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Ms. Kathryn Bonzo » About Ms. Bonzo

About Ms. Bonzo

 Welcome to 4th Grade!   Raise the Roof!
 
     A little background: My teaching career started in St. Augustine, Florida, after graduating from the University of South Alabama. Then, my husband and I lived, taught, and traveled overseas for almost a decade in Algeria, Singapore, and the Dominican Republic before coming to Idaho.  We moved here in 1994 with our daughter and have really enjoyed being involved in the community and participating in all kinds of outdoor opportunities. 
 
    I have taught and coached kids from preschool to high school. I graduated with a Master of Arts in Teaching majoring in History from the University of in 1999 and have always continued to add to my professional and content knowledge.
 
     A little about the present at MCS: The students in 4th Grade get to integrate what they have learned from K-3. It is a special year developmentally because kids at this age want to be active and make a difference in the world. One way that I like to help grow their curiosity and interests is to take them off campus for field trips and do my best to bring in experts (which are often parents:)).
 
 

Classes

Posts

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Charlotte, Wyat, and Amy teach Ms. Hoffmeister's First Graders on their STEAM project🌾 math work!
 
The kids got to work together and help the first graders do a multistep problem using calculators. It was important for the 4th to know the story of the math and let the first graders use the calculators.
The 4th graders learned they are really math programmers and that the tool can only do what they tell it the calculator to do.➕➖➗
🙌Good Learning all around!
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Ace and Charlotte show why RCR2E (Really Creative Reindeer Reverly Exchange) was soooooo fun! 🦌The Secret Reindeer did well this year!⭐
 
Each year the 4th grade gets 'to give and get' from each other in that 'Secret Santa' way.  
This year's class decided by vote to give treats on one day and a homemade gift on the second day. Ace made a Minecraft Creeper! This is the biggest homemade gift ever!  The smiles on both their faces say it all. 
 
The whole class learned a lot about playing by the rules of this game because that kept it suspenseful and interesting. 
 
😊One more week until our holiday break, and my wish for your family is that you have sweet times together celebrating in your special ways.
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Eos and Gavin work on the Lewis and Clark Math Challenge
 
Each partner group had a chance to check their work on the board.
The task was to search for math information in their Social Studies text and then do the equations correctly.
It is a fun and valuable activity because it incorporates cooperation and problem-solving, gathering facts and learning material more deeply.
Plus-- they were all having a great time!
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Cooperative Musical Chairs!
 
     The kids loved this and were one of the best groups to do this! 
This game is so different than Old School Musical Chairs. This one is filled with laughter and this class worked to help each other balance and feel included. They showed what working together can be. :)
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 MCS🏫 has collected 1039 pounds of plastic film so far this year and the school gets another bench to celebrate!
 
         Here, I was at the Moscow Recycle Center last Saturday (the first Saturday of the month) unloading from the MCS trailer where our school stores the donated plastic. Sending pictures this year was a requirement and since this was the one that met our goal-- thought I would be in it grinning! 😁
 
         The program has changed from years past and is now a community-wide collection to grow♻ recycling of #2 and #4. That means any organization in our town can collect plastic and drop it off at the Recycle Center. Once 1000 pounds has been collected, Trex will give a bench to that organization!
 
          Trex is encouraging more people and communities to recycle and I hope that more people will! There is more good news! The city will start allowing plastic film to be dropped off twice a month starting in January! YAY!!
 
       
     Six years of collecting plastic has shown the kids that we can all take action. This has meant that they know they can do something and that small amounts can have big results. 
To date, our school is closing in on 30,000 pounds of plastic👏 that has been recycled! 🎉Way to go MCS families and community members!
The kids have learned so much! That is what it is all about! We can all do something! And, we did!💐
 
Thank you, Ms. Bonzo
 
 
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Snow Ballet Performer and Kids from 4th and 5th Dancing too-- Inspired by Ballet Victoria!
 
Festival Dance provided tickets to all our 3-5 grade students. It was an hour of amazing skill and beauty. For many, it was the first time to see ballet and the Nutcracker story.
 
 
 
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Cooperation is Golden! The activity was for the group to raise and lower the Golden Circle by balancing it--shared-- each person used one finger! It was funny and frustrating! 
After each group had a turn, we discussed how to improve the success of being able to work together. They came up with three ideas immediately! They will get to try them today.
It will give you a smile to hear that each group realized they should
1. slow down,
2. talk about how they will work together before they move, 
3. listen more, not talk over each other. 
The kids know a lot! Excellent words of advice for many of the things we do together! 
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Michelle and Amy organize their materials for the science experiment that tests how changes they make to the ramp or how they use the marble will affect how it interacts with the ramp.
We studied the history of Skateboards with our SuperSTEM and today the kids used materials in class to create their ramps and follow the steps. 
 
Each student will come home with their marble and the ramp. They can continue to test their ideas with you.
The marbles are from our  Mug of Marvelous Acts. They each used this marble earlier last week for voting too.
 
 
 
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Luna, holding her clipboard for taking notes, stands in front of one of the installations by Jeffrey Gibson at the WSU Museum of Art. Thanks to her cousin Zoey who joined us for the field trip and took a great picture!
 
 
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At Jordan Schnitzer Art Museum at WSU with Curator Kristin Becker and Interns.
The kids were learning about the exhibit before they interacted with it. 
 
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Luna, Lily, and Bruce collect the 35 pounds plastic dropped off during the Gas Outage!
 
Many more people in our community are recycling plastic! This is great! Remember, there is the first of each month drop-off at the Moscow Recycle Center.
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Raking Leaves at Paradise Creek of Olympus Health Care
(formally, Good Samaritan)
The kids worked well to get the area cleaned up!
24 bags in about 30 minutes!
They did some good community service!
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Charlotte and Brynn raking up!
 
The kids did a great job raking leaves yesterday for what used to be called Good Samaritan! They finally ended up with 24 bags of leaves in 30 minutes!
Everyone worked hard together and that was good to see. Some of the residents came out to watch the activity.
:)
This was a good treat for the kids to do for our community!
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Trick or Treaters
The class has great ideas about who they are and why as they explained in our Morning Meeting.
 
They need to know how much candy they collected so if they ask to bring the bag into school, it is so we can use the scale in class to weigh what they collected.
Some of the predictions are wild-- 25 lbs., 37 lbs., even 100 pounds!
The bags will be kept behind my desk during the day so no candy munching.
Also, I asked them to notice which direction they are facing when they receive their favorite candy. We had a short lesson on the compass this morning.
 
Have a Happy Halloween!
Sincerely, Witch Direction
 
 
 
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How to Sell a Rock!!
 
Amy is painting her rock to look like a cat! The kids participated in a lesson from UI Extension led by Ms. Richel about entrepreneurship.
 
The kids thought about how to create a business and the costs, marketing, time, and materials. The goal was to create a profit to do something they wanted with their earnings.
 
They did a lot of thinking and math calculations to find out if what they wanted to create they would be able to do. It was a good introduction to decision-making about finances and ideas that can generate money.
 
The prototype rock design will come home today. Let the kids test out their ideas on you!
 
Check out my blogs from previous years:
2017-2018 School Year 
2016-2017 School Year
2015-2016 School Year
2014-2015 School Year