Download Tadpole Telegram - Windham Schools

Tadpole Telegram
The word "forest" was borrowed by Middle English from Old French and Medieval Latin forestis, literally
meaning "outside". Uses of the word "forest" in English to denote any uninhabited area of non-enclosure are now
considered archaic. The word was introduced by the Norman rulers of England as a legal term (appearing in
Latin texts like the Magna Carta) denoting an uncultivated area legally set aside for hunting by feudal nobility.
These hunting forests were not necessarily wooded much, if at all. However, as hunting forests did often include
considerable areas of woodland, the word "forest" eventually came to mean wooded land more generally.
Monday –Students worked on the spring writing prompt. The class had to work independently, as they demonstrated
their current writing ability. To meet the standard students were expected to use spaces between words, punctuation,
upper and lower case letters, initial and final sounds and words, and use some of our high-frequency words. This is one of
the many end of the trimester assessments primarily in literacy and math where students are demonstrating the amazing
growth they made this year. Math centers provided students with a review of the two-dimensional and three-dimensional
geometric shapes. We used our skills to compare and contrast different elements of a story. Students were asked to listen
very carefully to the medial vowel sound in words and write the correct one for each illustration in our practice books.
Tuesday – Our class was the first in Raymond Elementary school to return all their library books! Students are doing a
great job, progressing through their number books. These books are designed to help students practice writing and
identifying different numerals and exploring number quantity. We practiced matching upper and lower case letters and
writing them without reversals. Students practiced writing some of our high-frequency words. The class demonstrated
their ability to extend, describe and create patterns of increasing complexity. We learned how to correctly write the
month, day and year in or practice books. Everyone has gotten really good at reading their decodeable readers completely
independently. Students have learned to use picture cues, sentence context, rereading a sentence and sounding out words.
Wednesday – Everyone did an amazing job this morning with the bus evacuation drill. Students practiced evacuating
the back of the bus through the emergency door. We used a story to discuss things that are like and different. Both
characters in the story, wore safety equipment that included elbow pads, knee pads and a helmet. Students practiced
isolating the initial /u/ sound and the medial /u/ sound in words. Students included the word under in their story writing in
his or her journal. The S.M.I.L.E. math games went home with the last four students. I hope you enjoyed this opportunity
to share your child's mathematical thinking. The class did an excellent job decoding 10 different words, which included
the medial /u/ sound and read five different sentences.
Thursday – Today we examined a very large buffalo vertebra and compared it to our own. Everyone loved creating his or
her own backbone bracelet. The vertebral column (also called the backbone, spine, or spinal column) consists of a series
of 33 irregularly shaped bones, called vertebrae. These vertebrae result in a total of 26 movable parts in an adult. In
between the vertebrae are intervertebral discs made of fibrous cartilage that act as shock absorbers and allow the back to
move. Snakes can have 150 to 430 vertebrae depending on the species! Our flip picture of a cobra let us peek inside to
see all those bones. Mrs. Hutchinson worked with the children to help them review personal safety and the correct use of
911. Mrs. VanHaasteren, our occupational therapist, showed students how to use the Handwriting Without Tears program.
Friday –Today was our field trip to East End Beach and the Narrow Gauge Railroad to investigate the marine
environment. We found everything on our scavenger hunt. We found slipper shells (Crepidula fornicata) which are
gastropods characterized by a single uncoiled shell. Slipper shells form stacks and change sex. Older, larger slipper shells
are female and younger, smaller slippers are male. Students were intrigued with moon snail shells and their prey. This
species, like all moon snails, feeds voraciously on clams and other snails. Evidence of northern moon snail predation is
usually much easier to find than the snails themselves. When empty shells of clams and snails, including other moon
snails, are seen to have a neat "countersunk" hole drilled in them, this is evidence of predation by a moon snail. Thank
you to all the parent volunteers who came on the field trip. Homework for the weekend is to read their books with at least
two people. Wednesday, June 15th is our A to Z Feast.