Quarterly Newsletter, October 2018 The Buzz at Bessie

Have you heard the …

Our teachers, staff, and students have worked hard

for several years, and this Dream Team’s dream has

finally come true. The teachers have helped your

children make tremendous growth over the past three

years, and this dedication has finally paid off. I hope

you will join me in congratulating the staff and

students in their awesome accomplishment!

I also hope you will join me in thanking so many

others who have supported Bessie Weller and have

been an important part of our success. From

community members to the school board office to

you, the parents, Bessie Weller has received a

tremendous amount of support - and for that, we are

blessed.

Your children have been learning and growing for

years - we all know that - and now the rest of

Virginia knows that, too!

Bessie Weller is a great place, and I am proud to

work with the staff, students, and parents! Please join

me in celebrating our success!

Rich Fletcher

Principal

When Mrs. Kester's 1st grade class read How Do

Apples Grow?, they learned it takes 50 leaves to

grow 1 apple. Using all the unifix cubes in a tub

they had enough "leaves" to grow 64 apples.

It is hard to believe, but the 1st 9 weeks of school

is almost behind us. Students have worked very

hard mastering new grade level academic materi-

al as well as expressing kindness to their friends

and teachers! By the end of this marking period,

there will be over 200 Kindness MVP recogni-

tions on our Kindness Wall of Fame.

In addition, at the beginning of each month we

hold a short assembly and hand out certificates

to students who excelled in academics, citizen-

ship, and attendance. During our first assembly

this month, we handed out 563 certificates. Bes-

sie students have obviously been working hard to

reach their dreams!

Sandra McGrath

Assistant Principal

Counselor’s Corner It has been a great start to the school year! Students

have been working hard. I want to say a big thank you to our

parents/guardians for getting our students ready to learn! All

students had the opportunity to meet me and learn the role of

the school counselor. Students have been requesting to have

individual and group session meetings to talk about solutions to

their challenges at school. Students are working well to resolve

conflict with each other and using words to express feelings.

Students will be focusing on kindness for the next

classroom guidance lessons. We are excited to have Positive

Paws K9 Therapy Dogs come to Bessie Weller starting

September 28th! We will be having therapy dogs coming to

some of the classroom guidance lessons. The therapy dogs will

also be visiting some of our classrooms. During this time,

students will practice reading to the dogs. There are many

kindness initiatives we have here at Bessie Weller. Join us in

encouraging kindness both at Bessie Weller and at home.

Please feel free contact Mr. Chiles, School Counselor, at (540)

332-3940.

Lawrence Chiles, School Counselor

3rd

The world’s smallest frog is the size of a Cheerio!

Strawberries have more vitamin C than oranges.

A baby porcupine is called a porcupette.

*Info courtesy of: kids.nationalgeographic.com

M’Kaijah Fitch in 4th grade is creating her

salt dough map of Virginia’s 5 regions.

Our Scholastic Book Fair will be held

from October 10-15.

The Fair will be open each school day

from 8:30-3:20.

The Family Night will be on

Thursday, October 11,

from 6:00-7:30.

Please sup-

port your

school library

and come to

the Fair!

There’s lots of exciting learning going on

at Bessie Weller!

The Wildlife Center of Virginia visited Mrs. Marx’s

1st grade class to teach students about the Eastern

Box Turtle.

Students in Mrs. Bozung’s

class held a fashion show to

practice using adverbs and

adjectives! Students worked

in groups to pick outfits,

select their models, and

narrate the red carpet walks

using adverbs and

It is hard to believe we are over thirty days into the

school year! We are moving right along in kindergarten

learning our letters and numbers! So far, we have learned the

uppercase and lowercase letters C, O, B, M, S, R, T, A, N,

and G, along with their letter sounds! In math, we have been

learning all about numbers and shapes. We now are able to

recognize and write numbers 1-10 and are continuing our

learning with numbers 11-20! We have also learned to iden-

tify squares, triangles, rectangles, and circles using their

characteristics! We are pleased with the progress your child

is making and we hope you are too! We can’t wait to see

how they will continue to flourish!

The 3rd grade dream team is chugging along

with a full head of steam! Third graders have been busy

learning about main idea, details, and summarizing while

reading Soil and Biome. They are learning new strategies

when it comes to adding and subtracting two 3-digit

numbers. They completed a soil experiment where they

had to collect a sample and make observations on what

they found in the soil. Third graders from all classes are

still continuing to earn many kindness MVP awards and

their pictures are being shown on the MVP wall in the

cafeteria!

In September, 1st grade has been learning to add

by figuring out the parts to a whole. We also are work-

ing on counting to 110 by 1s, 2s, 5s, and 10s. In literacy

we have been reading about how apples grow and why

leaves change. Some exciting facts students learned

through their reading are that it takes 50 leaves to grow

one apple, chlorophyll helps leaves to be green, and

leaves have red, yellow and orange pigment. In science

we have been studying the different characteristics of

animals including: coverings, appendages, and how they

move (fly, swim, walk). We got to see real coverings of

animals, such as a deer hide, bird hackles, and bug exo-

skeletons.

Our focus for math this month has been on ordinal

numbers, probability, and graphing. Students have been

working hard to have meaningful math discussions about

these topics. We have been working on summarizing events

and connecting our reading to our previous experiences

while reading Ivy and Bean. We are so excited that our

caterpillars finally arrived! Students will get to experience

part of our science curriculum as they watch the caterpillars

go through their life cycle and become beautiful Monarch

Butterflies. Our goal for this year is that our students en-

gage in and take charge of their own learning. We are eager

to watch all of our students grow this year!

4th grade has been busy this month! In Virginia

Studies, students learned about the 5 regions of Virginia

and created salt dough maps to review their learning. In

math, we learned about least common multiples and

greatest common factors, and we are now starting our

graphing unit. While reading Blood On the River, we

focused on main idea and details, and predictions. Our

students are loving the cliff hangers at the end of every

chapter! Students learned several prefixes and suffixes this

month, as well as how they change the meaning of

words. As we look forward to October, we are SO excited

to take our first field trip of the year to Jamestown and

Williamsburg.

Our 5th graders have been showing determina-

tion and perseverance this past month! They have made

being a good classroom citizen seem like a piece of cake!

They have been working diligently each week to earn Fun

Friday activities, as well as Free Seating Fridays in the

cafeteria.

Students are delving into our fictional novel,

Walk Two Moons. Our focus standards while reading this

text are using context, inferences, author’s choice of

vocabulary, point of view, plot, and theme.

Students have exhibited their creativity during

math and science. They created their own mnemonic

device to help them remember the order of operations, and

in science they constructed models of flowers while learn-

ing about plant structures and functions. Students will

continue moving through the curriculum as they learn and

apply the concept of probability and begin exploring

animal adaptations.

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FAMIS must be renewed every 12 months.

The Nurse’s Corner

October 3&4 Frontier Culture Museum

Nonfiction Night (at the

Museum) 5:00-7:00 pm

October 5 2 Hour Early Release

October 5 5th Grade Field Trip to

Grand Caverns

October 8 No School

October 9 PAT Meeting 6-7pm

October 10-15 Book Fair

October 11 3rd Grade Spaghetti Supper

Fundraiser 5:30-7:00 pm

October 11 Family Night for Book Fair

6:00-7:30 pm

October 11-12 School Pictures

October 13 P.A.T. Trunk or Treat

5:00-7:00 pm

October 16 Report Cards

October 16 2nd Grade Field Trip to Back

Home on the Farm

October 25 1st and 2nd Grade Musical

6:30-7:30

October 26 4th Grade Field Trip to

Jamestown

October 26 Kindergarten Field Trip to

Back Home on the Farm

Bessie Weller Elementary School, 600 Greenville Avenue, Staunton, VA 24401 Phone: 540-332-3940 Fax: 540-332-3959

Be Respectful

Be Responsible

Be Safe

Be A Life Long Learner

Students from Mrs. Hoy’s class releasing their

butterfly that they got as a caterpillar.