May/June 2016

LETTER FROM ADMINISTRATION

A M H E R S T M I D D L E S C H O O L

In the Middle

Inside this issue:

Dates to Remember 2

Nurse’s Station 3-4

AMS Library 6-7

Project Safeguard 8

Reminders 9

SBAC Testing 10

Grade 5 11

Grade 7 12

Grade 8 13

Student Leadership 14

Remembering Josh 15

It is hard to believe that summer is just around the corner. It seems like only days

ago that we were welcoming students back and that the hallways and classrooms were

transformed from their quiet summer state to one bustling with activity. Our students truly

bring our school to life and as we near the end of the year, there is much to reflect on and

celebrate. From concerts, the launching of our Innovation and Design Lab, new extracur-

ricular, Oxfam Hunger Banquet, building jitterbugs, the epic poetry of ancient civiliza-

tions, to open art studios, guest speakers, DARE graduations, National Junior Honor Soci-

ety, community service projects, successful sports seasons, mock trial and so much more,

the AMS community has truly had a year to be proud of. As we prepare to help students

transition to the next leg of their journeys we hope that your students are as proud of them-

selves and all they have accomplished as we are of them.

At this time of transitions, many familiar faces in our learning community are

also preparing for the next chapter in their journey. It is with much gratitude that we cele-

brate the rich legacies of Pam Gross, Chris Brunelle, Beth Chestnutt, Michelle Emmond,

Tom Knapp, Sue McKenney, Donna Reddington, and Deb Tumas as they retire at the end

of this school year. There will be many new faces to introduce you to this fall as we wel-

come new additions to our learning community along with your students. One we would

like to introduce now, is Dr. Lisa Femia-Hou who will be joining the AMS administrative

team as the Dean of Students. You may have had the opportunity to meet Dr. Femia-Hou

in various roles she has held within the district over the past several years. We are excited

to welcome her to AMS!

While there are only a few lingering weeks of school remaining, please continue

to check our school website for a wide range of activities and events happening in and

around the school. We wish you and your students a safe and wonderful summer full of

the kind of spontaneous learning that saturates those long sun filled days.

We look forward to welcoming our returning students and the class of 2024 in September!

Porter Dodge, Principal

Bethany Bernasconi, Assistant Principal

Pam Gross, Assistant Principal

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PLEASE CHECK THE WEBSITE REGULARLY FOR

INFORMATION AND UPDATES

www.sau39.org/ams

DATES TO REMEMBER

May 27 Band—Memorial Day Parade, Amherst Village

Grade 6 presentation—Our Revolution

May 30 No School—Memorial Day

May 31-June 3 Grade 8 SBAC Testing

May 31 Talent Show Tech Rehearsal—Cafeteria—2:30-4:30

June 1 Grade 8—presentation—SHS Theatre—1pm

Talent Show Tech Rehearsal 2:30-4:30

June 2 8th Grade Celebration at Jasper Valley (parent sponsored event)/rain date 6/6

June 3 Grades 6&7—I Never Saw another Butterfly presentation—SHS Theatre 9:45am

June 6 Grade 7—Field Trip—Fenway Park

June 7 Late Start

Grade 6 Greek Mythology Plays—Cafeteria—1-2pm

Baseball/Softball Banquet—6:30pm

June 8 Grade 5– Field Trip—Canobie Lake/ rain date 6/9

Grade 6 Greek Plays—Cafeteria—9-11am

Grade 6 BBQ/ rain date 6/9

Track & Field Banquet—6:30pm

June 9 Grade 8—Step-up to SHS—12:30-1:30

June 13 8th Grade awards & graduation practice—8:30am

8th Grade Graduation—6:00pm /8th Grade Dance immediately following until 9pm

June 14 Last Day of Classes—Enjoy your summer!

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M a y / J u n e 2 0 1 6 P a g e 3

Friday, May 27—Change in morning Traffic Pattern

Memorial Day Observation: We will be honoring our fallen service men and women on Friday

morning, May 27.

At approximately 7:25am we will be re-routing morning drop-off through the staff parking lot.

We invite all veterans to join our ceremony by the flagpole in front of the building

which will begin at approximately 7:30am.

Notice from the AMS Food Service

Many children are still coming to school unprepared for lunch.

From now through the end of the year - if your child has a negative balance or insufficient

funds, they will be offered a sun butter meal which consists of a sun butter & jelly sandwich, a

fruit, a vegetable & a milk in lieu of the menu offering.

Please email or phone the Kitchen Manager about any special circumstances.

We kindly ask that you keep your child’s account current. Any money left in their account at the

end of the year will carry to the next school year and between schools. Balances may be viewed

online through the district website, www.sprise.com and using the Food Service and MySchool-

Bucks links. Payments may also be made on this site but is not required to view balances.

Balances may also be obtained by contacting Janice Bock, the AMS Food Service Manager.

If you have any questions please contact Janice Bock at 673-8944 ext. 7080 or at

jbock@sprise.com. Thank you in advance for your cooperation.

Last Day of School, June 14

The last day of school for all students, Tuesday, June 14, is a full school day with our regular

2:19pm dismissal time. As we did last year, rising 5th-8th grade students will “step up” to

their new grade and meet all the grade-level teachers and staff. Team/homeroom place-

ments will be made available to parents and students in mid-August.

P a g e 4 M a y / J u n e 1 6

Nurse’s statioN

It’s summer vacation time again, and a good time to make doctor appointments for physicals and updates

on immunizations. Please e-mail us at ssarraf@sprise.com or abenoit@sprise.com for any health

related questions or concerns you may have regarding your child’s return to school in the fall.

Please bring up-dated immunization records on the first day of school.

If your child has an epi-pen or inhaler, please obtain a new physician order for the 2016-

2017 school year. 6th grade and 8th grade students attending environmental schools must

have orders in place before they leave for camp and orders should state “permission to carry”.

Please make sure to pick up any medication that your son/daughter may have in the

nurse’s office before the end of the school year.

It has been a pleasure caring for your children. Have a safe and healthy summer.

Susan Sarraf RN

Anne Benoit RN

We would like to thank the PTA for the beautiful floral arrangement we

received from them in honor of School Nurse’s Day. Your thoughtfulness

and generosity are greatly appreciated.

P a g e 5 M a y / J u n e 1 6

Our spring Scholastic Book Fair was a huge success. Because of your support and generous purchasing, we now

have $2,700 available to spend on Scholastic books and re-sources. Look for all the new items when we return from

summer break in August.

The winner of the NH Great Stone Face Award has been announced. This reading award program for NH grade

4-6 students is designed to introduce books that have just been published, in the previous year. Twenty titles are

nominated and students then vote for their favorite. We purchased two copies of each title and 142 students voted for their favorite. The favorite book at AMS was the

Luck Uglies by Paul Durham, a NH author. Many of our students were very fortunate

to be able to meet this author and hear him speak, when he visited the Amherst Town Library. The State NH Great Stone Face Award Winner was El Deafo by Cece Bell, a

graphic novel about being deaf and having to wear a clumsy, comical, antiquated hear-ing device. Try to encourage your student to read this great book, about being sensi-

tive to others with disabilities. Or, ask them to tell you about it, if they have already read it. We had five fifth grade students who read an exceptional number of nomi-

nees. These students read between six and ten of the twenty nominees: Nikki Liu,

Norah Clancy, Dante Nieto, Katie Gruss and Jordyn Walker. BRAVO to these terrific

readers! For information about next year’s NH Great Stone Face Award please go to:

http://chilis.nhlibrarians.org/files/2016/05/GSF-brochure-2016-17-edited.pdf

On May 12 and 13 I was very fortunate to be able to attend the annual NH

School Library Media Association conference. This year the President of the national

organization, Leslie Preddy, as well as two other nationally recognized school librari-ans, Gwyneth Jones (The Daring Librarian) and Tiffany Whitehead (The Mighty Little

Librarian) were the keynote speakers. This was the best conference I have attended in all my years as a librarian. I commend the organizing committee and am grateful to

have had the opportunity to attend. I learned about hundreds of additional digital re-sources and new ideas and methods that I can make available to our students and net-

worked with many other local and national school librarians. I even won a raffle and

brought home a wind energy kit, that I will pass on to Mr. Opre in the Innovation & De-

sign Lab.

AMS LIBRARY

Continued, Page 6

P a g e 6 M a y / J u n e 1 6

We are looking forward to meeting our new grade seven Mont Vernon stu-dents. They come to visit AMS on Friday May 27. They will be coming FIRST to the

library, so we can show them how much fun we have here!

Does your student have an Amherst Town Library card? If not there is a link

on our AMS Library HOME page to help you get one ASAP. Look under LOCAL BOOK

SOURCES and follow the instructions. Then your child can READ ALL SUMMER and

avoid the dreaded “fall reading comprehension slide,” that happens to those who do

not keep up with their reading skills. The public library has a special statewide Teen

Read Program, as well as downloadable e-books

and audio books for your phone, DVDs, CDs, audio

books on CD, museum passes and many special

summer teen events.

Mrs. Sharon Phelan

AMS Librarian

AMS LIBRARY (continued from page 5)

P a g e 9 M a y / J u n e 1 6

Reminders

8th Grade Events

May 26: 8th Grade Chorus

May 27: 8th Grade Chorus visits Clark-Wilkins

May 31-June 3: SBAC Testing

June 2: 4-8pm Parent-sponsored 8th

Grade Celebration, 4-8pm at Jasper Valley The parent sponsored 8

th grade graduation party will be held at Jasper Valley on June 2 from

4-8pm (rain date of June 6). June 9

th: 8

th Grade “step up” at SHS (after noontime, 12:30-1:15pm)

June 13: 8

th Grade Graduation

In the morning, 8th grade will have graduation rehearsal and awards (parents are wel-come, time 8:30am)

The graduation ceremony begins at 6pm; students should be in their seats by 5:45pm The ceremony will be held on the lawn behind the school if the weather permits; in this

case, there will be no limit on the number of guests each student may bring In the event that the weather does not cooperate, we will hold the ceremony in the gym.

We ask that no more than two guests attend per student. We will NOT issue tickets, we simply ask that all comply with this limit. We will send an email and post the location of graduation on our website as soon as possible during the day of graduation if the weather is at all questionable.

DRESS: we ask that students dress in a manner which is appropriate for the occasion. In recent years, girls have worn dresses or skirts/blouses and boys have worn slacks or nice shorts with a collared shirt. We ask that the guidelines for dress outlined in the student handbook be used when selecting dress for the evening.

DANCE: The dance immediately follows the graduation ceremony in the AMS café until 9pm. This is a dance for our 8th grade students only. Students who do not attend the graduation ceremony will not be permitted to attend the dance.

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Fifth grade Humanities classes have been busy this spring learning

about the events that lead to the American Revolution. Students have been

immersed in Patriot versus Loyalist activities, writing a Revolutionary

newspaper, learning about the different perspectives of those involved in

the conflicts, and reading and writing about famous women in history.

In Language arts, students have been reading lots of short stories

and novels in addition to their free choice books. Teachers have been amazed by the sheer volume

of reading students are doing this year! Students have also studied Greek and Latin word parts,

how to write using dialogue, and practiced the fine art of revision!

M a y / J u n e 1 6

Teachers have been thrilled with the progress students have made this

school year and wish all a happy and healthy summer filled with lots of

reading and writing!

P a g e 1 2 M a y / J u n e 1 6

Seventh Grade Science is having a Blast!

Seventh Grade science had a fantastic turnout for their annual (Global Science Initiative) GSI Expo on April 21st. This year was especially impressive because it was the culmination of a joint project involving all curriculum areas. The humanities part of the project required the stu-dents to research about a global issue facing the world today and then choose an area of interest within that topic to research further including agencies and organizations supporting their chosen problem. They then pursued that interest further by designing a possible solution to that problem using the engineering design model or testing a hypothesis through experimentation using the scientific method. The connection between global problems and local solutions led our students to a deeper understanding of the global issues they are a part of. We are finishing the year with an in-depth study of the planets, stars, galaxies, rockets and a bit of astrophysics! We will launch our soda bottle rockets towards the end of the

school year as we blast off to summer vacation.

During the final stretches of the year in social studies students have been working

hard! We closed out our World at War Unit, we studied governments through European history:

WWI, WWII, and the Cold War, by capitalizing on student interests! Students created and deliv-

ered their World at War presentations to 50 classmates! They were poised and eloquent in their

findings and delivery. Students either had the opportunity to learn more deeply about

an aspect of history that interested them or became historical lawyers creating a claim

and proving their claim using history. Students were fully vested in the two weeks of

research and development process the humanities provided in school.

Upon returning from April vacation, we have only six weeks remaining with these in-

credible children. We began this unit as we started all our previous units – with a large map. Af-

ter all, it’s hard to know where you’re going, unless you understand where you have been. Stu-

dents have embraced our Coexist unit where we are exploring the continent of Asia through the

lens of religion. Students are learning the fundamental basics behind the six most widely fol-

lowed faiths in the world: Christianity, Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, and Sihkism. Stu-

dents will be asked to draw comparisons and also find the differences between these faiths. The

unit will end with an interactive collaboration between language arts and social studies. We have

been tirelessly working to create stimulating, hands-on cultural exploration stations across Asia.

Thank you for sharing your wonderful children with us this year – it’s hard to believe the

end is so near! This has been a wonderful teaching experience because of the children we were

afforded the opportunity to teach this year. Enjoy the summer!

P a g e 1 3 M a y / J u n e 1 6

Shakespeare cometh to Amherst in May!

Eighth graders are stretching their minds, delving into the world of Elizabethan drama and po-etry. Students are tackling challenging syntax with zeal as they read A Midsummer Night’s Dream. They have explored the world of richly developed characters and their struggles, untangling complex plot lines, all while trying their hands at acting in our English Language Arts classrooms. Shakespeare’s trickster Puck shares his conclusion to Oberon and the audience, “Lord, what fools these mortals be!” Puck might have drawn a different conclusion had he seen our students challenge

themselves as readers and share insights into human nature.

Throughout their study of Shakespeare, students are closely examining and analyzing charac-ter development, illustrating and storyboarding the plot twists, and explaining the comedy’s dia-logue. Their work culminates in a variety of activities including a performance assessment, and will hopefully result in a lifelong appreciation and understanding for the author whose work con-

tinues to be read 400 years after his death.

Throughout the year, students have explored complex pieces of literature by authors such as Charles Dickens, Harper Lee, Truman Capote, among others. They have examined language in pieces of writing and have challenged themselves to grow as writers. Through students’ ongoing discussion of universal themes in classic pieces of literature, students strengthen their under-standing of human nature. They see how reading and writing connect to their lives in meaning-

ful ways.

Continuing to emphasize the importance of being readers, we will introduce Souhegan’s summer reading program at the end of this month. Discussion of the book choic-es for summer reading will help strengthen students’ transition to high school as well as increase enthusiasm about reading. By the beginning of June we hope to

have all 8th graders registered with their summer reading selection.

8th grade science classes, students were involved in a ‘crash course’ in forces and mo-

tion. During this hands-on inquiry activity, students applied what they learned about Newton’s

three laws of motion to traffic accident investigations. Variables that students chose to explore

included the mass of the cars, the road surface and the incline of the road. Students demonstrated

great problem-solving abilities in this performance task.

The Summer Success Program is a great way to

reinforce skills and gain new ones!

The Summer Success Program is open to all Amherst/Mont Vernon students entering grades 5 - 9

(September ’16).

Registration Deadline: Wednesday, June 1st, 2016

Maximum course enrollment is limited to 8 students. Payment must be received in order to hold spot in

course. Please make checks out to: Amherst Middle School for $30 per course.

Drop off registration form and payment to the AMS Office or Mail to:

Summer Success Program

c/o Amherst Middle School

PO Box 966

Amherst, NH 03031

For information about any of these programs or scheduling,

please contact Tiffany Maher at tmaher@sprise.com

Dates and Times

July 12th – July 28th Classes held Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday

Session One - 8:30–10 a.m. Session Two - 10–11:30 a.m.

What will be offered?

~ Math Workshop An individual plan will be developed for each student based on his or her strengths and weaknesses.

Session One - 5th/6th/7th Grade

Session One - 8th and 9th Grade

~ Reading Workshop

Through novel reading, students will be exposed to reading comprehension, journaling, vocabulary

and word study, and sentence structure.

Session Two - 5th/6th/7th Grade

Session Two - 8th and 9th Grade

~Writer’s Workshop I & II What obstacles do you face as a writer? Do you have trouble getting started? Do you feel that you need to work on adding voice or description to your writing? This individualized program is designed to help students better understand and apply the writing traits, and will provide strat-egies to help them develop the confidence they need to improve their writing skills. Students may attend either

Session One or Session Two

SUMMER SUCCESS REGISTRATION

Student’s Name _______________________________________________________

Grade Entering in Fall of ’16 ________________________

Address ______________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________

Parent/Guardian

_____________________________________________________________________

Phone Number

_____________________________________________________________________

Email address

_____________________________________________________________________

CHECK ALL THAT APPLY

_________ Reading (5th/6th/7th)

_________ Math (5th/6th/7th)

_________ Reading (8TH/9TH)

_________ Math (7th/8TH/9TH)

_________ Writer’s Workshop I

_________ Writer’s Workshop II