2 0 1 6 - 1 7 S C H O O L Y E A R

I S S U E N O . 7

Together Achieving Educa onal Success

It is the policy of the Tyrone Area School District not to discriminate on the basis of sex, handicap, race and na onal origin in its educa onal and voca onal programs, ac vi es, or employment as required by Title IX, Sec on 504, and Title VI. Please direct ques ons about tnot to discriminate on the basis of sex, handicap, race and na onal origin in its educa onal and voca onal programs, ac vi es, or employment as required by

Title IX, Sec on 504, and Title VI. Please direct ques ons about this policy to Cathy Harlow, Superintendent of Schools, at 814.684.0710 Ext. 4123.

TYRONE HIGH SCHOOL MAIN OFFICE

04/03‐04/07 PSSAs: ELA 3rd & 4th Graders

04/05 Report Card Day

04/07 2nd Grade Jaffa Circus Field Trip

04/13 1st Grade Carnegie History Museum Field Trip

April 2017

04/14 Easter Vaca on: No School, Daycare Closed

04/17 Weather Make‐up: School In‐Session

04/24‐04/28 PSSAs: Math 3rd & 4th Graders

04/07 & 04/08

TAHS Music Department’s “Beauty and the Beast” Show me 7PM

04/16 Easter Sunday

"StuckonReading"Challenge

Preschoolthrough4thgraderecentlyparticipatedina5‐week“Stuckon

Reading”challengevotingtotapeourDeanofStudentstothewall.Congratulations—over250childrenparticipated,readingover80,000combinedminutesand

earning6,000inchesoftape!

Suppor ng Student Success on Assessments —by Lisa Hartsock, TAES Principal During this month, the PSSA will be administered to our third and fourth grade students. The exact tes ng dates are: April 3 – 6 PSSA ELA (3rd/4th) April 24 – 26 PSSA Math (3rd/4th) May 1 – 2 PSSA Science (4th only) We’ve been preparing students all year for the challenge they will face and now is a great me to address ways to make this experience less stressful and support them throughout the tes ng. Parents can help us by suppor ng your child physically and emo onally. Assist your child in preparing for tes ng by doing the following: Ensure your child gets a good night's sleep before a test. Ea ng a healthy breakfast is a great start each tes ng day. Maintain a pleasant home environment and avoid unnec‐

essary conflicts. Try to make the morning of the test a pleasant one. Do

not add to your child’s stress. Make sure your child has taken any needed medica on. Ensure that your child is present during tes ng (children

generally perform be er when taking tests in their groups rather than at a make‐up me).

Get your child to school on me the day of the test. Wish your child good luck each morning of the test. Tell

your child that he/she is special and that you believe in him/her!

Remind your child the test is important. Encourage him/her to do his/her best.

If your child is too ill to a end, please call the school office. Do enjoyable and relaxing things each evening a er

each tes ng day.

Meet Our Youngest Chemists —by Mrs. Smith

This month, Kindergarten had an exciting opportunity to explore some Chemistry with Dr. Joseph Houck, a professor from Penn State. During his visit we learned about chemical reactions. Dr. Houck showed us an ex-citing chemical reaction called “Elephant’s Toothpaste” which was really exciting. You can search it on YouTube to see it for yourself! He also gave some brave volunteers some cups of colored water to pour. When they poured the cups the first time, it went well. How-ever, when some of them tried to pour it again, it was stuck! Dr. Houck was sneaky and put the same chemi-cal that is found in diapers into the cups causing all of the liquid to be absorbed! To conclude his visit, each student participated in an experiment using Borax de-tergent to create slime. I think we may have some fu-ture Scientists here in Kindergarten!

Traveling to America --submitted by third grade PSU student teachers Miss Coreno, Miss Esposito and Miss Mallon

Third grade students at Tyrone Elementary School have been learning about immigration this month through research, simulations, videos and much more. Each class has been assigned a different country to focus their research on. All of their hard work culminated into a visual pro-ject showcased to family and friends during Family Fun Night. Be sure to ask your child what he/she has learned throughout this experience.

PM Daycare By Mrs. Cushion, Mrs. Snider and Ms. Liz For the month of March our daycare classes themes were birds, rep les, and amphibians. During the study of birds the children made a variety of bird cra s. They listened to a re‐cording of birds and tried to guess which bird made each sound. And, they had the opportunity to study a bird nest col‐lec on. Some were surprised by the variety of items the birds used to make their nests!

One game we played this month was Hungry, Hungry, Alli‐gators. Fortunately, we did not lose any fingers! In this game we walked around the swamp where there were three hungry alligators. We sang the alligator munch song as the class fed the alligators different colored frogs. A er the alligators were full, the children guessed which alligator ate the most. We counted together to see which one ate the most/least frogs.

One of our favorite stories was Li le Quack’s New Friend. This story reminded us that everyone is different, but we are all special. These photographs show the children with some of the cra s they made. We are very proud of their accomplishments.

Science Ignites the “Wow – Hmm - Aha!” in Second Grade

-from the Second Grade Teaching Team

Tyrone Elementary second grade students ventured out to the city of Pittsburgh recently for a trip to the Carnegie Science Center. The stu-dents experienced four floors of interactive exhibits as well as the con-stellations in the planetarium. Students quenched their curiosity as they united in the experience of sports with the laws of science at the Sports Works center, they put their knowledge of constellations to the test in the planetarium show, and experienced the inside of a submarine from WWII. Grace Zimmerman in Mrs. Elder’s class says that her favorite part of the trip was, “exploring the WWII submarine.” “It was so cool to see the inside of the submarine,” Grace stated, “I loved seeing all of the differ-ent rooms!” Taylor Wrye in Mr. Smeal’s class exclaims that she, “loved the planetar-ium show and Sports Works!” She added that her favorite part of the show was, “seeing the stars and different constellations.” She also ex-plained how she took on the challenge of the advanced side of the rock wall. It was a challenge, but she persevered! If you see a Tyrone second grader, be sure to inquire about their trip to the Carnegie Science Center!

Preschool Activities

in March 2017

—submi ed by: Ms. Becker

Throughout the month of March, our preschoolers have been very busy! We had special readers visit during our Dr. Seuss and Read Across America celebra on, leprechauns visit on St. Patrick’s Day, and families joined their kids at Marvelous Monday, and Family Fun Night!

My favorite ac vity was building traps to catch the leprechauns. Preschoolers love to be crea ve, invent, and test their ideas. STEM (which stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) Projects are a great way to build on their curiosity and inven ve nature. It allows students the chance to test their crea ons, make changes, and find a be er solu on. STEM is a great way for students to learn task persistence. They learn that failure is a part of learning and some mes we have to try something different or ask for help. I always remind my students that it’s okay if their inven on or idea doesn’t work. It helps our brains to grow when we are challenged to think of a different solu on. The students worked very hard to trap the leprechaun BUT those leprechauns are tricky! None of the students trapped him, but we had a lot of fun learning and inven ng along the way. And of course, the leprechaun le us some treasure! We hope you have fun inven ng and crea ng at your house too!

Exploring Art —by Mr. Fernandes, TAES Art Teacher

Elementary Art students at Tyrone use our classroom as a flying ship of the imagination, finding strange places and creatures that help us to learn about art. On our imaginary journey, kindergarten stu-dents encountered the ruins of a large, stone maze. We learned about architecture and about the different kinds of drawings architects use when designing structures. We also talked about heroes and creatures from ancient myths, like the story of the labyrinth (a huge maze). Each student created a small plan drawing of a piece of a labyrinth. Plan drawings are draw-ings done from above, like a floor plan. They chose to make a hallway, a corner, a three-way intersection, or a four-way intersection. They then added creatures creeping about in their passage. These creatures were challenging to draw, because they needed to be drawn from above. When everyone finished their labyrinth seg-ments, students worked in groups to fit their pieces together. Eventually, each class had cre-ated their own large labyrinth plan drawing. I

took all of these and combined them into one enor-mous laby-rinth plan drawing, which was displayed in the art room for all stu-dents to ap-preciate.

Be sure to check out our Elementary Art web-site for more pictures, project information, and resources. http://taesart.wikispaces.com/

First Grade Family Fun Night —by Mrs. Myers

On March 23rd, Tyrone Elementary first graders got to experience at Night at the Museum. In the LGI, several museum themed sta ons were set up for families to rotate between. Students had a chance to try dinosaur apps on iPads, use hieroglyphics to decode a secret message, explore how blubber keeps arc c animals warm, excavate chocolate chips from cookies, explore gems and minerals, experiment with different birds of prey mouths, as well as paint a sec on on a large T‐Rex. Then next month in April first graders will travel to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pi sburgh where they will see many of these sta ons in ac on. Along with the first grade museum, students had the opportunity to play BINGO for Books in the first ever all school family fun night.

Important Events in Fourth Grade

‐‐submi ed by Mr. Laubscher, PSU Student Teacher with Fourth Grade Teacher Mr. Koller

This month in fourth grade we studied the Civil Rights Movement, and constructed a

meline represen ng some of the most important events. Students worked in small groups to conduct research about the different events in the movement. They then came together and worked as a class to assemble the meline, which now hangs proudly in the hall. If you’re ever at the school come to the fourth grade hallway to take a look! Addi onally, a lucky charms thief hit Mrs. Getz’s class on St. Patrick’s Day. Students conducted interviews, worked through the alibis, and assembled evidence in order to catch the bandit. Through diligent work the students were able to solve the case, it had been Mrs. Driscoll all along. When reached for a comment about the case, Mrs. Driscoll was quoted as saying, “I just couldn’t control myself, they’re magically delicious!”

We’re Going on a Book Hunt! By: The Title One Reading Team

Spring is here and with it comes the holiday season . . . Easter! This Easter, try a few different ideas during your egg hunt fes vi es that will promote fun with reading! Once all of the choco-late goodies have been gathered, se le down back inside for a second egg hunt that will chal-lenge children to think outside the box when it comes to having fun while reading. Here are the steps to follow:

1. Cut out the provided sugges ons below, or make your own, and hide them inside some plas c Easter eggs.

2. Hide the eggs all over your house . . . they’ll never expect it! 3. Have fun collec ng the eggs! 4. Sit down with a favorite book and randomly open each egg to discover a new sugges on to

have fun while reading! 5. Enjoy the fun!!!

Read a page of your book back-wards!

Make up an alternate ending to your story

Act out the page you are read-ing with pillows!

Find three words on the page and scramble up the le ers, give it to someone and see if

they can guess the words!

Draw pictures of each event in the story, then give someone the pictures to see if they can

guess the story!

Use sock puppets to read aloud your story.

Draw a picture of your story and cut it up when you are fin-ished to create a puzzle of your

book!

Make a fort out of blankets to read your book in.

Give the characters in your book new names!

Keep a book next to you and read it during commercials.

Make popsicle puppet charac-ters to act out your book as you

read!

Draw faces on your fingers and use them to tell the story of

your book! Create a snack to eat with your book that you think the charac-

ters would like to eat.

Read the page you are on in an opera voice.

Record yourself reading a page of your book and listen to your-

self narrate!