Welcome to Fifth Grade

Dear Fifth Graders and Parents,

Welcome to fifth grade and your last year in elementary school! We're off to a great start and I know we'll have a fabulous year!

As many of you know I spend the summer as a research assistant at the Harvard Forest in Petersham (http://harvardforest.fas.harvard.edu/news). The Harvard Forest is Harvard University's forest ecology/ biology research site as well as part of the Long Term Ecological Research Network (http://www.lternet.edu/). 

For the past two summers I have worked with Dr. Andrew Richardson's Phenocam project. In the fall of 2011, the Ashburnham- Westminster Regional School District became the first of five schools to join  Phenocam Network with the installation of a digital phenocam on the roof of Overlook Middle School. Our school district is now part of a network of near surface remote sensing digital cameras that send images of forest, shrub, and grassland vegetation cover at more than 130 diverse sites in North America to the digital archives at the University of New Hampshire.

Mr. DeHays   Technology Director

          
 As a part of the Phenocam project, students at the K-12 level have expanded the scope of phenological monitoring that is part of the Harvard Forest Schoolyard Ecology Program protocol, Buds, Leaves, and Global Warming. In this protocol, we work with Dr. John O’Keefe to monitor buds and leaves on schoolyard trees to determine the length of the growing season, giving students the opportunity to be a part of real and important research concerning the critical environmental issue of climate change. 

   
This fall I have been invited to present at the LTER All Scientists Meeting in Estes Park, Colorado on September 10-13. (http://asm2012.lternet.edu/). I will be presenting both at the education and phenology working group sessions. 

Ms. Nancy Gera, former fifth grade teacher extraordinaire, will be substituting me for the week. So we don't miss each other too much, I have created this blog to chat and post pictures. 5B and 5C will have opportunities to blog with me at the computer lab, and of course you are welcome to blog from home. There will be a link to this blog on my website, which can be accessed from the JRB website (http://jrb.awrsd.org/class_profile_view.aspx?id=979082df-1678-4faa-8f67-64d4bcd7f2b0)

Unfortunately I will not be at Open House on Sept. 13, but Ms. Gera will be there to welcome you and answer any questions you may have.

Looking forward to "blogging" with you!

Ms. Bennett

Phenology is the study of recurring lifecycle events influenced by seasonal environmental changes, including budburst, flowering, and leaf drop by plants and migration by animals.