THEATER ARTS Will Todisco & Angela Harris

In 5th grade Theater we are performing Reader's Theater for our classes.  Everyone has the same script, a selection from this trimester's ELA book, Esperanza Rising.  The groups of students started by utilizing each other as resources to assist in defining the academic English words and working on Spanish pronunciations as they rehearsed their lines.  Reader's Theater is focused on using facial expressions, tone of voice, and pronunciation while reading from a script in a group.  Next we will start covering actor's positions and areas of the stage by using math to assist in plotting a stage floor plan. 6th graders have already completed much classwork from creating an original realistic fictional character outline to inventing their own astrological myth.  This week the classes discussed the importance of theme and mood in a work of art and are working on their own original A/B dialogue scenes.  The goal is to encourage the students to continue on their scene work and furthermore work collaboratively towards creating original one-act plays that the class could work towards creating an outline of a production team's artistic vision.

ESY (Kitchen & Gardening) Mimi Bonetti & Nickey Bennett-Reed
 
There's been some exciting stuff happening in ESY lately.
In Gardening we moved and replanted raised beds, remodeled our Worm Shack (they are much happier now), learned about the migration of Monarch butterflies and began the construction of our natural wildlife habitat by sowing butterfly friendly wildflower seeds.
 
It’s been a busy trimester in the Kitchen Classroom too.  You can see some of the fruits of our labor at the upcoming Harvest Festival. We will be selling a cookbook including salad dressing recipes from our students which they turned in for our assignment, How To Write A Recipe. We are also selling pickled items we are making during our next unit on preserving.  You can also see samples of our Recipe Project at the Winter Breakfast on December 13th here at Selma, as well as sample Winter Squash Waffles made by our students for you.
 
Thanks to all of the parents who have donated cans of pumpkin as well as the parents who have helped kick-off our campus beautification! Don't forget to support the ESY program by getting your tickets to the Harvest Festival that's on Dec 9th at the Fairfax Campus!!!
 
Have a wonderful Thanksgiving break!