News from the Hill
March 28th, 2018
Principal's Message
Dear Parents/Guardians,
Though the temperatures may not agree, spring is in the air! April will be a busy month at Hillside with a new core value recognition program, the start of student placement, state testing and plenty of opportunities for fun!
Core Values Stickers
Our Building Leadership Team, comprised of staff, students and parents, developed a core value recognition program which we began this week. When one of our core values- RESPECT, COURAGE, or CURIOSITY- is demonstrated, students will be recognized by receiving a sticker. In addition, one act of respect, courage or curiosity will be announced over the loudspeaker each day to build awareness of how we can promote each of these values in our Hillside community.
Placement and Parent Input
We invite you to partner with us in providing input into your child’s placement for the 2018-2019 school year. Please access the Parent Input Form by clicking here. Completed forms are due to your child’s teacher by April 18th.
NYS Tests
The New York State English Language Arts and Math assessments will be administered to students in Grades 3 and 4 according to the schedule below:
ELA: Wednesday, April 11th and Thursday, April 12th
Math: Tuesday, May 1st and Wednesday, May 2nd
All assessments will begin at approximately 9 AM and are untimed.
Our teachers and students have prepared for these state tests in class through a rigorous, engaging curriculum. You can best support your children by ensuring that they get a good night’s sleep and eat a healthy breakfast in the morning. Please click here and here for additional information about these assessments.
If you have any questions regarding this year’s state assessments, please do not hesitate to contact us.
April 10th Student Assembly
We would like to thank Hillside’s Culture and Arts Committee for scheduling a special assembly! Performing in elaborate masks to the explosive percussion of a corps of drummers, KAMATE TRADERS DANCE COMPANY brings to life the ancient stories and legends of Africa’s Côte d’Ivoire. Under the artistic direction of Yahaya Kamate, KAMATE TRADERS is one of the most exciting and dynamic African music and dance troupes in the United States. A review of the troupes performance at Lincoln Center Folk Parks program stated that, “the best aspect was the drumming: nonstop, high-speed, feverishly intricate rhythms and cross rhythms from a team of drummers who knew countless ways to subdivide a beat and make it jump.”
April 19th HEF Obstacle Course Night
We are looking forward to our HEF Obstacle Course Night at Hillside on Thursday, April 19th from 5-7PM. At this time the Physical Education Department will be opening the obstacle course to students in K-5 so that parents can see the wonderful additions that HEF has provided to us. Please note that this is not a drop off event and all students must be accompanied by an adult. Please click here to see the flyer for this special event and sign up using the Doodle link that follows: https://doodle.com/poll/ytfvsh6evz346y4d
Wishing you a wonderful Spring Break with your families,
Amy Cazes
Counseling Newsletter
April Calendar
Classroom News
Kindergarten
Kindergartners have been very busy during Writer’s Workshop where we have been working on personal narratives. The unit is called, Writing From the Heart where we are using touchstone texts to discuss times in our lives when we have felt emotions like, anger, excitement, happiness, shyness etc. We have completed a graphic organizer to take notes on each emotion and are in the process of creating writing pieces for each feeling. As the students move through the writing process, they will be learning about editing and revising and will be publishing a book! We are all so excited.
In math we have started our unit on number bonds where we are composing and decomposing numbers to five. An example of this would be, 5 = 3 and 2, or 1 and 4 make 5. During math stations we have been playing memory games using picture representations to ten, addition and subtraction bingo, orally telling word problems to match number bonds and much more. Ask your child to show you a number bond where the whole is five and ask them what the parts are. E.g. if a whole is 5, the parts can be 4 and 1.
Have a wonderful and restful break!
1st Grade
First graders are out of this world! This past month, our students have been immersed in a study on Astronomy. Students are intrigued with learning about our solar system. We have explored the sun, the moon, the stars, constellations and the planets. Children have created their own constellations and are using writing to record their understanding in their own astronomy journals. It has been a blast! Our study culminated with an amazing trip to the Hudson River Museum, where students participated in a hands-on “Daily Planets” workshop and live planetarium show. Children loved this and were so excited to take their own planets home!
During reading workshop, our readers are “Becoming Friends with Characters” and are learning to focus on characters as a way to read closely. Children will think more deeply about what characters like and don’t like, what they do. They will practice retelling what the main character does across a story and begin to think about how characters change.
Our work in math, has students involved in an in-depth study of place value. During this unit, students will focus on the role of place value with numbers to 40. They will compare quantities using symbols for greater than, less than and equal to, and use strategies to add two digit and single digit numbers.
First grade would like to wish you all a wonderful spring break! Enjoy the time with your families and friends!
2nd Grade
We are thrilled to be raising mealworms. The growing larvae are feasting on bran flakes, drinking water from potatoes, and then molting their too-small exoskeletons, as they grow. A few have actually changed to pupae. They will sleep inside their cocoons and magically transform into adult darkling beetles some time in April. They will reproduce, lay eggs, and the cycle will continue.
To compliment our mealwormania, in our balanced literacy classes, we are reading about interesting insects. We are gathering information about their life cycle stages, their habitats, their diets, and more, from two or more informational resources; we are stopping as we read to jot notes. We’ll organize our notes and then use the facts we learn to write diaries (from the insects’ points of view!).
We’ve finished our multiplication module;
Hip, hip, array!
After the vacation, we’ll be collecting, graphing and analyzing data, working with coins and bills, and measuring in inches, feet, and yards.
Mrs. Snyder read aloud Bully Beans to our classes. We’ve learned how to be upstanders, rather than bystanders, when friends are being bullied. We’ve learned that there are so many ways to confront a bully; most take courage, but we know to stand together! In our Second Step curriculum, Donnie Waterous is helping us to develop problem solving, life-ready skills.
Our second grade community wishes the greater school community a delightful (warm-weathered, snowless) holiday break.
3rd Grade
Social Studies work has incorporated reading, writing, art and research in our study of Russia. Teachers read the biography of Wassily Kandinsky, The Noisy Paintbox. Students learned about the different stages of Kandinsky’s work. They drew their own landscape art, and then recreated it in abstract form. Lastly, they researched information about Kandinsky and wrote a paragraph detailing important aspects of his life. Children have had stories read to them, such as The Littlest Matryoshka, and The Magic Nest Doll, to inspire them to create artwork about Matryoshka dolls.
Under the direction of Alison Marra, our artist-in-residence, they created fabulous Faberge Eggs. Ours may not sell for millions of dollars, but they are still beautiful! We celebrated our Russian studies this week with “Blini Breakfasts”. Parents got to learn many facts about Russia as they enjoyed delicious blinis with various toppings. The blinis are symbols of the sun and the return of Spring. Our celebration seems to have worked, as Spring finally seems to be arriving!
Our next ELA unit will focus on nonfiction reading and research.
In math, third graders are continuing with an in-depth study of fractions. This includes using number lines to add fractions and compare fractions. They are also working on multi-step word problems related to fractions. Multiplication and division fact quizzes continue. Any help you give your child to memorize these facts is appreciated.
STEAM activities have included learning about hurricanes and levees. The final project is creating the strongest levee possible and then testing to see if it can withstand a “hurricane”.
Have a wonderful and fun-filled break!
4th Grade
In math, students are about to begin a unit on geometry. 4th graders will not only review geometric shapes, but extend their learning to differentiate between rays, angles, and segments. They will also learn to measure angles and demonstrate the differences between parallel, intersecting and perpendicular lines.
In ELA, students are wrapping up our unit on non-fiction in the classroom. However, we will continue to study this genre in partnership with Jamie Nedwick in the library. Students will be selecting topics based on the, “You Wouldn’t Want to Be” series and then researching these topics to synthesize bigger ideas. We look forward to this important work.
In science, students are learning about how all living things depend on the environments around them, and how human interaction with the natural world can drastically change those environments. (Coyotes, anyone?) Students have also been learning about the water cycle and other natural systems on our earth. Our STEAM work has blended seamlessly with our science lessons, as Ms. Farrell has also shown students how humans impact the environment and how we can upcycle manmade materials such as plastic.
K-2 Communications
The second grade students have been busy researching insects. We have learned about a variety of insects. The students are now studying one insect in depth.
Reading continues to be a focus in our class for all of the students. We continue to work toward just right books. As the students learn to select books at his/her just right level, they are working on student specific strategies for decoding and comprehending texts.
We all have been very busy during Writer’s Workshop where we have been working on personal narratives. The unit is called, Writing From the Heart where we are using touchstone texts to discuss times in our lives when we have felt emotions like, anger, excitement, happiness, shyness etc. We have completed a graphic organizer to take notes on each emotion and are in the process of creating writing pieces for each feeling. As the students move through the writing process, they will be learning about editing and revising and will be publishing a book! We are all so excited.
Other curriculum is based on student IEP goals, grade level skills, and life skills. Throughout the day we will focus on individual skills in addition to accessing the general curriculum. As a whole class, we are participating in many hands-on activities that are both engaging and educational!
Learning Lab
In the Learning Lab we have been reading about great characters and having discussions about which characters we would like to be friends with. Some of our favorites are Amelia Bedelia, Cam Jansen, and Katie Woo. We have also been learning many word attack strategies that support our reading. We are learning about open syllables that have long vowels at the end, silent/”magic” e syllables, and even multisyllabic words. We are using our ChromeBooks to write a paragraph about a favorite character.
In math we are learning about fractions in third and fourth grade. We are using fraction tiles and many visual representations. Our second graders are learning the foundational skills for multiplication! We are making ____ groups of _____, for example 4 groups of 3 is 12. We are learning repeated addition as a prerequisite skill for multiplication.
We have been working so hard and some of the main skills we have been learning are stamina, fluency, and perseverance!
Art
Everyone is invited to attend the Grade Level Art Show during the month of May. Feel free to bring family and friends! Each grade level will have an exhibit of an art project in the Hillside All Purpose Room from 6-8pm. Every child will have a work of Art in their grade level show. Below is the schedule of events:
Monday, May 7 – Kindergarten (Gardens) 6-8pm
Wednesday, May 9 – First Grade (Monsters), 6 – 8pm
Monday May 14 – Second Grade (Collages) 6 - 8pm
Wednesday, May 16 – Third Grade (Random) 6 – 8pm
Wednesday May 23 – Fourth Grade (Still-Life), 6 – 8pm
Check out the Hillside Art Blog for updates from the Hillside Art Studio - http://www.hohschools.org/Page/1225
Music
March was another fun month of music making here at Hillside! Fourth graders learned about Duke Ellington and the role he played in the Harlem Renaissance. They studied both jazz and blues and learned to improvise using the 12 bar blues and blues scale. Third grade students were hard at work learning about classical composers including Joseph Haydn, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Ludwig van Beethoven. They also sang several Russian songs to go with their social studies unit on Russia. Second grade students studied the different families of instruments, in particular the percussion and strings family. First graders learned several fun new tunes about the solar system, while the Kindergarteners continued to engage in active music making through singing, chanting, listening, and basic rhythmic and tonal improvisation. They also enjoyed learning a few simple “royal” dances.
Physical Education
Hello Everyone! There are exciting things happening in the world of Physical Education. We have just wrapped up our Bopper Hockey Unit and are now in full swing into our Volleyball Unit. All grades started off by learning and practicing the bump, the set, and the serve by playing various games related to volleyball.. Grades 3 & 4 are now beginning to play full volleyball games, 2nd grade is starting to learn the rules of volleyball while still practicing their bump, set and serve, and 1st grade and Kindergarten are becoming continuing to explore the sport via self discovery. It has been an exciting unit thus far and we love seeing the enthusiasm from all the students.
As a reminder, be sure to please sign up for Obstacle Course Night through the link provided in the e-mail blast. Spots are limited and filling up quick!
We hope everyone has a happy and healthy break!! Enjoy.
FLES
STEAM
Engineers are everywhere in S.T.E.A.M.! Our fourth graders are learning about plastic, both the good and the not-so-good. We will gear up to upcycle the plastic around us when we return from Spring Break. Third graders have been busy designing and testing their levees. In second grade, our engineers are collaborating together into companies in order to prevent erosion from occurring in “Rock Away Town.” First graders are exploring their shadows as well as the shadows of stationary objects in order to launch their study of the sun and its light. Our kindergarten students are studying the ways in which humans can impact our planet in more positive ways, such as by turning off the lights when we leave a room or cutting down fewer trees.