We are Honest. We are
Respectful. We are
Responsible. We are Ready
We will be closing out the school week with a
School-Wide PBIS Assembly. Our PBiS system
outlines our rules of conduct across school
settings, teaches accountability for one’s
conduct and obligations, and recognizes and
celebrates students’ achievements in upholding
these community values. HR3 stands for the
following values: We are Honest. We are
Respectful. We are Responsible. We are Ready
to Learn! Our 6th Graders will be teaching
students about HR3 during Lunch at the
Assembly. We are looking forward to their
presentation. In addition, we will also be
recognizing our Kindness Counts nominations
on Friday. Students who are demonstrating
kindness in the classroom will receive a special
award for their hard work.
School Wide Updates
Our school wide theme of the month is
Kindness. We have started a Kindness Journal
with our staff. Teachers write one thing that they
appreciate about another teacher, and then the
journal is passed on. In addition we have also
launched a Kindness Counts recognition
program for our students. We are recognizing
students at every grade level who are
demonstrating kindness.
to Learn!
Fairfield Center School, 57 Park Street, Fairfield Vermont,
05455 www.ffcsvt.org 802.827.6639
February 20, 2017
Dear Parents and Friends,
It’s the week before vacation and it just so
happens to be Spirit Week at FCS. Students are
welcome to dress up but certainly are not
obligated to. Tomorrow is twin day, Wednesday
is USA day, Thursday is teacher-student day
swap day, and Friday is Fairfield Day. Today of
course is pajama day, which helped to make a
nice transition from weekend to work week for
our staff. We’re having some fun here today!
Mrs. Sargent and I met with Nurses and
Guidance Counselors from SACS, BFA, and
SATEC recently. We had a very productive
meeting with some insightful takeaways. One of
the topics that we discussed was about creating
our own GSA (Gay Straight Alliance) at
Fairfield. We are in the process of launching a
Gay Straight Alliance for our Middle School
Students. Our goal is to provide a safe
environment for students to share ideas and
build positive relationships.
Building and Grounds
- We are currently in the process of
working with the Central Office and
Peter Burns for our bathroom renovation
project. We are hoping to complete the
renovation in late June. Stay tuned for
more details!
Curriculum Updates- Middle School Social
Studies: 8th grade is currently working on an
exploration unit which will conclude with a
debate on Christopher Columbus 7th grade has
begun their Maple Marketing unit. We will learn
some basics of economics, and create a
marketing plan for our sugaring operation. 6th
grade is finishing up a unit about how the Earth
functions; plate tectonics, weathering/erosion,
movements in space. We will begin our history
of Sugaring unit soon.
Middle School Math: 6th Grade is just
beginning a unit about measures of center and
will be conducting their own surveys as a
culmination. 7th Grade is in the beginning stages
of investigating proportional relationships. They
will extend their new learning to find unit rates,
scale measurements up or down, and calculate
percentages. 8th Grade is working with square
roots and is building up to uncovering the
Pythagorean Theorem.
Middle School Science: 8th grade has been
studying weather systems and has created video
forecasts for the Super Bowl. The 7th grade has
been studying Earth Science and each student
has been researching a National Park and
learning about how the geologic features were
formed, based on their own guiding questions.
The 6th grade has been studying cells and will
be moving into body systems. During Black
History Month, all middle school students will
be researching and celebrating the
accomplishments of black scientists, engineers
and inventors.
5th Grade:
Mrs. Tully- In ELA/SS, we are reading Freedom
Riders, by Ann Bausum, and using the Chords of
Courage site to learn more about John Lewis
and the Civil Rights Movement. We are
“testing” the discussion guide that is used with
the Marching Feet song from Chords of
Courage. I am in contact with the founder of this
program, Susan Coti. We are also working on
informative writing and reading. In March, we
will begin our sugaring unit, Project Sweet Talk.
Mrs. Tully- In ELA/SS, we are working on
informative writing and reading. February’s
Scholastic Storyworks has a play called, “The
Unstoppable Ruby Bridges,” which we have
used as a resource to learn more about the Civil
Rights Movement. In March, we will begin our
sugaring unit, Project Sweet Talk
Mrs. Thompson- In Math students having been
working hard to understand and be able to use
decimals. We started with adding and
subtracting money and moved on to comparing
decimals to the thousandths place value on
number lines and >,< and =. We have been
working on applying it to the real world by
finding sales tax in various states.
In Science the fifth grade is learning about Earth
and other parts of space. Next Gen Science
Standards (NGSS) advocate modeling to explain
and understand Science concepts. They created
models to explain “the reasons for the seasons”
and shared them with their class and younger
classes as well.
Third Grade:
The third grade has been learning about
magnetism and conducting several experiments
to explore magnets. We also learned about
maglev trains and attempted to engineer a
maglev vehicle in small groups. The third grade
also got very creative to build something out of
Legos that uses magnets to pick up paper clips.
The students created several machines from cars
to cranes and even a fishing pole. We are
finishing up with our forces and interaction unit
and moving into weather and climate.
In math, the third grade has been working on
understanding multiplication and division with
repeated addition, equal groups, and arrays
which will lead to learning about area. The
students have been decomposing arrays to make
easier multiplication problems. For instance
students may take a 6x9 array and split it into
(5x9)+(1x9)=6x9. We are also exploring
patterns with factors and multiples during
morning meeting greetings. Third grade has
been learning a lot about money. The students
get paid during the week and spend the money
on Friday at the class store, where they have to
add prices and make change. In addition, we are
constantly reviewing addition, subtraction and
time.
The third grade is starting our study of
informative writing and nonfiction reading. We
have been learning about the features of nonfiction by reading many different books on
animals. We have also begun to read individual
biographies and will begin book projects on our
independent reading books in the very near
future. We are beginning to do “more” in the
area of writing: more research, more detail, more
control of grammar and structure, more dialogue
and more sophisticated language.
Second Grade:
Ms. Brett: Currently in math we have been
working on place value skills such as greater
than and less than. We have been learning to
build the same number in different ways. We
have been working on solving word problems.
We have been trying out different strategies to
solve the problem and organize our thinking on
paper.
First Grade:
First grade students have started investigating
geometric shapes as well as their attributes.
Through hands on activities, shape searches and
assignments, students have been learning to
identify the many shapes they see everyday.
Both first grade teachers are working on 2D
shapes such as: triangle, square, circle,
rectangle, rhombus and trapezoid before
transitioning into 3D shapes including: cube,
sphere, prism and cylinder. Students have
completed a pre-assessment and at the end of the
unit will be tested on their ability to meet the
standard for the three components of geometry
within the Common Core.
K: Kindergarten has been hard at work!
In ELA, we are deep into learning our sight
words. We have 25 words that students need to
be able to correctly read and write before 1st
grade. Connected with learning these words is
identifying them in leveled books and beginning
to read these books with accuracy and fluency as
well as retelling the stories for comprehension.
In math, we have just completed our PNOA
testing. We are currently learning our teen
numbers. We must be able to identify them,
write them and be able to decompose them into
their place value components of 10 + some
more.
Writing has been based on reviewing our capital
letter formation and working in our journals to
independently write a complete sentence. The
students are expected to begin their sentence
with a capital letter,correctly write their sight
words and tap out (sound out) words that are
needed in their sentence, as well as, ending their
sentence with the correct punctuation.students
must also create a detailed picture to match their
writing. Currently, sentences are based on nonfiction animal books that we have been reading
during shared reading time.
Art: The Kindergarten and 1st grade students
just finished up a Chinese Dragon drawing and
painting lesson inspired by the Chinese New
Year. They are beginning a clay pinch pot lesson
this week. The 2nd and 3rd grade students also
did a Chinese New Year project. They did
drawings/paintings of Chinese Lions. The 4th
and 5th grade students completed paper
sculptures of Chinese Dragons. They worked in
small groups to create these large sculptures.
The 4th and 5th grade students are beginning a
mask lesson inspired by wood carvings and
tattoos created by the Maori people of New
Zealand. The 6th, 7th and 8th grade students are
working on abstract paintings.
PE: K-3 students have been working on
basketball skills and when the weather lets us we
go outside for sledding and snowshoeing.
Grades 4-6 have been working on basketball
movement concepts, teamwork and
sportsmanship. We also had a chance to go cross
country skiing outside a few times. 7-8th grade
students have been playing some floor hockey
and they also went out cross country skiing.
Friday before the Super Bowl, we had a special
class and played flag football in the snow.
4th has been learning about identifying and
coping with anxiety.
5th has been working on friendships,
boundaries, and coping with being told no.
As part of our ACT 1 requirements (sexual
abuse prevention):
7th Grade has been receiving the “SAFE-T”
Program.
K-2 has been receiving the “Care for Kids”
Program.
Mrs. Sargent also sees students 1:1 and in small
groups, as well as advises the A World of
Difference middle school group which has
begun to teach lessons in grades 5-8 around
diversity and inclusion.
Student Data/Intervention
Mrs. Pigeon been administering the PNOA to K2 students. The data collected from this
assessment along with input from classroom
teachers will help to drive further instruction for
the students that I meet with.
Ms. Hathaway has been working with small
groups focused around the LLI program.
Students are introduced to book, work on
fluency, comprehension skills, and phonics and
word work.
Mrs. B-C has been working with students in
grade 4 with multi-digit multiplication. In 6th
and 7th Grade, Mrs. B-C has been working on
fractions.
Students had a lot of fun.
Guidance/Student Supports:
3rd has been working on conflict management.
Happy 100th Day!
Library:
Red Clover Award books continue to be
introduced, promoting reading and in-depth
discussions of the best of contemporary picture
books. I infuse and use technology to support
my Red Clover Program, connecting books and
information literacy skills.
The Dorothy Canfield Fischer Award honors
excellence in children's literature. It was
designed to help students become enthusiastic
readers and to honor Vermont author Dorothy
Canfield Fisher. The Fairfield DCF book club
began meeting in January on a regular basis. The
book club is to encourage students to read the
books on the DCF list. The list is comprised of
30 titles. We meet as a group and share lively
reading discussions on the DCF books we've
read.
Students were introduced to and learned about
Haiku poetry. They learned a Haiku uses exactly
17 syllables and that in a Haiku syllables are
arranged in three lines of 5-7-5 to create the
poem. They identified literary elements, such as
mood, that appeals to the five senses and then
they wrote their own Haiku poems.
Digital Citizenship continues to be taught and
discussed with great engagement and interest.
Students are introduced to digital etiquette and
digital security, elements that are critical in their
ever evolving digital society. The students
recently learned about the differences between
personal and private information and how to
keep information safe online and how to better
protect themselves from online identity theft.
Professional Learning : Our School Action
Plan places great emphasis on improving student
learning and engagement in Mathematics. I have
been working with Sean to ensure meaningful
professional development in mathematics K-8.
Last week I met with representatives from Math
Studio. I am really excited about this
collaboration! We are one of many schools
participating state wide. Other schools
participating include: Milton, Washington West,
Franklin North, Highgate, Franklin, Sheldon,
Missisquoi, Winooski, Mater Christi-Burlington,
Woodstock Middle, and Williston. We will
begin our work with Math Studio at the 5 day
math seminar over the summer. During this time
we will reflect on our instructional routines,
discuss math habits of mind, and learn more
about multiple pathways for student learning.
This summer, we will be sending a team of
teachers to the BEST Institute. I was able to
attend with a team of teachers last year. This
summer work together allowed us to define our
positive supports for students and improve
school climate by revamping systems.
Have a wonderful vacation! We will see you all
on March 8, 2017.
Fondly,
Jill Ballou- Principal