image of a notepad, pen, hot chocolate and dried oranges with text of FES updates, January 8

FES Updates, January 8, 2023

Mr. Ward, Principal

January 8, 2023

Happy New Year!  Freetown Elementary School hopes all families and friends of FES had a restful, peaceful, and memorable holiday season as well as a great start to 2023.  With that said, our school wide goal this week and next is to ensure that our students maintain a safe learning environment.  One that uses rituals, routines, and appropriate responses to create and maintain a safe physical and intellectual environment where students are free to take academic risks.  As one can imagine, coming back to school after a holiday vacation can be tiresome, a bit sad, and/or filled with anxiety.  Please know, we can reassure you that in a short time our scholars will be ready to make 2023 an exciting year filled with lots of learning. 

PTO Corner:

Attendance Matters Weekly Update:

Goal:  94% of the FES student population will attend school daily.  

  • The September average student daily attendance was 95%.  Goal achieved!

  • The October average student daily attendance was 95%.  Goal achieved!  

  • The November average student daily attendance was 94%.  Goal achieved!  

  • The December average student daily attendance was 89%.  We did not achieve our goal!

With a fresh start to the New Year we are off to a great start…

  • January 3-6 (excluding 1/6): 96%...Goal achieved!

 

Upcoming Events:

1/9:  January PTO Meeting beginning at 6:30 PM

1/16: No School - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day

February Vacation Week will take place the week of February 20-24.  School will resume again on Monday, February 27th.

SPECIAL NOTICE from SEPAC (Special Education Parent Advisory Council)

We, like the PTO, are a group of parents helping one another learn and grow regarding our children's needs. Please do not think that this parent group is strictly for parents of students with special education needs.

Is your child struggling academically, emotionally or behaviorally? Do you have a child that has a diagnosis and is eligible for an IEP or 504? Do you have questions about resources or how to help your child progress? If you are looking for support, then let's talk about it! Please join your FreeLake SEPAC Tuesday, January 10th at 6:30pm in the Apponequet Library for a mid year check in. Bring your questions and let's support each other. We are joined in our monthly meetings by the Director of Student Services Ms. Ashley Bouley, who can also assist with any questions or concerns you may have. If you are interested in coming or have any questions about SEPAC, please feel free to email us at sepac@freelake.org . We hope to see you soon!

 Additionally, the MA Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) will be visiting the District in March 2023 to assess our special education programming. In preparation for this, the DESE is holding a parent orientation on Tuesday, February 7, 2023 @ 6:30. We will be streaming this presentation during our monthly SEPAC meeting in the library at ARHS. Please contact Ashley Bouley if you have any questions abouley@freelake.org .

Grade Level Happenings from the Week of January 3-6:

Pre-School:  This week in preschool, we brainstormed and shared our New Year’s resolutions.  We welcomed the new year with a few creative crafts, such as mega phones, fireworks, and party horns.  We introduced  polar animals, which will be our unit of study over the next few weeks.   We began learning about polar bears and their amazing adaptations, such as blubber to keep them warm.  

Kindergarten: Welcome back! This week in kindergarten we were excited to see friends and teachers. We shared stories of holiday gifts and fun activities that were had. We reviewed rituals and routines while we learned the last letters q and z in Fundations.  Our math lesson was adding within 5. We reviewed the plus symbol and learned the equal sign.  We discussed and wrote about the new year and what goals/resolutions we want for the new year.

Grade 1: This week in first grade we started unit 6 in FUNdations. The students learned about the suffix -s. For comprehension we reviewed rereading text for understanding and retelling the key details of a text. We read “Me on the Map” and discussed text features. In writing we are working on responding to the text. For math this week the students learned about numbers greater than ten. 

Grade 2:  This week in second grade reading we worked on finding the main idea and key details in nonfiction texts. In Fundations we worked on combining open syllables with other syllable types to make multisyllabic words. In math we learned strategies to subtract 2-digit numbers with regrouping. In writing we began a new unit on Informative writing. We will be researching an animal and writing a report.

Grade 3: Happy New Year! This week in third grade we talked about why people immigrate to new places. We read a historical fiction story called Sailing to America. In writing, we learned about facts versus opinions. In math, we began to solve one step word problems using CUBES. In science, we began our magnet unit by investigating how magnets can attract each other. 

Art:  Grades 1-3 are starting our color unit.  Kindergarten created a tissue paper patchwork background for a snowman project. 

Physical Education: This week we are finishing Bowling by learning how to keep score (grades 1, 2 & 3).  In third grade students are introduced to keeping score with bonuses for strikes and spares.  Second grade students keep a simple score without bonuses but learn how the scores accumulate from frame to frame.  First graders are keeping a simple score and adding it up at the end. These grades are also working on their alley responsibilities, grip and stance, as well as the delivery.  Kindergarten students are working on their one step underhand roll, job rotations, and alley responsibilities.

Music:  This week, students K-3 have started the 6th and final week of their unit on improvising. Grade 1 and Kindergarten will continue to improvise with arioso type songs. 

Library:  During library class this week, kindergarten students learned how to login to the Seesaw website. They wrote out their sight words after they logged in.  First grade students chose an animal to research and write one or two facts about on Seesaw. Second grade students are working on choosing a topic to research. They selected  the databases they wanted to work with to learn about their topic. Third grade students learned about credible sources of information. Students were provided with a picture of an elephant seal with an antennae on its head and had to figure out if that picture was credible or not by using a safe search engine to look it up and verify it.