Adventurers
Team
Team teachers Pam Wise/Joplin James
ParaProfessional: Cheryl Thomas
Student interns: Alex Larson/Heather Fox
Welcome
to the Adventurers Parentlink for Friday, March 23rd, 2001.
Believe it or not we welcomed the arrival of spring
on Tuesday, wearing the “springiest” fashions we could find including Capri
pants and sandals. We shared many of the signs of spring we had observed for
homework, such as birds, melting snow, longer days, etc.
We really appreciated the opportunity to see everyone
at conferences this week. Thank you for setting aside this important time for us
to share some of our observations about your child’s growth and have some
uninterrupted time to hear from you and your child about the things they have
learned, ways in which they have grown, things they are challenged by, and the
things that they would like to get better at. As always we would appreciate it
if you would share with us any follow-up comments on your conference i.e. things
that perhaps you forgot to ask or share, thoughts about the format of the
conference that made it useful for you or that might be improved upon make them
even more productive, or scheduling, etc. THANK
YOU! to Susan Holson, Dana’s mom, for calling families and scheduling the
conferences.
On Thursday this week we had a special presentation
by our Destination Imagination team (Laura, Steel, Maureen, Rachel, Tom and
Hannah). They are getting ready to present their solution to the “Mystery
Loves Company” problem this Saturday at the state D.I. competition at UVM.
Their solution is very creative and humorous. We wish them well on Saturday.
Some of the books we read this week included: The Relatives Came
by Cynthia Rylant, When Bluebell Sang by Lisa Campbell Ernst, and Jamela’s
Dress by Niki Daly. Megan filled our estimating jar with cotton balls. She
gave us a big clue that there were 300 in the bag she took them from and she
didn’t use them all. So we had some very good estimates. Alicia will take it
home this weekend to fill it with something new.
Our poem this week was titled
“Smells” by Kathryn Worth. If
you close your eyes and have a great imagination you can begin to smell those
fragrant odors of past springs (presently buried under 3 or more feet of snow
and ice!) You can find our poem
each week on our homepage or go directly from here to: http://shelburne.k12.vt.us/TEAMS/ADVENT/PoemSongs/Smells.htm
For the art project this week
the students made some nice “spring” paintings. First they made a landscape of their choice- something that
reminded them of springtime- using nice, bright colors.
Next they used broccoli to stamp on trees that later had pink or red
cherry blossoms painted on them. The
paintings came out wonderfully and they will be a nice reminder to us all that
spring will be here soon!
The challenge this week was a
list of 29 different fruits and vegetables and the children had to figure out if
whether the fruit or vegetable grew above ground or under the ground.
Everyone did a great job!
First graders have been
working on polygons again this week, as we are finishing up on the unit.
The students have continued to make some wonderful 2-D and 3-D polygon
creations that demonstrate their understanding of the material.
Wednesday, Thursday, and today we did A LOT of reviewing because geometry
can be quite difficult! We have
played math games, guessing games, and completed a review worksheet that
everyone completed with flying colors! Next
week the first graders will begin a new unit on mental arithmetic, money, and
fractions.
The Second graders have
continued to work on the measurement unit this week. They have learned that it is very important to be exact when
measuring and to label things with the unit of measurement that they use.
The kindergarteners have
been doing a lot of writing this week. They
have also examined (with a magnifying glass) and discussed their observations of
a quarter. Together we also made a
100 chart and now have our creation up on the wall for all to see and use. The
kindergartners did a great job recognizing patterns in the 100 grid.
FOR STUDENTS BRINGING HOME
SPELLING BOOKLETS: please remember that they are to complete three activities
using ALL the words in EACH ACTIVITY and that the spelling words need to be
circled in sentences, poems, songs, stories, etc. Remind them TO PUT THE UNIT AND THE NAME OF THE ACTIVITY ON
THE TOP OF EACH PAGE and RETURN it TO SCHOOL EACH TUESDAY.
This coming Wednesday March 28th, we’re preparing for our
trip into Shelburne village to visit six of our local merchants around the
Shelburne plaza. We’re depending on getting some parent chaperones to help
with small groups, and so far only have two. Please let us know if you are able
to join us that morning.
In preparation for this, the homework this weekend is to make a drawing
of some of the shops at the Shelburne plaza that you sometimes go to and some of
the people you see there.
We’re also planning for other trips including our big trip to the
Granby Zoo on Friday June 15th. Our Vermont Teddy Bear fundraiser
will help cover part of the costs of this trip. By the way, VTB asked if we
could send some of the parents that helped out with the Valentines Day
fundraiser to accept the funds on the morning of April 4th. Please
let us know if you would be willing to attend.
Congratulations to Rita,
Darla, Kerry, Mary, Susan, Lynn, Lisa, Nancy, and Kathy
for correctly recognizing, “It is fruitless to attempt to indoctrinate a
superannuated canine innovative maneuvers.” As “You can’t teach and old
dog new tricks!”
Is it really only mom’s that can figure these out? We
don’t even want to consider the possibility that dad’s aren’t reading
Parentlink. Just to be sure, for this week we want to hear only from dads who
can get this one: “All articles that coruscate with resplendence are not truly
auriferous.”
By the way, if dad has a
separate email address, we would be happy to add it to the list if you send us a
note: Jjames@Shelburne.k12.vt.us
or pwise@shelburne.k12.vt.us .
Return to the
Adventurers Teams Homepage
Home Page
maintained by Joplin James / Pam Wise
jjames@shelburne.k12.vt.us
Last updated: 26 March, 2001