Parkview Library

The Parkview Garden over the years

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Sun, 08 Nov 2015 02:33:00 +0000

The first Parkview Garden is a 44 by 90 inch bed that was housed outside a third grade classroom. That first year, Mrs. Nagy's class helped water the peas, broccoli, spinach and radishes that we all planted. They also cared for our first worm bin.

This garden flourished, and the students enjoyed tasting the peas, especially the peas, but also the spinach and lettuce. Until the end of the school year, when a groundhog or rabbit or other small animal gradually ate it all up. We didn't have a garden club yet, so the plants were planted by third grade classes, and seeds were planted by first graders.

Next year, we planted it again, and I put up a three foot chicken wire fence to keep the little critters out. I think Mrs. Nagy had moved on to a new school, and the room near the garden was occupied by Miss Maiorano's 4th grade class. All went well until the crops ripened, and I thought we were going to harvest a big crop of lettuce to share with the school. But then deer trampled the fence, and ate up all the crops.

The following year, I heard from my friend and Board of Ed member Dawn Milburn that Milltown had received a $10,000 small grant from Walmart that would help us build school gardens at Parkview and Joyce Kilmer Schools. Collaborating with Master Gardener Jeanne Logan, we designed two gardens that community members, parents, students, and Home Depot Volunteers constructed.

These gardens have thrived successfully for the past five years, as part of the School Green Club.

Autism Speaks

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Sat, 30 Mar 2013 16:11:00 +0000

April is Autism Awareness month, and Autism Speaks is a great resource for families to learn more about Autism. To learn what you can do to raise awareness, to make a donation, to join in their campaign visit www.autismspeaks.org

Welcome Friends

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Fri, 31 Aug 2012 12:43:00 +0000

A new year is beginning at Parkview School, and teachers and students alike are getting nervous tummies about meeting new people and new challenges. If this is the case with you, relax! We are all friends at Parkview, and especially in the library we want to be your friend, too. We will make sure that each of our students feel respected and know that your opinions are important to us. Over the summer we purchased some new books for the library, and we have a new technology teacher this year, Mrs. Eichert! Check this page for an update to our latest purchases.

Joyce Kilmer's Glog

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 02:28:00 +0000

I used to have this glog as part of my JOyce Kilmer Library webpage. It seems to be gone from there, so I'll keep it here for now.

Do the Dewey!

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 20:00:00 +0000

Second grade classes are learning about the Dewey Decimal System. We read the book What Marion taught Willis, and will try to learn and educate each other about the different hundreds sections of the library in the weeks to come. What? You don't know how libraries are arranged and the story of Melville Dewey? Well check out this short video, which sums it all up pretty nicely...

Introduction to the Dewey Decimal System from Ellen Shave on Vimeo.

And if you are a glutton for punishment, or, I mean, have a great sense of humor, watch this video of the Dewey Decimal Rap!

Stories of Milltown

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 21:12:00 +0000

I always love arranging for the fourth grade students to visit the Milltown Historical Society buildings when they are learning about their community. We spend a few weeks in our library classes talking aobut the highlights of Milltown history and read from the Rod Leury book The History of Milltown. The classes also spend some time illustrating a chapter "Life On the Farm" where Anna Ochs Lindstrom discusses how life on her family farm would have been in the year 1890.

Click to view my story.

Click to view my story.

Click to view my story.

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Thu, 19 May 2011 03:28:00 +0000

Is two years too long to wait to write a new post? Wow, it has been a long time. Life in the library has been exciting and rewarding. fourth graders are learning about podcasting using Audacity. They are having a blast, reading from a script. We may be a few years behind the time, thinking that the students will get much practical use from podcasting, but creating mp3s may help them in other ways. We are going to look into reading public domain texts for librivox.org.
First graders are writing stories with Littlebirdtales.com. They have a lot to learn, but I think they will be making fast progress.

Trends in information technology, including Web 2.0, and integration with subject curricula and information literacy.

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 02:27:00 +0000

What is Web2.0? What is its importance for teachers and students?
Web2.0 can be described as the interactive internet, where users contribute and communicate with others: Wikipedia, photo sharing, blogs, social networking, and Google Docs are several examples. Just a few years ago, teachers were excited about having students use computers to read and receive information from reputable websites and databases. Think of Merriam-Webster, Bartleby.com the Encyclopedia Brittanica Online. Today, forward thinking educators are teaching their students how to use project-based learning and modern technologies to produce their own web content.
What are the most important technologies that will assist teachers and students in the years to come? If school filters will allow it, interactive web applications will energize students to be more creative. It is exciting for students to respond to others' works, and to become published authors or creators of web content. This slide show was on classroom20.com, a ning.com site where educators share ideas about using web2.0 in the classroom.

| View | Upload your own

New Wiki

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 00:48:00 +0000

The library has a new wiki, for our students to write and make artwork about the library animal display. It's been up for this past school week, and 8 classes have had the opportunity to add to the pages. It's been extremely slow, and it's hard for me not to post my own microsoft paint pictures there, but that's not wha the page is for. So I'll be patient. I haven't sent the info home to parents, and the kids are very busy in school, so ARRGH! Anyway, here's one of my pictures.

The halls are alive...

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 04:43:00 +0000

Celebrate National Library Week April 13-19,2008

It's the Parkview Natural History Museum

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 04:28:00 +0000

These birds and small mammals are currently on display in the Parkview Library Display Case, thanks to a loan from the Lawrence Brook Watershed Partnership. Our students have been learning about how these animals, all found in or near Milltown need a clean environment in which to live. Today we started doing research projects and the first graders drew pictures to help me with our new display.

Thanks for the loan, Lawrence Brook Watershed Project!

Read Across America

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 01:26:00 +0000

Read Across America was a big success this year at our school thanks to the solid recruiting of local celebrity guest readers by Dr. Madison. Hamady N'Diaye and Alan Ajamian headlined the event, and were greeted by chants of "RU rah rah!" from children in grades k-3. Coach Mike Emanuel and Home News Tribune writer Laurie Granieri were also crowd favorites.

Blog Action Day

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 04:11:00 +0000

Blog Action Day is a day to use your blog to do something to help the environment. People all over are joining together to take some small steps to reverse the damage we have done to the health of our planet.
If you work for the Milltown School District, you can join Debbie O'Halloran's Milltown goes Green group. We are meeting after school on Wednesday after school.

If you are a member of the Milltownps ning site, you can join our Milltown Goes Green group there. If we have vision, we can make things happen.

September at Parkview

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 11:05:00 +0000

It's September, and it's hot in the Parkview School. But there is one place where you are always welcome to come cool down. If we have room for your class anywhere in the library, the reading area, the work tables, or in the computer area you can come with your class and read or work quietly in our air conditioned room.
So give us a call at ext. 1111 or send a student down to ask about available space. Come spend some time with us.

We're the library and we love to help people.

getting started on ning

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 02:34:00 +0000

This summer I created a social networking site for the teachers and staff of Milltown Schools. If you like facebook, or have ever used or wondered about sites like myspace, check out the MilltownPS ning. It will be a private space, for Milltown employees only, to discuss education or anything else you want, to share resources that we find. I think it will help us all to grow as a school family, and you can contribute as much or as little as you choose.It's public right now, to give everyone the opportunity to check it out before you join. So come see the page and join it! If you have any trouble, watch the video displayed below for an easy walkthrough.

Click To Play/Right Click to Download

Windows Movie Maker

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 02:34:00 +0000

I created the Getting Started video on Windows Movie Maker, an easy program that is on every Windows computer we have!
Just another cool trick I learned in school...

Let's Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Mrs. Wright) — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 23:45:00 +0000

Is summer over yet? It isn't as I write this, but it sure doesn't feel like August 10, either. Brrr...
So this is our library blog. Are you new to blogs? They are an easy way to create content for, or write on the world wide web. You can write blogs about any number of different things, and for any number of purposes. You can even use blogs to get your students involved in projects with kids at other schools. But before we do that, we should practice a little ourselves. Here are a few common uses for blogs:

a personal journal about yourself or your family
opinions on current topics in education or the world
post your own reviews of books you've read or movies you've seen
post your family photos for people to see
share video or audio podcasts

The Parkview Library blog will probably be used to let you all know what's new in the library, but I reserve the right to just share my thoughts about-whatever!

I will help anyone here learn to use blogs. Give me a call in the library, email me bwright@milltownps.org, or leave a comment here on the blog.