School News

As part of their investigation into the rights and responsibilities of U.S. citizens, the 4/5 class at Vermont Day School created iMovies for students from Vermont Adult Learning. Many of the students are newly resettled in Vermont, traveling from countries in Africa, SE Asia, and the Middle East, and are eager to learn about their new country, and pass a citizenship test. The 4/5s researched through primary and secondary sources, learning stations, and webquests in order to become experts on the subject. Here they are presenting their iMovies to their parents, and teachers from Vermont Adult Learning.

This week, 6/7 mathematicians at Vermont Day School are immersed in the world of accounting and are playing Monopoly in order to simulate a series of financial transactions. After classifying different types of financial transactions into “current/ non-current assets” or “current/non-current liabilities”, they recorded all their Monopoly transactions into one of the four categories. Students did an excellent job at this simulation, and were diligent bookkeepers over the course of the game. Now that they have compiled their transactions, they will put all of the pieces together and create balance sheets using GoogleSheets. This has been an exciting look into the world of accounting and real-world math for our 6/7 class!

As part of an integrated unit on World Cultures and Biomes, the K/1 class is learning about the Yanomami culture of Brazil in Global Studies and the Rainforest habitat in STEM.  Pictured below are K/1 students teaching their schoolmates about the Yanomami culture during our weekly all school assembly.

Vermont Day School was excited to win the “Maker of the Year” award at this year’s Champlain Mini Maker Faire for our innovative “Great Zucchini Race “activity. Visitors to the activity were challenged to create an ergonomic vehicle out of a zucchini, using wheels, axles and other materials, ranging from pipe cleaners to cardboard and feathers to duct tape. The vegetable vehicles then raced down a 10 foot ramp.

During this year’s first all school assembly of the year, students continued our tradition of creating a time capsule for the school year. Each student added “all about me” information, as well as a string to represent their height at the start of the school year. We’ll look forward to finding the time capsule at the end of the school year and seeing our growth (both literally and figuratively!).

Thank you to all our amazing families for attending our Back to School Picnic and sharing such delicious food. A shout out to our Parent Committee as well for helping to organize this fun event. What a great way to kick off the school year!

Hello Families, Friends and Community Members! We are thrilled to start the 2018-2019 school year with 53 inquisitive, curious, creative and kind learners in grades K-7, and 13 experienced, passionate and hardworking faculty and staff members on our team. Please check back on occasion for updates about school happenings and events. Hats off to an exciting year of learning and growing ahead!

Students in grades 2-6 had a fantastic outdoor education experience at Hosmer Point in Craftsbury Commons. They had fun swimming, paddleboarding, mountain biking, learning archery, working in the garden and more. Of course, the evening campfire was a big highlight for all!

Thanks to all who attended our 3rd annual Spring Carnival event. Everyone enjoyed the creative carnival games, prizes, tasty treats, photo booth, and of course…. the chance to dunk a teacher!

For our Spring CLIC week, Vermont Day School students in grades K-6 learned about the concept of Fair Trade through a collaborative project with Lake Champlain Chocolates (LCC). After a tour of the company’s headquarters, the students were given the challenge to develop marketing and educational materials to help LCC teach others about Fair Trade. At the end of the week, Vermont Day School students returned to LCC to present their ideas. Working in teams, students came up with a variety of ideas, ranging from game boards to packing ideas, iMovies to wristbands and more. This was a great example of real world learning in action!

Inspired by Linda Sue Park’s book, A Long Walk To Water, the 5/6 class explored water issues around the globe. They each researched a contemporary water issue in Global Studies, and used the design thinking process in STEM to engineer a potential solution. Topics of study included: Water shortage in Capetown, water contamination in South Sudan, freezing water pipes in Eastern Kentucky, water contamination in Flint, Michigan and Cyanobacteria growth in Lake Champlain.

The 2/3 class has been busy learning about inventions and how they have changed over time. To demonstrate their learning, each student designed an art piece with a working circuit. Meanwhile……the 3/4 class has been immersed in the world of energy efficiency! Their multi-faceted project included the creation of iMovies and posters to inform others about the importance of energy efficiency, inventions to demonstrate innovative ways to generate renewable energy and a personal challenge for energy conservation at home.