at home, please let us know so we can fill out the form when your child arrives at school. We are delighted that new guild-lines allow students to share toys and materials now!  We are still being conservative with this, but students may now share an activity bin with one other child during choice time!  As warmer weather allows we will be eating and learning outdoors more.  Students may want a camp chair at school if they took theirs home last fall.

I also had some great news regarding Third Grade Graduation!  More information will be coming, but as it looks now, we will be able to have an outdoor ceremony, with all students/families attending which may include a BBQ /Pot Luck!  I have several ideas to make this a memorable event. If there are parents who would like to work with me to help plan such an event, I would welcome the help.

I hope you all have a great week!  See you on April 26!

 

Week 31

 

Warm weather brought us outside for lunch.

Wow!  What a fantastic early April week we had.  Warm temperatures brought an end to the ice on the lake, the birds were singing songs of joy, and the children were excited to spend more time outdoors again.  This week brought the return to lunch outdoors and full recesses together.  We were also able to squeeze in a couple of extra recesses!  

This week we wrapped up our persuasive writing unit with an on demand writing prompt on Tuesday.  During this unit students practiced writing three variations of persuasive writing: 1) persuasive essays, 2) persuasive letters, and 3) book reviews.  Students were able to pick one of these three formats to write one final persuasive piece about something they feel strongly about.

Later in the week we began working on a class book.  This project will be published into a keepsake, hardbound book.  Each student will have a page they will write and illustrate.  We have decided to write a book about the Elmore School!  In your Friday Folders you will find an order form.  Parents have the option to purchase a copy of the book as a keepsake for you student.  As I said this is an option, but not required.  However, I do need everyone to return the order form along with your signature even if you decide NOT to order a book.  If you decide not to order a book, please check the book near the bottom of the form indicated you do not wish to order.  If you choose to order a book, please check your book cover choice and the quantity and include payment in the envelope provided.  All order forms need to be returned with a signature (whether or not you order a book) in order for our class to receive a free copy of the book for our classroom.  Thank you in advance for the opportunity for your child to have their work published in a professionally bound book!  Books should be here before the end of the school year.

We also began a new unit on Maps, Geography, and Communities this week.  In this unit students will learn about various types of communities (urban, suburban, and rural), and identify features of their own community.  We will be learning various map features and well as explore different types of maps.  Finally, students will learn various geographical features (towns, states, counties, continents, the world).  We will conclude this unit by looking more closely at Elmore (community, maps, and geography) and students will create their own representation of what they learn.

On Friday, we had a virtual field trip to the the Billings Farm.  Students were introduced to a variety of new baby animals residing on the farm.  Some animals we saw were, chicks, bunnies, kids (baby goats), and calfs.  If you are looking for something to do this weekend the farm is taking reservation for visiting.  click here for more information.

on Friday, we also did the next step in an art project inspired by Henri Matisse.  Matisse is known for his bright use of colors and shapes.  Finished projects will be 3 dimensional "egg" sculptures.  Students used shapes cut from paper which are molded over a balloon using a glue mixture (see photos).  Stay tuned for finished projects next week!

With the warm weather this past week it is easy for us to put winter behind us.  Please be mindful of the weather changes over the next several weeks.  We know that in Vermont, there will be many more cool days ahead and possibly even more snow.  Be aware that students will need warm layers and appropriate shoes/boots.  In an effort to keep the classroom clean, all students should have a pair of shoes to wear inside and another pair of shoes for the playground.  Indoor shoes could be slippers, slip on sandals, Crocks, or an extra pair of sneakers.  

3rd graders will be taking SBAC (Smarter Balanced Assessment) in May.  They will have a couple of days to practice prior to administration of the test.  As I narrow down the schedule for administration of the assessment I will let you know, but right now I am looking at the second or third week in May.  The SBAC is a standardized test required by the State of Vermont which all 3rd graders need to take.  There is a math component and a reading / writing component.   The test will be given over the course of four days with each session lasting 11/2 (or more if needed) hours.  All assessments are taken on students computers / iPads.  There will be a writing component which will require students to type an essay.  At this point, we have not had a lot of practice with this skill, so I hope to allow more opportunity for students to practice typing between now and the test.  

When your book is so good you want to read a recess!

Announcements:

• Library is Monday!  Remember to bring your Library books and activity bags!
• Tuesday and Thursday are PE at 8:00.  Students need their sneakers! 
• Students should have "indoor" shoes to put on after recess.
• Spring Break is April 19 - 23, 2021
• Please email me your lunch orders 

Thank you to the Elmore families for the beautiful Birthday Flowers

delivered Friday Afternoon.