Volume 6 February 17th, 2023

The First Branch Newsletter  

A bi-weekly newsletter from Principal Janet Cash and Associate Principal Kate Liptak featuring photos, stories, and updates from the Chelsea and Tunbridge schools.

Follow us on Facebook for daily photos, updates, and announcements. 

Important Upcoming Dates:


Feb. 20th - 24th NO SCHOOL, February Vacation

March 3rd - EARLY RELEASE, noon dismissal

March 6th - SCHOOL BUDGET VOTE, 7pm AND March Madness Celebration of Basketball before the vote in the Chelsea Gym

March 7th - NO SCHOOL, Town Meeting Day

March 17th - EARLY RELEASE, noon dismissal

March 20th -30th - PARENT TEACHER CONFERENCES

March 31st - NO SCHOOL, In Service

Greetings First Branch Families!



February has been a month full of determination in First Branch.  Students were introduced to the “D” in ROAD during Town Hall where they were challenged with tasks to show determination.  In Chelsea, students were asked to make the longest paper chain that they could with only paper and glue.  In Tunbridge, students were challenged to a relay race carrying an egg on a spoon from one side of the gym to another.  All students were then challenged to bring their determination back to their classrooms for learning.


Our elementary students were determined to help where it is needed and partnered with the American Heart Association by participating in the Kids Challenge.  Our K-4 students have raised $2,211.81 while also learning about fun ways to keep their brains and hearts healthy through kindness, gratitude and learning ways to de-stress.


Mindy Farnham has shown a tremendous amount of determination through her years of work in the First Branch schools and was recently recognized at the state level.  We wish to extend a congratulations to her for being chosen to 2023 Vermont James F. Cawley School Counselor of the Year Award!  This award was given to her in recognition of distinguished contributions to school counseling and to acknowledge and honor those instrumental in bringing outstanding innovation’s to the development of counseling in Vermont.  


We want to wish everyone a happy, restful and adventurous vacation and challenge students to get outside!  


Principal Janet Cash

Associate Principal Kate Liptak



Elementary School News

Ms. Elizabeth’s Kindergarten 


In addition to working hard in the classroom on early reading and numeracy skills, social skills, and science concepts, Miss Elizabeth’s class has been working hard outside learning to skate. Using new skates and helmets purchased from a grant, all students have been able to get outside onto the wonderful rink and learn skating skills. The progress has been amazing!

Ms. Crocker’s Kindergarten


In literacy students are becoming experts at using their “sound power” to read and write CVC words! We are working on writing sentences using a capital letter for the first word, lowercase letters for other words, good spaces and ending punctuation. In math we continue to work on reading, writing and understanding those tricky teen numbers. Our class has had three opportunities to skate and many students excitedly comment on how much they improved from their first time out! We enjoyed a fun “Woods Wednesday” last week. Ms. Eliza joined us to tell a story, build our first fire, and enjoy a popcorn snack cooked over the fire!

Ms. Lesure’s PE



In Elementary PE, students have been actively engaged in the Kids Heart Challenge. The Kids Heart Challenge focuses on whole body wellness, helping students improve their own health and better their character while raising life-saving donations for the American Heart Association to help kids facing heart-health issues. In class students have worked hard at building up stamina while learning lifelong skills of jump-rope! They have learned so many new tricks and skills. 



Along with the focus of Kids Heart Challenge, K-2nd students have worked hard at building strength, stability, and weight transfer skills in our gymnastics unit. And our 3rd-4th students have been focused on learning to work together and cooperate with teammates in competitive games of pillo-polo. 


Ms. Lesure's Health 

In Elementary Health, K-2 has been focused on learning their 5 senses! We discussed the benefits of our senses and how they can keep us safe from danger. On the days we didn’t learn about our 5 senses, K-2 as well as 3/4 took full advantage of winter activities such as body sliding, tubing, and skating. Students have been having so much fun!


Middle School News 

Miss Amy’s Middle School PE


In Middle School PE class students have been actively engaged and participating in various components of the Fitnessgram. The Fitnessgram is a series of assessments to determine where students are at in areas of health related fitness compared to other students their own age. Areas of fitness being assessed are those such as flexibility, muscular strength and endurance, as well as cardiorespiratory endurance.  


Along with assessing areas of fitness using the Fitnessgram program we have also been working on team sports, specifically with striking skills and strategy play. In class students worked hard on stick control during the pillo-polo unit, finishing with “World Cup” tournament play. Following polo students were introduced to a new activity called Omnikin ball. This is the only sport that plays 3 teams at the same time. It was great to see the improvement of skill level and strategy play develop so quickly during this unit. As Omnikin has come to a close we are continuing with striking skills, however we are moving to individual and partner play during the “Picko Ball” unit.  



Miss Amy’s Middle School Health



In the health classroom we have been busy finishing up community projects from food drives, to school dances, to holiday caroling. In grades 5/6 we completed the “MyPlate” nutrition unit and have started “puberty”. In grades 7/8 we are finishing up ATOD (alcohol, tobacco, other drugs) slide show presentation projects. Students will soon be reviewing puberty and changing as we grow, as well as an introduction to sexual decision making.


Miss Amy’s Middle School Elective - Jr. Iron Chef


There were many students that signed up to join the Jr. Iron Chef, and 20 were chosen to fill the elective. During this elective there are many skills to gain including: knife safety, measuring tips, direction following, teamwork, communication, recipe searching, modifying recipes, soliciting donations for local ingredients, and more. It has been amazing to watch students learn from their mistakes and have to make deadlines. Some of the foods being cooked on a butane single burner include: stuffed jalapeno peppers, blue cheese, pineapple steak and pepper shish kabobs, savory jalapeno crepes filled with garlic chicken, roasted and seasoned pumpkin and cranberries topped with yogurt sauce. A special thank you to Ms. Cathy, Ms. Lori, and Ms. Casey for helping out during this elective! Absolutely amazing elective!!


Ms. Em's 5/6 Humanities


In Ms. Em’s humanities classroom, 5th & 6th graders have been listening to Vermont author, Ann Braden’s Flight of the Puffin during a daily read aloud. The themes of acceptance, personal identity, and the challenges of middle school peer groups and family life are extremely relatable in this story set in small Vermont schools. We finished up the student-favorite Linked, with a paper-bag report. Each student decorated and filled a paper bag with items, characters and summaries of the book.


Students each now have a ‘Membean’ account for personal vocabulary practice; this is a literacy station three times per week for 15 minutes. Writing lab is daily practice for sentence structure, paragraph construction and evidence gathering. Right now, students are finishing up a Response to Literature essay and have started personalized research on a topic of their choice. After vacation, we’ll take field trips to the Chelsea & Tunbridge Public libraries for more research time and to get to know our local librarians.


March will bring an exciting collaboration with Northern Stage for the BridgeUp program. Visiting actors/instructors will spend time with each ⅚ class three days a week to teach, rehearse and produce an abbreviated Shakespeare play (we don’t know which one yet - it’s a surprise!). Students will put on the show in First Branch for fellow students and then perform on the real stage at Northern Stage in White River in May! (Families watch for details coming home.)


The biggest news in Ms. Em’s classroom is the return of Maple, the bunny, after he took a few weeks off from school. Maple and the 11 goldfish offer students jobs and sensory breaks, plus unusual company for read alouds!!

Ms. Holbrook’s 7/8 Humanities Class


In 7th/8th grade humanities, students have spent the past few weeks studying the Civil Rights Movement through the lens (or should we say microphone) of the music that defined the Movement. Along with learning the history of the Civil Rights Movement, they've been studying how to analyze the themes and ingredients that go into lyric/poetic writing. Now, their challenge is to bring their newfound writing skills and historical knowledge together to write their own songs! This project has allowed students to showcase what they're learning in a fun and creative way!

Thank you for reading the First Branch Newsletter!