marlboroschool.net

Dear Parents,

It’s been a quiet week in Kindergarten—there is a fever going around that has kept Alice and Eliza home for many days.  Our normally small class has become tiny!  I hope that everyone is healthy and back in school soon.  I miss them and they miss each other when anyone is out!

The March Reading Challenge is underway.  Please feel free to borrow books from the classroom, if you would like some variety in your reading material.

This week, the kindergarteners will be taking on a new responsibility in the school.  Each day, a different student will have a chance to work with a Junior High student to put up the flags in the morning.  After everyone in our class has a turn, the primary class will take on this new assignment.

As we continue with our sugaring study, the students are becoming experts on boiling sap.  It is a joy to see them don gloves, hang buckets, gather sap, load wood into the firebox and light a fire, monitor the temperature and depth of the sap in the pan, scoop the bugs and debris out of the boiling sap, add a drop of cream when the bubbles in the pan get too high, grade and bottle the syrup, and so on.  It is interesting to see them apply new learning.  When they are introduced to a new tool, (like a sheeting scoop) or scenario (such as sap bubbling over) in a weekend visit to a sugarhouse or in a book that we read, they incorporate that new information into their fantasy play.

We also boiled the sap that we gathered from our Maple Tree out back, and have made about ¼ cup of syrup!  We will continue to gather and boil sap over the next couple of weeks.  I am still planning on visiting Dan and Gail’s sugarhouse, but at this point, I want to wait until at least half of the class is in school!  Our visit will have to wait until after conferences.

During our sugaring study, we are learning about other products and gifts that people procure from trees.  We brainstormed a list of things (tangible and non-tangible) that we get from trees, and compared that list with a similar list based on a picture book about people and trees in India—check out our “double bubble” map in the hallway.  We also played a fun sorting relay game called “From a tree, not from a tree”—ask your son or daughter about it.  The class has determined that people need trees in order to live!

In addition to our sugaring study, we are keeping up with our journals, playing math games, reading stories, snowshoeing, reading with our reading buddies, and all of the usual choice activities—building with blocks, painting, listening to books on tape, and so on.  On Friday, we had the opportunity to watch David’s class’ shadow puppet plays based on Greek Myths.

Student-led conferences are scheduled for this Friday.  If you haven’t done so already, please sign up for a time slot with Gail in the office.  If neither of the designated times work for you, talk to me to set something else up.  These unique conferences are truly student-led.  This is a time for your son or daughter to share their learning with you.  You will have a chance to look at your child’s journal, to play a math game, and to look at your child’s body model, among other things.  This is not a time for parent-teacher discussion, but as always, I am happy to set aside time to discuss with you any questions or concerns that you have.  Just let me know!  I look forward to seeing all of you on Friday.

Sincerely,
Sarah