Brown School Buzz

Dear Families,

First and foremost, thank you all for being such a great community! The first week back from our winter break has been anything but typical. I sincerely appreciate everyone's willingness to exercise patience, extend support, and work together, particularly during arrival and dismissal times. And while we may be struggling with the amount of snowfall, I can assure you-our kids are loving it!

The students came back to Brown this week ready to learn. They settled into their routines quickly and got back to work. With almost two full trimesters in the books, we are looking very carefully at our progress and making instructional adjustments wherever needed. Our progress as a school, and as a District, is measured in a number of ways. We use local measures, unit assessments, short term progress monitoring assessments (kind of like quizzes), and of course, state assessments. The Commonwealth also issues an annual report card for every school and district. Included in this newsletter is our recently released report card for 2025, issued by the Department of Education. Our students are making great strides, and we are looking forward to the next four months of learning.

Though our primary focus will always be on learning, we also manage to have some fun along the way. In February we celebrated our 100th Day, Valentine's Day, Black History Month, Heart Health Month and had some great PTO sponsored Enrichment experiences! Although our busy February is coming to a close, March will bring us more learning experiences and excitement at the Brown School as well. Next week we will kick off Read Across America Week, Women's History Month, and Music in our Schools Month . And, grades 1, 2 and 3 will perform in their first concert on March 26th!

We are all looking forward to a great month of continued learning and fun at the Brown School!

Thank you for your continued support.

Mary

Our first day back and the kids were ON POINT!

Brown School students were definitely ready to return and were working hard on

our first morning back on Wednesday!

The Magic Hat is a proud sponsor of the Brown School PTO and funds all of our Enrichment experiences! From authors and musicians to performers and scientists, our kids are very fortunate to have the Magic Hat's support each year. If you would like to help the Magic Hat continue to help our school and you'd like to get out on a Tuesday night, you might be interested in this event!

Next week is Read Across America Week, and we'll be celebrating!

In addition to do some extra Inchy drawings and reading together as a school, we'll also be celebrating by having Mystery Teacher Readers. and guest readers in the classrooms. Also, Wednesday will be Words are EveryWEAR Day! Students are encouraged to wear a shirt with words on it for everyone to read on Wednesday, March 4th!

Every year, each public school and school district in Massachusetts receives a report card. Just as your child’s report card shows how they are doing in different subjects, the school’s report card is designed to show families how our school is doing in different areas.

You will notice on our report card that we are above the state average for both ELA and Math MCAS assessments. To improve student performance in our school, we are strengthening our multi-tiered system of support framework to support the academic achievement of all students. We encourage you to become involved in helping us improve our school. We see parents as critical partners in the success of our students and school, and we are grateful for your continued support.

CLICK HERE FOR THE BROWN SCHOOL LETTER

BROWN SCHOOL REPORT CARD

ARE YOU MUSICAL? WE WOULD LOVE TO HEAR YOU!

At the Brown School we LOVE to celebrate the arts! During Music in our Schools Month we celebrate by having LIVE Music in our Lobby from 7:50-8:10. Students are welcome to sign up to perform on Tuesdays or Thursdays and we are actively seeking adults and students to share their musical talents with us for just 20 minutes in the morning.

If you sing, are part of a singing group, play an instrument, OR know someone who has one of these talents, PLEASE SIGN UP HERE. Adults may also sign up on a student day if one is open.

Please feel free to share with a musician in your life! :). We'd LOVE to have you join the fun!

As we learned more about the contributions of Black Americans throughout our history, and in particular in Marblehead, students have been engaging in conversations in classrooms, singing songs and sharing literature about more famous Black Americans. Today we celebrated our school's namesake with our self-imposed LUCRETIA AND JOSEPH BROWN DAY! Classrooms celebrated with conversations and gratitude for Lucretia and Joseph Brown for their contributions to our community. You can celebrate at home by clicking the links below and learning along with us....and maybe even bake some Joe Frogger cookies this weekend!

Joe Frogger Cookie Recipe!

Info on Joe Froggers and Lucretia and Joseph from Smithsonian

Great video with a wealth of info from Marblehead Museum