Mrs. Harrison       

                    
Agnes Gray Chorus rehearsals began Monday, September 9. Chorus is for students in grades 5 and 6 who like to sing,want to learn to sing in harmony and who like to perform. Our holiday concert for chorus and instruments is in the evening on Tuesday, November 26.  Letters about chorus have been sent moe.  Instrumental students can also sing with chorus since the lessons are on a different day.  If your child is interested in singing with our school chorus, please sent the bottom of the letter back to school.

    Cinema Booklets                        
We have 150 booklets to sell for $25 each.  More information will be sent home.

Bag Program
We are so excited to share that our Foodstock Pantry has been selected to be a part of the Hannaford Helps Reusable Bag Program, which is designed to make it easy for customers to contribute to their local community while supporting the environment.  For the month of September, each time a $2.50 reusable Fight Hunger Bag is purchased at Hannaford located in Oxford, $1 will be donated to our Foodstock Pantry.  This is a great way to raise awareness, support the environment and fundraise for our cause.

     Mrs. Clarke
We are so happy to have your children back in our lives.  My how they have grown!
On Thursday we harvested some veggies from our garden Thanks to the Alan Day Community Garden for all of their support in helping with our garden expansion.

 Classrooms
Pre-K – Pre-K has been busy meeting new friends and teachers. Staggered start is now finished.  I am so excited for this year as we have a great group of children. Pre-K will take the next few weeks learning the basics of school: routines, expectations, safe use of materials, and of course how to have fun. One important part of Pre-K is learning to be independent, so please allow your child to do things on his/her own at home (opening snacks, putting shoes on, washing hands, getting dressed).  One last reminder is that school starts at 8:30. Teachers use this time in the morning to prepare for the day so please try not to come earlier than that.
Ms. Larceny

Kindergarten – We have had 2 full days of school so far! We concentrated on building new school routines, learning a new schedule, and making new friends.  Please make sure your child gets plenty of rest as it is an exhausting day for them. For reading, we will be focusing on environmental print and realizing that we can become readers. We will begin by reading a word or 2 which is supported with a picture. We are exploring our math materials at this time along with counting: our classmates and objects we find around the room. During calendar, we are starting to work on recognizing numbers as we count through the month. For writing, we are trying to draw a picture and write our names.  While we are working on building a classroom community, our focus will be on names and recognizing rhymes and letters. Please make sure you pack a sweatshirt in your child’s backpack to use in case it rains…it’s a long walk to the little school.
Mrs. Biggers

Grade One – What a great couple of weeks it’s been in first grade! We’ve been sharing lots of read alouds, learning the routines about how we function as a class, and exploring math and science concepts. We are also getting ready for our field trip to the Oxford County Fair on the morning of September 11. Unfortunately, I will be at a conference next week on Tuesday and Wednesday, so Ms. Davis will be accompanying our class along with a guest teacher. If you would like to chaperone and have not yet returned your child’s permission slip, please do so as soon as possible. Every night it is expected that students will spend 15-20 minutes with books. That can mean that you are reading to or with them, they are listening to audio books, or enjoying a favorite on their own. Unless there is classroom work that was not completed in a timely manner during the day (which will be sent home for completion), this will be our homework this year (along with helping your child learn shoe tying!) LOL!
Mrs. Chafin

Grade Two – Second grade has had two amazing weeks back to school! I am so excited to see how eager each student is to come to learn! They are all working very hard to remember routines and classroom expectations. We began our first unit in writing, narrative, this week and we are focusing right now on topic development and how to choose a “Small Moment”. Second grade is spending the week talking about telling time and remembering which hand is the hour hand and the minute hand. Our focus for this week is to learn time to the hour and half hour. Please help your student at home tell time whenever possible. Students began working with maps this week, beginning with basic skills such as cardinal directions, map symbols and the difference between continents, countries, states and towns. I am working hard on getting reading assessments done this week with hopes that second grade will dive right into our reading groups starting on Monday!
I’m looking forward to our first whole week together next week!
Mrs. Puiia

Grade Three – What a great team of students here in 3rd grade! Our routines and expectations are becoming clearer each day. We have been exercising our natural curiosity as we explore and read about things like soil, caterpillars and seeds. Ask your child what is growing and changing in our classroom this week.  Now we are beginning to bring our attention to books that tell stories, and we have begun writing our own true stories.  Thank you for taking the time to read through the math related family letters and homework that will continue to come home. Staying connected with your child’s learning is the key to their success.
Mrs. Cooper

Grade Four – Fourth grade has had a wonderful start to the new school year. The first week of school was centered around community building, team building, and sharing stories of our summer experiences. This week we have been focusing on how to choose a book to read and how to read more deeply, trying to get to the heart of the characters.  This week also involved pre-assessments and I was so impressed with how the students jumped right in, cooperated, and performed well! It is going to be a terrific year! Please look for communication to come home in the green folder. I will be sending home some important information.
Stay tuned!
Mrs. Toita

Grade Five – Our first two weeks have been quite busy and lots of fun, as we settle into routines, begin our subjects, and participate in new activities to get to know one another (and as we welcome our two new classmates!).  I’m sending home a sheet in your child’s home folder about how to join REMIND for messages on your phone, as you saw in the parent letter home this week.
Just a reminder that 5th graders should be reading at home each evening for at least a half hour, in addition to other assignments that will be found in their home folder from time to time. I’m happy to meet with you at any time. Please email me or call the school to set up an appointment.
Mrs. Timm
s.timm@msad17.org

Grade Six – Every classroom is different and each is an incredibly dynamic environment.  We have spent much of our first two weeks together establishing  those crucial class expectations and quite simply getting to know one another.   The progress our team has made in less than two weeks is incredible.   Reading Workshop has kicked off with some really great character work.  Writing Workshop has opened with Personal Narratives, one of the hardest (in my opinion) genres of writing. Personal Narratives take such tremendous courage because we are writing about ourselves. That is a scary thing to do (much like singing for strangers). I CAN though proudly share that every one of our team members has demonstrated their willingness to take on this first writing challenge. Next week this newsletter will be written by one of our team members.
Please have a great weekend and reach out to me anytime with any questions or concerns.
jonofrio@msad17.org

Upcoming Events
Friday, September 13 – All School Gathering, 8:30 a.m. in the gym
Wednesday, September 18 – Picture Day.  All pictures taken before lunch

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