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On Monday we’ll get back in the swing of our winter schedule with Winter Workshops in the morning and Winter Sports in the afternoon. While the kids are off at Winter Sports the teachers will be taking a close look at our math program and identifying areas where we need to place more attention. Math is so different from what we as adults remember learning. More and more emphasis is put on using math skills to solve real world problems.

In the Primary Room this week students were using what they knew about how many legs an insect has (6!) to figure out how many ants were marching across the room. They needed to determine what information in the problem was important and what strategy would help them solve it. All this is just as important as coming up with the right answer! As teachers we constantly strive to find the right balance of teaching addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division with providing opportunities for kids to learn when to use these different skills as they solve problems.

Although this took place a couple of weeks ago, I’d like to recognize the very successful High School Evening that Tom Hudak planned for Junior High students and parents. Since Marlboro residents can choose which high school best suits them, it’s so valuable to be able to meet and speak with representatives from local schools. The Compass School, Brattleboro, Twin Valley, Leland and Gray, the Putney School, and Vermont Academy met with Junior High students and parents on January 10th. As I drove Alex home from a basketball game last week, he told me that he had broadened his thinking to new schools based on this evening. Thanks, Tom!

Jodi’s class has been learning about “informational text”. We usually think about story books when we think of kids learning to read but, when you consider what kind of reading most of us do as adults, you realize it’s pretty dry stuff – directions, e-mails, newspapers, Friday Notes (!!). And it requires different reading skills. Daniel, Max, and Ben came to my office on a scavenger hunt, looking for informational text. They found lots – posters, mail, labels, schedules. What kind of text can your children find around home?

The Healthy Snack program just keeps getting better. Composting of paper products and food scraps makes it a better deal for the environment as well as for your children’s nutrition. Celena has arranged for this service with Triple T, our trash hauler. Each classroom has a pail for compostables which is then emptied into the container in the parking lot. From there it’s hauled away to a site where it’s broken down into compost.

The Marlboro Community Club supports town residents in many ways. One way is to make memorial gifts. Tinky Turner asked that the Club’s gift in memory of Bob McLane go to the school art program. We’ll let you know when Lauren has decided how to use these funds. In the meantime, thank you to Tinky and the Community Club.

Before you know it, spring will be here and so will Girls on the Run for 3rd-5th graders. We need a coach. Is that you? Do you need more informations? If so, please call Francie.