Hopefully you heard a bit about your child's experience with our arts residency this week.  I spent each day with 5 children from our class, some first and second graders, and artist Eleanor D'aponte.  Our focus was creating plaster tiles to be incorporated into the outdoor space.  We began by selecting interesting natural materials that we pressed into clay to make designs.   The next day we poured plaster into the molds.  Once the tiles were dry children found a place for their tiles in the outdoor space.  While I didn't get to spend time with other groups, it sounded like all of the children had a great experience.

Next week is bike/walk/bus to school week.  Your child is bringing home a pledge sheet for this today, along with some incentive prizes.

Sketching natural materials before using them to make designs in our tiles.

This morning we were very fortunate to have Larry Clarfeld visit us from North Branch Nature Center. He brought some very interesting guests!

We had a fantastic morning during ECO yesterday.  After snack around the fire and a brief story about chickadees, children became chickadees.  They worked in groups of three to build nests and gather food.  Unfortunately I forgot to bring my camera, but  some fabulous, creative, and imaginative nests were created from a two floor nest to a nest hotel.  On our way out we went slowly and observed the many emerging buds, taking a picture in our minds so we could document what we saw when we returned.  Everyone was completely engaged the whole time we were in the forest, partly because everyone was warm and dry.  Thank you for helping with this- it makes a huge difference!

During writing we have been working on creating informational books about our nature name animals. We began the process several weeks ago by brainstorming a list of questions people may ask about our animals and using these to determine the information we would include.  We narrowed our questions to what does your animal look like, what does it eat, where does it live, and how does it move.  We are also including one interesting fact unique to each animal.

Next week the entire school will be participating in a weeklong artist residency focused on creating an outdoor community space at the school.  Children will have the opportunity to engage in a variety of activities from landscape design to building with rocks as work on this new space gets underway.  Be sure to ask your child about his or her experience with this next week.

This morning Mrs. Gale's class joined us while her room was being used for pre-school screening.  We spent the first part of the morning talking about birds (I have seen many robins already despite the snow!) Children worked in pairs testing a variety of bird "beaks" on different foods to see which beak worked best.  Ask your children what kind of beak they would want if they were a bird.   After snack  and a little dancing, we created our own colorful birds for the classroom tree.

On Wednesday, April 16th we will be traveling to the Flynn Theater in Burlington to see Seussical the Musical, based on the stories of Dr. Seuss.  Our show is at 10:00 so we will leave school around 8:45 and be back for lunch.  While the PTA generously funds most of the cost, each child is asked to contribute $3.00.  You can give the money to me or directly to Kathi.

Testing bird beaks.

Birds in the tree.

I hope everyone had a wonderful vacation.  We have had a fantastic and productive first couple of days back.  After 11 days all of the children looked a bit older!

Yesterday during ECO we worked in stations creating a puppet theater,  making puppets for our nature name animals, creating a scene with tracks for each animal, and narrating a brief story to go with the scene.  We had a great time watching several children's  shadow puppet stories and everyone will have a chance to share theirs in the coming days.

Parent conferences will be held in two weeks, on March 20th and 21st.   The online scheduler is open now and you can schedule a conference at any time by visiting the school web site (www.waitsfieldschool.org) and clicking on the online scheduler link on the right hand side under quick-links.  I look forward to meeting with all or you and talking about your child's progress.

We had a fantastic time at our WE ROCK! winter carnival this afternoon.  We spent the afternoon outside in teams working on snow sculptures, having sled races, and generally enjoying all of the new snow in the field.  The student body was split into mixed age teams, so I was only with two children from our class, but based on the energy when we gathered back at the end of the day, everyone had a great time!

For the past couple of weeks we have been exploring non-fiction during writing working on All About posters.  We began by thinking of things we know a lot about and then recording and illustrating what we know.  We are experts on a wide array of things from sharks and snakes to skiing and football, andFlorida and Peru.  Children have been quite motivated to share what they know!

A while ago I started inviting small groups of children into the classroom for lunch.  Several weeks ago I decided to have the whole class come and we have been continuing to have lunch together on Fridays.  We push all of the tables together and use our best restaurant manners.  It has been an absolute pleasure for all of us and something we look forward to all week long.

We had fun celebrating our 100th day of school yesterday.  We began the day by making crowns, then many collections of 100 were created, everyone enjoyed searching for tiny pictures to 100 (I think your child can best explain this!), we wrote about 100 things we would like to have and what we would do with them (ice cream cones, pieces of gold), and even squeezed in a snack of 100 things, although a few children may have just eaten the 10 m&m's.  With anticipation of the snow storm added in it was a very exciting day.

Next Friday we will be having a Valentine's celebration with Ms. Gale's class.   Yesterday your child should have come home with a list of all the children in kindergarten to help with making valentines.  If your child chooses to bring valentines please make sure there is one for everyone!  These can be home-made or store-bought and as simple or elaborate as you and your child decide.

Hooray for snow!

Happy 100th day!

Building with 100 geo-blocks.

Searching for pictures to 100.

Found one!

An animals in winter scene created with third and fourth grade partners.

The coyote is following the rabbit down to the stream.  Notice the tracks!