Eric Olson "The Canopy Guy"

"Canopy Guy" Dr. Eric Olson, an ecology professor at Brandeis, gave our third graders a "tour" of the New England and Costa Rica treetops.  Students learned how trees make a living from soil, air and light; how trees consist of both below ground and above ground parts; how different trees use various adaptations to spread their seeds; and about the different types of animals that live in and around trees. To show students how he studies life in the treetops, Dr. Olson concluded with a spectacular schoolyard demonstration of a tree climb!

During the classroom workshops, he discussed the life cycles of spores, wasps, and caterpillars using real life specimens. After the discussions, the students divided into small groups to examine the specimens and make labeled scientific drawings. Dr. Olson visited each group and discussed their work and answered their many questions.

Dr. Olson is a fun and engaging presenter and the students really enjoyed learning about ecology from him!

October 8th was International Walk to School Day!

On Wednesday morning, dozens of families arrived at the Franklin School on foot, bike, stroller, scooter and roller blades!  Many of the families said that they walk to school every day! Congratulations Franklin families on enjoying the fresh morning air, having a few moments to connect with your children, connecting with other walkers, getting a little exercise, freeing up the Blue Zone and reducing your carbon footprint!

Cup O' Joe with Principal Kelly

Once a month parents and guardians can join Principal Kelly for an informal conversation about Franklin.  The typical format is a brief update followed by questions from parents and guardians.  This is an open forum to discuss any questions or concerns about what is happening in school in general.  For questions about your child or your child's classroom, please contact the teacher directly.

On Friday October 3rd, roughly 35 parents gathered, sipped coffee, noshed on Munchkins and had the following questions:

Can anything be done about the morning "stampede"?

Principal Kelly assured everyone that there were lots of conversations happening at the school level.  Many adults present shared the same concern and there were several possible solutions proposed.  Unfortunately, there were just as many reasons that those solutions were not possible.

• Could there be additional entry points into the school?  This presents a security issue.  In addition, Principal Kelly cherishes her interaction each morning with the students and learns a great deal in those few minutes.
• Could the doors be opened earlier? There is a risk that kids will be unsupervised as the teachers' contract states that they do not have to in their classrooms until 8:20 AM.  School must begin at 8:25 AM to meet the instructional hours of the school year.
• Can we allow kids into the lobby early?  All 15 elementary schools have agreed to follow the same procedure this year and for security reasons, the doors will not be unlocked until 8:20 AM at all of the elementary schools.
• The teachers contract is being negotiated this year, is there an opportunity to examine this to get teachers into the classroom at 8:15?  These five minutes would add up to two extra weeks each year and increasing teachers salaries across the Newton Public Schools would be a significant amount of money.  This cost for this could have undesirable consequences such as larger class sizes.
• Could students line up by class? Line up in three lines?  Let in the first three steps and once they are in let in the next three?  These and other ideas will be considered.

Homework:

• Parents are pleased with the amount of homework that has been coming home - lesser quantity and higher quality.
• But will students be ready for middle school?  Several parents chimed in with their experiences with their middle school aged children. They feel that their former Franklin students were well prepared.  Fifth grade homework ramps up in preparation for middle school and students spend a lot of time in 6th and 7th grade learning time management skills.  By middle school age, students can handle the additional homework.  It is developmentally more appropriate.
• Talk about your approach.  Is it from you or from the district?  Principal Kelly's experience as a parent has been that the amount of time spent on homework takes away from creative development.  As a second grader, her eldest daughter wrote a 70 page novel out of her own interest in writing.  Now she doesn't write, or play piano or guitar because she has no time for it.
• Students in all Newton Public Schools are learning the same content at the same pace and are being assessed at the same time.  This enables teachers to share best practices.  Now that there is curriculum mapping, we can be assured that all students in Newton are learning the same thing at the same time.  Teachers still have the flexibility to teach using their own styles, skills and strengths.

My child held a lemonade stand and wants to donate the proceeds, what is the most helpful?

Fulfilling teacher wish lists is the most helpful.  Many teachers have their wish lists posted on their classroom websites, in their classrooms, or in emails to families. Teachers often buy supplies for their own classrooms.  Other options for the money would be to give it to the room parent for the classroom fund, or to donate it to the PTO.  Money cannot be donated directly to the Franklin Elementary School as an entity.  The Franklin PTO is a registered nonprofit and can accept money that will be used for the Franklin.

So as you can read, a lot of topics were covered in 50 minutes!  We hope that you will join us next time and share your questions, concerns and ideas.  The remaining Principal coffees will be held on:

• Friday, November 7 - 8:40-9:30 AM
• Friday, December 5 - 8:40-9:30 AM
• Friday, January 9 - 8:40-9:30 AM
• Friday, February 6 - 8:40-9:30 AM
• Friday, March 6 - 8:40-9:30 AM
• Friday, April 10 - 8:40-9:30 AM
• Friday, May 1 - 8:40-9:30 AM

Faces of Franklin: Meet Our Librarian

Jennie Simopolous is new to Franklin Elementary School this year and is looking forward to getting students excited about reading. Most importantly, she wants to help them discover books that they wouldn't seek out on their own. She finds that this is more difficult in the digital age where the element of discovery has been lost. Under Jennie’s guidance, students at the Franklin are exposed to a variety of series, authors and genres to help pique their interests.

Jennie Simopolous in the newly updated library.

After graduating from Boston University with a B. A. in Communication Studies, Jennie went on to receive an M. A. from Emerson College in Media Arts. After doing some production work, she realized that what she wanted to do - what she had always wanted to do - was to be a school librarian. She returned to school and got her Master’s in English and in Library Science from Simmons College. She has been a licensed librarian since 2008.

At her former school, Jennie was described as approachable, friendly, and open to trying anything. Her calm demeanor encouraged her colleagues to come to her with technology challenges and she alleviated their fears by working to figure it out together. She hopes to be a resource for both her students and her colleagues at the Franklin.

Growing up in Marlborough, MA, Jennie played “library". She made homemade cards for the backs of her books, checked them out using a Cabbage Patch stamp, and lined up her dolls to read to them. Her happiest memory of elementary school was writing her own book - a ghost story - in the fifth grade. Seeing her book in the school library made her realize that she too could be an author one day. Growing up near the public library helped to ignite a lifelong love of reading. Her gnawing question was always “What else can I read?”.

While these experiences set the stage for her future, they weren't always positive. Jennie loved The Baby-Sitters Club series by Ann M. Martin.  She remembers reading them in the school library in the fifth grade when the parent of a classmate commented “You’re reading The Baby-Sitters Club?” in a voice suggesting disdain and disapproval of her choice.

Jennie’s library is a judgement-free zone where students are encouraged to check out whatever interests them. It is a place for discovery and expression and she wants all of her students to feel comfortable asking for book recommendations and for assistance. Students do not have to like everything and they have a choice in the books they check out. “The freedom to read whatever I wanted made me a reader", says Jennie. Some of her current recommendations, Liar & Spy by Rebecca Stead and Dumpling Days by Grace Lin, can be found on the Massachusetts Children’s Book Award list.  For more great book suggestions, check out the Franklin Elementary School website. 

Jennie considers herself to be very lucky. Her parents are her heroes, having immigrated from Greece with nothing and working tirelessly to put Jennie and her brother through college. Through their efforts and her own, she is living in a great city and has a great job. There is no better place to be with a vibrant community of children’s authors and publishers. The Franklin community considers ourselves to be very lucky to have Jennie as our new librarian!

Behind the Scenes: Monthly All School Meeting

Monday morning began with our monthly All School Meeting.  The meeting is modeled after the daily morning meetings that take place in every classroom.  This month’s meeting was led by some very enthusiastic members of the fourth grade class.

The Greeting - the pinky shake! Everyone turned towards their neighbors and extended a greeting...and a pinky.

As this was the first meeting of the school year, several students taught the "All School Signal" to the four hundred students assembled. This signal is to help quiet everyone and to prepare them to be attentive listeners:

• Hands Up
• Eyes on Speaker
• Voices Off

The Share - A skit was preformed about the "Book Diet"

"What's a 'book diet'?"

"It's like a regular diet. What's your favorite food?"

"Watermelon."

"What if you ate watermelon for breakfast, lunch and dinner?"

"You wouldn't be healthy!"

"You need to try lots of different foods to get vitamins. You need to read lots of genres to be a healthy reader."

"What's a genre?"

Students came up on stage in groups of two, hoisting aloft a poster and announcing their genres: Historical Fiction, Fantasy, Traditional Literature, Poetry, Science Fiction, Auto Biography, Realistic Fiction, Informational Text, Biography and Mystery.

The Activity - led by the fourth grade, the entire school participated in a rousing version of "Boom Chicka Boom" starting with indoor voices, then whispers and finally the underwater version!

Happy Birthday - all students with September birthdays stood up, Ms. Mustachio played the piano and everyone sang a harmonious Cha-Cha-Cha version of "Happy Birthday".

The meeting closed with an update by Ms. Lefever regarding Fantastic Fridays for 5th graders beginning on October 17th.  

Led by the Kindergarten, students and teachers filed back to their classrooms with a sense of energy and community to kick off the day.

We've Got Spirit!

On Friday, students could be seen wearing every hue of green imaginable!  Unless St. Patrick's Day has been moved to September, this can only mean one thing - Franklin Day!

Every month at the Franklin, there is an opportunity to dress up and show your spirit:

October 31: Orange and Black Day - dress in as much orange and black as you can
November 26: Fancy day - dress up in fancy clothes
December 23: Pajama Day - wear your pajamas to school
January 16: Crazy Hat or Crazy Hair Day
February 13: Mixed Up Day - wear mismatched or backwards clothes
March 2: Dr. Seuss's Birthday - dress as your favorite book character
April 17: Sports Day - wear your favorite sports attire
May 22: Favorite T-shirt Day - wear your favorite T-shirt

Look for our "Roving Reporter" and you could be featured in Principal Kelly's next post!

Duckling in the Blue Zone

Some of you may have heard about the duck at Franklin School.  During April vacation, a duck laid her eggs in the faculty parking lot in the back of the school. Fearing for the duck's safety, we called animal control and were told to leave the duck alone.  The teachers and staff have been observing the duck as we enter and leave school each day.  Some have even provided food and water and we blocked off one of the parking spots with cones to protect the nest.

This past Friday, the eggs finally hatched and 9 little duckings were born.  As you might imagine, we were concerned about how these duckings would make it from the Franklin School parking lot to water. After calling several wildlife agencies, I was assured that they would definitely find their way to water.  I wondered if there were any ponds close to the Franklin School.

When I arrived at school this morning and saw the empty nest, I hoped that they had all made it safely to water.  About 20 minutes after getting to school, two students arrived in my office holding.... a duckling!  They had found the tenth duckling waddling through the blue zone.  Several teachers and I prepared a makeshift nest in the office.  We got a box, a warming lamp from the kindergarten, a water vessel and some oatmeal flakes.

Then, we searched the grounds of the school for the mother and the other ducklings.  Unfortunately, they were not to be found.  Just then, a 4th grade student told me that he knew where the duck family had gone.  In fact, on Saturday, he and his family had followed the duckling parade to Cheesecake Brook at Albemarle.  I wondered if the ducks were still there and knew we had to check.

Once the duckling seemed a bit stronger, I put the "nest" in the back seat of my car and headed to Cheesecake Brook.  As I drove down Albemarle, I noticed that my daughter's second grade class was at recess on the Horace Mann playground.  Since we call her "the noticer" at home, I knew she would be the perfect assistant. Lucia walked along the side of the brook while the duckling and I rode in the car beside her.  We crossed Crafts Street and then North Street, and I was beginning to lose hope that we would reunite the duckling with her family.  Lucia was gaining hope that we would have a new pet.  As we neared the end of the brook, Lucia began pointing and jumping up and down.  She had spotted the duckling's family swimming down the brook towards the river.  After wishing the duckling well, we placed it in the water and it quickly swam to join the others.

The happy mother duck rounded up all the ducklings.

And they all swam off together.