No TV Week 2019: Spuds in Space!

May 20th to the 26th was "No Time for TV Week" at Ashaway School!  (Although I realize we really should start calling it "Screen-Free Week".  A lot has changed since I started doing this program twenty years ago!) 

The rules were the same as always: students were challenged to pay attention to which activities they were choosing for their free time.  They earned points for non-screen activities, and they earned bonus points for each full day with no screen time at all.  Students who earned at least 100 points get a prize, and those who earned at least 100 points and had no screen time for the entire week get two prizes! 

This year, just for fun, I encouraged the students to exercise their creativity by decorating a potato to look like an alien, or anything else space related! (This extends our Reading Week theme "A Universe of Stories" while also urging students not to be “couch potatoes”!)

Students brought in their creations all week to be displayed in the library, and we all loved admiring their creativity!  We got lots of cool aliens, some rockets, a couple UFOs, an astronaut, and an asterism!!  (Click on the word if you need the definition; I didn't know that one until my student taught it to me!)

Neil Spudstrong!

UFP : Unidentified Flying Potato!

Since "A Universe of Stories" is also going to be the summer reading theme at the public libraries this summer, I asked Miss Heather at the Ashaway Free Library if she'd be interested in co-hosting a potato-decorating workshop.  She enthusiastically agreed, and on the evening of May 21st many children gathered in the library's new community room for "Potato-palooza!"  We had a blast, and I transported (not teleported!) the kids' incredible creations to our school library for everyone to admire.

Big thanks to Miss Heather and Miss Cheryl for co-hosting this fun event with me!

All this week students have been bringing back their papers to show how many points they earned by exercising their minds and bodies, and there are a LOT of them!  I'll be handing out the prizes next week for those who earned at least 100 points, but today I got to announce the 10 winners of the $10 gift certificates to the Savoy bookstore in Westerly!  While the deadline has passed for being included in the drawing, I will continue to accept participation forms from those who earned at least 100 points.  These students will be allowed to select something special from the library "prize basket" next week!
  

Congratulations to our ten lucky gift certificate winners!

Thanks to all the families who participated and supported their children during the week!  I am also grateful for the sponsorship of our wonderful Ashaway School PTO, who provides the funds for the gift certificates and "basket prizes"!  
 

We're a Bunch of Happy Campers!

Once again Ashaway School enjoyed a very successful and fun Reading Week!  Every day was special as we celebrated books and reading with a camping theme!






Thanks to our fabulous PTO the week was kicked off by a "Books and Breakfast" event.  Students were invited along with their families to come to school a little early to enjoy a free breakfast and book fair preview.  Teachers were also welcome to join in on the fun, have something yummy to eat, and select books for a classroom "wish list".  

Here are just a few pictures from this fabulous week.  (You can see a LOT more by visiting our school photo gallery!)  Enjoy!

As always, Mrs. Bartkiewicz filled the hallway with balloons to welcome the students as they entered the building!

The bulletin board outside our library!

Students "warm their hands" by our library campfire!  ;)

Students in grades K-2 enjoyed a QR Code Listening Center.  They had six camping-themed books to choose from!

Students in all grades were invited to make their own "Camp Out with a Good Book" book mark!  (Thanks, Miss Zemske!)

On Monday the wonderful Tommy James amazed us all with his reading themed magic show!

Tuesday was a perfect day to set up outside for our Family Read-In!

Wednesday night's Book Fair and Ice Cream Social was a huge hit!

On Thursday students and staff were encouraged to dress as "Happy Campers".  Mr. Scanapieco welcomed everyone to morning meeting with a lot of spirit!

 My sincerest thanks to everyone who contributed to making Reading Week an enormous success!

 

Rooster Games 2016!

Team Red matching book titles with their characters

On Monday our fourth graders participated in the 8th Annual Ashaway School Rooster Games!  All of the students who read at least five of the books on the list of nominees for the Rhode Island Children's Book Award were invited to participate.  The five teams (each a mix of boys and girls from both fourth grade classrooms) competed in a variety of games that were based on books from the list.

I had three students who earned special recognition by reading all 15 of the RICBA nominees that I bought for Ashaway School.  I started off the games by awarding Champion Reader medals to these students!

Two of the games are set up on PowerPoint and the students use marker boards to display their answers. Students match pictures from each book to their titles in the Illustration Round, and they answer multiple choice and short answer questions in the Question Round.  Two other games involve matching the titles to characters and matching objects to the books they represent.  

Team Yellow earning a point during the Question Round

Team Green earning a point during the Illustration Round

"Boards up!"

Team Blue shows a pair of matching object cards

Team White working together during the Object Round

This year I introduced reading relays, and the kids loved them!  I based the first on a game that was featured on the show "Minute to Win It" in which students held an uncooked strand of spaghetti in their mouths and used them to pick up pieces of ziti without using their hands.  I called the game Sharks and Seals after the RICBA book Neighborhood Sharks.  The team earned one point for every seal captured by each shark!

I called the second reading relay the Homophone Hustle.  In the story Rain Reign, main character Rose has an obsession for homophones (words that sound the same but are spelled differently and have different meanings).  In this game, the students raced to match their homophone cards with the corresponding words on the other side of the gym.  It was fast-paced fun!

Making a match!

Rushing back to the starting line so a teammate can go!

With six teams competing at once, there was a LOT of action!

This year's winner was Team Orange, but there's no prize for winning the Rooster Games.  At the end of the day all of the students who qualified to participate in the games gets to enjoy a pizza party sponsored by our P.T.O., so they truly are all winners!

Team Orange: Winners of the 2016 Rooster Games!

     

It was a really fun event, and it couldn't have happened without the support of our fourth grade teachers, our parent volunteers, and our Ashaway School P.T.O.  My sincerest thanks go out to them all! 

I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream for...

ICE CREAM! 
(And books, of course. LOTS and LOTS of BOOKS!!!)

Thursday night was Ashaway School's annual Book Fair and Ice Cream Social.  Once again our PTO put together a fabulous evening of fun and fund raising!  Lots of families stopped by to enjoy a FREE ice cream sundae, design a book mark, do some coloring, and shop for new books.  Some of the money brought in from the book fair will be donated to the library to buy books for all of the Ashaway students to enjoy.  YAY!!

These kids really got into the theme of a "Monster Book Fair"!

This 4th grader found some "Rooster books"!

Check out this cool "monster" book mark!!

Adding to the Monster Mural Masterpiece!

So many awesome books to explore!

Aww!  A moment sweeter than ice cream!

Family fun!

Ashaway School staff members were on hand to do the scooping and dole out the toppings!

The ice cream came from Mel's Downtown Creamery in Pawcatuck.  They donated one tub of ice cream and provided two additional tubs at a discount.  Thank you!!! 

To see more pictures from this event,  

click here to view the Ashaway School online photo album! 

 

A Wonderful Kind of Wishing!

Today all of our students had the opportunity to browse the offerings at our Scholastic Book Fair and create a "wish list" of books they want.  Tomorrow students in kindergarten through second grade will be able to do some shopping, and on Wednesday the third and fourth grades will get a turn.  Parents can also stop in to shop on Tuesday and Wednesday from 9am-10am.

Then, on Thursday, the doors will be open 5:30pm-7:30pm for the Scholastic Book Fair and Ice Cream Social.  Families are welcome to come in for a FREE ice cream sundae and shop the book fair!

The Book Fair is also open online for purchases now thru Oct. 13th: http://bookfairs.scholastic.com/homepage/ashawayelementaryschool

A great, big, ENORMOUS "THANK YOU!!" to the PTO for making our Scholastic Book Fair happen!  The library receives money from this event to buy new books for our students to borrow.  It truly is a win-win!  

"And that one and this one and one of these and one of those and ..."