Elementary

2nd/3rd: Week of 8/19

Building Community & Establishing Routines- Building a community within the classroom sets the tone and encourages students to be active members of their own learning. Community is about relationships. It’s a place where people come together and feel like they belong. It’s about creating a space where every student feels safe; where students and teachers work together toward a common goal, and celebrate both collective and individual wins. We spend a great deal of time at the beginning of each year learning to work and play together, and we do this in many different ways: We read How Full Is […]

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Second grader works on literacy at progressive school.

K/1st: Week of 8/19

This week in Alpha… Pickles gets a kiss from a new friend! Welcome to Alpha’s 2024-2025 Year! What a whirlwind of a week! Our first week is a blur of procedures and routines but through it all we are getting to know each other, getting to know our space, and getting to know how we want to make our room the best room it can be. We learned how important listening is when we are all together in a big group – we played “Guess the Leader!” We also had a very inspiring discussion about how people can hurt bodies

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Four elementary children sit at a table painting

2nd/3rd: Week of 5/13

Visiting a castle in Texas?? Why, yes! Our little knights really enjoyed exploring, and battling, in a real life castle! Thank you parents for driving and spending the day with us at Newman’s Castle! Our feast on Wednesday was a huge success (thank you again parents!) Feasting was a very important part of medieval life for Kings in medieval times. It was a way for them to lift their own spirits and the people around them. Feasts were commonly a gathering of kings’ or nobles’ family and friends in which an abundant supply of the finest foods and drinks were

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Second grade students visit castle as part of Medieval study at project based school.

4th/5th: Week of 5/6

General News We are entering into one of the most magical times of year – POP! We will spend next week finishing projects, collaborating on committees, and turning our room into an interactive space to show off what we’ve been learning for the past two quarters! Note that P&P will be optional next week so that kids can focus on project wrap-up at home in a stress-free way if they are still tying up loose ends for any POP projects. Ms. Lorrie’s brother came to deliver our Nok sculptures this week and we can’t wait for you to see the

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Fourth grade student works on math at table at private elementary school in Austin.

2nd/3rd: Week of 5/6

Math – Ms. Andrea’s math group began the week by analyzing and then creating our own bar and pictographs. We finished the week with 2 assessments – our graphing unit test and (part 1 of) a comprehensive that covers the scope of the entire year. They worked so hard!! Ms. Kelly’s math group started the week off with a fraction review- game style- before tackling new challenges with the exciting equivalent fractions concept! We began by comparing models, which gives a wonderful, very concrete visual, then created and plotted equivalent fractions on number lines. Literacy – In writing the Betas

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Teacher sits with third grader at private school with small classes.