Upcoming Dates:
March 14 - PTO meeting 7:00 p.m. - School Cafeteria
March 22 - Report Cards Posted for term 2
MCAS Dates
Grade 3 Only
Math - May 17 and 18
ELA - April 11 and 12
A note from our School Nurse,
Dear Parents and Guardians,
The School Health Office will be conducting its annual Mandatory Health Screenings for grades K,1,2, and 3 during the month of April. Kindergarten, 2nd and 3rd graders will have vision and hearing screening. First graders will have vision, hearing, height, weight and BMI.
https://www.mass.gov/lists/sch...
https://www.mass.gov/doc/105-c...
If a parent or guardian wishes to exclude the student from the state required screening, please email me stating so.
Thank you,
Nancy Amaral
NAmaral@freelake.org
508-947-1403 x4104
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STUDENT ABSENCE NOTIFICATION POLICY
Whenever your child is absent from school, please call the designated telephone number below during the designated times or call/send a note anytime before the day of the absence. Please leave a message with your child's full name, the reason for the absence. Any family of a student whose absence has not been reported will be contacted by the school office the morning of the absence to make you aware and to remind you of our policy.
School Designated Sickline: Phone Number: 508-947-1403
TARDY STUDENTS GRADES PK - 3: Students arriving late to school must report to the main office with their parents to be signed in. The family of any student that is tardy 5 or more days in a given term, may be required to meet with the building principal (or his/her designee) to discuss the reasons for such tardiness and develop an action plan.
Please note our policy for communicating absences:
ABSENT STUDENTS: A letter may be provided to parents that documents the dates a child has been absent or late to school. If the amount of unexcused absences or tardies exceeds 5 school days, a meeting may be scheduled with the building Principal (or his/her designee), the Parent(s)/Guardian and possibly the student to develop an action plan to improve the student’s attendance. Please note that when a student has been absent for five (5) or more consecutive days, parents must obtain a doctor’s note and submit it to school.
If a student is absent for eleven or more days per term, school officials may file a CRA (Child Requiring Assistance) petition with the Juvenile Court which could result in a hearing before a Juvenile Court Judge. Prior to the filing of a CRA, families and students will be required to work with school administrators to improve the student’s attendance.
Chronic absenteeism may also lead to academic failure for the year and retention of the student per the discretion of the building principal. An Excused Absence/Tardy includes: ● Documented illness or injury ● Medical or dental appointments ● Bereavement/family funeral ● Major religious observations ● Extraordinary family circumstances (excused at the discretion of the principal)
An Unexcused Absence/Tardy is any absence or tardy that is not covered by the aforementioned definition of “Excused Absence/Tardy”. Examples of an unexcused absence may include, but may not be limited to: family vacations, undocumented absences, non-emergency family situations.
** If anyone has any questions about the above policy, please contact Ms. Pineault for further discussion.
A look into our classrooms:
Art:
Kindergarten students read Camille and the Sunflowers, a story about Vincent van Gogh. We designed colorful vases. Next week, we will “fill” them with sunflowers.
First graders, with the help of some wonderful parent volunteers, made tie-dye shirts for Grandparents’ Day!
Second graders made 3D cylinder drawings using colored pencils.
Third graders learned how to layer colored pencil to create stencil-like drawings.
Music:
K: This week we worked on playing the unpitched percussion instruments while singing a fun song. We also saved some time for dancing!
1st: We have been hard at work getting ready for our Grandparents Day performance in April! The kids are super excited!
2nd: We have been continuing to work on songs for our Disney performance in May as well as a few rhythm games.
3rd: This week we are working on playing the recorders! Everyone has learned to play our first note (letter B). The kids have been working in groups to give a peer critique and figure out ways together how to fix issues/problems with the recorder.
Library:
We are in Round 2 of March Book Madness this week! The following are our winners from last week: Everyone in the Red Brick Building, Runs with the Stars, Gibberish and My Pet Feet. Stay tuned for this week's winners! Our students are very engaged and excited to see if their favorite books will make it to the championship round!
PE
This week in PE we are beginning our Basketball unit. This week students in all grades are practicing dribbling with both hands and moving while dribbling. Students are also practicing bounce passing in pairs. In grades 1-3 students are also playing a keep away like game in small groups to practice passing and defense. In grade 3 students are shooting on an 8ft hoop to practice good shooting form.
Kindergarten
We had another busy week in Kindergarten. We talked about things that grow on a farm and we categorized them into groups of fruit and vegetables. We read the book An Orange in January, by Dianna Hutts Aston which showed us how things grow, how they are picked, how they are transported, how they are sold and how they get into our homes. This led to a great discussion about the process of getting food from farm to home.
In Math we continued to work on teen numbers by counting groups of 11-20 objects. We also practiced writing numbers to 20.
Grade 1
This week, students learned about how animals survive in nature, as part of our ongoing Wonders unit on animals.We are continuing to learn about vowel teams, with a focus on vowel teams ai, ay, oi and oy this week. Students are also working to identify words with open or closed syllables.
In math, we are working with teen numbers, as well as reviewing strategies to solve word problems. Students are about halfway through our math facts unit, and will continue to have their weekly math facts.
Grade 2
Second grade had a fantastic week. This week we read Biblioburro. A man, his burros, and his books bring joy to children in remote Colombian villages in this inspiring book based on a true story. The second graders also got to read about Luis and his burros in a Scholastic Reader, which they were excited about!
In math, second graders began working on subtraction with regrouping. They are using a variety of strategies such as base 10 blocks in order to solve these problems.
Most classes are doing the St. Patrick’s Day Potato Project so students can be working on that at home so their potatoes are ready to go for next Wednesday!
Grade 3
Grade 3 enjoyed the field trip to the NBSO this week; thank you to the PTO for making it possible!
In reading, we are wrapping up Unit 3 in Wonders, reading about historical events and finding unique features in events and passages. We are working on various stages of opinion writing, including supporting opinions with information from several relevant sources.
In math we continue with various types of measurement, including elapsed time, liquid volume, mass, and linear measurement.
In social studies we are wrapping up our study of The American Revolution, and getting ready to discover and explore extreme weather events in science.
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Thank you! Have a great weekend.
Bethany Pineault
Principal