https://animoto.com/play/HAOGGCyJbxpmg80s3zmatQ
PDS, and the middle school in particular, were fortunate to have the internationally known artist Barbara Beisinghoff spend a day on campus.
Barbara was brought to Poughkeepsie by Vassar College through their Creative Arts Across Disciplines grants program. Silke…
In a school like PDS, where teachers are advisors, and where we spend so much time getting to know students well, it doesn’t take long to “get down to work,” in the subject areas. In all classes, teachers and students…
https://animoto.com/play/8T32McaAFn8rzw6f7r1t7A
It’s a long tradition that near to the start of the year, the middle school students and advisors spend a day outside. Students work to solve game-like problems together, engage in some team races and basically just enjoy getting…
We’re back! After our separate summers of action, our middle school learning community began to reform, today, for the new school year.
It was a day of getting acquainted and reacquainted. In whole group meetings, and in advisory, students learned…
The Class of 2020 photo op!
In June we celebrate each student moving up to the next grade, with a special emphasis on the eighth graders. As they finish the “grammar school” part of their educations, they have much to…
The end of the year brings many celebrations: completed work, successful projects, moving on to a new grade in the fall, moving up into a new division. This year, we added one more celebration to middle school: We celebrated decades…
By the end of each school year, the teachers and I can all glimpse the future high schoolers that the eighth graders will soon become. At this point in the year, they have registered for their high school courses, and…
While grade six works on research papers and presents Lego missions, grade seven is deep in the midst of grappling with proportional thinking in math and literary analysis in English.
Of all the concepts in middle school math, the leap…
Who doesn’t love a robot? Even with robots in our daily lives, it is still a fantasy to think of what else could be engineered to help us. Our sixth graders work each spring, to imagine robots. They also spend…
Counting down until the end of the school year is a bittersweet experience. Sometimes it seems as though just when we have the students performing at their highest level, the year is over. The end of the year is full…
