Ag Visit

 Ag Visit

Click on the link above to view our visit to the Madison County Ag Day.

New First Grade Reader's Theater

Those busy first graders are at it again!  They have been working on a new reader's theater about TEETH! Here they are giving their performance.

Blogger seems to be experiencing some problems with videos.  It seems that they don't appear during the daytime, but in the evening or at night, there they are!  Haven't heard anything from Blogger concerning this problem, but I hope they will get it figured out soon.

Video Project

The first graders learned about Martin Luther King, Jr.

Reading Conference

Today is the second day of the Nebraska State Reading Conference in Kearney, Nebraska.  Six teachers from Winside Elementary are attending this conference.  We have been conferring between sessions and at the banquet last night as to which sessions each of us attended and what we learned.  There have been many very interesting ideas presented and we all agreed that we have many new ideas to bring back to our school.

Last night the speaker at the banquet was Jon Scieszka, a nationally known author of many, many books for young people.  His topic was "Guys Read - Getting Boys Into Reading."  He was an extremely funny presenter and had us all in stitches!  He has a web site called "Guys Read" which encourages boys to read with lists of books that boys of all ages will love.  If you have a chance, why not check out this web site.

Today we are attending more sessions in the morning and will get together at an author's luncheon before heading home.  The weather has been kind so far allowing us to arrive safely Thursday evening and we are hoping that we do not run into any bad roads on the way home.


We have already been talking about ways to implement some of the things we have learned.  We are always very grateful to the school district and administrators for allowing us to attend these conferences.  Not only do they fire up our enthusiasm, but in the long run they benefit our students.

Back to Work

    Well, we are all back to work after a wonderful break.  Thankfully the weather cooperated so that most people could get together with their families. Now we are all trying to get back into our school routine.
     One of the reasons why it has been so long since my last post is that I have been learning about the new web site for the school.  Yes, we are looking at changing the format of the Winside Wildcat web site.  I am not sure just when the change will take place.  Meanwhile I have been learning how to manage the new format.  I think that I am finally getting the hang of things!  Soon Mr. Messersmith, Mr, Kravig and I will train the rest of the staff on how to use the new site.  I really think that once we get going with it you will like the new look.
     If there are some things that you would like to see added to our web site please let me know so we can try to include them.

Winside Wildcats Now on Facebook

    For all of you Facebook fans, Winside Schools now has its own Facebook page.  In an effort to make contact with former and current students the page was created and will contain announcements as well as surveys for students to give their feedback.  As a part of school improvement that feedback is very important for us to know what we are doing well and where we can improve. Be sure to check out the new page.
    Just a reminder for parents - Facebook has an minimum age requirement of 13.  There are several of our students who have Facebook pages who are under that minimum age.  This is in violation of the agreement policy with Facebook.  Please make sure that your children abide by the rules as set forth by Facebook and that you are aware of web sites that they are signing up for.
Winside Schools

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Timez Attack!

     I know - I already had a post about Timez Attack, but I thought you might like to see what it looks like.  This video clip is of some of the 6th graders as they were using the program. (They actually asked to practice their multiplication facts!)  Note: on the day we filmed this the students were allowed to wear their hats as part of Red Ribbon Week activities.
     The 3rd graders started today with Timez Attack. They haven't actually started doing multiplication in their classroom, but we are interested to see if this program helps teach the facts without formal instruction.  Everyone was very excited and couldn't believe the 20 minutes had gone by so quickly. Next time will be even better since they now have an idea of what to do.  They can't wait for next Friday!