November 19, 2021

Good Afternoon,

  I hope this all finds you well.  I truly enjoyed our parent conference times and appreciated all of the conversations.  If any other further questions pop up, please don't hesitate to reach out.  This week we continued our study of geography.  We learned about land forms, bodies of water and which of these features we had in our own town.  We also talked about how our town was built around some of these features.  The students then worked in groups to create their own town and they had to incorporate some land forms and some bodies of water.  

  In math, the 1st graders focused on math facts, and complements of 10, 20 and/ or 100.  The students played a card game, a basketball game, and used dice to practice these concepts.  The students also continued to work with telling time to the hours and half hours.  I am very pleased with the group's progress with these skills.  Ms Figdor had this to say about 2nd grade math. "This week the second graders wrapped up unit two with the end of unit assessment. The students did an amazing job on the assessment. I was especially impressed with their ability to use mathematical equations to show their thinking. During unit three, students will continue to develop efficient strategies for adding and subtracting numbers. Unit three will push students to work with larger numbers."

 Our small moment/narrative unit is officially finished.  I hope you enjoyed getting to look at your child's golden story during our conferences.  Our next writing unit will focus on opinion writing.  I will need each student to bring in a shoe box or Ziploc bag with some items they collect.  the collection should be 4-5 items of something they collect.  Please don't make it more than 5 items or the focus and intent will get lost in the magnitude of collections.  I would like these by Tuesday, November 23rd.  We will be using them on the following Monday.  

On Wednesday, the students were able to see the snowplow that our school named.  They were able to meet the driver and ask him questions about the plow.  We learned that our plow is the one that plows the mountains near us and that during a snow storm, it will use over 210 gallons of fuel.  As you are out and about this winter, look for the "Waitsfield" plow on the road.  

Notes:

*There will not be a blog next week.  Today's post will be the last one until after Thanksgiving.

*The homework bags will go home today but not Monday and Tuesday of next week.  That way I can get them all back and start fresh when we get back from break.

That is all for now.  I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving.  

Peace,

Mr. Young

November 11,2021

 Good Afternoon,

  I am writing this post a day early because I will not be in school tomorrow or Monday.  I have two brothers who were both career Marines.  One of them has already retired and the other will be retiring from the Marines on Saturday.  My family and I are all going out to Pittsburgh, PA for the ceremony.  I am both proud and humbled by their service and am glad I can share this moment with him.  Mr. Cadwell will be the substitute, so class will cary on as usual.

Time, Time, everywhere there's time, open up your eyes and tell me the time . . . Well maybe that is not how the song goes but that was the theme in 1st grade math this week.  We have been working on telling the time to hours and half hours.  I will introduce quarter hours later in the year, when they have a better understanding of fractional parts.  I like to relate the two concepts.  This week I also assessed the addition strategies students were using to solve within 10 equations.  I hope that the full class is back this next week and I can get everyone caught up and continue forward.  Ms Figdor had this to say about 2nd grade math, "This week in second grade math we have been working on anchoring our additive

understanding in models. The second graders have been using number lines and then open number lines as a way to model their thinking. A number line representation of a number quantity has been shown in cognitive studies to be important for the development of numerical knowledge. If you want to learn more about the research on the importance of visual modeling to support students' mathematical understanding check out the following article. https://www.youcubed.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Visual-Math-Paper-vF.pdf.

During our social studies time, we continued to talk about geography, community, and maps.  We dove into characteristics of our community and used Google Earth and a Waitsfield map to find human characteristics and natural characteristics of the town.  We then compared that to bigger cities by traveling on Google Earth to each spot.  We even took a moment to look at Ben's hometown of Beverly.  

NOTES:

*Just a reminder that the kids should pack an extra snack/protein bar that they can leave in their backpack.  Today a few students were wanting something before lunch but didn't have anything in their bag.  Packing an item that can stay in their bag for a period of time is always encouraged.  I allow kids to go and grab something from their bag when they are feeling hungry.

*If your child wears boots to school, please make sure to pack a pair of sneakers or shoes too.

*Homework bags will go home today and tomorrow.  Rememebr, these are books that your child is choosing out of interest.  It may be a book he/she can read or it may be one they want read to them.  If you don't read it that night, no big deal.

Have a great weekend.

Peace,

Tommy

November 5, 2021

Good Evening,

  I hope this finds all of you well and keeping warm as the nights become cooler.  I have to say, overall, I was super psyched with how the kids handled post Halloween week and I was impressed with their focus.  This week we started a geography unit (for social studies).  The first two days had us looking at a map of the U.S., the state of Vermont, and a map of Waitsfield (Resort Map).  We talked about terms like direction, location, map, map key, and symbols.  The students worked on activities that had them finding items on a map and identifying symbols.  Today we heard a reading of the book Me on the Map by Joan Sweeney.  This story has a young girl showing readers herself on a map of her room, her room on the map of her house, her house on the map of her street--all the way to her country on a map of the world.  When I don;t have a hard copy of a book, it is nice to be able to use online read-a-louds.  It gives me access to so many more books!  

  On Wednesday, Mr. Cadwell conducted a design tech lesson that challenged kids to use marshmallows and toothpicks to build a structure that could hold books.  The kids worked in teams of two and Mr. Cadwell related it to an earlier lesson that I had done back in October.  There were some great attempts and most structures held 1 or 2 books.  One structure held 25 books!  

  First grade math continued to focus on using addition strategies for fluency and efficiency.  The students also compared quantities using the greater than, less than, and equal signs.  Some of the students have been spending extra time learning or becoming more fluent with their complements of 10.  This is a foundational skill that will be used for much of the work we do in 1st and 2nd grade, hence we spend a good amount of time working on it.  I can explain what this leads to at our parent conference (if you are interested).  

NOTES:

*Please don't forget to sign up for parent conferences.  There are still 4 families that have not signed up. If you are uncomfortable meeting in person (Covid) and rather meet via Zoom, please send me an email by 11/15/21.

*This week the PTA provided winter hats for all of the students.  They are a big hit and the kids love them.  However, they all look alike and that can cause confusion if your kid drops their hat or someone takes one thinking it was theirs.  Please, please put your child's name on the inside with a permanent marker.  

*Thank you for the paper towel and toilet paper tubes.  Please keep sending them in.  I am trying to replenish my supplies from last year.  

Sport Team Friday!

*Fridays are "sport team Friday" at our school.  This is something we started this year.  If your child has a sport team shirt, have them wear it on Fridays.

That is all for now.  I hope you have a great weekend.  My oldest came home from college, for a visit, and I am looking forward to some family time and enjoying what looks to be a nice weekend.  

Peace,

Tommy

November 1, 2021

  Good Monday Evening!  I am sorry that I am just getting to write this post now.  The weekend got away from me.  There is a bit to this post, so please take the time to read through all of it.  You may have heard your child talking about writing a "Golden Story."  Basically this is their final piece in our narrative writing unit.  They are writing it on gold paper.  I am using this term strictly to give the assignment importance and to get them excited about it.  This story is their chance to show all of the concepts that each student has learned during this unit.  This final piece will take two-three week to complete.  I will share them at our parent conference.  

 Last week's math class had the students working on more fact fluency with dominoes, comparing equations and totals using the greater or less than symbols, and working on story problems. These story problems are designed (and adapted for each kid) to challenge  kids to use the math skills they have learned by applying them into problem solving situations. We will continue this work this week too. Ms. Figdor reported that the 2nd graders have begun to explore measurement. They used unifix cubes as a benchmark for measuring the length and perimeter of rectangular shapes. They noticed that when measuring the length and perimeter of objects students were finding very different answers. This led us to develop a set of measurement guidelines so that they could be more accurate in our measurement. A few examples of the guidelines are: Make sure that your measurement tool is flat against the object you are measuring and always make sure you are starting at the end of the line. In addition to measurement the students have been working on telling time, expanded notation (326= 300 +20 +6), and skip counting by ten starting from a number other than ten (12, 22, 32, 42, 52….).

 We finished up our science unit (What is a Scientist? and Writing Like a Scientist) last week.  We finished the unit with an experiment.  The kids had 8 cups two of each of the following: hot water, vinegar, vegetable oil, and seltzer.  Then a candy corn was placed in one of each of the liquids and a ghost Peep was placed in one of each of the liquids.  The students continued to focus on the scientific process and recorded their results in their science notebooks.  During the month of November, we will be focusing on a geography unit.

  Last week all of the students had a chance to carve pumpkins that were then used on the Loop Rd. during Halloween.  We used our project time in Wednesday afternoon to go outside and pick and carve our pumpkins.  Most of the students seemed to really enjoy this.  A couple found it a little "gross."  

Parent Conferences:  Later this week, you will have a chance to sign up for your child's conference time.  There are slots on a Wednesday and a Thursday.  Please sign up early to get a slot you want.  These conferences will be done in person.  I ask that the students do attend the conference.  

Please understand that with twenty students and a very full schedule, I will only be offering slots during these two times.  There are 20 slots for 20 kids.  If one parent needs to join remotely and the other in person, we can make that work via Zoom.  I appreciate your help in making this work.

Notes:  

*All of the Scholastic books should have been delivered now.  If you didn't receive something, please let me know.

*Mr. Cadwell (our class' student teacher will be conducting a STEM lesson this Wednesday.  He will be recording this lesson for his class.  He sent out an email today with the information and he will need to know, by tomorrow night, if you don't want your child to be in the video.  If you are okay with it, nothing needs to be done.  The video will only be used for his classwork.  His email is cadwellp@gmail.com.

*We will not have school tomorrow.

*Tomorrow is the day to vote on the school bond.  No matter where you stand on this, please get out and vote.  

That is all for now.

Peace,

Mr. Young