Blog

Upper El’s Extraordinary Week

Posted on by Karen Sankey

Our week was packed with lots of activity! Our group lessons focused on History and Biology this week. In History we continued learning about our closest fossil relatives and had lessons on Homo erectus, Homo neanderthalensis, and Home sapiens. In Biology we had a lesson about the vital function of sensitivity and learned which animals have nerve nets, ganglia, nerve cords, and brains.

We were fortunate to be gifted the raised garden planter which was purchased at the auction by Lydia’s family, and on Tuesday we planted some flowers and tasty herbs. A special thank you to Kristina and Brian for the gift!

On Thursday we were finally able to have our visits with the next level. The fourth graders welcomed some third grade friends to our classroom for the morning and they were wonderful mentors. The fifths were thrilled to visit middle school and had a great time going to math class, humanities, and science with their sixth grade peers.

We are excited to go on our big trip to Nature’s Classroom next week! Our group leader, Anna, has given us a wonderful variety of fun and educational activities to choose from. We had a class meeting, and after discussing our options, we chose some terrific ones to participate in while we are there.

Students should arrive at school between 8:00 and 8:10 on Tuesday. They can be dropped off in the back or, if you like, you can park in the front and walk them in. The bus will leave at 9:00. We will return in time for dismissal on Thursday. Please reach out with any questions about the trip.

Have a beautiful weekend!

Expert Project Symposium; Head of School for the Day; Summer Camp Registration; FWM Calendar 2022-2023

Posted on by Gina Tryforos

BRAVO to the 8th year class on their Expert Project Symposium 

One of the highlights of the 8th grade year at FWM is the Expert Project.

All of us in attendance on Wednesday evening were moved, inspired and impressed by the level of maturity, professionalism, and expertise these students demonstrated as they spoke passionately about their topics of choice. Each presenter prepared a visual presentation and spent approximately 20 minutes on stage talking about their subject. 

An important part of Montessori education is learning about what interests you or what you are curious about. 

Years of exploring, learning how to research, and developing critical thinking skills at Fraser Woods leads to the culminating, five-month Expert Project. 

This end-of-year 8th grade research project begins with a topic chosen by each 8th grade student that is then thoroughly researched. Part of the research process includes consulting with experts in the field. Students contacted and corresponded with an array of experts in their respective fields of research to enhance and support their thesis statements.

Topics included: 

  • Building a House
  • Ways to Improve Mental Health
  • Cuban Missile Crisis
  • The Case for Race
  • Athletes and Mental Health

Congratulations to this incredible 8th year class!

Head of School for the Day

Liam Alston was FWM’s Head of School for the day on Friday, May 20th. Liam began the day with the 8th years as they delivered the weekly news. Liam announced, “Popsicles for everyone and extra recess for his Lower Elementary class.” After that he called and checked in with his family, rolled up his sleeves and got to work! Liam had a couple of formal meetings this morning. He met with Ms. Pascarella to talk about Field Day, he met with Ms. Gina and talked about new ideas for After School Clubs for the upcoming school year. Liam also visited classrooms and attended an extra PE class. All in all, a GREAT day for a Head of School!

Summer Camp Registration

If you would like your child to participate in FWM’s Summer Camp, please register as soon as possible. We need to meet the minimum number of students in order to run the camp. 

Note: We are able to accommodate more children than the minimum required.  

To Register:

  1. Log in to your  MyFWM.org account
  2. Click on PARENTS Widget and click FWM PROGRAMS
  3. Find the program and click REGISTRATION DETAILS

FWM School Calendar 2022-2023

Mrs. Hood: Spreading Wings!

Posted on by Andrea Hood

The time we all were waiting for finally arrived!  Our beautiful butterflies emerged, took time to strengthen their wings and enjoyed the well prepared environment your little ones created for them. Children enjoyed watching the butterflies walking around and using their long tongues to taste the fruits we provided for them. When the time came, we gathered together in the butterfly garden and opened the glass doors! We could almost sense the butterflies’ excitement as they felt the sun and the wind and immediately started to flap their wings. One of them flew high as soon we opened the doors, while the other four seemed a little more shy. I grabbed a little stick and offered it to them. After a couple of seconds the butterflies decided to fly, bringing smiles and laughter to your children while fulfilling their purpose as butterflies.

This activity always brings so many emotions for us as guides! In just a couple of weeks our school year will be over and as we reflect on the butterflies flying away, we realize that as with those tiny caterpillars,  we have observed and enjoyed every change in the lives of your children during this year! They have grown so much! It has brought so much joy to our lives just to step back and observe how independent, confident, and capable your children have become.  Like the butterflies brought so much joy to your children, your little ones have brought so much joy to us and we are so incredibly thankful to you for trusting us with them. Soon it will be time to open the “glass doors” and watch them fly and we are so sure each one of them is going to spread their wings and fly high!

On another note, we started our studies on birds this week and children have had a great time taking some time to listen to the birds outside and learning to recognize them by name. Cardinal, blue jay, robin, woodpecker, oriole, indigo bunting, warbler, house sparrow and goldfinch are some of the names you will hear often in our environment. Children got to observe, feel and smell the type of food birds eat and also learn some names like sunflowers seeds, millet, corn and wheat. They also helped to prepare our bird feeder.

This week some of our older toddlers got to visit a primary classroom and worked with some of the kindergartners and teachers. We explored cherries for food tasting, celebrated a  fantastic three year old birthday and got a fresh new member in our FWM community! Big congratulations to the Mica family on their new precious addition!

We hope you all enjoy the weather this weekend,

Stay cool and see you next week,

Mrs. Hood and Ms. Maria

Reminder: As the weather is getting warmer, please remember to apply sunscreen to your child before school arrival.

Mrs. Semmah: Bird Sounds

Posted on by Kaoutar Semmah

Last week the children were so engaged in learning sounds around us and we continued into this week by learning about our birds theme and we came up with more listening games to add to our theme. Listening to birds’ sounds added to the children’s excitement and learning. This is a simple, yet effective activity of seeing photos of different birds and listening to the sounds they make. The children were so engaged and also enjoyed imitating the birds’ sounds. We also learned about the life cycle of a duck and a robin and their chicks. The children loved the book Have you Heard the Nesting Bird. This is an enjoyable book about unique bird songs with beautifully illustrated bird pictures. This week we also released our three beautiful butterflies on the playground. It was a very beautiful moment watching the children so keen on following butterflies and wishing them a happy life.

Have a great weekend,
Kaoutar and Sara

Lower El: Moving Up Day

Posted on by Ashley O'Connell

This week we had Moving Up Day!  Third-year students spent the morning in Upper Elementary and Mrs. Doyle’s Kindergarten students spent some time with us in Lower Elementary. Next week Mrs. Lopes’ class will have a chance to visit.

Multi-age groupings are an advantage of a Montessori classroom. They give the children the opportunity to go through a cycle of being mentored, practicing mentoring, and becoming the mentor. This week our third-year students practiced being mentees and our first and second year students practiced being mentors to their Kindergarten friends. It was a joy to see students at both levels completely engaged and happy working with their future classmates. Our first and second year students did a wonderful job planning work that was enjoyable and interesting for the Kindergartners. Some children even made posters to welcome their future classmates to the class!

Middle School: A Week in Review

Posted on by msutherland

It has been a very exciting and busy week in the middle school community.  Students participated in our second flag football game, we welcomed the upcoming upper elementary students for moving-up day, as well as, enjoyed the amazing 8th grade expert project presentations. Next week we will be traveling to Woodloch Resort, PA and are excited to enjoy four days participating in the fun filled activities we have planned (May 23-26). We are all looking forward to our overnight trip to enjoy time all together before the school year comes to an end!

Humanities

6th grade Humanities classes finished their class novel, Shooting Kabul. It was an exciting novel that took the readers on twists and turns. Next, we completed a vocabulary unit. Finally, we welcomed the Upper El students for a class period and worked on a writing prompt.

7th grade Humanities classes continued their studies of European History and learned about the rise of Adolf Hitler post-WWI and also the formation of the Nazi Party. They learned about the state of Germany post-WWI and how that contributed to Hitler’s ability to become a leader. Next they started the novel, Four Perfect Pebbles, which is a memoir highlighting the experiences of Marion Blumenthal Lazan as a young, Jewish girl in Germany during the Holocaust. Finally, students completed a unit of vocabulary.

The 8th grade successfully presented their Expert Projects to an audience of family and friends on Wednesday evening. After five months of work, they delivered their TED Talk-style presentations that were about 20 minutes long and enhanced by multimedia and Google Slides. Their hard work and perseverance with the project is commendable! Bravo!

Science

6th year Earth Science students finished their unit “Phases” this week. Students created model representations of the eight phases, including the transition each phase progressed into and came from. Our next unit will be “Rotation, Orbits, Seasons”. The objectives of this unit will be for students to describe earth’s motion in space, explain the relationship between earth’s tilt, orbit, and seasons, and explain why the northern and southern hemispheres experience opposite seasons.

7th year Physical Science students are also finishing their unit “Characteristic Properties of Waves”. Throughout this unit, students represented the different wavelengths of colors and created a stop motion video depicting the similarities and differences between transverse and longitudinal waves. We are currently covering topics pertaining to the history of AM and FM radio waves.

The 8th year Life Science students have completed their unit “Digestive System.” Throughout this unit, students learned about the function and role each organ within the digestive system plays, along with accessory organs such as the liver, pancreas, gallbladder and appendix. Students were able to dissect a dogfish shark within the unit which created a great hands-on approach to learning more about the circulatory and digestive systems. Students carefully identified known organs of the shark, comparing similarities and differences to our own. Our next unit will be “Nervous System.”

Math

In Transition class students began working through the final chapter of this year’s curriculum. This week, we learned how to solve and graph linear inequalities and equations. This class is practicing how to solve for unknown variables on both sides of the equation, as well as how to create equations from real world word problems.

In Algebra class, students are excited to conclude their learning of Chapter 10 and begin exploring our final chapter titled Polynomials. This class is able to solve nonlinear systems, write a system of inequalities from a graph, as well as determine how many solutions a system has based on its slope value.

In Geometry class, students concluded their learning of Chapter 9 titled Three-Dimensional Figures. We learned how to determine symmetry planes in 3D shapes, as well as, calculate the surface area of prisms, pyramids, cones and cylinders. This week the Geometry class also learned how to use nets to determine unique polyhedra shapes.

Math Joke: How do we know the fractions, x/c, y/c, and z/c, are all in Europe? ……….They’re all over c’s!

Mrs. Lopes: Enjoying the Outdoors

Posted on by Amanda Lopes

“There must be provision for the child to have contact with nature; to understand and appreciate the order, the harmony and the beauty in nature,”- Maria Montessori 

Being outdoors ignites a unique excitement and curiosity in children that cannot be replicated in the classroom (unknown).

Every day your children spend time learning, working together, and exploring our natural playground. Daily outdoor learning helps to develop healthy, active lifestyles and routines for the children, while providing them with hands-on experiences in our natural world. Our beautiful natural playground provides unique experiences to stimulate the children’s creativity and contribute to their appreciation of nature.

Helping children develop an appreciation for the outdoors is one of the significant benefits of regular outdoor play. The outside world is full of beautiful sounds, sights, textures, and life. Exposing children early on to the beauty of the world around them can be the perfect way to boost the aesthetic development of a child, allowing them to be more aware of all the beauty around them.

Here’s to rising temperatures, longer days, and the opportunity to spend time exploring the outdoors!

Wishing you a peaceful week,

Amanda & Heather

Mrs. Wilson: Little Ornithologists

Posted on by Cynthia Wilson

We started this week by ending our lesson on The Life Cycle of a Butterfly by releasing them into nature. The children giggled as they flew out of the butterfly house. I could even hold one on my finger for the children to look even closer.

We introduced the children to the names of seven backyard birds such as cardinal, oriole, indigo bunting, warbler, blue jay, robin, and woodpecker. We even pre-recorded the different sounds each bird makes. The children can listen to the sound and match the sound button with the picture and objects of each bird. Pretty soon our toddlers will become little ornithologists. We also learned how to say a bird in Spanish (pajaro) and in sign language.

Food Tasting: The children seem enthusiastic about doing our food tasting activity outdoors. This week we tasted cherries. And oh boy were they sweet, juicy, and delicious!

As the weather is getting warmer we are going to add water activities to our outdoor experience. Please apply sunscreen to your child every morning before arrival.