This Week in the Tulip Room

It’s been another busy and fun week! With only 19 days left of school, we are beginning to feel the rush of the “things we haven’t done yet!”.   These next 19 days will be a whirlwind for sure and will go by in a flash.

This week we got a new farm table in our classroom, it is nearly 100 years old and was found in Cincinnati in a consignment store owned by a lady who moved to Cincinnati about 10 years ago from our very own Center Grove area! We also got our other new pets! Two African dwarf frogs, they are super cute and the children are excited to have them.

With Rehearsals and practices for the spring program we didn’t have a lot of time to do our normal things and look forward to performing for you this Sunday.  We did however squeeze in an educational and interesting Recycling presentation given by the Indiana Department of Environmental Management. We all learned a lot about what could and couldn’t be recycled and are now inspired to visit our local waste treatment facility for a tour. The recycling committee is working on putting this together.

It was the first week of running club. We learned stretches and running manners and rules this week while walking our one mile course and then we were challenged to walk 1 mile 2 other times before the next meeting. We will practice foot form and begin running 1 minute, then walking 3 minutes for one mile.

Coming up- we will begin our Relay Recess and fundraising activities. Relay Recess is a program designed for elementary students by the Relay for Life, a fundraising event that benefits the American Cancer Society. It focuses on sun protection, healthy eating and exercise as a way to prevent cancer.  We will culminate these activities on the last day of school by hosting a “Mini-Relay”, where the students will have a small field day and walk a track for 24 minutes (representing the 24 hours of the Relay for Life event). This will all take place at the park and it will be a half day and last day for all!

Before that time, however, we have trips planned to the Zoo, to study the biomes, on May 22^nd and an Indians game, for Baseball in Education, on May 13th.  We will also be sending 3 more sets of 2 students to the Refuge and will be taking some children on small outings to pick up supplies for their Spring Committee projects.

Mark your calendars for May 11^th 1-4pm; Center Grove Montessori will be hosting its first community showcase.   At the showcase there will be local vendors, as well as Montessori materials and materials made by the children.  The Tulip Room will have a table, selling homemade birdseed and snacks.

Elementary Encore must have 5 students ,registered by May 10^th and we are just one shy of that so please register soon! We would love to spend some extra individualized time with your child!

Think warm thoughts and let’s get this spring weather started!!

This Week in the Tulip Room

Another busy week has passed way too quickly! We spent a busy week working on learning songs for our program, working in our spring committees as well as preparing for and hosting our classroom pet presentations. Back in the fall we had to part with our guinea pigs due to allergies and we posed the challenge to the students that if they could make a good case for getting a new pet then we would be able to welcome another (besides Boomer the fish) into our classroom. Much research was done on allergies, food, housing, cost, care and needs of many different animals. Then on Wednesday the presentations were made, each child had 5 minutes to present and 5 questions from the audience, then the voting began with each child allowed 2 votes. It was a close race and we ended up with two new animal friends! First Jayden will be bringing in his dog, Jasper,  each Friday to spend the day in our room, then Kate was able to place an order for two African dwarf frogs! The children have really taken ownership of these pets and we hope to add more animals in the fall with the wish to have an animal representing each class of the Animal Kingdom’s vertebrate phylum.

As we look at the calendar we can’t believe it is so near time for so many things! First coming up on the 28th is our spring program at 2pm in our old location, Old Smith Valley United Methodist church. We will begin decorating our shirts on Tuesday so be sure your child has their white shirt to school ASAP.

Second the school will be hosting a community fair on May 11th and the children will have their own booth, selling snacks and bird seed, watch for sign up times soon! We could also use volunteer greeters and runners (who might check to see if vendors need water or snacks) so we will be asking students who might be interested.

As some of you know, the Relay for Life is an event I am heavily involved in (I am the chair person for the one in Martinsville) and during the month of May we will work on some cancer education as well as fundraising projects and we will culminate those activities with our mini-relay event that will take place on the last day of school, which will be a half day and be held at the park.

Also on the 22nd of May we will be taking a trip to the zoo! We will spend the day there working in our biome research teams, bringing biomes to life! We will be in need of at least one additional driver but all are welcome to come! We need to order tickets so please RSVP to Brenda by May 10th.

Elementary encore currently only has three students registered. In order to take place we will need to have 5 registered by May 10th. So please sign up soon!

Also running club will begin next Wednesday, hope to see you there! Which brings me to my biggest revelation….It is almost summer! The children will all change grade levels, new friends will be coming and our classroom will grow again!

Thank you for making us such lucky people!

This Week in the Tulip Room

Whew! What a week! I can’t believe that we have only been back from Spring Break for one week! The children came back with such a hunger for work! In addition to our work we have created Spring Committees; each student is a member of a committee that is planning a spring activity. For some of these activities we will need to go shopping or price comparing, so just know that your child may leave the school building at some point for a short period of time during these next few weeks with either Ms. Brenda, Ms. Kristen or Ms. Melissa.

We have also started practicing for our Spring Program, which will take place April 28^th at 2pm at Old Smith Valley United Methodist Church. Along with our performance we are asking each family to contribute one canned good as “admission” to help stock our local food pantry, The Refuge.  Also if you could, please send in one white t-shirt for your child to decorate for the event, by Friday, April 19^th.

This week we were lucky enough to experience a visit the Indiana Statehouse to learn about our government and the history of our State as well as the Indiana State Library and tunnels in between. We also received a visit from Ms. Melissa’s exchange student, Susi, who is from Germany, but has a German mother and a Turkish father and was able to share the culture of Turkey with us.

Coming up we will be finishing up or Plant studies with a (insert drum roll here) “Plant Party”! We will be sampling different parts of the plant and having some fun! Then on we will move to the Animal Kingdom for some studying of vertebrates and invertebrates.

Beginning Wednesday, April 24^th

Ms. Melissa will begin an after school running club. If your child (or yourself) is interested in learning more about running please see Ms. Brenda to register and fill out a release form. We will discuss the culture and manners of running, hydration, skin care, warm-up, stretching, run/walking to build to running a distance- beginning at one mile and possibly moving to distances. Parents are welcome to join!

Some things to note:                                                                                       

Spring is here & with it we will begin learning about team sports. Please be sure your child always has on or has access to tennis shoes because anytime the weather is nice we will be playing a sport in “the field”.

Also with the breaking of the weather we will be spending as much time as possible outdoors; eating lunch, having lessons, reading time, line time, rocket math & folder time, will all be spent outdoors.  We have added sunscreen to our “personal care” shelf, but please have your child apply it in the mornings as well as to be hydrating themselves in the evenings and mornings.

Due to recent concerns our neighbors have expressed about the safety of children in their parking lots, we are asking our parents to please use our parking lot only when dropping off or picking up your children.  We understand that it is a tight area, but if we work together, we can keep everyone safe.