A big thank you to everyone for helping get our ski and ride program off the ground last week. Despite a few logistical hurdles it was a very successful first day. The kids all got on the snow and we saw a lot of big smiles out there. We plan to continue to run the program as long as Hoodoo is open. The low snow conditions are challenging but we still feel like getting up on the mountain is a valuable experience.

A couple reminders to help keep things running smooth:

• The students come in from the slopes at 2pm and this is probably the most challenging and chaotic time of the day. If you are checking out your child at this time, please sign them out with a teacher and then exit our area with all of their gear. This helps us make sure we aren’t leaving any kids or items behind.
• Make sure students have full water bottles and lots of snacks/food. There is no microwave available to students in the lodge.
• We plan to send rental skis and snowboards home with students every Friday. If you don’t want the gear to come home and would rather it stay at BBS please let us know. 

In Field Study class we got our fish delievered last week. We have over 100 rainbow trout we are raising this winter. The kids were very excited to come back from the holiday weekend to see most of them have hatched. Upper grade students will be monitoring and caring for the fish as they grow and develop.

In Health class we are learning about eating healthy this week. Although we all know this is important it can be very hard for kids to choose healthy food and drink options when we live in a world of delicious sugary and savory food that is all around us.

We encourage you to have conversations with your kids about food choices this week, and ask them what they have learned in class. Healthy eating habits that are supported and guided by adults will help kids resist temptation to junk food.

In Humanities, Blue Bay finished the unit on Ancient India. There was a test for 4th-5th graders and a different test for 6th-8th grade students. As a part of their test, 4th-5th graders wrote an informational paragraph about daily life in the Indus River Valley. 6th-8th graders wrote a multiple paragraph essay comparing and contrasting Hinduism and Buddhism. They finished revising their papers today and the results were good. We are already jumping into ancient China, and there is a test on spelling words tomorrow.  Students also took a grammar quiz in which they added commas into sentences that lacked proper punctuation.

In Math, Blue Bay is chugging right along and staying busy. 4th graders are working with various multiplication strategies and checking their answers, 5th graders have been spending time on dividing numbers with decimals and including remainders in decimal form in the final quotient. 6th grade is working on finding the unit rate, a great applicable math skill. 7th grade is partway into their geometry unit on Circles, they get to use Pi and their calculators a lot. Our 8th grader is continuing to work on representing linear relationships.

Keep switching out those BBS library books and encouraging students to read at home.

In math we are wrapping up comparing numbers and finding the difference in word problems using more and less and will move into data collection and graphs.

In literacy we are starting to play with multisyllable words. 

Games and activities to try at home: 

• Math- Keep playing compare games. Play “war” but students only get to keep the cards if the difference is above 4.
• Literacy- See if you can find close multi-syllable words around you like- fantastic, dentist, sunset

In Science we are wrapping up our art unit by making an art project in the form of a mural or paper quilt.  Students are voting on the topic of the art project which will also inspire action in our community.

Green Ridge Math: Students are deep in the wonderful world of flat and solid shapes! Ask your child how they determine what a cube is! Listen for key vocab like, faces, edges, vertices, and squares. 

Green Ridge Literacy: Students finished the chapter book Julian’s World and are working with VCE works that use a schwa sound. They are also updating their Writer’s Notebooks’ ‘AUTHOR’ity List with an emphasis on memories. 

Art Literacy: Rosehip students are working with pattern blocks to design a zoomed in snowflake. Green Ridge students are finishing their banana to whale transitional drawing and will begin a polygon-centered snowflake.