Lowell School Newsletter

Greetings,

The end of the year brings no greater joy than the opportunity to express to you season’s greetings and good wishes. May your holidays and New Year be filled with joy.

Mrs. Phelan

Late for School

Recently we have had excessive tardies. Many students are coming into school after 8:20. Beginning Monday, December 18th our teachers and staff will not be holding doors open after 8:15. Students will need to be buzzed in and report to the office after 8:20. Today we had 61 students marked tardy, they arrived after 8:20. Students should be in class at 8:15. Doors open at 8:05.

Thank you...PTA

The Scholastic Book Fair was a huge success!

The week’s language of the week will be Polish.

To say good morning in Polish, you would say...

"dzień dobry"

Here is a YouTube video of how to pronounce that: https://youtu.be/pn-vU38phlw?t=1m46s

Author & Illustrator, Matt Tavares, at Lowell School Friday Night.

Thank you to the following people

Following are the members of the Lowell Literacy Night Team. We’d like to thank them for their strong commitment to our school.Bethan Bailey, Ann Cox, Anne Sudbay, Kate Peck, Dganit Toledano, Jaclyn Zywocinski, Lucy Driscoll, Lauryn Richardson, EIleen Donahue, Emily Walsh, Elizabeth Walker, Caroline LaBella, Elizabeth Kaplan, Jackie McCready, Alaina Antonelli, Gabrielle Grimaldi, Christine Gendron, Lauren Harrison, Madeline McDonough, Tony Fiandaca and a special thanks to the PTO and the LCVP!We’d like to thank them for their strong commitment to our school.

Winter Concert

Thank you Mr. Spano and all the band, strings and chorus students for putting on a lovely Winter Concert.

The holidays are a great time to donate a book in someone's honor.

Donate a book in honor of a grandparent or a child.

We will announce the title of the book and the name of the honored person during morning announcements.

Dates: Event: Time/Location:

Dates: Event: Time/Location:

December 20th	Grade Level Team Meetings	During Scheduled Specials
December 20th	PLT Meeting	2:45-3:45 pm
December 20th	Winter Concert In-school only for grades Prek- 1	1:45 pm
December 21st	Kindness Buddies Activity	1:40-2:15
December 25th - 29th	Winter Break	Return to school on January 2nd
January 3	Faculty Meeting	2:45-3:45
January 4	Prek Tour	9:00-10:00
January 4	School Council	7:00-8:00
January9	PTO Meeting	6:30-7:30
January 10	Grade Level Department Meetings	2:45-4:45
Junuary 10	Kindergarten Information Night	6:30-7:30
January 15	Martin Luther King Day Observed	No School
January 16	Professional Development for Teachers	No School
January 17	PLT Meeting	2:45-3:45
January 26	International Night	6:00-8:00

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Lowell School Newsletter

We’d like to thank all the parent volunteers for making the bookfair a success!

Thanks for helping us to get this holiday season off to a good, giving start!

Library and Technology Learning at the Lowell

Students in grades 3 and 4 have begun their keyboarding programs in both the library and their classrooms.  We are monitoring speed and accuracy.	Students in 2nd grade have been learning about how books are organized in the library.  The Dewey Decimal System helps us organize books!
Internet appropriate use: All levels: We begin Internet safety lessons this winter. Students in grade 5 have been focusing on learning how to judge if sites are reliable, biased or trustworthy.  They are just beginning to learn how to cite sources for their information.

Students in Mr. MacLellan’s class learned how to use Quicktime to record their voices reading the books they created in class.

• Grade 5 started using Google Classroom in library class to keep track of work, assignments, and activities.
• 4th and 5th grade continue their Quest to master Google Apps for Education. They are currently exploring Google Docs learning menus, formatting, file sharing and uploading and downloading graphics.
• Grade 1 students practice using a mouse, moving and resizing images, opening and closing files, saving their work and accessing it again for revision.
• Kindergarten learned about all the different jobs computers do for people and organizations. They also started learning about the placement of letters on a keyboard.
• Grade 3 students explored the library catalog online learning about reading the records books to determine if it's available and how to find it using the call number.
• Grade 1 students began familiarizing themselves with letters on a keyboard by playing Keyboard Zoo a program designed to identify the location of various letters by name and letter sound.
• PK and Kindergarten students learned about fiction and nonfiction books in the library and how to tell the difference between them.

Grade 2 students practice putting library books in call number order using Shelver! On the smartboard

Hour of Code is coming to Lowell December 18-22. Students in grades PK-5 will explore coding games and activities to learn the basics of computer programming.

Mr. Spano proudly presents…

Lowell School Chorus

& Instruments

December 15, 2017

1:30 - 2:15

Parents please arrive 15 minutes early to get a seat. Performers are asked to wear white tops and black bottoms.

The holidays are a great time to donate a book in someone's honor.

Donate a book in honor of a grandparent or a child.

We will announce the title of the book and the name of the honored person during morning announcements.

The week’s language of the week will be Nepali.

There are a few options for greetings but "namaste" seems to be the one we would want to use.  

Namaste has a few meanings including hello and goodbye.  

Thank you Lowell for Supporting the People of Puerto Rico

Co-teaching at Lowell

Lowell’s Lauren Harrison, ELL teacher,  recently reached out to the author of Jamaica’s Find, Maribeth Boelts, she was excited about a lesson she and Ms. Talamas co-taught in first grade. Students were asked to compare and contrast the story “A Bike Like Sergio’s” and “Jamaica’s Find.” Here’s what the author had to say to Lauren.

Just a little about each story

Maribeth Boelts’ A Bike Like Sergio’s will appeal to readers and writers of all ages. It’s a heartfelt story with a message to which readers will relate; the right decision is often the hard choice.

Jamaica finds a stuffed dog at the playground and after taking him home without trying to find the owner discovers her conscience as well. Jamaica's honest and appealing character inspired five more books, each about a childhood ethical dilemma.

Parent Teacher Conferences

Tuesday, December 12th – Evening conferences – 6:00 pm – 8:00 pm

Thursday, December 14th – 12:15 dismissal

• lunch is served
• Extended Day and Boys & Girls club open
• Afternoon conferences – 1:00 – 2:40

Families can sign up on the conference using this website. Website sign ups will be available Wednesday, November 29th.

Dates: Event: Time/Location:

December 11th- 15th	Scholastic Book Fair	All Week!
December 12th	Evening Conferences
December 13th	Grade Level Meetings	2:45-4:24 pm
December 15th	Winter Concert	1:30 pm
December 14th	Day Conferences/ Early Release	12:15 pm
December 15th	Literacy Night	6:00-8:00 pm
December 20th	PLT Meeting	2:45-3:45 pm
December 20th	Winter Concert In-school only for grades Prek- 1	1:45 pm
December 25th - 29th	Winter Break	Return to school on January 2nd

You can now subscribe to the James Russell Lowell Blog, just type in your email address.

READ MORE ON OUR WEBSITE