In the Words of Porky Pig...

..."That's all folks!"

As we wrap up the 5th and final session of ELP (for 2015-16) at Robinson we look back on 30 weeks of learning.

I want to thank parents, teachers, and community members for supporting our program. We look forward to next year and the new, exciting opportunities that will benefit the children at Robinson.

We also look forward to summer at Robinson. ELP will run a 5-week summer camp. The dates are July 5th - August 5th, Monday-Friday 8:00 am to 12:00 pm. There is transportation available for pick-up and drop off. Breakfast and lunch will also be provided to students. Hours not long enough? Your student can be transported to Bristol for an extended camp day. Please direct questions towards me, my email is mcowette@anesu.org.

I will leave you with photos from the past year!

Best,
Megan

 
 

Session Five at LCS

This session we are lucky to be hosting three amazing workshops! Susan Mahony is teaching beginning violin to her small and focused group of two, on both Mondays and Wednesdays. John Amory is teaching Improv to two different groups of students, the younger group meeting on Monday and the older group on Wednesday. Lastly, Elliot Cluba is continuing to teach two groups of Tae Kwon Do on Tuesdays.

In Susan's Beginner Violin workshop, students start by learning the basics with “box violins” before being introduced to a real violin. Using a box violin helps to be able to see and learn the different parts of the violin, without the distraction of the noise of an actual violin. Students also practice body awareness by learning the proper stance to have while playing the violin, where to touch and how to hold the violin and bow, how to take a proper bow, and even how to march while playing! Susan's many years of teaching comes through with the various games and activities she uses to engage and teach her students. The small size of the class, paired with the focus of the students, has allowed the group to move forward quickly!

 As this is John's third workshop at LCS, the students have gotten to know and love him, which is evident by their shared excitement upon his arrival! Since there was so much interest in last sessions Improv workshop, we decided to offer two groups this session, based on age. Students start with determining what Improv is, and some basic rules of Improv. The workshop offers an outlet for the students' active imaginations, as well as a venue for working on communication skills, including speaking in front of a group and listening to peers. Students take turns being in scenes and in the audience, as well as offering ideas for the scenes and characters.

Tae Kwon Do continues to meet on Tuesday's, with a core group of commited students who have been participating throughout the year, and will continue on through early June. Students have shown both physical growth, as well as growth in other areas such as listening skills and self-control. Students were invited to attend a gathering with other students from across the state.  All participants were recognized and received medals for their efforts, which helped to boost self-esteem and confidence. The year-long commitment that students have made to their practice of Tae Kwon Do is commendable!

As this is the last session of the year, we would like to thank all of the teachers and students who have participated, making the program a success, as well as the teachers and staff who volunteered their classroom space. We are looking forward to continuing the program next year, and are always open to ideas for workshops!   Thank you!

Old MacDonald Had a Farm...

I often talk about how lucky I feel getting to organize Expanded Learning Program workshops for students at Robinson Elementary. As Session V, our final session of the school year, has gotten underway I once again find myself lucky. This time I am lucky because I am learning right along with the students.

Kerry Kurt, owner and operator of Unbound Grace at Sentinel Farms in Starksboro has opened her barn doors to our students. I get to travel along as the chauffeur and chaperone. We showed up to the farm on Day 1 and the only way I can describe the excitement of the students is as if they had entered the Champlain Valley Fairgrounds for the first time. They had the attention spans of gnats. Kerry, who has upwards of 15 summer campers took everything in stride.

Our first task was learning how to groom a horse. Our test subject was Charlotte. She was very patient while the little hands learned which brushes to use and in which order to use the different brushes. Dylan, a 3rd grader, was psyched about brushing her tail and couldn't wait to braid it when he was finished!

On Day 2 the attention spans grew, by a few seconds. They were even excited to learn how to clean out a stall. Think shoveling poop. (I opted out of this learning experience). Kerry took us on a tour of the property where we were able to get up close and personal with 4 calves. We also saw all 15 of her horses, including her yearlings.

The students involved in this workshop are lucky to have Kerry as their leader. As we went on our walking tour Kerry shared many of her reasons for opening her farm to students. As we watched the four students run as fast as their legs would carry them towards the calves she said, "They need this. They need to run without structure." How true. In a world where we have allowed strict schedules to rule our lives and our children's lives it is refreshing to have an adult who understands the bigger picture.

BES is already cruising along in our 4th session

Bristol Elementary School is excited to start their fourth session of the extended learning program. We are excited to be hosting the 4–5-6 grade play this session we have about 31 kids signed up for that. The play is the "Granny awards". Sounds like it's going to be a lot of fun for all involved. The play will also run through our next session until the opening night.

      The kids are very engaged in the workshops we have offered the session.             We are offering tai chi with Nancy McLaren for kids in kindergarten through second grade it is a large group but all involved are excited to learn a new thing.

    As always we offer a scholarship club for kids in third grade through fourth grade they get to do their homework and reading. When they're all done that they do some fun experiments and exciting things that they can learn and have fun with.

       We are excited to have Shawn Kimball back with us the session teaching film production for four through six graders they are learning what it takes to put on a whole film production/ movie with the lighting ,sound effects ,makeup and much more I'm excited to see what they come up with for their end product. 

       Mckinzie Gilbert the dance team coach at Mt. Abraham  has graced us with her presence this session teaching dance team to two different groups. Fourth through six and K through third graders. They are having fun learning the choreographed dance routines and all the different moves with fun music. The smiles and giggles coming from dance team tells me they're all having a great time. 

        The jewelry club is making beautiful jewelry for the age group of kindergarten through second grade learning dexterity with fingers and patience I'm getting beads onto small wires is a good skill to learn. They are coloring their own beats and then making jewelry out of that. This little group enjoys taking jewelry home for their families. 

       The trivia club is conquering some hard questions. By the end of the session they hope to be able to answer many questions that most people don't know the answers to. They like to challenge themselves and they are coming up with questions of their own to be able to challenge other with their knowledge. 

        We have been blessed to have Bertha Allen had bestowed her kitchen knowledge on our children throughout our four workshop so far. She is doing kitchen exploration with three through six graders and they seem to be having a great time in the kitchen making delicious things to take home and try. 

       In a collaboration with the Bristol recreation department we are offering Thursday pottery. At the clay studio in Bristol.

     We are already busy filling up the workshops for our last and final fifth session for this year. We will be having some repeats like dance team trivia scholars club. We hope to have a lot of new and exciting things to try to. The play also will be going through our fifth session. Look forward to seeing more and more kids join our program for us for more exciting learning opportunities.  

        

Session 3 Is 4 Times The Fun

Monkton is pumped to kick off our third session of ELP with our returning dream team of MCS classroom teachers Stacy Carter, Caitlin Leggett, Jenn Livingston, and Kelly Pierpont and MCS alum Shawn Kimball making up our awesome workshop leadership team! The title of this post references the fact that in our third session, we have quadrupled enrollment from our first session back in the fall. ELP is rocking at MCS and we have the droves of enthusiastic students to prove it.

This session, our workshops include Food Network (cooking and video tutorial productions of recipes) for 3rd through 6th graders, Craft Club for the K-2 crowd, and Film Production with the 5th and 6th graders. Already, we are off and running on a great session, so stay tuned for updates and pictures from Monkton!

Mystery Mousse at MCS

There is something pretty soothing about ending the day quietly stitching and chatting with friends and that is just what the Craft Club has been getting up to these past two weeks. Hard at work, but also relaxed and enjoying the time together, our third through sixth graders have been sewing bean bags and putting the finishing touches on their stylish felt bracelets some with conductive thread, allowing for it to light up. The dynamic duo of Ms. Leggett and Ms. Pierpont are the perfect pair for these high-tech, low-tech projects!

Winter in Lincoln equals...

...sledding! It's much easier to transition back from vacation when you have sleds, perfect sledding snow, and a great sledding hill - which we here at LCS are lucky enough to have! We begin each ASP day with our outside time, and the majority of students opt to spend most (if not all) of that time whizzing down the hill, running back up, and repeating the cycle over and over.

Another popular outdoor option these days is fort building. We take snow fort construction very seriously here at LCS. On this day, everyone involved had a specific job to do to ensure speedy (yet well-done!) construction, so that there would be enough time to play before heading inside. Unfortunately, winter also equals less outside time - but we make the most of it!

Those of us who choose to stay inside on these chilly January days have fun too. Lately, students have been really enjoying the game Headbandz, where you wear a plastic headband with a little clip for a card to fit into, and ask other players yes or no questions to guess what card you have. We have also been enjoying our new sets of markers, along with beautiful coloring pages courtesy of Cathy. 

January has also brought some sad news - we are no longer graced with the wonderful presence of Amy at ASP. We know she is going on to do amazing things and we are proud of her, but we miss her already! It will be difficult to replace Amy, but we will do our best to find another team member who enjoys coloring as much as she does!