The Pulse of the Pride

Lyme School Friends,

We are back at it after February Break. This week our students regained their focus and got back into their school routines. It is a great time of year as the weather ranges from the teens to 50 degrees. It is also a time of year that educators experience and see how much students have grown and matured in their respective grades.

Our second trimester is ending today. This means we have one third of the year left and it is time for Parent/Teacher conferences again. We have an in service day scheduled on March 20th (no school) and then the rest of the week has early dismissals (Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday 1:30 PM and Thursday 2 PM). Please plan accordingly for these changes in dismissal that week.

Our Middle Schoolers have been hard at work rehearsing for James and the Giant Peach Jr. under the direction of Ms. O'Leary supported by Mrs. Girdwood, Mr. Betournay, Ms. Pizarro, and Mrs. Damren. It is a true team effort and I know the students are excited to put a show on for the community. Students will be performing in front of our school on Friday, March 17th during the school day and opening night will be March 17th at 7PM. Details on all shows and reserving tickets are found further down in the newsletter.

The next newsletter will hit your inbox on March 24th. Have a great weekend and remember to spring those clocks forward!

Regards,

John P. D'Entremont, Principal

3/10 - Second Trimester Ends

3/20 - Teacher In Service Day

3/21 - 3/24 - Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday 1:30 PM Dismissal, Thursday 2 PM Dismissal for Conferences

The 7th grade is having a bake sale this Sunday (3/12) at the fire station from 9-12 to raise money for their 8th grade class trip! Please come out and support the 7th Grade.

Missing something? Please remind students to check the lost and found. We will be putting items out in the lobby for conference week. Afterwards, left items will be donated.

The process of putting together next year's school calendar is underway. This is a process that takes time, coordination with other districts such as Hanover and Thetford and then goes to the School Board for approval. A calendar will go to the School Board soon.

The Lyme School Apparel Store has a variety of apparel and accessories all customizable with a variety of school logos. The Lyme School PTO earns 12% of all sales. Thank you for supporting our school and go Lions! #LYMESCHOOLROCKS

Beginning March 6, the middle school advisories will be hosting a collection of hygiene items to be donated to the Upper Valley Haven. As you may recall, during the holiday season, all the advisories collected food and hygiene items for those in need. The Haven has reached out to let us know that they could use our help with donations of hygiene products and of course, we are glad to help.

If you would like to donate, the following items are needed and can be placed in a donation bin located in the main lobby:

Shampoo

Hair conditioner

Body wash

Bar soap

Deodorant

Toothpaste

Toothbrushes -adult and child

Feminine hygiene products

Facial cleansers-liquid and wipes

Acne wash-facial and body

Moisturizing lotion

Diapers

Our collection will be held until April 7. Thank you in advance for all of your help and support for this great cause.

The Lyme School welcomes Ms. Caitlin Feltus and Ms. Sabrina Vlahovic, two teacher certification candidates from Plymouth State University’s Health and Human Performance department.

They have begun their work with students in grades K-5, where they have been conducting observations of my teaching and interacting with students. Both young women are excited to learn and gain experience in the field of education and I am honored to have been asked to work with them as their mentor.

Kati Miller RN BSN: Mon, Tues, Thurs, Fri

Matthew Greenway RN BSN: alternating Weds and coverage as needed

Celeste McCool RN BSN: alternating Weds and coverage as needed

Thank you for letting us know when your children are absent due to illness. If you are emailing Amanda Perry in the front office, you can also add nurse@lymeschool.org. Thanks so much!

We continue to experience fluctuations in weather. Please check the weather and ensure your children have what they need. We have some emergency clothes/boots but too many. As we get closer to mud season, it is important to remember students still need boots outside and sneakers for the gym.

Please remember when we return to school that if your child is experiencing symptoms, please test for COVID. If a person is not positive but has any symptoms, we kindly request a mask.

Thank you so much for your partnership in keeping us all healthy.

Ms. Connie and Mrs. Stanton here, writing you a joint article for the Pulse! We thought it might be helpful to share some information about teasing, bullying, and conflicts - words that come up at school some times. These types of interactions can surely come up in students’ days - whether at home, school, clubs, sports, or elsewhere.

During the year, all grade levels talk about problems, whether they are kid-sized problems they can solve themselves, or adult-sized problems where they need help from a grownup. Some problems might include how we treat or mistreat one another: teasing, conflicts, and relational aggression (bullying). We explore what each of these are, why they might be happening, and most importantly, what to do if you are witnessing or experiencing them. During Stanton Time, we focus on being an UPstander - someone who sees something unkind or dangerous happening to someone, caring about their feelings/safety (showing empathy), and doing something to stop or disrupt the behavior (showing compassion and responsibility). These are big and real ways that our Lyme School values move us to ACTION.

Ms. Connie helps students with problem solving - whether individually or in small groups all the time. Collaboratively, students identify the problem, brainstorm different ways to solve the problem, consider the outcome of each solution and then decide which solution they want to try if the same or similar situation comes up again. Once they have tried that solution, students evaluate the solution. During problem-solving, students are thinking about what they need and hope for as well as what their peers might need or be hoping for. This is where student practice flexible thinking - thinking about others. Much of the language used in the classroom lessons are echoed throughout the problem-solving process. That’s why Ms. Connie and Mrs. Stanton make a great team! If there are any incidences of bullying, Dr. D is involved as well. We all work as a team to make sure

Teasing, bullying and conflict are words often used interchangeably, but involve three distinctly different types of interactions among people.

Understanding the specific behaviors involved can help parents and guardians coach kids on the best way to respond. So, what’s the difference?

Teasing can consist of neutral, playful words and actions but also can be negative, annoying, or cause harm. Teasing is often intended to get attention or cause a reaction but not cause harm. Strategies such as under-reacting or ignoring often put an end to teasing, but children should reach out to an adult for help if those strategies aren’t working. When teasing becomes hostile behavior intended to have power over another person, it can escalate to bullying.

Bullying is unwanted, persistent, aggressive behavior that is intentional and severe. It involves a social or physical power imbalance between the person doing the bullying and the target. The four types of bullying are verbal (using mean words to hurt or intimidate); physical (harming a person’s body or possessions); social/relational (intended to hurt someone’s social relationships or reputation); and cyber (harming others over a device). Children who experience or witness bullying at school are encouraged to stand up to bullying and report it, but parents and guardians should contact the school immediately if bullying occurs. Bullying is serious behavior that cannot be ignored and rarely stops without adult intervention.

Conflicts are arguments, disagreements, or fights between people and a normal part of human relationships. While conflicts may involve verbal namecalling or physical aggression, a one-time event of two children fighting with no perceived power imbalance is not an example of bullying.

If you have concerns about any behavior at school, please don’t hesitate to reach out! We want the Lyme School to continue to be a place where kids feel safe, welcome, and valued.

Have a great weekend!

Ms. Connie and Mrs. Stanton

Resources

How to Talk to Kids about Bullying – Tips for Parents and Caregivers

Stopbullying.gov

The first graders are wrapping up their Lyme Wildlife research project and we are excited to share the final project with you! Each student developed research questions, and then used print and digital resources which they used to take notes. Those notes are being transformed into paragraphs, as well as the podcast episodes linked below. I was blown away by the wide variety of animals and the depth of knowledge shared by our young scientists and researchers. Listen to section 1A’s podcast here and section 1B’s podcast here.

The Lyme School will be moving to a new student information system next school year. Just last week our teachers received their first training. So far, we have a number of staff members using the new system. We will be using this system for grading, demographic information, behavior, and collating information for students. A feature of our system will be both a student and parent portal. There are many details that need to be worked out still and we will continue to put out information as we move into next year.

The Middle School teachers have been exploring a book study together. The book is titled "The Successful Middle School: This We Believe". This We Believe is the foundational position paper of the Association of Middle Level Education (AMLE). Published roughly 40 years ago, the book has gone through several revisions. As a staff, we are reading the book and meeting about our learnings. Our most recent meeting focused on Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment. We discussed a curriculum being challenging, exploratory, integrative, and diverse. As we finish this work this year, our hope is to develop a This We Believe statement about our middle school experience based on best practice. We look forward to sharing more as work continues with our book study.

The Lyme School performs James & the Giant Peach Jr.

Come support our Middle Schoolers as they put weeks of hard work on the stage for you!

Show Dates/Times are:

Friday, March 17th @ 7PM

Saturday, March 18th @ 2PM

Saturday, March 18th @ 7PM

You can reserve tickets here (seating is General Admission) or get tickets at the door.

Admission is free donations are welcome. Our cart for the Haven will also be in the lobby for donations!

We can't wait to see you there! Email any questions to

Shannon O'Leary (soleary@lymeschool.org)

March is a big month for theater productions! Crossroads Academy's presentation of Matilda Jr. is this weekend! They are performing tonight (3/10) at 7PM and tomorrow (3/11) at 4PM. Check it out! It will be a great show!

Dear Middle School Families,

We are excited to announce that the middle school play is approaching. We would be very grateful if any of you could donate baked goods for our concessions sales. Baked goods that would be appreciated would include cookies, brownies, banana/pumpkin bread, muffins, whoopie pies, and cupcakes. Drinks would also be helpful and may include bottled water, small cans of Sprite, Coca-Cola, Kool-Aid, Capri Sun, and Seltzer water. Donations can be brought to school on the mornings of March 17 and 18 so we can prepare for sales. Food and drink may be consumed before and after the show in the cafeteria. No food and drink allowed in the gymnasium.

Enclosed is a sign up form for three adults to sign up for food/drink donations per show. We are asking for an ingredient list to be provided for food donations so that we can be sensitive to food sensitivities that people may have. This can be simple, for example,” contains milk”, “contains gluten”, etc. In addition, we are looking for three adults to supervise the sales during each show.

Concession sales will go to the Lyme Drama Fund and Doctors Without Borders. We are grateful for your help and support.

Sincerely,

The Middle School Concessions Team

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1wtu75LhLorV_F6aUR4S8psGonxR0d_XPluLniBBf6yc/edit?usp=sharing

Dear Lyme School Families,

As we come to the end of Trimester 2, I will be sending home a batch of artwork from your artists. I hope you will get a moment to ask your artist about their work! I am proud of their hard work and flexible thinking as they try new things.

This week, I have included photos of work from grades k-5.

In MS, all we can think about is getting James and the Giant Peach, Jr. ready for the community. We are SO close and working so hard!

Here is the rundown:

Kindergarten: Color mixing gumball machines.

First Grade: Digital drawing for their Animal Research Project, and Fish with Feelings. We read the book Happy, in which fish have a whole range of emotions.

Second Grade: Stories from Africa (Ghana, specifically) and working on a circle weaving project.

Third Grade: We learned about drawing cities and the artist Faith Ringgold.

Fourth Grade: We had a virtual field trip to the Hood Museum with Museum Educator Vivian Ladd. Vivian shared work from the Hood’s collection of Native American Art. We explored themes of reverence for the natural world, pride in traditions, innovation, craftsmanship, and valuing community. We have been making prints in the art room to support these ideas.

Fifth grade: Monster pots and looking at how artists use the element FORM to convey three dimensional space. 5th grade is working with both linear and isometric perspective to show form and space.

Sap's running! As are the collection teams as they excitedly travel from tree to tree.

The second year of the Lyme School Maple works is now well underway. Thanks to our friendly neighbors and supportive community, we have 17 buckets hanging on 12 trees around the school and nearby properties. As always, there are copious learning opportunities through this program. This week we've spent much of our time discussing tree health, and why or why not we're tapping different trees.

The Maple Works program is designed to be a very hands-on experience for kids, and offers the opportunity for active and purposeful learning. We're discussing everything from proper use of hand tools for tapping trees and splitting firewood, to how to maintain a hot fire in the evaporator and the many steps in transforming sap into various maple products. We are also integrating some of this learning into their science and math classes and collaborative with local community members.

The students are not the only ones benefiting from this experience. Not only do the students get to sample the maple products along the way, but we will make several rounds of donations of various maple products to the Lyme food pantry. Making for others is a core value in the design lab, and adds authenticity, purpose and meaning to their work.

Sweet days ahead!

Upon our return from February vacation, students in the primary grades resumed their celebration of “Healthy Heart Month” by learning the art of jump roping. Jump roping not only involves the use of the heart, muscles, and lungs working together, but also a great deal of motor planning.

The beginning stages of learning how to jump rope involve the reinforcement of the locomotor skill of jumping - taking off and landing on two feet. Students practice this skill by jumping over small discs and then a jump rope lying on the floor. This allows for students to develop a rhythm as they jump and serves as a nice precursor for the actual skill of jump roping, which follows this process of skill development.

Our assessment came in the form of an informal means of answering the questions I posed to them about what the most important muscle in the body is and how many feet we use to jump.

Students have certainly worked hard and their work reinforced the health benefits of jump roping as a heart healthy activity that can be done well into adulthood.

For more information about the Lyme School PTO, please check out our web page.

You can also join our Facebook Group: The Lyme School PTO

Please don't hesitate to reach out with any questions.

Warmly,

Brigette Cameron

Lyme School PTO Secretary

Lyme School PTO Meeting Link:

Google Meet joining info
Video call link: https://meet.google.com/hqd-ixad-cri
Or dial: ‪(US) +1 407-545-7995‬ PIN: ‪522 319 072‬#

The next Board meeting at the Lyme School is on Thursday, March 23rd 7 PM.

Sign-ups for both baseball and lacrosse will open up tomorrow and you can find the registration link on the rec page of the town website.

Lacrosse is a skills development program which teaches all aspects of the sport but doesn't include any checking and/or games with other towns. Traditionally, it's been held directly after school on Thursday's (but up to the coaches availability) so that your child can learn this sport while participating in our baseball program w/o any conflicts. No helmets are required.....simply a stick!

Baseball: Details are in the intro to the sport when you sign up so please read carefully as you have options.

Briefly - Grades k/1 (Farm) play t-ball, 2/3 (C-minors) play a combo of coach pitch and t-ball and we offer Cal Ripken for grades 3-6, Minors (grades 3/4), Majors (5/6). These are player pitch leagues. Some "younger" 7th graders may be eligible depending on their b'day. Again, please read the intro carefully. As you can see, 3rd graders have the option to play CR Minors or C-Minors and it is their choice as we don't make cuts for any teams. Obviously the CR team is quite a bit more competitive.

For the Farm and C-Minors we play in a rec league with hanover and norwich, so travel is minimal and all games are @ 5pm. Farm play Mon/Wed and C-minor plays on Tu/Th - One day is a game day and the other is a practice once games begin (May) - but practices may vary depending on the coaches availability.

If you'd like to learn more about our CR league please go to our League website...

https://www.twinriverbaseball.org/

If you sign your child up for a CR team do NOT buy a shirt - it's included in your registration fee.

Of course, as with all our offerings we need volunteers to coach so please sign up if you can help out in any way!

Almost time to PLAY BALL!!!

Steve Small - Recreation Director

(O) 603-442-6781

(C) 603-491-7537

We are so excited to announce that Echo Lacrosse is representing teams for the New Hampshire Youth Lacrosse Association (NHYLA) Sunday tournament games this spring! This is open to boys and girls grades 3-8 in the Upper Valley. We would like to have athletes who are looking for more experience and exposure to lacrosse this spring (In addition to their rec programs). We would love to have your athlete join us this spring! Visit www.echolacrosse.com to sign up!
*Note our sign up date has been extended to 3/7!

vicki.mccorkle20@gmail.com

ALL Together has Elementary and Middle/High School Parent Handbooks available free of charge.

These handbooks are a practical guide for parents, guardians, and others who interact with youth and addresses today's toughest issues.

The Elementary edition: "Raising kids isn’t easy, start the journey off on the right foot. Cell phones, social media, anxiety and even issues with alcohol and drugs are starting earlier than ever. Learn how to set boundaries and keep your child safe."

The Middle/High School edition: "This edition of our Parent Handbook addresses some of the toughest issues affecting today’s parents and their teens. This resource will raise awareness immediately and educate readers on the latest trends, misconceptions and warning signs associated with each issue. This handbook is being used to help prevent issues such as addiction, violence and suicide across the United States."

Please fill out this form if you are interested in a FREE handbook.

OUR VALUES

● Fairness ● Acceptance of Others ● Integrity ● Responsibility

● Perseverance ● Individuality ● Compassion ● Courage

John P. D'Entremont, Principal

Elise Foxall, Academic Director

Geoff Tomlinson, Student Services Director