News from the Nest

Hello Elm Street School Families and Friends,

We are sending home some very tired students to you all today after an AMAZING Elm Street School Field Day. Huge SHOUT OUT Erin Harrington, Megan Hurley, and Geoff Iadarola for all the organization and hard work and magic that went into making today so special for all our students and staff. And another HUGE SHOUT OUT to our head custodian John Kane for helping with set up, clean up, and making sure everything was running smoothly throughout the day. THANK YOU to Caitlyn Jones for organizing all the t-shirts that looked so wonderful in gray, blue, and orange out on the fields. And thank you to all of our family volunteers who came out today to run stations, set up, and clean up all of the events. Today wouldn't have been possible without all the hard work and time all of the volunteers put in and we are so appreciative of your time and efforts!

In this week's News from the Nest you will find additional information about:

• Upcoming Dates/Events: June
• May/June Counseling Newsletter
• Little Free Library
• Extended Registration is OPEN
• Math Update
• PAC Feedback Survey
• Battle of the Books Interest and Volunteer Form
• Elm Street School Gear Sale
• Walpole Road Race Information
• Elm 180 Fundraiser

I hope everyone has a restful weekend and we will see all our Eagles back at the Nest for our last week of the school year!

Jen

• Pride Month

• 6/3: 1:45p Incoming Kindergarten Peek and Practice

• 6/3: 6:00p Walpole Middle School Information Night for Incoming Grade 6 Families

• 6/4: Grade 5 Field Day

• 6/5: 8:45a/2:00p Grades 3-5/K-2 End of the School Year Assembly

• 6/5 3:15p Elm Street School Council Meeting

• 6/7: Elm Street School Field Day

• 6/10: 6:00p Elm Street School Talent Show

• 6/12: Grade 5 Celebration

• 6/13: Last Day Of School- 11:55a Dismissal

• 6/15: 1:00 - 2:00p Walpole 300th Cornhole Tournament at Lorusso Athletic Complex

• 6/16: Father's Day

• 6/19: Juneteenth

• 6/19: 2:00 - 5:00p Juneteenth Celebration at Walpole Common

• 6/20: Summer Solstice

• 6/25: 6:00p Walpole 300th Trivia Night at Jalapenos

• 6/28: 6:00 - 8:00p Walpole Pride at Walpole Common

HUGE SHOUT OUT to Rebecca Costello, Dave Jones, and John Kane for helping set up our Elm Street School Little Free Library. The lending library is housed right by the buddy bench outside near the playground and is a great spot for students to share books. If your child is interested in donating a book to the lending library, please have them bring it in and add it to the library.

Walpole Extended Day will be processing registrations for the 2024/25 school year through Community Pass. Families that wish to register for Extended Day programs must first make a Community Pass account using the following link: https://register.communitypass.net/WalpolePublicSchools

Please reach out to Dan Santangelo (dsantangelo@walpole.k12.ma.us) or Evan Storlazzi (estorlazzi@walpole.k12.ma.us) with any questions.

As we come to the end of our second year with the new Bridges Math Curriculum, it is wonderful to see the teachers and students embrace Number Corner, Work Places and the use of Number Strings to build number sense, increase critical math thinking and improve math discourse. The deep mathematical thinking that is happening in our classrooms from kindergarten to grade 5 is impressive. At every grade level students have learned to use new tools, visual models and strategies to improve their efficiency as mathematicians.

We have taken some time to analyze the data from last year to this year in regard to unit tests and Number Corner check ins and we already see growth at all grade levels. The percentage of students reaching mastery is growing because both the teachers and students are more familiar with the curriculum. The vertical alignment embedded in Bridges helps students bridge their learning from one year to the next strengthening their conceptual understanding of the standards.

Of course, we have also continued to utilize ST Math as a supplement to our Bridges Curriculum and for the second year in a row the entire district has reached the 100% puzzle progress goal. This year, schools strived to reach 80% for all students and every school improved their overall percentage of students who succeeded in hitting that benchmark. More importantly the goals achieved, incentives and celebrations have helped improve overall math disposition for students throughout the district. We see it in their smiles, their eagerness to solve the next puzzle, and how they verbalize to anyone who will listen how many puzzles they solved or what percentage they are at.

We couldn’t be more proud of our students and staff and the growth we have seen around our mathematics curriculum over the past two years. We are excited to see where we will be at this point next year. In the Summer Edition S’more that will come out in June, we will provide ideas and links for how to keep your children engaged in fun mathematics over the summer to keep their skills sharp and ready for the challenges of the next school year.

We are getting closer and closer to the end of the year and want to spend some time this summer thinking about and planning for a great year in 2024-2025. To help ensure that the Elm Street School Parent Advisory Council (PAC) communicates effectively with you and provides events and initiatives that meet your needs and preferences we are reaching out and asking for your input. Your feedback is essential in helping us improve our efforts.

Please take a few moments to complete this survey. All of the feedback is anonymous.

First I want to thank Aimee Gagne, Silpa Pande, Colleen Campbell, Moriah Boulos, Jaclyn Small, Kelsey Flanagan, Tini Cantrell, Lynne Cook, Nichole Morasse, Kim Farley, Elizabeth Ryan, and Michelle Perron for spending time together with me this past month digging into Battle of the Books and finding solutions to the challenges we were facing with the current model while also exploring other non-competition based ways to celebrate literacy learning at Elm.

We are excited to announce the return of Battle of the Books for next year along with several other all school literacy celebration events that will be developed this summer! Battle of the Books will relaunch this fall contingent on enlisting enough family/caregiver support and volunteers. We are looking for about 15 - 30 family volunteers.

For those of you who may not be familiar with this program, it is an OPTIONAL friendly reading competition between students where teams are given a list of titles to read. At the end of the program, the teams will collaborate to answer questions that test their knowledge of the stories. The questions are in the form of: “In what book…” and teams then decide on the correct title and author of the book that answers the question. Teams will consist of 5-7 students from across grades 3, 4, & 5. The competition will begin in October of the 2024-2045 school year and end before the Winter Break in December.

This form will be used to give our Relaunch Team the opportunity to "jump start" the preparations over the summer. Please note, this form is not binding; the "official" registration will happen in September of 2024. Included in the form is the option to indicate your interest in volunteering to support Battle of the Books.

Important things to consider:

• The majority of the reading will be done at home.
• Copies of each book will be available in the Elm Street School library, and, in many cases, the Walpole Public Library. For those who would prefer, purchasing books is also an option; we will collaborate with Park Street Books in Medfield to create an "Elm Battle" book section.
• Students (with teacher guidance) are responsible for working with their team to divide up the book list fairly, keeping in mind the book level and the grade level of the members. Once this is agreed upon, students are responsible for reading the books they were assigned.
• Students are responsible for taking notes or completing a google form to share information about their books with their group members.
• There will be some after school team meetings during the competition window

If you and your child(ren) are interested, please fill out one form per child!

Our Student Council has partnered with the Run House here in Walpole to sell Elm Street School and Walpole gear. 10% of sales from our online shop will be donated to the Walpole Council on Aging. Visit our online shop here: https://therunhouse.com/collections/elm-street-school

I hope to see many of our Eagles and their families this year alongside me at the Walpole Labor Day Road Race in September!

Registration is now open for the 51st Annual Walpole Labor Day Road Race! Don’t miss this wonderful Walpole tradition. Sign-up now for the 5K, 10K, or Youth Mile. All proceeds support the 200+ athletes in the Walpole High School Cross Country / Track & Field Program. Each race participant will receive a finisher’s medal. If you register before August 15th, you’ll also receive a free race t-shirt! Can’t join us live? No problem. We have virtual editions for both the 5K and 10K races. For additional information and to register online, please visit www.walpoleroadrace.org. See you on Race Day - Monday, September 2nd!

Email: jbuller@walpole.k12.ma.us
Website: https://www.walpole.k12.ma.us/o/ess
Location: 415 Elm Street, Walpole, MA, USA
Phone: 508.660.7374