Elm Hill School Newsletter
March 2025
Dear Elm Hill Families
I hope these warm temperatures and sunshine that we have seen lately are filling your days with joy. The children have been enjoying the fresh air and although they miss sliding they are happy to not have all the snow gear on.
Many of you have reached out with questions regarding the transition. We are excited to report that many plans are underway and we look forward to meeting our new students. If you have PreK and K students coming to Elm Hill next year and you have questions please call us at 802-885-5154. If you will have a 2nd or 3rd grader next year who will be at Union Street school please feel free to direct questions to us here at Elm and to Union Street at 802-885-5155.
Parent/teacher conferences were a big success!!! It is wonderful to collaborate with so many families. Our next event we are excited to offer is our Literacy Night on April 10th. It will be Dr Suess themed with fun stories, crafts, activities, snacks and books to take home. As you know parking can be a challenge at Elm Hill. We are working with Butler Bus to offer some busing from Riverside Middle School up to Elm - more details to follow.
Thank you again for making my first year as Principal at Elm Hill School joyful. It has been great fun to get to know the children and so many families. I love when I'm out in the community at the grocery store, sporting events or a restaurant and I get a chance to see the smiling faces of my little friends.
Happy Spring!!
Miss Rachel
March has been a busy month full of learning and fun! This month, we spent some time celebrating Dr. Seuss's birthday by learning about this very special author and illustrator. We read many of his wonderfully wacky books together, as we participated in Read Across America. We also had the opportunity to have Vermont Institute of Science (VINS) come to Elm Hill to teach second graders 3 lessons about Pollination. On Saint Patrick's Day, we wore green and reflected on the many things we felt lucky to have, such as family, friends, teachers, homes, food, etc. This was part of a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow writing project. You will see it pictured below. We also had fun doing a guided drawing of a Lucky Leprechaun. The students' artwork came out great! We have some very talented artists! Each day, I am so impressed with the kindness, hard work, and perseverance this class shows. They bring lots of sunshine to my days! Hooray for Second Grade!
Kindly,
Christina Perkins
We have had a very fun and exciting year so far in first grade. We have been busy doing a lot of learning, and a lot of crafting. Most recently, we spent time making leprechaun traps, in hopes that we may be able to catch a leprechaun. Lucky for us, we did get a special visit from Smiley McClover, but unfortunately he just left us a big mess to clean up. He did leave us a pretty awesome note though! We had so much fun designing and making our traps. Another fun activity that we started earlier this year is our adventures with our class pet, Ava. Every weekend, Ava gets to go home with a different student, and that student gets to write, draw or take pictures of their adventures together. Most recently, Ava got to travel with a student to New York City! She looked like she had a great time. We have also been very busy with our learning. We just finished reading the book Charlotte’s Web. Now we are talking about some of the book characteristics. We have been learning about characters, setting, problems and solutions. Soon we will be watching the movie, and comparing how the two are alike and how they are different.
Students in Miss Maresa’s class have been researching animals and their habitats. They made dioramas of the habitat of their chosen animal and wrote informational paragraphs about what they learned. We have also had three visits from VINS (Vermont Institute of Natural Science), during which we learned all about pollination! Students explored concepts of cross pollination, pesticides, and seed dispersal. They considered how almost all the food they eat depends on pollination. They designed and tested pollinators and “seeds” that would disperse in the wind! This week we dissected owl pellets to help us further explore the concept of interdependence of all living things.
The past few weeks we have been learning strategies to show kindness. Kids have practiced showing kindness many different ways: helping at lunch, being a friend and spreading joyful energy throughout our building.
We have started a weekly “Bucket Filler” award and will have our recipients honored at All School Meeting. We have a school full of Bucket Fillers.
We are still continuing to rotate lunches in the school counselor room and teachers have been given passes for kids to use during designated times throughout the day . When kids take a break we are learning various mindfulness strategies and finding tools to help them have a successful day. We’ve begun practicing the ‘Box Breathing’ activity with some of our lunch groups.
Our afterschool American Indian Dance club has begun. These students will learn 2 dances; Woman’s Fancy Shawl Dance and The Women’s Traditional. We will showcase their skill at an all school assembly and at our powwow on May 31 in Alstead, NH.
