Champions at Mennies had an amazing turnout for their parent event last Friday! The students practiced and performed a dance for their parents from a specific decade. Kindergarten and first grade danced to "Walking on Sunshine," second and third grade danced to "Watch My (Whip)/Jump," and fourth and fifth grade did the Cha Cha Slide. The students did an amazing job!
Check out this link for clips of the dances: https://bit.ly/3IzPNG7
Join the journey with Miss Vineland 2024, Eve Ortiz! 👑 Stay connected as she continues to shine bright in the community. Follow @miss.vineland2024 on Instagram for information on events and fundraisers.
We will be streaming tonight's Board of Education Special Budget Meeting live at 5pm on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/live/s2anMJ1XsIE?si=0AeVrqn1Ujbyd6Mk
Meeting agenda: https://bit.ly/49QlTcV
DiBiase Preschool families enjoyed a recent Literacy Night! Students and their families participated in book-themed activities, listened to guest readers, won door prizes, enjoyed snacks, and shopped at the book fair.
Cameron Shapiro from the NJ Americorps Watershed Ambassadors program visited with the VHS S.H.A.P.E. (Students Helping Animals, Plants, and Environment) Club. She began with a presentation about watersheds and water quality. She followed up with having the students sort out aquatic macroinvertebrates to assess the water quality of the river they came from.
Last week, Michelle Rebilas from the American Littoral Society visited with the VHS S.H.A.P.E. Club. Students listened to a presentation about dune grass ecology and the importance of protecting them. Afterwards, students re-potted dune grass plugs that the students will take care of over the next two months. At the end of April, in honor of Earth Day, S.H.A.P.E. Club members and the AP Environmental Science class will head out to the beach to plant the dune grass clumps as part of a dune restoration project with the American Littoral Society.
Students in Mrs. Haley's 8th Grade Accelerated classes at Veterans Memorial School presented masks they'd created. The students read William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet." These masks visually connected the students and their interests, personality traits, etc., to the text.
The students needed to provide 3-4 symbols to represent themselves and explain the connection. They also needed to choose a song that would be their entrance music to The Capulet's feast and analyze the lyrics. Lastly, they were required to choose a quote from the play and make a personal connection to it.
The students did a phenomenal job planning, designing, and presenting their masks to their peers!
Mrs. Bertonazzi's 2nd-grade students at Mennies Elementary School are diving into the world of 3-digit subtraction and regrouping. To make learning more engaging and fun, they have actively participated in hands-on centers where they practice their subtraction skills collaboratively. The students enjoy these activities, especially the competitive aspect of the hands-on subtraction games.
On Thursday, March 7, the general manager, Lisa Zuniga, and her amazing staff treated Mrs. Robbins' VHS science students to a tasty lesson at Vineland's Pizza Hut. Students enjoyed applying their knowledge of nutrition, food groups, career exploration, and food preparation/safe handling to the restaurant setting. We want to thank everyone at Pizza Hut for the wonderful afternoon and generosity in treating the students and staff to a delicious lunch!
Students in Mr. Martine's class at Rossi Elementary School had a fun time making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to learn more about placing events in chronological order. Students first wrote their own instructions for Mr. Martine to follow precisely. Laughs ensued when a student wrote, "Put the jelly on the bread," and Mr. Martine put the entire jar of jelly on top of a piece of bread! Students laughed, but a valuable lesson was learned: be precise with how you write instructions. Students then cut and pasted the peanut butter and jelly-making instructions in order from first to last and followed the instructions to create their own peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. A fun time was had by all and the students' creations were delicious!
Mennies Elementary School is proud to announce the Character Badge Winners for February! The school celebrated the character trait of Kindness during the month of February. These students demonstrated outstanding kindness throughout their classroom and the school.
Our Tiny Tots students took advantage of Fabulous Sleepy Friday for Dr. Seuss week by wearing pajamas to school!
"Today we follow a new rule! It's called wear your pajamas to school!"
Some great activities coming up at the YMCA!
Petway Elementary and the Petway Safety Patrol worked extra hard the past few months to collect bread, soup, peanut butter, and jelly for the Vineland Soup Kitchen. All students at Petway participated in the donation process, bringing in whatever they could. When all of the donations were in and counted, 355 cans of soup were collected, 65 jars of peanut butter, 40 jars of jelly, and 26 loaves of bread. The patrol delivered all the donations to the soup kitchen and assisted in making lunches! They made 100 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and packed over 100 lunches for the homeless. All of Petway contributed to this act of service! 1st grade classes made lunch bags, 3rd grade wrote jokes to spread laughter, and Mrs. Holt's class made bags of candy for a little something sweet for the lunch bags! #PetwayProud
Josue Sandoval from Mrs. Pennington's 4th-grade classroom at Mennies Elementary School was nominated and selected to be School Citizen of the Month for February. When sharing why she nominated Josue, Mrs. Pennington said, "Josue always displays good character. He is responsible, empathetic, honest, courageous, kind, and a good listener. He is a model student." Congratulations, Josue! #menniesproud
Culminating Read Across America week was a great opportunity for students at Mennies Elementary School to “Get Wild About Reading” by exploring a variety of “tasty” genres. In small groups, students visited five genre tables. They selected a book from the serving tray and read 3-5 pages. After reading, the students wrote about the “first bite” (book cover), their initial thoughts on the book, and how the “chef” (author) “hooked them”. Finally, they rated the book, and on their Book Tasting Graffiti placemat, they wrote whether or not they would recommend the book to a friend.
Some fun quotes from the students included:
Alana said, “I want this book.”
Leo said, “Can I take all these books home?”
Annabella said, “Poetry was not what I have read before, but I like it.”
Sophia ended by saying, “This was AWESOME!”
The activity was well received, and the Bistro served up a sweet treat to eat and drink.
In January, Vineland High School World Languages Department Chair Sarah Edwards and colleagues administered over 200 language proficiency assessments in 15 different languages to VHS juniors and seniors hoping to wear Seal of Biliteracy honors at their graduation. Tests were administered in all of the languages taught at Vineland High School, as well as Ukrainian, Hindi, Tamil, Turkish, Latin, Punjabi, and Haitian Creole. Students took rigorous language tests that measured their proficiency in listening, speaking, reading, and writing in a language other than English. In order to attain the Seal of Biliteracy, students must pass a test in a language other than English at the level of Intermediate Mid (see graphic below), and they must also pass their graduation assessment in English.
The results are finally in, verified, and uploaded to the NJ Department of Education: 66 students in the class of 2024 will receive the Seal of Biliteracy at graduation. An additional 45 juniors have already qualified to receive this honor when they graduate in 2025. Five students in the class of 2024 will receive the Seal of Biliteracy in two languages. They are as follows: Nikita Yazvinskyi (Russian and Ukrainian), Carina Bautista-Vargas (Italian and Spanish), Gabriela Cumba (Italian and Spanish), Nahomy Garcia Figueroa (Italian and Spanish), and Sulema Olmedo Osorio (Italian and Spanish.)
Students in the VHS/Rowan University dual enrollment bilingual teacher education program took the Oral Proficiency Interview and Written Proficiency Test assessments that are required for teacher certification by the New Jersey Department of Education. Seal of Biliteracy recipients must score an Intermediate Mid on these assessments. Teacher certification candidates must score at least an Advanced Low. All of our students scored above the level required for the Seal, and most scored at the level of teacher certification. Two students received scores of Superior. This accomplishment removes a barrier on their path to the classroom. The Rowan dual enrollment seniors who took these exams are Michael Cordero Salinas, Raúl Ortiz Rivera, Nicol Bejarano Mayorga, and Naren Ochoa Navia.
All of the Seal of Biliteracy recipients will be honored at a ceremony at VHS at the end of the school year. They will also have the honor noted on their transcripts and in the graduation program, and will wear a black cord at graduation. Students in the Rowan program who received the Seal will have a special medal designating their status. They will all receive a certificate from the State of New Jersey.
Obtaining the Seal of Biliteracy literally puts money in a student’s pocket. Both Rowan University and Kean University will award 6 World Languages credits to incoming freshmen who attain the Seal of Biliteracy in high school. This represents a savings of approximately $3,600 in tuition. Other state schools are sure to follow as they compete for students who have demonstrated a high level of academic, linguistic, and cross-cultural competence.
Winslow Elementary School had a packed house for their Magic of Reading family night! Over 300 students and their families joined us for a night of food, fun, magic, and books. Families enjoyed breakfast for dinner catered by Sodexo, free books for their home libraries sponsored by Book Smiles, new bookmarks from our librarian, Ms. Dematte, and a very entertaining and engaging magic show by magician Ken Northridge! Our Winslow whales have had a great Read Across America week celebrating the importance of literacy!
Students in Ms. Bernard & Mrs. Jones’s kindergarten class at Mennies School celebrated Read Across America week by reading Hop on Pop by Dr. Seuss! They created an anchor chart of all the rhyming words they found in the story, made their own popcorn using an air popper, and completed a science experiment where they made popcorn kernels “dance”!
The Vineland Education Association, through a FAST grant, hosted a Dallago Preschool Pajama Party on March 1st to celebrate Read Across America Week. 154 students and their family members were in attendance, as were many Vineland Education Association member volunteers.
Students were invited to wear their pajamas as they enjoyed a pajama-themed concert provided by Young Audiences performer TAHIRA. Literacy activities were provided for students and their families, including a make-your-own-book station, creating a character headband, exploring fine motor skills with play dough, and creating a story-time sticker scene. Additionally, a “bedtime snack” was provided, as well as books and promotional items for every child and family.
As part of the Vineland Education Association FAST grant, all Dallago students received a copy of the book Peppa Pig Class Pet and Lilly’s Purple Purse. This book is the sixth in Lena’s Library Legacy in memory of Dallago student Evangeline “Lena” Tietjen.
