Summer Learning Guide
For those interested, Smithfield will be offering elementary students the opportunity to complete summer learning activities. Please view the link below for more details. This link will be posted on our website. Please contact the school with any questions.
https://summer.smithfield-ps.org/home
Keeping Up With Kindergarten
Wow, what a fun week! We had a blast at Capron Park Zoo! We became zoologists during our zoo class and learned about cuddly, and cute animals! We got to pet a chinchilla, lizard and giant rabbit. We also had a blast eating our lunch under the pavilion and playing on the playground. It was a great day! Thank you to our chaperones who spent the day with us. Everything went so smoothly!
During Reader’s and Writer’s Workshop we began our unit on Rhode Island! We looked at a globe and found our continent, country and state. We looked at a map of Rhode Island and talked about our state capital and where Smithfield is. We learned about a bunch of other state symbols such as the Big Blue Bug, Dels, coffee milk, etc . Students enjoyed reading Mrs. Lanzieri’s Rhody Ram’s Rhode Island Vacation book, and Good Night Rhode Island. We also had fun reading Mrs. Austin’s book, RI Loves: Showing Love From the Ocean State from A-Z. We are so lucky to have such fun literature to read from our very own Winsor family authors!
We also spent time practicing for our Kindergarten Celebration Show! Kindergarten families, you are in for a treat on June 7th! A formal invitation for the K Celebration will be in your child’s mailboxes soon!
Have a wonderful Memorial Weekend!
Hi Brian,
Here is this week's blurb.
Learning and Fun in Grade One!
And the Countdown continues!!! Everyone has been having such fun with our ABC Countdown. This past week, we wore crazy/silly hats, heard lots of interesting and amazing informational facts, shared funny jokes while wearing our jammies, and showed many acts of kindness, along with writing to our future second grade teachers. Memory Day saw our firsties writing about their favorite memories from this year and everyone was happy to hear that homework ended on Thursday. To close out the week, we all went outdoors for some fun activities.
In Fundations, we continue to work on adding suffixes –s, and –es to words. Students know that if pluralizing a word with the ending of a ch, sh, zz, x, or ss, they will add an –es.
In Math, we completed our chapter on 3-dimensional shapes. Ask your child about faces and vertices of 3-D shapes. Next we will be reviewing all first grade skills learned this year. Fluency continues each week, so keep practicing at home.
During Writer’s Workshop, we continue to work on opinion pieces. Students use a graphic organizer, then draft, and a final copy. It’s amazing how far our little friends have come as writers!! Dads, there’s some very thoughtful writing coming your way!!!
Today, it was “Teacher for the Day”. Our lucky teachers were Sophia Adler in 1K and Lillian Handwerger in 1D. It was a day filled with much fun, extra recess and snacks along with teaching their own student-created lesson. We think our “student/teachers” realized that being a teacher for the day, isn’t as easy as it looks!!! Be sure the girls get a good night’s sleep- they will be exhausted!
Just a reminder: our field trip permission slip and suggested donation is due on Tuesday, May 28, 2019. All students must have a signed permission slip to attend this field trip on Thursday, May 30th.
During this Memorial Weekend, let’s remember all those who have served our country. Happy Memorial Day – enjoy the long weekend!!!! The weather promises to be most cooperative! Don’t get sunburned.
What's New in Grade Two
We had two exceptional, professional, visiting teachers this week!
Mr. Aaron Guilmette taught 2M on Thursday.
His lesson plans included Pajama Day, Stuffed Animal Day, Bubble Gum Day, visiting epic.com, mathplayground.com,
and abcya.com on the Chromebooks, no homework, and extra recess. In addition, he taught a writing lesson asking his peers,
"What would YOU do if you were Teacher for the Day?" During his mini lesson, he had his students brainstorm sentence starters and wrote them on the chart for them to refer to. Each student created a Google Doc, choose their own font and color to type their writing piece.
Throughout the day, Mr. Guilmette answered several questions, gave permission for bathroom visits and drinks, and
used our "attention getters" to get everyone's attention before he gave the next direction.
Mr. Guilmette learned some important lessons from being a Teacher for the Day!
Mr. Asher Ninivaggi taught 2D on Friday!
His lesson plans started with gathering data about sports and creating different graphs on Google sheets.
Some students created pie charts. Others represented their data in horizontal or vertical bar graphs. In addition, his class strengthened their mathematical minds while playing games on mathplayground.com. Mr. Ninivaggi rewarded his students with extra recess.
After lunch and recess, he taught his students about the importance of active listening and following multi-step directions while working with ArtHub.com. Lastly, he reviewed polygons and had his students color different polygons. They combined the polygons to create a picture.
Mr. Ninivaggi, also, learned a lot from being a Teacher for the Day!
Mr. Guilmette and Mr. Ninivaggi clearly exceeded the standard as educators for the day!!!
THRILLS IN THIRD
We have had another busy and fun week in grade three! In Math we have been working diligently to review many of the skills we’ve learned this year and take final assessments. In addition to that, we have been learning about different kinds of graphs and preparing for an exciting data and graphing project next week! In Writing, we continue to focus on opinion writing and using text evidence to support our opinions on various topics related to school. The improvement in writing, editing and revising has been very impressive! In Reading, we addressed different perspectives and points of view that stories can be told from and attempted to retell stories from different characters’ perspectives. This is always a fun way to explore literacy! Our final Social Studies topic for the year has been the different levels of government. We learned many new and interesting facts about how local, state and national government works, as well as how we as citizens can be active in the different levels of government. We may have some future leaders among us! Of course our ABC Countdown to Summer marched on with days K, L, M, N and O. We enjoyed our back to back field trips to learn about “Kindness” and “Listened” to the Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra. “Movie” time was lots of fun, as were our “Name” crafts and messy “Oobleck” play. We wish all of our third grade families an enjoyable long weekend and look forward to seeing everyone next week!
Learning More in Grade 4
Fourth graders have been doing a LOT of research!!! They have read about a famous person’s life and have written essays about them. They are also practicing speeches they have written about that person. They will pretend to be them on May 31st, next Friday. This is called “The Wax Museum” and parents are invited to come see their child at 2:00. They will be performing for the other students that morning. We will need all props and costumes for next Thursday’s dress rehearsal.
Students are also researching regions of the US. They will create a presentation on one of the regions with one or two other students and share with the rest of the class. They have become excellent information gatherers!
We have been busy measuring in math. Students measured using inches and converted inches, feet, and miles. They also learned about units of capacity (cups, pints, quarts, and gallons) and weight (ounces and pounds). It is not easy to convert customary units, but they are getting the hang of it!
See you at next week’s Wax Museum!!!
The Fabulous Five
Our field trip to Smith-Appleby House and Museum was a wonderful learning experience for our 5th graders. The students took an informational tour of this historic home and learned many interesting facts about its history and what life was like for the families that lived there. In addition, the students worked in small groups where they participated in hands-on colonial activities. They were engaged in activities that reflected the colonial time period, such as weaving, tin punch, stenciling, silhouettes, and playing colonial children’s games. It was a fun and educational field trip for all of us!
Earlier this week, the fifth graders participated in two other educational experiences. On Monday, they attended the 3 Screens Assembly, “Let’s Be Friends”, as a continuation of our social justice theme for project based learning. The students were presented with inspirational stories of tolerance and acceptance from children their own age. The students were impressed with how these children faced real life challenges and were determined to make a difference in the world.
On Tuesday, we attended The Orchestra Moves! at The Veterans Memorial Auditorium. This exciting concert with The RI Philharmonic taught the students about the orchestra and the different ways music can move us. They were able to join the orchestra by singing and playing their recorders. They really showed their musical talents when they sang a Brazilian song in Portuguese!! It was a fun field trip!
We are very excited for our field trip to the Boston Duck Tours and Museum of Science on May 29th!!!
News and Notes
Art Show!
Thursday, May 30th
6:00-8:00 PM!
*Come see all student artwork on display!
Please attend our PTO meeting on June 4th. We will be voting on a new executive board. Our meeting will begin at 7:00pm in the auditorium.
Enjoy a happy, healthy, and safe Memorial Day weekend. We look forward to the return of our students on Tuesday, May 28th.