The Robin's Nest

On Thursday this week, 6th grade teacher, Miss Shank, took 5 6th graders to the Kid’s Inquiry Conference at the National Wildlife Center. These 6th graders applied and were selected to go based on their science fair experiments they completed in March.

At the KIC, students met with scientific experts in various fields, and got to hear about projects and experiments completed by other FCPS students in other schools.

Here are some comments from three of our students who attended:

“This KIC meeting was really fun! I also learned a lot about the environment and how to help protect it. I would really encourage students to sign up next year. You get to miss a day of school!” -Keely

“Rolling Valley sent 5 students to KIC, and I was one of them! I had a great time geo-caching, making wind mills, and meeting other students from different schools!” -Neel

“I thought KIC was awesome. I really liked taking a nature walk and making butterflies out of milk cartons. I also liked that it was at the National Wildlife Federation. I would love to do it again sometime.” -Zachary

I am happy to share our new sign that was just hung last week in The Robin Hood. It was designed by Rolling Valley parent, Sonal Shah, and is a bird’s eye view of our native plants habitat. It will be a great addition to our courtyard area because now visitors can see what is planted in each part of the courtyard.

I was happy to see Mrs. Tseggai’s class out in the courtyard sharing their writing the other day. I wish I had my camera to snap a photo.

The courtyard is and will continue to be a great place for learning.

I’ve been caught up in my Facebook postings and have really been neglecting this blog. As you should be aware, we are currently conducting our annual parent survey. One of the areas in the parent survey has to do with the number of parents accessing the different communication tools we use at Rolling Valley. One of these tools is this blog. I will use the data retrieved from the parent survey to make a decision about continuing this mode of communication. Please take the time to complete the parent survey. The link has gone out through the Keep in Touch system twice, and I will continue to send it out. We also have paper copies available for those who do not have access to a computer. I’m assuming that those of you reading the blog are not in that category.

While parents continue to give feedback, we are anxiously awaiting the start of spring break. It has been a strange winter without having any snow days or delays. I think teachers and students alike are ready for a nice week-long break. I hope the weather holds and is nice for our vacation.

As always, contact me if you have any questions, especially any about the current parent survey, at mboland@fcps.edu.

I didn’t realize how much I let the blog lag in the last month. I’ve been busy promoting our Facebook site and have been placing more information on that. I do want to get back to weekly posting, though.

Last week I had the priviledge of visiting the 6th grade classes to see their culminating projects in their biography unit. I heard students share about a variety of famous people – Julia Childs, Jim Henson, The Beatles and Steve Jobs to name a few. Below are some pictures from the day.

I am so proud to show our readers the tree in our front lobby displaying all the scarves, gloves and hats that our families contributed during this holiday season. These items will be donated to ECHO to meet the needs of families in our community.

Those of you who have been keeping track of our Virginia native plants habitat, The Robin Hood, know that we have been working on creating a pond. With the help of FCPS environmental educators, Elaine Tholen and Brice Boyd, our dream is now our reality.

Fourth grade students have been instrumental in constructing the pond and continue to maintain the Robin Hood. We have also organized a new seating area so that teachers can take classes outside to learn and appreciate the courtyard.

I will post additional pictures when it’s complete and will include an entire album on our Rolling Valley Facebook site with before and after pictures (including pictures from last year!).

For the past two months, Rolling Valley’s “Girls on the Run” team has been training hard after school twice a week. As a part of the program, the girls have been running and preparing for a big 5k race, while also learning important life skills such as teamwork and self-confidence. On Sunday, November 20, the Rolling Valley “Girls on the Run” team ran in their 5k race with over 3,500 girls from neighboring counties in the Northern Virginia area. We are so proud of their accomplishments this season! Coaches Mrs. Valint and Ms. Cobb were more than excited to lead their second season of GOTR and cannot wait to continue the program at RVES this Spring!

For more information about the program and upcoming season, please visit: http://gotrnova.org/

At Rolling Valley students know it’s our expectation to be “Respectful, Responsible, and Ready”.  On Thursday of this week, Mrs. Dalton and I had the pleasure of delivering this quarter’s Rockin’ Robin awards to 51 students! Our furry friend, Rocky, followed along on our journey.

There were 2 students chosen from each class, with our smallest classes selecting 1 student. We made sure that as we handed out the awards, students knew that everyone has an opportunity to be a Rockin’ Robin and that their turns may be next! 

We will display the Rockin Robin pictures on the bulletin board by the main office. 

Wow – our 25th annual Haunted House was a smashing success and the Fun Fair provided for loads of non-scary entertainment. I went through the Haunted House twice and was scared both times. Thanks to all of the volunteers who made the night such a success! Below are a few pictures:

Our weather was spectacular, thank goodness, and Rolling Valley was triumphant for the 7th year in a row in the Pyramid Challenge. There is some dispute about whether this was our 6th or 7th victory, but the majority of the spectators I talked to thought it was the 7th victory.

It was a great morning and afternoon of running and I’m so proud of the many Rolling Valley students who partcipated. Above is a montage of the day!