TLC Community Potluck!

This Monday we invited our community to join us at school for a presentation about the Outer Islands TLC! Our fabulous TLC coordinator, Anne, was on the island so it was a great opportunity to take some time to fill in our community on all the amazing things we have been up to this year with our TLC classmates and teachers!

Our school board chair welcomed everyone and gave a little explanation of the TLC. It is so nice to have such support from our school board!

Then Anne and I gave an overview of the TLC mission and goals!

Then the exciting part... the kids got to present. Quinn talked about what an "average week" looks like to a TLC student!

Dalton went over the big highlights we have had so far this year in the TLC, such as field trips, holiday parties, and student council events!

Miss M. talked about her TLC book group and the TLC "color days."

These kids get trained in public speaking from quite a young age!

Quinn talked about some of the field trips we have taken with the TLC over the last two years.

And Dalton added some information about the technology we use within the TLC.

We ended talking about the future of the TLC and how we really want our community to be aware and involved in all the amazing projects and events our school is doing with the TLC!

Hydrosphere!

Our TLC pals on Islesford led us in a really wonderful lesson about the Hydrosphere in science class on Monday afternoon. The hydrosphere is the combined mass of all the water in, on, and around our planet! Let's just say that is A LOT of water!

The lesson began with Ms. Eysnogle reminding the students that 75% of the Earth is covered in water! She included a visual of if the Earth was four quarters... three of those quarter's would represent our water and only 1 quarter would be the actual land we have on Earth!

The students were then challenged to guess how much of the Earth's water is fresh water! They were reminded that fresh water was any water that was not salt water... which includes lakes, rivers, streams, ponds, and even puddles!

The kids revealed their guesses. Quinn was actually pretty stinkin' close! He knew that less than 5% of the Earth's water is actually fresh!

Ms. Eysnogle showed us that actually only 3% of all the Earth's water is fresh! She is so good at giving us visual representations to understand more clearly!

After our group discussion, two of the older students on Islesford shared with us a slide show they created to teach us even more about our hydrosphere!

More great visuals!

We then got into the concept of the water cycle.

Each school was then asked to created "tableaux" for each of the steps of the water cycle and then come back and share with the group. It cracked me up when everyone covered or turned their cameras so each school could create their tablos in secrecy!

The Islesford School lead the "Water Cycle Tableaux!" Super creative and fun!

You can see all of our water cycle tableaux here!

We ended our lesson with a discussion about why we think the water is so important and what the study of the hydrosphere has made us wonder about. We came up with a great list of questions! I am excited to learn even more about our hydrosphere and how the water cycle effects our life on a daily basis!

Thanks Islesford for an EXCELLENT lesson. You guys are wicked smarty pants.

Thanks Paul!

A special thanks to my dad, Paul, for building us a ramp for our robotics class this year! Dalton is entering the "climbing" competition at the robotics track meet in May and we needed our own ramp to test his robot out. It came out perfect! It is nice to have our own personal shop teacher at the Monhegan school!

The ramp in action! Pretty cool!!!

Rainbow Day!

Our last color-theme day for the TLC "youngers" was RAINBOW DAY!

It is obvious that I do not enjoy these color theme days, at all!

Margaret was looking rather spectacular in her colorful rainbow outfit!

Here is Cliff School looking quite lovely!

And I got a quick look at this little one from Islesford in her rainbow tutu!

Such cute little faces up on that screen!

This little one had rainbow hair, nails, AND makeup on!

Of course the dogs had to have their rainbow colors on too!

All I could find was tie-dye bandanas from kickball... but I think it worked!

My favorite rainbow dragon!

We shared pictures of what everyone was going to do over February break!

It was fun to have the kids share a little about what they like to do with their families!

Another great, fun share time!

QT turns 12!!

We had lots of celebrations at school the week before vacation... the next one on the list was Quinny's birthday!!!

Margaret made some super sweet cards for Quinn!

And my dad brought him a half-empty container of cashews!

Look at those awesome drawings by Margaret! So nice!

We had some celebratory cake at break time!

My parents seem to always know when to show up just at the right time!

Quinn in his new 12 year old hat!

Aw! A hug from his big brother!! What a birthday gift!

The kids with my parents and Bella!

And us just being us!

It was a great day for a great kid! Happy birthday QT!

Valentine's Cookies

I have to say, Valentine's Day is one of my favorite holidays. I like a day where it is encouraged to tell those around you how much you love them!

I have three little students who I love SO very, very much!

I also have lots of furry friends I love! Don't they look super cute in their Valentine's shirts!?

Aw, Millie LOVES her life!

When the kids got to school we worked on a special little project for our community members to tell them how much we love their support all year long... the project involved heart stickers... can you find one on Quinn?!

I love love.

For our Valentine's Day project we made our island famous sugar cookies and decorated them all pretty and sparkly and lovey-dovey! My parents stopped in to help with the decorating (and taste-testing) process!

Miss Margaret was on her way back from inshore while we were decorating so it was nice to have some extra hands to decorate the THREE batches of cookies we made!

Getting messy!

Can you tell that Quinn made this one!?

The "stacker cookie" introduced by Papa Campbell!

Yay! Margaret arrived!

Only a few more to go!

Thanks Sheila, for laying them all out so nicely!

Time for the traditional cookies test tasting... they are always allowed to decorate one cookie for themselves after they decorated all the cookies. Obviously Quinn overloads his with decorations and then can hardly fit it into his mouth!

Oh man, priceless!

Margaret is a little more dignified with her cookie eating!

And the traditional mess! But those cookies are worth it!

After lunch we packed up our cookies in little cups and baggies to go out and deliver to the community!

We added little notes, thanking everyone for "loving our school!" We were ready to deliver our Valentine's treats!

It was a gorgeous day to go door to door and deliver some sweet treats!

Margaret was excited to brighten everyone's day with cookies!

We dropped off some for Lisa who was working the election at the library! No one loves our sugar cookies more than Lisa!

Delivering some cookies to Stew and Gina!

It was kind of like backwards trick-or-treating! We were happy to be providing the treats!

We used the underhill trail to cut across to the Lobster Cove houses... we had almost completed our Valentine's mission!

Cookies for Donga and we got hugs in return!

We stopped at the post office to deliver to the post master!

And then found the final few community members on our walk back to school! It took as about an hour's time but we delivered all our cookies! What a fun way to show how much we love our community on such a lovely day!