Weekly Newsletter
April 8, 2021
From Principal Emma Liebowitz
It has been so wonderful to have most of our students under the Sanderson Academy roof! Children have doing amazing following the protocols and procedures. Children have been listening carefully, applying feedback and caring for others. We appreciate your patience as we work through some of the challenges with drop-off and pick-up.
Health Office News from Nurse Loranna
It has been so wonderful seeing many of our students back in person! The weather has cooperated and it has been a great week to spend more time outside with our school community and enjoy the sunshine. This week I wanted to share some tips about handwashing/sanitizing. With the extra focus on hand cleanliness it may create dry and irritated hands. Washing and sanitizing hands is an incredibly effective way to reduce illnesses and keep us all healthy, soap and water is always the first choice but sometimes can be difficult when there is no access to a sink. One way to combat dry and irritated hands proactively is applying hand lotion after washing hands and before bed. If you would like your child to bring in some hand lotion from home that would be fine- please avoid any highly scented lotions- these lotions may further irritate hands and can irritate those with scent allergies. Aveeno sensitive skin lotion is my favorite go-to lotion for children. Please reach out to me and your child’s teacher with any questions or concerns lalmeida@mtrsd.org
Kindergarten News from Ms. Sarah
This week we have been focusing on learning routines and coming together again as our class community. Students shared what they hope to do at school this spring and we talked about how our class rules (take care of yourself, take care of each other, and take care of our school) can make those hopes come true. Now that we have more time at school, we have been able to visit the Far Far Woods. The kids have been able to make the walk in just 10 minutes! While there, we collected wood frog eggs from the vernal pool and we are excited to watch them hatch in our classroom tank.
First Grade News from Mrs. Pedersen
First grade is enjoying coming back together as a class. We are all adjusting to getting back into new routines. We are spending time outdoors in the morning and having snack. This week we explored for signs of spring and discovered a vernal pool in the woods filled with wood frog eggs. We plan to return and make more observations. Our mornings are also filled with reading and math. In the afternoons we enjoy Fundations, writing, and more math. We also enjoy our end of the day time outdoors before boarding buses. We have 2 wonderful structures to use and wonderful area in the soccer with bars for moving on.
Second Grade News from Ms. Robertson
What a beautiful spring week to welcome our students back to full days of school! As we transition from our days of remote learning to in-person learning, we are enjoying seeing our friends, playing on the playground, and exploring in the woods. We are also learning new classroom routines and establishing classroom expectations. It’s been wonderful to finally leave our screens behind and to come together as a class!
As we ease into in-person learning, one of our new units is on fairy tales. We are learning the elements that make a story a fairy tale, such as: the story has good characters and evil characters and it involves magical people, animals, or objects. A fairy tale may also include a lesson to be learned and often has a happy ending. This week we have enjoyed listening to multiple versions of The Three Little Pigs and the Big Bad Wolf, with the class favorite being The Three Little Tamales by Eric Kimmel. We are also reading aloud different versions of Goldilocks and the Three Bears and comparing and contrasting the traditional tale to the story The Three Snow Bears written by Jan Brett.
We are also beginning our poetry writing, with our first poems being about our favorite wild animal. To help us plan for our writing, we are currently brainstorming words that describe our animal, such as speedy and spotted for a cheetah. We are also thinking of actions our animal does, such as the chomping or the swimming of a crocodile. These ideas will then be used to write our “I Am” poems.
Fifth Grade News from Ms. Johnson
It has been great to be back in class together. Laughing, sharing, cooperating, and learning. We have been doing a lot of think, pair, shares. That is where students have time to think about question or prompt (such as what strategy would you use to solve 5x1/4 or what rules do we need to support our hopes and dreams for the rest of the year), talk to their partner- someone sitting close to them, and then share with the class. We are also doing a weekly activity on Wednesday afternoons and this week we made paper cranes.
Sixth Grade News from Mrs. Schreiber
Welcome back to in-person learning. This has been an exciting week as we get to know our new routines and welcome a new student bringing our class up to 19 students. This week we have jumped into our study of plant and animal cells! We have begun to research the similarities and differences and later we will be writing a compare and contrast essay to demonstrate what we have learned. In math, we are finishing up our unit on decimals as we learn about finding percents.
VOLUNTEERS WANTED!
Over April vacation we will be having a vocabulary challenge. Every student in the school in grades K-6 will receive a bag of vocabulary activities/games and words to play with over vacation. Students will have a menu of activities and a sheet to fill in as they play the games. After vacation, they can return the sheet and receive prizes based on the number of activities they complete. In preparation, I am looking for volunteers to help put the bags together. Anyone, students and adults, who are able to help out is welcome to join me on the basketball court on Tuesday, April 13th from 3:15-3:45. THANK YOU!
Math (Title I) with Mrs. Prew
Guess My Rule 1:
1. Some equations belong in the circle and some do not. What is the rule to be in the circle?
2. Write another example that belongs outside the circle.
3. Write another example that belongs inside the circle.
Guess My Rule 2:
1. What is the rule that decides what belongs in the red circle?
2. What is the rule that decides what belongs in the blue circle?
3. Write another number pair that belongs in the red circle.
4. Write another number pair that belongs in the blue circle.
CHALLENGE: Write a number pair that belongs in the middle.
Mindful Movement with Ms. Sue
It has been WONDERFUL to see so many students & teachers in person!! It also has been fun handing out yoga mats to every child. Again a THANK YOU to all the generosity of the community and beyond! This week was all about understanding the expectations of being together safely, taking care of your yoga mat and having fun...we will be doing Mindful Movement outside as much as we can!
Sanderson's 3 M's (Moment, Movement, Mantra)
About Us
Email: eliebowitz@mtrsd.org
Website: https://sanderson.mohawktrailschools.org/
Location: 808 Cape Street, Ashfield, MA, USA
Phone: (413) 628-4404
Facebook: facebook.com/SandersonAcademy