Inspire, Create and Grow a Community of Lifelong Learners

Okemo will be accepting gear at the Snow Stars facility at the Clock Tower base area.

Drop-off will be available from 2 pm until 4 pm Monday through Thursday this week and the following week.

Where: Clock Tower base area in the Snow Stars Facility.
When: 2 pm until 4 pm Feb 27th - March 2nd and March 6th -March 9th

Kindergarten and First Graders completed their Zones of Regulation books this week and brought them home to share. I hope your child was able to read their book to you! As a final Zones activity, students made feeling faces using PlayDoh and then had a classmate guess the feeling and zone that they created. Students really enjoyed this activity as you can see in the pictures!

Second, Third and Fourth Graders completed a team building activity called "Zoom!" Students brainstormed what teamwork looks like and sounds and then were able to put what they shared into action by putting together the Zoom puzzle. All classrooms were able to complete the challenge and it was a good activity to practice perseverance and cooperation. Here are some pictures of the students working together to solve the puzzle!

Girls on the Run is back for another season. Participant registration is now open for 3rd or 4th grade girls. Please email Jennifer.vaughan@wnesu.com with any questions. The program starts on March 27th.

Phone: 802-869-2637 or Email: jennifer.vaughan@wnesu.com

Need Health Insurance?

Visit www.vermonthealthconnect.gov or call 1-855-899-9600

Please reach out if you have any questions or concerns regarding your child's health.

Phone: 802-869-2637 or Email: jennifer.vaughan@wnesu.com

We came back from vacation this week and hit the ground running! We started a new unit in Fundations, worked in our writing journals and we learned about tens and ones.

In ELA we are working on tapping out CVC words. These kindergartners are doing a wonderful job identifying beginning sounds. We are now working on identifying ending sounds. We also began group writing in our journals this week. They have really been working hard on letter formation.

In Math we have been working on our addition skills and learning to find how many more we need. A new concept that we learned this week was tens and ones. This group really worked hard to understand the idea of place value. They are also getting better each day at counting to 100!

We are wrapping up our hibernation unit and will begin our unit on frogs next week. That means Spring is almost here!

Reading

• Second Grade Readers started learning about a new nonfiction genre: biographies. In Interactive Read Aloud, we have focused on biographies of women who have changed history for Women’s History Month.

Writing

• These writers started writing their nonfiction books. They practice writing a topic sentence for each section that describes what they are going to write about in that section.

Phonics

• Second graders reviewed reading and writing words with the vowel-consonant-e (silent e) spelling pattern. They are also learning how to read these words with suffixes.

• Students are also practicing being able to read and spell the following trick words: move, house, only, place, together, right.

Math

• Second Grade Mathematicians are working on strategies to add multiple 2 digit numbers. They challenged themselves with a problem to find a way to buy different priced candy to equal exactly $1.00. They loved the challenge.

Theme

• This week we started a new Social Studies unit on map skills. Students were excited to explore different maps and what they noticed on them. They will continue to learn about the features of maps and how to use them to follow directions.

REMINDERS

• PLEASE REMEMBER WATER BOTTLES!

• This week in math we learned how to use a half-circle protractor to measure angles. We learned that it is important to first decide if it is an acute or obtuse angle, which then helps us determine the angle measurement. Today we created our own angles using masking tape on our tables and then challenged each other to measure them.

• In our reader’s workshop we have spent the week “finding the proof.” This has had us reading for evidence, using context clues, and highlighting text. Thursday we had Ms. Deb Kardane, WNESU’s Director of Instruction and Innovation, lead us through a vocabulary lesson using one of our science books. We look forward to future lessons using some of the activities Deb shared with us.

• In writing we wrapped up our slideshow on Black History. In all we learned about 15 famous African Americans. We are now beginning work on a new unit: The Wax Museum Project. This will entail choosing a famous American and using informational text to research, create a giant poster, and write a short speech on their chosen person. These will be shared with other classes, and we hope, families at the end of the month!

• In science, we were visited by Meredith Wade, WNESU STEAM Coordinator. We were able to use D-cell batteries, aluminum foil, and mini light-bulbs to create simple circuits. We look forward to another visit and opportunity to explore more electrical energy materials next week!

**Reminders**

1. Snow Gear is still needed daily: snow pants, jackets, boots, hat, and gloves.

2. Sneakers or other shoes, so that we are not wearing wet boots all day long.

1. PE is Thursday and Friday - sneakers are expected!

You may have heard your student or their teacher mention nonsense words. What is a nonsense word? It’s a string of letters that follow common spelling patterns but does not have meaning. Here are some examples: daf, shug, climp. They aren’t real words, but we can read them if we know the sounds of the spelling patterns.

Why would teachers ask students to read words that aren’t real? Teachers ask students to read nonsense words to learn more about their knowledge and application of phonics skills when decoding unknown words. It helps teachers determine if students have memorized words, are using context cues, or are truly able to decode based on spelling patterns.

The ability to decode nonsense words especially helps students when they come to unknown multisyllabic words. If you can read the nonsense words “par,” “tic,” “u,” and “lar,” then you can probably decode the real word “particular.”

This is why teachers assess and practice reading nonsense words!

Our Concert and Art show will be Thursday March 30, 2023 at 6:30 PM at the Bellows Falls Union High School Auditorium. We will have a dress rehearsal on the same day in the morning. All students should plan on attending. More information to come!

All grades have been busy choosing songs and movement activities for our concert. They have been very thoughtful in their selections. It will be a wonderful night! This concert is planned by students and will be performed by students. How exciting! Our concert is going to be so much fun! See you there!

Kindergarten, First and Second Grades have continued their weekly/daily work in our First Steps Curriculum. They have chosen songs and activities from lessons they have learned this year.

Kindergarten is practicing: These Are Grandma's Glasses, Oh Ricka Bamboo, Frosty Weather and their movement as clocks in Pizzicato Polka by Delibes.

First Grade is practicing: Tall Trees, Grizzly Bear, I Climbed Up The Apple Tree and taking a country walk in Country Gardens by Percy Grainger.

Second Grade is still working on narrowing down their favorites (which is a tough job for all classes). Among their favorites are: All Night Long, Pickin' A Spot and Standing Like A Tree. They have narrowed their choices of movement down to three! We will see what they decide in the next week!

Third and Fourth Grades will be combining their efforts in some of their favorite songs. Inch By Inch, Red Red Robin and We Will Build This House are some of their favorite songs to sing. They will be performing the dance "Bo Diddley" in a longways set.

We will have some all school and all audience songs. Be sure to bring your best singing voice, as we will have special parts for you to say and sing.

I appreciate all of the hard work and thought our students are putting into the planning of this special night. We can't wait to see you there!

Mrs. Daigneault,

Music Educator

4th Grade

Fourth Grade artists have been hard at work finishing up their full body portraits! They are coming out very well with their hard work and creativity. Keep up the great work artists!

3rd Grade

Third Grade artists have been working on their comic book unit. We are creating a comic book from a 4 paneled strip, to a 6 paged comic book! These artists have wrapped up their comic strips and comic pages, so they will be moving onto the comic book next class. Keep up the great work!

2nd Grade

Second Grade has finished their pop art inspired superheroes! We explored the work of Andy Warhol and his work in the Pop Art movement. Inspired by their bright and vibrant colors we created a new superhero!

1st Grade

First Grade artists have been finishing up their Lego Self-portraits! We learned about Lego artists like Nathan Sawaya and his work with legos as his materials. Inspired by his work we created ourselves as lego versions!