Thank you
- To Luke Baird for purchasing new fish for the fish tank. They are so pretty and a great addition to our tank.
- To everyone who came in to pack backpacks with food for the holiday weekend.
Student Snowman from Grades 1/2
Instructional Updates
Pre-K/ K Mathematicians have been working on writing numbers, matching numerals to quantities, describing shapes without naming them and identifying characteristics of and naming shapes.
During literacy, students are continuing to work towards mastery of Fry’s first 100 sight words through fun activities such as sight word basketball, matching games and building sight words with playdough.
3/4 ELA: Students worked on doubling the consonant when adding the morphemes of -ed and -ing to base words (grabbing). They also worked on reading the “book” – short story- called “Previously” and became experts at reading that text – separating out the prefixes and suffixes of words as they decode. Most of the students mastered the spelling list, which used the same concept (grabbed, jarred, etc.) There was a lot of testing going on this past week – both the NWEAs and the Fountas and Pinnell assessments. This next week, we will begin a unit on nonfiction about frogs. There are several anchor texts. The focus will be on reading and digesting nonfiction text. This unit will last several weeks.
5/6 ELA: Students have almost completed the novel Bud, Not Buddy, which has been a fun read about a young boy, Bud, living during the Great Depression, whose mother has died and who is trying to find his father. It is a sad, sobering topic, but has a satisfying ending. The final essay will be written Monday, then students will begin on a nonfiction text: Astrophysics for Young People in a Hurry by Neil DeGrasse Tyson. This next unit will be more project-based than the past two have been.
7/8 ELA: Students are challenged with completing their projects and presenting them, as well as writing brief summaries (gists) of each chapter of the book, The Disappearing Spoon. This has been a great opportunity for students to assess their own readiness to be independent learners and adjust as needed for the rest of this year and into next year. The next novel will be more of a decompression – just a fun read that takes much less brain power before we launch into one or two much more difficult texts (emotionally and academically).
5 -8: Students in 5/6 and some in 7/8 have been working with Ellen Booraem for independent writing tasks. Please ask your child to share their writings with you. Many of these students are future writers, if they choose to be – they have excellent storylines and are expressing themselves in a very mature manner. Ellen spends every available Friday afternoon with us and has started having some writing workshops with 5/6 on Mondays. Please feel free to ask about how all of this is working.
3/4 Super Studies: Despite several interruptions due to NWEA testing and DIBELS reading assessments, the students have continued making progress on their readings on Maine history and discussing ways to celebrate Maine’s birthday. They gathered some books from the library written by Maine authors to feature during their upcoming celebration.
5/6 Super Studies: The students are excited about their preparations for Tuesday’s trip to the Challenger Center! We are leaving for Bangor at 7:30 Tuesday morning, so please be sure that everyone is at school on time with a packed lunch! They have been making great progress on their space mission projects. Students’ models and reports are coming along nicely and will be wrapped up next week.
7/8 Super Studies: This was the start of Slime Week! Students made a variety of slimes to demonstrate chemical reactions and physical changes of matter. Some of the slimes were even edible! Next week, students will make the final slime and then write about their findings.
3/4 Math: Students completed the NWEA Assessments this week. We will send home copies of their reports this coming week so you can see their progress. After the assessments, 3rd and 4th-grade mathematicians had a lot of fun learning new math games to practice their math facts. Please feel free to ask your child some of these math facts. The more practice they get, the better! Students were also making up their own games and asking to play them at home. Please encourage this, as well. In their lessons, 3rd-grade mathematicians were learning their 6 and 7 multiplication facts. They also explored different ways of finding answers to these facts, rather than only using skip counting. 4th-grade mathematicians are continuing to practice their long division skills. They also learned about prime and composite numbers.
5/6 Math: Students completed the NWEA Assessments this week. We will send home copies of their reports this coming week so you can see their progress.
After the assessments, 5th-grade mathematicians continued their work with fractions and this week focused on subtracting fractions with unlike denominators. They learned how to subtract with mixed numbers, as well. 6th-grade mathematicians began a new module about integers, which are all of the whole numbers and their opposites. They were applying the idea of a number line to real-world scenarios.
7/8 Math: Students completed the NWEA Assessments this week. We will send home copies of their reports this coming week so you can see their progress.
After the assessments, 7th-grade mathematicians worked on writing and solving equations in real-world situations. They are doing a great job in these scenarios. They also continued to practice using the distributive property. 8th-grade mathematicians began a new module on linear equations. They learned the difference between linear and non-linear equations and began solving equations with two steps.
PTF News
Upcoming Events:
- Friday, January 24th @ 7:30 AM Coffee Social. Come have a cup of coffee and a snack.
Community News
Blue Hill Girls Who Code Club
Registration for Blue Hill Girls Who Code is now open for girls ages 12-18. Girls Who Code is an after school program that focuses on teaching girls computer coding in a supportive environment of peers and role models. Learn basic programming concepts and try out a variety of hardware and software programming. Meetings are Wednesdays from 3-5pm at the GSA Library beginning on January 22 and running through mid-April. Information and registration at bluehillgwc.com.
January
1/17 3-4:30 PM Rube Goldberg Challenge
1/20 NO School Holiday
1/21 4:00 PM Home A Team Game vs Bay School
1/22 4:00 PM B team game at DISES
3-4:30 PM Boys Practice
4:30-6 PM Girls Practice
1/23 4:00 PM Home A Team game vs DISES
6:00 PM Budget Meeting
1/27 3-4 PM Grade ½ Pee Wee Practice
3-4 PM B Team Practice
4-5:30 PM Combined Boys and Girls Practice
1/28 4:00 PM Home A Team game vs Castine
5:15 PM B team game at Home vs Surry
1/29 4:00 PM Home A Team game vs Blue Hill
1/30 10:00 AM 8th grade visits GSA
1/31 1:00 PM Early Release
