Learning Updates for Week of March 29 to April 2

April 2, 2021

Arts Update: Improv Sets Off Some Wild Stories

In our eighth grade theater intensive, the students learned about acting and empathy and then wrote monologues from a shoe’s perspective. They next analyzed a scene adapted from Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. They also created an original set design for the scene. At the end of the intensive, we learned to say “yes” and build on each others’ ideas in a series of improvisation games. Two favorites were “The Worst Day Ever” and “Late to Work.” In the first game, everyone has thirty seconds to regale their peers with a description of their worst day ever. In “Late to Work,” one student plays the employee, another plays their boss, and the remaining students are a group of co-workers. The employee is sent out of earshot, and the rest of the players come up with a reason the person is late for work. When the employee returns, the co-workers pantomime the reason, while the employee tries to make sense of their actions and explain what happened to the boss. The boss “helps” the employee by acknowledging when the reason is viable or not. Imaginations were in high gear as our employee explained being attacked by penguins, captured by flying pigs, and trying to resurrect a dead cat with the help of a cult of cat worshipers!

– Susan Dempsey, theater teacher

Seventh Grade Advisory Sharing Research With Their Peers

Since the start of the third trimester, the seventh grade Carter/Fogelstrom Advisory has launched a new project in which students are sharing a presentation on a topic of their choice. The students can choose and research any school-appropriate topic that they are interested in and that they feel would be valuable to their classmates.

Students have gone above and beyond with interesting slides, deep topic knowledge, and great use of Q&A time. So far we’ve heard from Nadia Lomelia on “Anxiety and Strategies to Help,” Ella Blecher on “Social Hierarchy of Social Media,” and Chloe Mitzenmacher on “School Dress Codes.”

– Gretchen Fogelstrom and Leal Carter, grade seven teachers

Sixth Graders Get to Where It All Began

Sixth graders used some advisory and resource time to concoct origin stories for a variety of BDS features and traditions, making short videos to tell their tales. The BDS sheep made more than a few appearances. The final products revealed their own origins in past social studies classes about religious creation stories, science class lessons about the life cycles of stars, English work on short story structure and coming of age … and more than a little bit of the Marvel universe of super-hero origin stories. The larger narrative here is some creative outdoor fun that could be shared across the whole grade.  

– Dean Spencer, grade 6 social studies teacher

PE Update: Fifth Graders Start Track & Field

This week in physical education, our fifth graders started a heart-pounding track & field unit. After being introduced to every event outside early in the week, students came inside the Barn on Thursday afternoon for an exciting crossfit workout. The workout included battle ropes, agility ladders, med ball slams, jumping rope, farmer’s walks, sprints, bosu push-ups, and box jumps. Check out this video to see a quick look at the students in action! 

– John O’Neill, athletics director and physical education teacher

The second grade class poses together at Gaining Ground.

BDS

May 26, 2023

We are proud to present the final tally for our second grade changemakers’ efforts to raise funds for Gaining Ground. During Read for Seeds, this group of second graders read 59,774 pages in two weeks and raised $5,097.84 to support…

By John O'Neill, director of athletics |

May 26, 2023

The boys’ lacrosse team exploded for five goals in the fourth quarter against Shady Hill this week for a come-from-behind 7-4 win. The win was the team’s third straight, improving their record to 5-3 and guaranteeing a winning season with…

BDS

May 26, 2023

Fourth Graders Tell Many An Ancient Tale Last Thursday was the fourth grade’s annual Greek Storytelling Festival. Students retold ancient tales and toured their guests through a classroom museum. The museum included architectural marvels, the Hall of the Gods, ceramic…

By John O'Neill, athletics director |

May 12, 2023

With three games on the docket, Belmont Day’s ultimate program put its best foot forward this week in a trio of competitive contests. The JV team got things going with a home game against Waldorf on Tuesday afternoon that saw…
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