Principal's News April 2018
Meg Colella
Placement
During the months of April, May, and June the Bridge staff works hard to place students in classrooms for the following year. You should have received, both by e-mail and in your child’s backpack, a “Parent Placement Letter and Input Form”. It is not a requirement for you to fill out the form but if you would like to provide input, this would be one avenue. In addition, during the spring parent-teacher conference we recommend that you have a discussion regarding any special considerations, needs, or past experiences that you think would help in the placement process. Please remember that we do not review the previous years’ placement forms annually. The forms you submit each year are the ONLY ones we review. Thus, if there were previous situations or information that you would like us to take into consideration this year, please note that on your input form.
The placement process is multi faceted, is done with great care, and many people are involved. The classroom teachers take the primary role of placement while input from specialists is also valued. The principal and assistant principal oversee the process and make decisions as needed. As I mentioned in the placement letter, we work to create balanced classrooms across each grade level. The number of sections per grade level is dependent on the number of students enrolled. I will keep you updated as sections are finalized.
A word from Superintendent Dr. Mary Czajkowski
I think we have finally turned a corner with the winter weather… I am writing to notify you that the official last day of school will be Friday, June 22, 2018. This day will be a half day for all students and a full day for staff.
Bridge Elementary School will need to make up one school day due to a power outage on October 31st and closure of school on that day. The schedule for Bridge Elementary School only is the following:
June 22, 2018 - A half day of school for students along with all other schools.
June 25, 2018 - A half day of school for all BRIDGE students and staff.
International Night
Did you know here at Bridge School....
Nearly 10% of all students at Bridge are learning English Language Learners (ELL)!
Check out the image below that shows all the different languages spoken!
Thank you Bridge PTA for the new water filling stations!
Math Talk Rescheduled
Grade Level Updates
First Grade: First graders are learning about different American Symbols including the Statue of Liberty and the American Flag. First Grade is also planning some exciting technology integration with curriculum. Exploration in the classroom can include the Scratch Jr. app to program animations connected to their writing, the use of Ozobots to demonstrate understanding of addition and subtraction, or extending the Hour of Code with offline coding activities. We are always looking for ways for students to be creators versus consumers of technology and these opportunities allow students to be inventors!
Second Grade: Second graders have been focusing on geometry during math lessons. They have become familiar with two and three dimensional shapes. During Social Studies the children have been study India. Some topics of lessons have been geography of the country, currency, cultural celebrations, and reading about Gandhi and his contributions to not only India, but the world. At Writing Workshop, the children have been writing narratives and realistic fiction. Series book clubs are going strong in the classrooms and children read and discuss books written by the same author.
Third Grade: Third graders are beginning a new science unit on Chemical Testing. They will be conducting several experiments in which they mix a liquid with unknown powders. They will record their observations and try and determine what each of the unknown powders are!
Fourth Grade: The 4th Grade has been studying "Animal Adaptations" by looking at crayfish in our classrooms. We've also been using the engineering design process to plan and construct shelters for them.
Fifth Grade: In 5th grade we are preparing for our Concord Museum field trip and studying events leading up to the Revolutionary War. In Reading we working with studying elements of non-fiction texts and looking at how subject matter, inferencing and main idea get more complicated as we work with more challenging texts.
A message from Music Teacher Ms. Side
Music is entertaining. Much of the view in the present day is that music should be purely for entertainment but music has been around since the beginning of humanity and has expressed some of mankind’s deepest emotions including despair, longing and hope. This year, Ms. Side and her fifth grade chorus are exploring the themes of despair and hope with songs ranging from oppressed groups of people’s deepest desperation to their hopefulness and joy.
The recent vertical concert March 12 at Lexington High School featuring 3 elementary choruses, the Clarke female chorus and 2 choruses from the high school highlighted those themes. Bridge students did a beautiful job singing a song, written in a concentration camp during World War 2. They dedicated it to the 65 million plus refugees in the world. They also sang two other songs, one about hoping for world peace and another about unity and joy. Although the students from all; the schools had never rehearsed with each other, the concert was an exhilarating example of the power music can have on the human spirit.