Mr. Ward’s Message:
Update on the Kindness Challenge…
As you know the challenge calls for FES as a school community to create a Rainbow of Kindness using cut-out hands to create the rainbow. Each grade level has a designated color, including staff, to help build the rainbow.
Yet another project that spreads kindness - Project 351 Clothing Drive Update…
Project 351 - Clothing Drive concluded on Friday. FES was able to collect two full boxes of clothing for families in need. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts to all those who donated clothes.
PTO Corner:
The next PTO Meeting will take place on Monday, April 10th from 6:30 - 7:30 PM. The meeting will be both in-person and virtual. The meeting invitation will be provided as the meeting approaches.
FES PTO website is...https://freetownelementarypto.weebly.com/
Attendance Matters Weekly Update:
Goal: 94% of the FES student population will attend school daily.
March student daily attendance rate…
March 1 & 2: 96.5%...Goal achieved!
March 6-10: 94%....Goal achieved!
March 13-17: 94%...Goal achieved!
March 20-24: 93%...Not quite our goal!
March 27-31 (excluding 3/31): 96%...Goal achieved!
Upcoming Events:
April 7: No School - Good Friday
April 14: No School for students and staff
April 17-21: April Vacation Week (School will resume again on Monday, April 24th).
District Wide SEPAC Night on April 4th from 6:30-7:30 PM at the ARHS Apponequet Library. Please consider joining Dr. March Atkins as she presents Anxiety & Defiance: How to Help your Kids at Home. This event is sponsored by the FLRSD SEPAC. A backpack flier was sent home with your child.
News and Happenings from the classrooms for the week of March 27-31:
Pre-School: This was a very busy week in preschool! On Monday, we celebrated our 100th Day of School with special projects, such as building structures with 100 blocks and making face masks using the number 100! We also enjoyed our “Spring into Spring” evening event, which included a fun obstacle course, photo booth, crafts, and games. Thank you to all our families who attended this event! We learned a new Lively Letter, letter j, who jumps quickly over a candlestick. We continued our community helpers theme with a special focus on police officers. Our projects included police cars, police officer hats, and fingerprinting. We discussed safety and one class learned about the importance of wearing a seat belt through an inertia science experiment! Preschool ended their week with Diamond Shape Show and Tell.
Kindergarten: This week our Fundations lesson was an introduction to the digraphs /sh/, /ch/, /th/, /wh/ and /ck/. In our reading curriculum Wonders, our HF words were- of, they. For comprehension we made/confirmed predictions and discussed the problem/solution in a story. For print concepts we reviewed top to bottom and left to right tracking and the use of an exclamation point. We focused on describing words and left to right progression in writing. Finally for math, we compared length.
Grade 1: This week is first grade we worked on adding suffix -s to words with blends. For comprehension, we read “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” and discussed what the lesson or moral is in the story. In writing we began the How-To unit. The students will be looking at how to books and developing their own how to pieces. In math we added tens and ones together. For science this week we are finishing up seasonal patterns.
Grade 2: This week in second grade reading we worked on describing the plot of a text and characters’ perspectives. In Fundations we worked on reading and spelling words with the “ow” and “ou” spellings for the /ou/ sound as in “pound” and “flower”. In math we learned how to make and interpret line plots. In writing we worked on our personal narratives. In Science we learned about properties of materials.
Grade 3: This week in third grade, students did a variety of games and activities to prepare for the MCAS test. Students reviewed important vocabulary with parts of speech, analyzed poems, completed an MCAS tutorial, and did a practice test on the computer. Our hope is for the students to feel confident and prepared to shine while taking the MCAS test. In social studies, students learned about the battle of Lexington and Concord. In math, students learned how to read pictographs and bar graphs.
Art: Kindergarteners continue to experiment with texture. This week they created layered textured by dipping marbles in paint and rolling around on their paper in a box. Grade 1 completed their implied texture fish by coloring the scales with oil pastels and then painting with watercolor. Grade 2 has begun a weaving project with yarn on a cardboard loom. Grade 3 has learned about the colorful sports art of Leroy Neiman and traced poseable people stencils to start a large scale drawing.
Music: This week, students K-3 have started the 3rd week of their unit on musicianship. Grade 1 and Kindergarten are practicing elements of the beat. 1st grade will also practice rhythms. 2nd grade will expand their musicianship with Sol Mi patterns. 3rd grade will be writing and reading music for their recorders and practicing pitch patterns.
Physical Education: This week students continued to practice their basketball skills. First, second and third graders practiced spot shooting, passing and dribbling. Kindergarten and first grade students learned the proper technique to shoot the basketball.