Huron Colony School

The Huron Colony fourth- through eighth  grade have been very busy this winter! They have been reading individual books to gain Accelerated Reader points. Also, they read “Little House in the Big Woods,” “Farmer Boy,” and “Little House on the Prairie” together as a class. With those books, they did activities and Language Arts projects.

They celebrated Dr. Seuss’s Birthday by reading a favorite book to the younger grades. In honor of his birthday, they also enjoyed Twist-a-doodles from the Donut Shop.

In math they are perfecting multiplication, division and learning how to change fractions into decimals and percentages. With Social Studies, they are reading about Lewis and Clark’s Expedition and how Sacajawea helped them through their journey.

They have Art every Thursday and they hallways are decorated with beautiful art pieces students have created.

Huron Colony students work very hard and are respectful of each other and the teachers. It is a delight to work with them!

Submitted by Janet Schinderling, 4-8 grade teacher

Buchanan K-1 Center

The English Second Language (ESL) department at Buchanan K-1 Center has been very busy the last few months. We just finished Access testing (an annual language proficiency test) of all the ESL students for kindergarten and first grade. The students have shown a lot of growth from the last time they took this test and we are very proud of them!

Kindergarten ESL students have been working on listening when directions are given, speaking more frequently in their classrooms, and learning to read and write their letters and sounds.

Students have been working on building their number sense and 2D shapes in math. We are finishing up a unit in Language covering the topic “What do you like to do?” where students have been learning vocabulary words of activities they can do both inside and outside. At the end of the unit, students will be able to answer the question with a full sentence, “I like to……”

A few other topics students have covered during Language this year include names, school, home, clothing, and food.

All kindergarten students participate in a Music and Me class, where language skills are developed through music. Students in Pod 1 Music and Me are learning about carnivals and will be able to identify the people and things that are found at a carnival by the end of the unit. Students in Pod 2 Music and Me are learning about weather and will be able to identify different types of weather.

First grade ESL has been focusing on further developing foundational skills such as: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension. Mrs. Fryberger uses explicit instruction in her approach for teaching foundational skills as they are presented in a very direct way. Students are given clear objectives and then a lot of practice to improve each new skill.

Repeated review is also a vital part of this process.

First graders have also been working on word attack strategies in addition to building on their foundational skills. Reading is a skill that is essential for any student’s success. When they come to a word they are unsure of, students are taught to use picture clues. They try sounding words out loud to see if it makes sense. Students learn to look for word chunks and try blending sounds together. They also learn to re-read a sentence until it makes sense. Lastly, they are also taught to read ahead and look for clues that may help determine unfamiliar words.

All first grade students participate in a language class each week focusing on higher order thinking skills, abstract thinking, components of the English language, and overall gaining a better understanding of the rules of our English language. We recently did a unit on mapping skills and had the opportunity to explore different areas of the world to see where our students came from. It was an exciting way for students to learn about other areas of the world.

As the end of the year approaches, students will continue to work on foundational skills as well as numerous other strategies used throughout the year to help reinforce new vocabulary such as the language of math, science, and social studies. They have made significant progress this year and are encouraged to apply these language based skills out in the community and at home as well.

Submitted by ESL teachers Carrie Azure, Sabrena Brooks and Lacey Fryberger

HMS Science and Science Fair

In Science, the students are completing a unit on the human body. Seventh-grade science students have been learning the different body systems and how they work together to help maintain homeostasis. They are wrapping up the unit with frog dissections. The students will compare and contrast the systems of the frogs with humans.

Next, they will be gearing up for the Science Fair in April and working on creating projects and writing and collecting data based on their experiments.

Submitted by Sharon Engelhart