Specialist Communicator
2023 Issue #2
Welcome!
Our Specialists
Mrs. Comtois - Content Literacy
Mrs. Katz - Music
Mrs. Ballerini - Art
Purpose
Parent-Teacher Conferences
We are looking forward to touching base with you during Parent-Teachers Conferences!
Mrs. Comtois and Mr. Casey will be available in the Content Literacy Classroom/Library on Wednesday March 8th from 1:10-3:10pm.
Mrs. Katz and Mrs. Ballerini will have two different times they can meet with families on Google Meets. They will be available on:
- Wednesday March 8th from 9:30-10:00am and
- Thursday March 9th from 10:05-10:35am
Please reach out to either Mrs. Katz or Mrs. Ballerini via email with any questions: Laura Katz (lkatz@lowell.k12.ma.us) , Kathleen Ballerini (kballerini@lowell.k12.ma.us).
Here is the conference link for the Conference with Mrs. Katz and Mrs. Ballerini:
To join the video meeting, click this link: https://meet.google.com/hnx-zymu-euy
Otherwise, to join by phone, dial +1 401-237-0771 and enter this PIN: 557 012 894#
To view more phone numbers, click this link: https://tel.meet/hnx-zymu-euy?hs=5
Music
Grades 3 and 4
Up next...students will finish their projects, perform them on recorders, ukuleles and other instruments and learn about famous composers throughout history!
Grade 2
Up next...Students will be learning about Brass instruments (instruments you play by buzzing your lips and that have valves and slides.
Grades K, 1 and CSA
Up next...students will be working on dynamics (the concept of loud/soft).
Physical Education
Grades 2, 3 and 4
Students in grades 2, 3, & 4 have continued learning about team building games started with Project Adventure activities. Our first activity was called “Popcorn” and all the classes in 2,3, and 4 classes all competed against each other with a period of extra gym on the line. The activity was won by Ms. Hill’s second grade class. They have been working to strategize as in a team in games such as capture the flag, steal the candy, watch your back tag, and team flag tag. Students have also learned team sports such as soccer, kickball, and baseball.
Also, they have been learning chasing and fleeing games such as Rainbow tag, Never-ending ball tag, and asteroids.
This spring our focus will shift to team sports.
Grades K and 1
Students in grades K and 1 have been continued chasing and fleeing games such as rainbow tag, Mr. Fox, Big A little a, Cookie Monster, banana tag, and stuck in the mud. They have been working on special awareness games such as musical hoops, vroom, line races, and freeze dance. We have also been working on movement variations with work on obstacle courses and relay races.
Also, students have been working on cooperative games such as asteroids, fairy godmother tag, and parachute activities.
This spring our focus will shift to the basic skills of team sports.
CSA Classrooms
Art
Grade 4
For the start of the new year, the fourth grade began with an exploration of acrylic painting! They finished their mixed media cakes, inspired by Wayne Thiebaud. The finished pieces were fun and creative! We followed this project by creating a color wheel using primary colors and mixing secondary colors, as well as tints and shades. Our next project for the fourth grade students will be to create a paper mask for our Cambodian New Year celebration. We will use tissue paper and glue; it will surely be messy and fun!
Grade 3
Grade 2
Grade 1
Kindergarten
For the past few weeks in kindergarten we have been creating giraffes and pandas out of cardboard; it was a project with a lot of steps! The students did such an exceptional job with craftsmanship and individual artistic flair! We followed this project with some drawing and will be venturing into clay and 3-dimensional pieces for the spring!
CSA (Pre-K through grade 4)
Afterschool Art and Gardening
The First and Second grade students have been busy after school! The students have been exploring printing with shaving cream and food coloring! They have also explored salt dough clay!
On Mondays, the Third and Fourth grade afterschool has been working with Mill City Grows. They have been practicing dicing vegetables, measuring ingredients and trying new healthy snacks! Along with Mrs. Kubick, we have started seedling in our light table for our spring planting! All the students are excited about our gardens!
Content Literacy
Grade 4
The last few months the fourth graders have been learning about the 5 regions in the United States. We have spent time looking at the climate, landforms, animals and plant life that are found in those regions as well as the different states. As a final project the students worked in groups to create a brochure about one of the regions. Sharing with their classmates different places to visit, food specific to that region as well as interesting facts they learned about their regions. We also took time to participate in the Bobsled challenge. The students paired up and designed a bobsled that would get to the end of the track the fastest. After learning about the science behind a bobsled the kids were off and running. The fastest bobsled got to the end of the track in .47 seconds.
Grade 3
We have been hard at work learning about the American Revolution and why we are known as the United States of America instead of still being part of England. We began our unit talking about how King George treated the people of the colonies. This led us to the Boston Tea Party. As part of our lesson on the Boston Tea Party the students took some time to design a crate that would keep their tea driest the longest once the crate was placed in a bucket of water. The students were all given the same supplies and came up with some great designs.
We have interrupted our study on the American Revolution to look at the Industrial Revolutions as the students will be heading to the Boot Mills to learn about Mill City. Ask your students why our city is called Lowell to see if they can remember.
Grade 2
In second grade we have been hard at work being engineers. We have spent the last month exploring what an engineer is and the different jobs they do. We also spent time being civil engineers and designing bridges out of many different materials. We had fun testing our paper bridges with pennies. The winning team's bridge held over 300 pennies. We also made bridges out of popsicle sticks.
We also were lucky enough to have a visit from Jeanne d’Arc Credit Union. Mrs. Casey talked to the kids about the importance of spending and saving money. Each child was able to make a bank to take home to start saving money. If you would like to open a savings account for them at Jeanne d’Arc please reach out to us and we can send the paperwork home. The Bank comes in every other week to collect the kids' deposits. This is a great way for them to learn about the importance of money.
Grade 1
We have been spending time learning about the weather. As part of our unit we have learned how to be weather watchers to help identify what the weather is like. We also learned about different types of weather and the tools that the meteorologist uses to help predict what type of weather is coming our way. We had a lovely visit from David Williams from the Channel 5 meteorologists team before we left for vacation. Our students were proudly displayed on the morning news waving hi to all the viewers. Mr. McCreavan posted a link to the video on the school facebook page if you missed it.
We have also been learning about animal adaptations. We so far experimented with how a polar bear stays warm using blubber. How ducks feathers stay dry because of special oil and we will be looking at why bears hibernate in the winter. To go along with this unit we have been checking in a mother bear and her two cubs as they are hibernating under a family's porch in Pennsylvania. You can check on the family at home the link is https://hdontap.com/index.php/video/stream/pennsylvania-bear-den-live-cam.
Kindergarten
In Kindergarten we spent the month of December looking at how the winter holidays are celebrated around the world. We visited Israel, France, Mexica, and Italy as we talked about the many December holiday celebrations.
We took time before vacation to look at force and motion. We learned many new vocabulary words such as force, motions, position, push, pull and friction. We also had fun testing some of these forces and showing our ability to decide if someone is using a push or a pull.