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Helping Gardens Grow

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FMS is getting ready to expand its garden area this year, thanks to the help of our wonderful staff, parents and students. We are planning to build new planter boxes (thanks to the gracious assistance of a few FMS fathers); fix the sprinklers; and start planting! One of our elementary teachers, Ms. April, is spearheading this exciting new development with the hopes of teaching the children more about nutrition, health and the natural environment. If you would like to get involved, please contact her at ap***@fo*****************.com. We really have some amazing, knowledgeable and proactive parents in our community and we can’t thank you enough.

This week, middle school students got involved by cleaning out the garden and researching best planting practices. On their classroom blog, E4 writes:

“Thank you to Middle school friends for researching and cleaning our garden! After finding out some facts about the plants in our courtyard boxes, they cleaned and cut back tomatoes, peppers, and sunflowers. Next, they provided us with a list of plant information. We are preparing to build more planters and add more sprinklers. Now we know we can always turn to our middle school students for knowledge and assistance! It was interesting to learn how to care for sunflowers and tomatoes. Here are some helpful hints:

  • We should use distilled or rain water for sunflowers because other types of water can be poisonous to the flower.
  • They need at least two feet of space to grow
  • They need to be watered every other day
  • If the flower is dead, cut the head off then uproot it
  • Tomatoes need deep soil so the plant’s roots can hold it upright
  • If you don’t prune tomatoes regularly, the plants will develop extra branches called suckers. Suckers take away energy from the plant.”

Stay tuned for more garden expansion updates!

Foothills Montessori School is a private Montessori school serving families in Henderson, Las Vegas and Southern Nevada.

Living the Writerly Life

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Let’s take a peek inside E5 this week, where students are learning about tectonic plates, metacognition, and living a writerly life:

“Our first week was amazing, and filled with some exciting community building activities! From post-it note competitions, to ‘Saving Fred!’, our students have started to build a solid foundation of working together to solve problems and using different strategies to brainstorm creative solutions. We are thrilled with our intelligent, kind and thoughtful class and can’t wait to see them thrive this year.

Our 6th years taught our First Great lesson this week, starting with the birth of our universe and spanning to the formation of planets. Concepts such as the Big Bang theory, centrifugal force, gravity and tectonic plates were covered. We are so proud of our 6th years hard work and preparation.

Elder Mary assisted in teaching the first great reading lesson on Metacogniton. We modeled the importance of thinking while we read, truly enjoying our literature!  As the year continues we will touch upon more great lessons in both Cultural and Reading. We have also launched our Writers Workshop. During our ‘Sacred Writing Time’, the children have been exploring various collection strategies. These strategies will help them when they feel like they feel like they have writers block. Ask your child today about any ‘seeds’ they may have written in their notebooks.  Often time conversations about their writing in school will help them remember a great story for their notebooks. We encourage the children to live a writerly life, observing, taking notice of the small things, and pausing to capture a seed and record it in their notebooks.

We will keep you posted on the happenings of our E5 community. Our blog is a great place to see reminders of important dates and events that are coming. Thank you all for your continued support at home!”

–E5 Teachers

Visit the E5 Blog for pictures (FMS Parents only)

Foothills Montessori School is a private Montessori school serving families in Henderson, Las Vegas and Southern Nevada.