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GRACE ART IN THE SCHOOL GRACE Art in the School will take place on Friday February 24, 2012 @ 3:45-5:00. This amazing program is FREE to all Fairview students. Students will learn about artist/architect Frank Lloyd Wright and will then create their own masterpiece representative of the artist. This program was a huge success at Clifton Elementary School and the PTA is excited to offer it to Fairview Students. The program is run by parent volunteer docents. Please consider volunteering for this worthwhile venture. No art background or Creative skills necessary. LEARNING GARDENS SIGN PROJECT Know a good Metal Fabricator?? The Learning Gardens Committee is trying to locate a metal fabricator to create a sign for the entrance to the Learning Gardens. If you or someone you know is knowledgeable in this area, please contact Stacey Peters (staceypeters@verizon.net or 703-250-6902). GOT COMPUTERS? Fairview ES seeks corporate sponsor of 32 desktop computers to replace the 32 existing 10-year old computers in the computer lab that are failing. Please contact Kevin Dahlke, Technology Support Specialist at kkdahlke@fcps.edu. Great opportunity to help a local school provide better learning tools and be recognized in the community. LEARNING GARDENS Attention all Green Thumbs & Handy People! We need your help! We are currently in the process of developing Learning Gardens for our students. The families from Clifton ES had a dedicated team of parents, teachers & volunteers who built some incredible gardens in the courtyard of their school. Each garden is tied to a specific grade level curriculum & maintained by the students in that grade from year to year. For example, 4th grade students have a colonial garden to correspond to their colonial Virginia studies. They grow plants that are native to Virginia & which colonists used for food & medicine. The 2nd graders have a butterfly garden that they plant to relate to their studies of the lifecycle of butterflies & which gives them a place to release the butterflies into the environment. Our kindergarten students have traditionally grown seeds & then transplant their flowers into the existing bed in front of our school each spring. These flowers are often donated to a local Senior Center. Planning, planting, maintaining & harvesting from the gardens teaches the students a wide variety of skills in areas such as science, social studies, health & math & also gives them a real connection to the world outside. Landscaping with curriculum-linked native plants & habitat-friendly gardens is a portal for understanding concepts & issues in environmental education & healthy living both at home & at school. The Clifton gardens have been split up between the schools that their students are now attending. Fairview is one of those schools & we are thrilled to have both their students & their gardens at our school. We are planning to transplant the gardens this fall now that the heat of summer has passed. We are using the site of the current Kindergarten garden to expand & evolve our Learning Garden project. We will have 4th grade, 2nd grade, Kindergarten & a sensory garden to start, with plenty of room to expand.
Now that we have our plans, this is where we’ll need the most assistance! Anyone with knowledge of landscaping or gardening or an interest in the idea is welcome & encouraged to help. If you have a rototiller we could borrow; lumber & hardware for building raised planting beds that you could donate; or the time, energy & knowledge to help us build; we would love to talk to you. In the next few weeks before the first frost hits, we’ll need to prepare our beds, dig up & transplant plants from Clifton, & make the new Learning Gardens look great. We’ll also be looking for Grade Level Coordinators to assist the teachers with getting the kids out into the gardens over the course of the school year. If you have already signed up to help, we’ll be in contact with you this week. Please contact Diane Creasey at dicreasey@verizon.net or Stacey Peters at staceypeters@verizon.net if you’d like to be involved.
FINAL FRIDAYS
In an effort to find rightful owners for our lost and found items, and to keep the bin from overflowing, we make the final Friday of every month “Final Friday." The lost and found contents will be on display on tables in the lower hallway beginning in the late afternoon on Thursday until Friday afternoon. Anything left at the end of the day will be cleared out and donated to charity. Thanks for your help in getting belongings back to their rightful owners, and for keeping our bin manageable. Next date is February 24th. |
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