End of Year in the Library: Fun Inside and Out!

The weather is great, and the library has moved outside!

Bring your family and friends on the storywalk Daniel Finds a Poem. Calling all friends and members of the Fort River Community! Come take a walk on the path behind the garden. The Rattlesnake Gutter Trust of Leverett has generously let us borrow Daniel Finds a Poem by Mischa Archer in storywalk form. Follow the path away from school and back again to read the book. In order to “turn” the page, you must walk (run or skip) to the next page hanging from a nearby tree or lamp post.

Come check out our 4th graders’ vision for how they will each change the future, the world, and themselves! Each student in 4th grade has a vision statement posted on the walk outside the library.

The 6th grade UTOPIA sculpture is almost complete! Inspiration came from the book The Seventh Most Import Thing, the life of outsider artist James Hampton, and scavenged materials. Come check it out in the 900s section of the library.

The last day to check out books is Thursday, June 7th. 

On June 8-14, every student who returns ALL of their library books (and takes responsibility for any lost or damaged library books) will receive a raffle ticket. Local businesses have been donating prizes for our more than 20 raffle baskets that will be filled with books, toys, and activities to get students excited for summer reading fun.

Axis360 eBooks and Audiobooks will be available through June 30. On July 1, we’ll be switching to Overdrive. All other online resources will be available through the whole summer!

Please say hello! Lani Blechman, Librarian, blechmanl@arps.org, 413-362-1215
http://fr.arps.org/academics/fort_river_library/ 


 

Summer Art Tips from Ms. Singer

Reminder! Ms. Singer needs volunteers to help tidy up and protect the Art Room and its resources for summer. Please see original post here and email her here if you can help. 

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from the May/June newsletter:

Remember to keep making (and talking about) art over the summer! If you're looking for some great art camps and classes, here are a few local ones with awesome programming in addition to the fantastic museums in our area:

Multi-Arts Camp: Hosted right here at Fort River! Theater, art, music, dance, creative stories, and more. For ages 4-12, with groups organized by age. www.multi-arts.org

Feather Press Studio art classes: Run by Wildwood art teacher Julie Rivera at a beautiful studio in Leverett. Summer sessions include classes for ages 5-7 and 7-12, and then after-school art classes (including portfolio development for middle and high school) begin in September. More info at www.featherpressstudio.com

Summer Art at the Art Barn: Monday-Friday, full day art program in 1- or 2-week sessions for kids in grades two through eight, in Hatfield. Experienced teachers, multi-media! Includes painting, drawing, ceramics, crafts, and more. More info at www.summerartbarn.com

If you're looking for camps or classes for middle and high school aged children, send me an email. There are many other great camps and programs around for those ages too and I'm happy to share more.

Have an excellent and artful summer!
Nicole Singer, Art Teacher

Youth Writing Summer Programs at UMass

Still looking for summer camp options? Here is some info about youth writing programs available at UMass Amherst. Offerings include Poetry, Journalism, and Creative Writing. https://www.umass.edu/wmwp

Mental Health Team Shares Thoughts on Mindfulness

from the May/June newsletter:

Fort River is doing Mindfulness, everywhere. You’ll see “Breathe” signs on the walls, observe kindergarten students mindfully moving parts of their bodies, focusing on one part at time, or notice fifth graders taking a few moments to stop their studies to breathe.

What is Mindfulness? Mindfulness is the practice of purposely focusing your attention on the present moment—and accepting it without judgment. When you're mindful, your attention is focused in a relaxed, open, attentive and curious way; all important aspects of both learning and feeling happy. As kindergarten students have said, “it’s when your mind is full of smarts”, “thinking about 1 thing at a time” and “makes things feel easy and relaxed”. Mindfulness helps to develop self-awareness, regulate emotions, control impulses, increase perseverance and focus, build students’ stamina for work, empathy and understanding of others’ perspectives, and helps students to make good decisions. When students are calm and peaceful, the information they’ve absorbed can flow to the front of the brain (prefrontal cortex) where learning, reasoning and thinking occurs. This highly evolved part of the brain controls our decision making, focuses our attention and allows us to predict, comprehend and learn to read, write and understand math. Mindfulness increases students’ ability to learn and decreases their stress. This is why we’re doing Mindfulness at Fort River.

Regularly practicing Mindfulness helps to increase executive functioning skills in people of all ages and can assist children in feeling more calm and less worried. Developing a regular mindful practice supports a child being reflective instead of reactive which means they’ll make thoughtful decisions before acting. There’s multiple research documenting this; what type of mindful practice is up to you.

Although meditation is one form of Mindfulness, there are many ways to practice it. When eating an orange, washing dishes, noticing a rainbow or stretching your body. Using mindfulness during these activities means attending to the present: to the smell of the orange peel, the taste of the juice, the feel of the warm water, the sight of the vibrant colors of the rainbow or to how each muscle feels while you stretch. And if another, different thought comes into your mind, let it go without judgement and return to thinking about the orange, rainbow, water or muscle; only single tasking your brain. Tensing and relaxing or motion types of mindfulness practice (such as yoga) can assist children to move through their frustration or dis-regulated state and become more calm, ready to talk about the problem that occurred.

Here are some resources for further information about Mindfulness:

• Holistic Life Foundation: Working primarily with urban youth such as in the Baltimore Schools http://hlfinc.org/
• Two well established and researched programs: http://thehawnfoundation.org/mindup/ and https://mindfulnessinschools.org/courses/dotb/.
• This is the curriculum the kindergarten classes are currently using. https://centerhealthyminds.org/science/studies/kindness-curriculum-study-with-pre-kindergarten-students  
• What is Mindfulness? http://morethansound.net/mindfulness/

Ms. Jessica Rudnick, Ms. Melanie Collins, Dr. Pat Schumm, Ms.Ruth Killough-Hill, Ms.Ana Encarnacion, Mr. David Rutherford, and Mr. Miguel Aquino

Baystate Textiles Recycling Program at ARPS

Now you can drop your clothing and other textiles into collection bins located at each school. Convenient and easy! The collections are weighed weekly and each school's PGO will receive a check based on the bulk weight. Help the Fort River PGO earn FREE CASH while also helping our planet Earth by up-cycling your textiles. Thanks!

FIELD DAY IS COMING! Wednesday, June 13th (Rain date June 14th)

Field Day is a school wide event that allows the entire school to get outside for sun and fun. In the morning, students will participate in field day activities together in multi-aged groups to build school unity across grades. Groups will rotate through a variety of outdoor and indoor activity stations on the fields, on the playground, and in the gym. This year, the afternoon will also be filled with community building games and activities.

Schedule:
9:00 am - 11:30 am: Grades K – 6 Field Day
11:30 am – 12:30 pm: Picnic lunch & recess (bring your own or purchase cafeteria lunch)
1:00 - 3:10 pm: Afternoon elective activities

Field Day is an exciting day for students, and they have made many wonderful memories in previous years. Please consider volunteering to help make Field Day 2018 another huge success.

We will need lots of parent volunteers to fill a number of important roles. Parents can volunteer as an activity station worker or a group leader; parents can help set up or clean up.

Volunteers can sign up on the “Bring It” section of the Ft. River blog: (http://frpc.pleasebringit.com/public/ZR90d5H2bU8) or

by filling out the form below and leaving it in the PGO mailbox, or

by emailing the coordinators, Christine St. Laurent (cwstlaurent@gmail.com) or Tom St. Laurent (tomstlaurent.ht@gmail.com). 

Thank you and we are looking forward to seeing you on June 13th!

Field Day 2018 Spanish
Field Day 2018 English

Keeping Children Safe and Secure Online: A Project Safe Childhood Presentation for Families on May 29

The U.S. Attorney General’s Office will host a presentation: Keeping Children Safe and Secure Online: A Project Safe Childhood Presentation for Families on May 29, 2018, from
7:00 pm – 8:30 pm at ARMS.

The presentation will include: being safe and secure online; Social Media 101; Digital Footprint; Gaming; Sexting and Cyberbullying; Sextortion; and Internet Predators

Click here for further information.