Raymond C. LaPerche Elementary School

In third grade today, Mrs. Nonis used a third grade passage called The Whales’ Song to teach sequencing the events of a story. After reading, students went back into the text to find the evidence. To make the assignment hands on, students cut out and moved the events on a graphic organizer. They are always learning in third grade.

Thank a teacher! This has been a challenging year for educators but Smithfield teachers have met the challenge head-on. There are several ways to show our appreciation. Consider.... Nominate a Teacher for Smithfield Teacher of the Year - Send nominations to Lisa Petrone, lpetrone@smithfield-ps.org, by April 16th. Nominate a Teacher for a Golden Apple Award - NBC 10 and the Rhode Island Department of Education recognizes outstanding teachers. Winning educators will receive a $250 contribution from Ocean State Credit Union. You can nominate teacher using the form at turnto10.com. Barnes & Noble My Favorite Teacher Contest - The 2021 My Favorite Teacher contest will run the entire month of March. The winning teacher will receive $5,000 for themselves and $5,000 for their school, and the student who writes the winning entry will receive a $500 Barnes & Noble gift card! To enter and see official rules, please visit the Barnes & Noble website.

Have you seen how the addition at LaPerche is progressing? The windows are being installed and a large section of the brick work is complete! It looks amazing! Inside, the walls are up and you can truly visualize all of the amazing teaching and learning that will take place throughout the space!! The excitement is building.

Mr. Feinstein challenged the LaPerche Junior Scholars to do kind deeds and post them in the school. LaPerche rose to the challenge and have started documenting the kind things they do and that they see others do on our kindness board. Feinstein Junior Scholars spreading kindness!!

In fourth grade, students shared who inspired them and why. They discussed the qualities of someone who would be inspiring and shared with the class. One student shared that his karate teacher inspired him as he pushed him to try archery. Another student shared that a meteorologist he met inspired him to want to be one as well since there is still so much to learn about weather patterns. The students posted their thoughts for all to read.

In Mrs. Hayward’s class, the students enjoyed a movement break. Each student had his/her own die. When it was your turn, the student tossed the die and everyone did the move with high energy. Counting, reading and moving all in one. So fun!

United Way of Rhode Island 21 Day Equity Challenge The United Way of Rhode Island 21 Day Equity Challenge invites all Rhode Islanders to commit 15 minutes a day to equity with the goal of understanding how inequity and racism affect our lives, our communities, and our state’s ability to thrive. Rhode Islanders who sign-up for the challenge will receive an email daily continuing for 21 days. Each email will feature a different racial equity topic, a brief introduction, and choices to select from to spend roughly 15 minutes learning, watching, reading, or reflecting about the day’s topic. The challenge is self-guided and done at each participant’s own pace. People may save emails for when they have more time, and anyone can sign up to begin their own 21-day journey. The Challenge is available as of February 24, but can be started at any time. Here is the link to sign up: https://unitedwayri.us12.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=fb1686ef671a7368d39afacf9&id=280b2e6e3d

On Friday March 5, first graders at LaPerche celebrated crazy sock day. One activity involved students collecting data about what type of socks everyone wore and creating a tally graph to display it. Miss Zucker’s first graders also surveyed those walking by their discussion and added that data to the graph. In the end, plain socks was the winner. (I think that had to do with those passing by!) First grade teachers at LaPerche know how to make learning fun!

Every fifth grader at LaPerche serves on the student council. This year, the council runs the whole school Morning Meeting over the intercom. They give reminders, share compliments, celebrate birthdays and lead the Pledge of Allegiance. The new March student council is doing an amazing job speaking clearly and using inflection in their voices, all while holding an old fashioned type of phone they have never seen before! Great job, LaPerche students!

In third grade yesterday, Reading Rotations were in full swing. During reading rotations, each group has an assignment one of which is guided reading. Guided reading is a time to work with the teacher at your instructional reading level on skills you need to practice. In Mrs. Nonis’ class, she was meeting with students in the class but they were all on a google meet. This way, students from across the room can come together for a discussion and still be socially distanced. The group quietly spoke while the rest of the room worked on their own activities at their own pace. It was a focused, productive learning environment!

LaPerche is a Responsive Classroom (RC) School. One part of RC is Morning Meeting. Morning Meeting has four components; greeting, sharing, activity and message. The whole point is to build community in the classroom as we learn about each other and have fun together. Today in fourth grade the activity was “What are you doing?” One student starts a movement and the next asks What are you doing? Whatever that person says, the student has to act out. The process continues around the room until everyone is laughing and acting out something silly. Today we had students picking flowers, playing football, taking a shower, riding a bike, making pizza, rocking climbing and more! Ask your fourth grader to introduce “What are you doing” to your family!

Now that third grade at LaPerche has figured out what makes a functional cart (two sets of wheel/axel systems and a base, moved freely, no friction on the ramp) We explored how we can improve our cart and make it travel further. Students added weight to their design, reduced friction, and many other design modifications! We learned how to measure with a centimeter tape measure by lining it up at the base of the ramp at 0. We also learned how to measure on, beyond 100cm with the same measuring tape. Students were challenged to create a cart that traveled 15cm farther than their original design.

Students in first grade at LaPerche have been reading Hunter’s Money Jar. During writing time, they retold the story in their own words using the transition words First, Next, Then and Finally. Students looked back in the text to find the events and used their writing binder filled with resources such as word wall words and organizers. At the end of writing, partners shared their writing with each other. Writing time is fun (and challenging) in first grade!!

Today is the 100th day of school at LaPerche! Did you know that means it is the 1000th day of school for fifth graders!! The fifth graders reflected on all of the things they learned during the last six years and added them to the 1000th day board! Endless experiences at school!!

For Valentine's day, third grade read the book, "Somebody Loves you, Mr. Hatch" by Eileen Spinelli. In the story, Mr. Hatch, a man who mostly kept to himself and had the same routine every day, was surprised with an anonymous valentine one day. Mr. Hatch was "woken up" from his sadness and filled with joy to think that someone would be thinking of him. His whole daily routine changed, from keeping to himself, to branching out and talking to people at work and around the community. Mr. Hatch later finds out that the valentine was a mistake. It was delivered to the wrong address. He became very sad once again; however, this time, the community noticed he was sad and had a party just for him. We talked about how every day, we have the choice to build someone up with our words, or tear them down. How one smile, one kind word or gesture could help someone feel less alone and shift their whole mindset. After our discussion, each student received paper hearts. Thank you to the volunteers who helped cut! We created a list of adjectives that would build someone up. We then used our class list and wrote kind words on hearts for every person in our class. We even wrote some about ourselves! When they finished writing out hearts, we delivered them and everyone was left with kind words about themselves. You may have seen these kindness wreaths come home on Friday. They are truly beautiful and the kids loved building each other up.

Due to the pandemic, students have an assigned desk, they are spaced out and space can be tight in the classrooms. That doesn’t stop LaPerche teachers from working with small groups of students. Having time to work in a small group at your instructional level is vital to student growth. Teachers meet in the hall, in the library and any space they can carve out. LaPerche educators always get the job done!

The Art of Pablo 3rd grade was introduced to the work of a local painter who uses bold colors in his paintings of figures. Drawing the figure can be both challenging and intimidating so before beginning their own projects, the students cut out paper figures. Then they teamed up for an activity, taking turns posing and placing the paper figures in the shape of their partner. This was a silly way to begin looking at the way the body moves! The students used ere fully engaged as they studies the awkward placement of paper limbs before finding the proper pose!

Second graders at LaPerche are learning about their social filter and when to keep thoughts in your head, when you should say it out loud or when to filter it by changing your thought to something that can be said. Students were given a partner and a variety of situations to discuss. The students were very aware of what was expected and unexpected and made a commitment to stop or change the unexpected comments. Students felt unexpected comments included complaints, answers to a test, mean words and play date/party discussions when the whole class is not invited. Our second graders are accountable for their words.

Kindergarten students work hard to learn word families. When the students understand that changing one letter in a word makes a new one, they can read so many new words. On Wednesday, students practiced the at family. They listened to the new word and determined which letter had to be exchanged. Everyone had their own white board they used to demonstrate their thinking. Students were asked to manipulate the letters so all could see the new word. Kindergarten students are word detectives!

During intervention time, LaPerche kindergarten friends worked on letter formation. The students used lined fundations white boards. At the start of each line is a symbol the teacher references when instructing letter formation. Symbols include the sky, a plane, the grass and a worm. On this day, student were prqcting the letters j and k. Beautiful handwriting takes practice!