We had a fantastic trip to the fire station today. Firemen Tristan and George showed us what firefighters do when they are called to a fire and how they keep themselves safe while they fight a fire. We were then given a tour of a fire truck and the equipment van. I was extremely impressed with the level of respect the entire class showed during our visit and on our walks to and from the fire station!

Bub Burbank, who is a custodian at our school and also the new fire cheif, has graciously agreed to give us a tour of the fire station tomorrow. We will be walking over around 8:20 and should be back in time for library at 9:00.

We have spent lots of time discussing community the last couple of weeks. When asked what community was, the class decided it was a group of people who help each other. We talked about different kinds of communities that we may belong to and have really focused our attention on the school community and the Waitsfield community. This week children have been creating a block community by painting block buildings and labeling them. We also worked on community books. Next week, we will begin a project in the computer lab focusing on important ways we can help in the different communities we belong to. All of this is in preparation for our Bread and Puppet residency at the end of February, which will have a focus on community.

Today was our 90th day of school. As long as the weather cooperates, this means our 100th day will be in two weeks, on February 8th. I have asked each child to collect 100 somethings at home and choose a way to display these in the class. We brainstormed objects that would work well for this: toothpicks, pasta pieces, mini marshmallows, legos, beads. I have encouraged children to have fun thinking of creative ways to share their objects, for example one child thought of collecting 100 legos and building a structure, while someone else thought of making a design with 100 toothpicks and gluing it in paper. These can come in any time between now and February 8th.

If you haven't sent in Flynn money yet ($3.00 per child), please do. While our show is not until April, we need to pay the bill for the entire school now.

We have finished learning the letter formations and sounds for all of the lower-case letters. Over the next several weeks we will learn upper-case formations as well. Knowing all of the letter sounds, we have moved on to forming simple 3 and 4 letter words with similar endings. We have been practicing tapping the sounds (perhaps your child could demonstrate) and then blending them into words. Children were also very curious about ch, sh, ck, and th, which appear on the bottom of our letter poster, so we have talked about those sounds as well, noting that sometimes the number of letters in a word doesn't match the number of sounds (chat, ship, chin, to name a few).

Please remember to send in $3.00 for the Flynn Performance. Our trip is in the end of April, but money should be in by Friday.

WINTER CONCERT TOMORROW EVENING AT 6:00. Students should come to the gym between 5:50 and 5:55 and join the class on our mat!

Thanks to Emily Church many children have been making accordion books during Writer's Workshop. Children have been working with these in many different ways, but one of the fun things about them is they can hold two different stories.

There has been great interest in the block area recently and the creations seem to be getting bigger and more innovative each day! This week builders have spent a lot of time combining block structures and cars. The block area was also getting a little crowded so I shifted a few things in the room to increase the block space a bit. This also created a separate area for puzzles, another high-interest activity lately.

The winter concert will now be next Thursday, January 19th, at 6:00 p.m. Students should arrive between 5:50 and 5:55 and come straight to the gym.

While we will not be going to the Flynn Theater until April, money for performances is being collected now. The PTA subsidizes the cost of the performances, so we are asking each child to bring in $3.00. Please send this in by next Friday. Have a great long weekend!

For the next several Tuesdays, Lily's mom, Emily vonTrapp, will be coming into the classroom during stations to give small groups of children lavender hand massages. Lavender is an herb that has gained recognition for its calming and soothing effects. Emily will be using lavender oil for these massages and will ultimately teach the children to give hand massages to each other, giving them a perfect opportunity for positive and gentle interaction. So if your children come home smelling of lavender, perhaps you could convince them to give you a hand massage!

Please remember our winter concert is on Thursday evening at 6:30 p.m. in the gym.

We took advantage of the cold on Tuesday and Wednesday and made icy sun catchers with colorful bits of nature in them. These are now hanging all around the playground. Alas, they may not last through the weekend's predicted warmer temperatures, but they are fun to look at for now!

After two days of not going outside because of the cold, today we spent a significant amount of time enjoying the various joys of winter! Everyone had a chance to try either skiing or snowshoeing, and I think everyone took at least one turn down the hill in a sled. Snowshoeing wasn't quite as much fun as skiing as there really isn't much snow on the ground, but I think everyone appreciated the opportunity to try different activities. We came in with just enough time to think about things we noticed with our different senses and record these in our science notebooks. Some of the observations included: I saw sculptures of ice, I tasted snow, I felt the coldness of the air, I saw ice melting, I saw sun catchers on the trees, I felt wobbly on my skis!

Happy New Year! I hope everyone had a wonderful week whatever you were doing. It was fun to hear about the various ways students spent the vacation.

Our next eight weeks will be busy! In math, in addition to our continued focus on number sense, we will be exploring measurement using different non-standard units (cubes, craft sticks etc.), and in several weeks we will begin an exploration of geometry. We have nearly covered all of the lower case letters and soon we will focus on upper case letters, learning these at a much faster pace because most students are already familiar with them. In science we will soon begin an exploration of the five senses, and in social studies we will be looking at community and ways people help each other, which will tie into our arts residency at the end of February. We will also try to ski and snowshoe enjoy the changes winter brings!

PLEASE MAKE SURE YOUR CHILD HAS APPROPRIATE WINTER CLOTHING EACH DAY!!!