“Don’t you sometimes feel bewildered when you think of the millions of things that put life together?’ … ‘I’m not bewildered. I’m filled with the deepest awe and wonder. The miracle is that in its complexity it all works.” -Julie Andrews Edwards, The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles

We spent most of last week testing, and everyone handled the schedule like pros! Students spent their early mornings rehearsing for the spring musical, followed by our class chapter-book read-aloud, and then testing. After following this schedule Monday through Thursday, we were glad to get back to a more typical routine on Friday with student-led yoga after our read-aloud and some work cycle time before lunch. Students are hard at work on an end-of-the-year biology project, researching and writing reports about the vital functions of animals. Their options for completing the project are either to prepare a presentation with a slideshow about their animal or to write an informational booklet.

This coming week is our last week before we head off to Massachusetts for Nature’s Classroom. We are getting very excited, and students will choose their activities in the next couple of days. If you haven’t turned in your medical forms yet, please do that by Tuesday at the latest. I will be inviting you to join a WhatsApp text group for communication while we are away. I’ll use this group to share photos, in real time when possible, and communicate information about our trip while we are away.

Coming Up!

• Monday, May 18 – DEADLINE to Order Pilot Lunch Program
• Thursday, May 21 @ 7:00 – Spring Musical
• Friday, May 22 – DEADLINE to Order a Yearbook
• Monday, May 25 – No School: Memorial Day
• Tuesday, May 26 – Thursday, May 28  – Nature’s Classroom Trip
• Friday, May 29 – May and Summer Birthday Breakfast

Why I Wake Early

Hello, sun in my face.
Hello, you who make the morning
and spread it over the fields
and into the faces of the tulips
and the nodding morning glories,
and into the windows of, even, the
miserable and crotchety-

best preacher that ever was,
dear star, that just happens
to be where you are in the universe
to keep us from ever-darkness,
to ease us with warm touching,
to hold us in the great hands of light-
good morning, good morning, good morning.

Watch, now, how I start the day
in happiness, in kindness.

Mary Oliver

Wishing the happiest of Mother’s Days to all of our Upper El mamas! 

Thank you for a very special Teacher Appreciation Week! Sara and I feel so loved and appreciated with all of your and your children’s heartfelt messages and gifts last week.

Upper el students are hard at work researching the vital functions of an animal of their choice. The process began with using our classroom materials to gather some initial facts. From there, students are weaving in what they learned in this week’s writing lesson on multi-paragraph reports, taking notes, and building outlines for their final papers. They are focusing on crafting strong topic sentences for each paragraph, then developing supporting and concluding sentences. After writing everything by hand, revising, and editing, they will type their final drafts, transforming their research into books about their chosen animals to share with the class. Their enthusiasm is clear – they’re dedicating a great deal of time and attention to this project. We love seeing them share information with each other as they learn more about their animals.

This week, we had our last sandwich-making morning of the year. We made 208 sandwiches for the soup kitchen! Thank you very much to all who contributed ingredients this month. A very special thank you to Teresa and Brandon for helping us make the sandwiches and dropping them off at St. Vincent DePaul! We appreciate all of you!

Next week, we will take the ERB-CTP5 standardized test. We will do a little each morning and keep the testing as low-key as possible. As a Montessori school, we take this test only as a practical life experience. We know that children will need to take tests in the future, as they enter high school and beyond, and we want to help prepare them for that. At the upper elementary level, we don’t report scores. This is because I use this opportunity to guide them through the test and explain things as questions come up. While I do not provide them with answers, I do give more guidance than the test allows if it is being scored. When students reach the middle school level, their tests are scored, and you will receive those scores.

Because we are in rehearsals for the musical until 10:00 each morning next week, the May and summer birthday breakfast will be on May 29, the day after we return from Nature’s Classroom.

If you have not yet turned in your child’s medical forms for our trip, please do so as soon as possible. 

Upcoming Dates

• Thursday, May 21
  • Spring Musical @7:00
• Friday, May 22
  • Yearbook Orders Due
• Monday, May 25
  • No School – Memorial Day
• Tuesday, May 26 – Thursday, May 28
  • Big Trip to Nature’s Classroom!
• Friday, May 29
  • May and Summer Birthday Breakfast @8:30
• Monday, June 1
  • First Annual Variety Show @4:00

“We have come as far as we have because we are the cleverest creatures to have ever lived on Earth. But if we are to continue to exist, we will require more than intelligence. We will require wisdom.” -David Attenborough

We’ve had a busy two weeks in Upper El, preparing for end-of-the-year traditions and beginning to wrap up a year’s worth of lessons.

Writing lessons and work focused on expanding on a paragraph by adding detail, description, and interest, with the ultimate goal of making it more engaging and informative. Students also learned the importance of revising their writing before editing and to practice using transitions and varying sentence structure in their own writing. While completing their follow-up work in revising paragraphs, students used analytical and abstract thinking.

In fourth-grade grammar work, we worked with adverbs of time, place, and manner. Fifth graders learned that complements of specification are used to add clarity to a sentence by adding meaning to a noun. They worked with infinitives, prepositional, and participial phrases. Fifths also learned about the differences between phrases and clauses and practiced identifying each, as well as finding the predicate and subject in clauses.

In geometry work, fourth graders learned to find the area of parallelograms and acute triangles, and fifth graders began work on finding the area of a sector of a circle. Each of these lessons involved working with hands-on materials to determine the formula for finding the area before students practiced drawing figures and applying the formulas.

In biology, we wrapped up our vital functions lessons by examining the matrix of all six vital functions across 14 different phyla and classes of animals. The next few weeks will involve student research on the vital functions of a student-chosen animal, including a written report and an optional oral presentation to the class.

In our history lessons, we learned about Neanderthals, fossil humans who lived in Europe and Central/Northern Asia before and during the last ice age, between 400,000 and 40,000 years ago. We also learned about Homo sapiens, the only surviving species of the Homo genus, who, by about 30,000 years ago, had spread to nearly all parts of the world. We took a closer look at the Cro-Magnon people, whose fossils were the first of the early modern humans to be identified.

We wrapped up our week with a beautiful day spent with grandparents and special friends, followed by an amazing concert performed for our community. Bravo to all of the children for your hard work! I am in awe of you!

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Upcoming Dates

• Thursday, May 7: Sandwich Making for St. Vincent DePaul Soup Kitchen
• Wednesday, May 13: May and Summer Months Birthday Breakfast at 8:30
• Thursday, May 21: Wonka! Spring Musical for UE and MS at 7:00
• Monday, May 25: No School – Memorial Day
• Tuesday, May 26 – Thursday, May 28 – Nature’s Classroom Trip
  • If you have not turned in your Nature’s Classroom forms, please do so this week.

“The fact is that no species has ever had such wholesale control over everything on earth, living or dead, as we now have. That lays upon us, whether we like it or not, an awesome responsibility. In our hands now lies not only our own future, but that of all other living creatures with whom we share the earth.” -David Attenborough

As the weather gets warmer, we will spend more time outdoors, including time in the woods on our beautiful land. Please send insect repellent and sunblock for your student to use as needed before we go outdoors. They will label the bottles with their name and keep them at school. Children should also get into the habit of checking for ticks each night.

In language work this week, our writing lesson focused on fact vs. opinion, and students worked on transforming sentences as follow-up work. I gave them sentences, and they identified which were facts and which were opinions, and then they transformed each sentence. If it was a fact, they turned it into an opinion, and if it was an opinion, they turned it into a fact. For the novel study, students worked in small groups to review the reading assignment. They discussed the chapters and their answers to the novel study questions. In grammar, fourth graders learned about verbs and verb phrases. They identified actions in sentences, learned about “helping” or “auxiliary” verbs, and identified the complete verb in a sentence. Fifth graders learned about the differences between attributive adjectives, appositive adjectives, linking verbs, and predicate words.

Fourth-grade geometry focused on deriving the formula for finding the area of a square, which is a specific kind of rectangle, from the experience of finding the area of a rectangle last week. Fifth graders compared the nomenclature of a regular polygon with that of a circle. They used that information, along with what they knew about finding the area of a polygon, to derive the formula for the area of a circle. To celebrate using Pi to find the area of circles, the fifth graders enjoyed some apple and cherry pies before our lesson.

In biology this week, we looked at the vital function of reproduction in animals. We learned about asexual vs. sexual reproduction and the differences, advantages, and disadvantages of each. Some types of asexual reproduction discussed were budding and regeneration. In our discussion of sexual reproduction, we covered the differences between male and female sex cells, the nomenclature of male and female reproductive organs, fertilization, oviparous, viviparous, and ovoviviparous animals, and breeding.

Our history lesson this week focused on Neanderthals, and we viewed a portion of the 2024 BBC documentary, Secrets of the Neanderthals. We will learn more details about Neanderthals next week, along with taking a look at Cro-Magnons and comparing the two.

Upcoming Dates:

• Wednesday, April 22
  • 8:30 – April Birthday Breakfast
  • 6:00 – 8th Grade Expert Presentations
    • Come see these amazing projects and what lies ahead for your child when they are in their 8th grade year!
• Friday, April 24
  • No School – Student-Parent-Teacher Conferences
  • 9:30-12:30 – Spring Musical Rehearsal
• Friday, May 1
  • Grandparents and Special Friends Day
  • 11:30 – Early Dismissal
  • 5:00 – Spring Concert
• Saturday, May 2
  • 6:00 – Springfest

“There is symbolic as well as actual beauty in the migration of the birds, the ebb and flow of the tides, the folded bud ready for the spring. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature – the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after the winter.” -Rachel Carson, The Sense of Wonder 

As I look over the images from last week, I am struck by the children’s joy. They are playful, innocent, and full of enthusiasm about learning and their friendships. They generously give their time to help others and are passionate about justice both in the world and in our classroom. During their lessons and independent work, they are focused learners. Over the past seven months, they have honed these skills and qualities, and as we enter the final weeks of the school year, they will reap the benefits of their hard work as they wrap up lessons across the curriculum. Go Upper El!

We began the week with a writing lesson on paragraph outlines for narrative writing. The students worked on this writing assignment alongside their daily writing prompts, which they created themselves. Each child has written a prompt for their classmates to respond to. We will work through the prompts one at a time each day until we have completed all 19. The children are enjoying seeing their prompts displayed on the board and are excited to discover how their friends respond.

In our geometry lessons this week, both groups focused on finding area. Fourths learned the formula for finding the area of a rectangle. I introduced this concept using Montessori area materials, allowing the children to discover the formula and then apply it to their own drawn rectangles. Fifth graders listened to the story of Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi – Radius and the Number Pi by Cindy Neuschwander.

In grammar, the fourth graders learned about reciprocal and reflexive/intensive compound pronouns, while the fifth graders studied nouns of direct address.

Our biology lesson this week centered on the vital functions of support and movement. We examined the differences between exoskeletons and endoskeletons and learned about the animals that fall into each category. We also explored the muscular structures of animals with both types of skeletons and how those muscles aid in movement. In the coming week, students will examine in greater detail the vital functions of support and movement for each animal on the evolutionary strip.

We wrapped up our week with a focus on serving others. On Thursday, we made over 200 sandwiches for St. Vincent DePaul soup kitchen in Waterbury. Thank you to everyone who contributed sandwich ingredients, and a special thank you to Moira and Jeannine for your help in making the sandwiches, as well as to Teresa for delivering them to the soup kitchen! On Friday, Upper El students enjoyed buddy reading with their kindergarten book buddies.

 

Upcoming Dates:

• Friday, April 24
  • No school – Student-Parent-Teacher Conferences
• Friday, May 1
  • Grandparents & Special Friends Day
  • Spring Concert
• Saturday, May 2
  • Springfest

“Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark.” -Rabindranath Tagore

We kicked off our week with a writing lesson on how to write a single paragraph outline. The classroom was full of excitement as students brainstormed and collaborated to develop their outlines, setting them up for some awesome writing down the line! After brainstorming, we came back together as a group to share ideas and formulate a topic sentence, supporting sentences, and a concluding sentence together.

In geometry, fourth graders were busy exploring area through some hands-on activities, constructing rectangles of different sizes using various arrays. This not only reinforced their understanding of area but also got them thinking critically about how shapes relate to numbers. The fifth graders dove deeper into circles. They learned how to use the diameter and Pi to calculate circumference. As they measured the diameters of circles and calculated their circumferences, their understanding solidified.

In grammar, fourth graders focused on interrogative and relative pronouns, which really helped sharpen their sentence structure and comprehension. They analyzed sentences and worked on distinguishing between different types of pronouns. Meanwhile, the fifth graders tackled appositives during their sentence analysis work. They learned that a noun is an appositive when it renames the first noun and that adjectives may be in apposition to a noun when they follow the noun rather than precede it.

In biology, we looked at how sensitivity functions in animals. The students learned about various biological features, such as protoplasm, nerve nets, ganglia, nerve cords, and brains, and how these structures help animals interact with their environments. This week laid the groundwork for a deeper dive next week, where we’ll look at specific animals and their unique adaptations for sensitivity.

Coming Up

• Thursday, April 9 – Sandwich Making for the Soup Kitchen
• Friday, April 10 – Nature’s Classroom $100 Deposit Due
• Wednesday, April 22 – April Birthday Breakfast

“Come with me into the woods. Where spring is advancing, as it does, no matter what, not being singular or particular, but one of the forever gifts, and certainly visible.” -Mary Oliver

This week, it felt great to get back into our normal routine after all the hard work we put into our autobiographies before March Break. We started off by adding two new activities to our morning work cycle: weekly math word problems and daily writing prompts.

The math work, which is in addition to their individual lessons and assignments, is designed to be collaborative and to focus on skills they’ve previously learned or to enhance their math skills. This week’s math involved working together on skip-counting, using calculators, identifying patterns, solving word problems, creating graphs, working with modes, collecting data, making line plots, and understanding fractions.

The daily writing prompts are meant to complement our weekly writing lessons and assignments, focusing on short, creative writing tasks. As students arrive in the morning, this writing serves as an opportunity to settle in quietly and to write every day before lessons, collaboration, and assignments begin.

I’m already noticing a calmer vibe in the room during the mornings before yoga. Children come in, greet each other, and find a spot to sit with friends to spend a few peaceful minutes writing. This quiet writing time really helps us start the day off focused and productive.

This week in our geometry lessons, the fourth graders were introduced to the concept of finding the area, while the fifth graders learned about the origins of Pi by comparing a circle’s circumference to its diameter. In biology, students worked in small groups to review the vital functions of nutrition, respiration, and circulation. Each group then took turns presenting information about different animals and their vital functions to the rest of the class. In history, we explored Homo erectus and compared them to the fossil ancestors we have studied so far, as well as to modern humans.

For our last student-read book of the year, we are reading The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles by Julie Andrews. We are reading this book as a novel study instead of as a literature circle book. This means that students will answer questions and complete packets for each set of assigned pages, rather than completing role sheets. We will meet weekly to discuss the assigned passages as a whole class. I have found that reading one book as a class is a wonderful way to end the school year.

Wishing you a peaceful week ahead.

“What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become.” -Henry David Thoreau

What a full and amazing week! It was the perfect send-off for our two-week break.

Our week began with a presentation by our seventh-grade friend, Bella, who spoke to us about the effects of social media on our brains. This timely presentation engaged everyone, and the children asked some very thoughtful questions afterwards. A special thank you to Bella!

The rest of our week was dedicated to preparing for Thursday’s Research Night, which involved a lot of printing, cutting, and gluing. Emotions ranged from determination to frustration and joy as we learned about the rewards of intense focus and the challenges of modifying the presentation boards. I noticed students really “locked it in” this week, a concept we’ve been discussing a lot in class lately. When Thursday night arrived, the children radiated pride and confidence! I am so proud of each of them for their hard work and accomplishments.

We ended the week with February’s Birthday Breakfast, which had been rescheduled due to snow days. Thank you, Erin and Malcolm, for sharing doughnuts with us, and thank you, Tim, for joining us for yoga!

We hope you all have a wonderful two weeks with your kiddos! Happy Spring Break!

Looking Ahead

• Wednesday, March 25 @ 8:30 – March Birthday Breakfast
• Thursday, April 9 @ 9:30 – Sandwich Making for the Soup Kitchen