A little choreography. A lot of joy. 💫
The Alice in Wonderland Jr. cast warms up to Taylor Swift’s “Wonderland” as a centering, team-building tradition before rehearsal. One month until they take the stage. 🎭✨
📚Students in 201 celebrated READING by designing Valentine's Day boxes inspired by their favorite books!
From colorful characters to imaginative story settings, each box reflects the book that the spark their love of reading. ❤️
✨💌 Happy Valentine’s Day & Presidents’ Day Weekend, EFA+ Community! 🇺🇸✨
We hope your long weekend is filled with love, rest, and quality time with those who matter most. 💕
We look forward to welcoming our students back on Wednesday, February 18th—ready for another great week of learning, creativity, and connection!
Enjoy the break! 💫
Fractions, teamwork, and a little mystery! 🔐➗ Our 4th graders tackled a Fraction Escape Room and crushed the challenge.
🎶✨ EFA+ Treble Makers Shine at the South Dakota Legislature! ✨🎶
Our EFA+ Treble Makers had an unforgettable day in Pierre for Arts Advocacy Day at the South Dakota Legislature! They joined voices with students from Buchanan Elementary (Pierre) and Philip Elementary to form the South Dakota Arts Ambassador Choir, performing beautifully in the Capitol Rotunda. What an incredible way to represent the power of arts education across our state!
Students also had the special opportunity to meet renowned South Dakota artist Dale Lamphere — especially exciting after viewing his sculpture Dignity on the drive to Pierre.
After their inspiring performance, students enjoyed a Capitol tour led by Mr. Mickelson (Ms. Mickelson’s father). The day continued with an exciting invitation into the Senate session, where our students were formally introduced to the senators.
We are so proud of our Treble Makers for representing EFA+ with talent, confidence, and heart. The arts matter — and our students are powerful advocates! ❤️🎵
🎭🌍
5th graders brought history to life in Drama by creating historical tableaus from the Elizabethan Age and the Age of Exploration.
Powerful poses, thoughtful details, and a whole lot of learning in action!
🎭✨ Calling EFA+ Alumni! ✨🎭
Are you a middle or high school alum who loves theatre behind the scenes?
EFA+ is looking for alumni students to join our backstage crew for Alice in Wonderland Jr.!
This is a great opportunity to:
🖤 Be part of a live production
🖤 Learn backstage and technical theatre skills
🖤 Support younger performers
🖤 Reconnect with the EFA+ community
If you’re interested, please fill out the application linked below. We’d love to have you back in the wings with us!
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1r3VIK7Va9qwJIKp_1_JPZUccNKyv0_WfzVWYeM_S_Qk/edit?usp=drivesdk
✨🎭
Kindergartners are working on developing facial expressions in Drama!
Through play, movement, and imagination, students are learning how faces help tell a story and show emotions.
As you can see, we have some future stars developing their skills! ⭐️
🎭✨ Lights, sound… ACTION! ✨🎭
Our 1st graders have been busy bringing science to life through an exciting puppet show all about light and sound!
During art-integration, students worked in teams to storyboard original stories: each one featuring an animal, a weather event, and a creative solution. They chose sound effects to add drama and excitement while practicing what they’ve learned about sound and vibration.
In science, they experimented with different techniques to build puppets and create lighting and sound effects. In drama, they wrote and practiced narration.
Soon they will perform their puppet shows for their classmates.
So much creativity, collaboration, and learning—all rolled into one show-stopping experience 🌟👏
So proud of our EFA+ alumni! 🎭✨
Congratulations on a wonderful run of Annie Jr. at Whittier Middle School. Your passion and commitment to the arts continue to inspire us—keep shining!
(Judah, Jaylen, Claudia, Colette, Grace, Keida, and Lily)
We hope you’ll join us tomorrow, Tuesday, February 3 at 6:30 PM in the multipurpose room for our PTA meeting. New faces are always welcome, and it’s never too late to get involved. Come as you are—we’d love to have you!
Our 2nd graders combined math and art in this creative place value lesson! 🎨➕
In Art Integration, students created place value pictures using circles to represent hundreds, tens, and ones. Afterward, they took time to observe each other’s artwork and used the place value “code” to identify the numbers shown.
🎨 Kindergarten Art Integration 🎨
Our kindergarteners have been busy learning through art + science! This lesson focused on forces, specifically push and pull, while also exploring primary colors and how they mix to create secondary colors.
Students experimented with movement and texture through hands on art experiments like box and ball painting, paint scrapers, and straw painting.
💙❤️💛
So much creativity, curiosity, and FUN learning happening all at once!
5th grade students have been hard at work on nonfiction writing! As part of their unit, they researched world landmarks, and wrote informational pieces about them. Students then brought their learning to life by building creative recreations of their chosen landmarks. 🌍✨
Here are some of their amazing builds!
Friday, January 23, 2026, will be a Remote Learning Day in the Sioux Falls School District!
iPads and Chromebooks were sent home with each student earlier today. We will not have in-person learning in the schools, but students are expected to connect to their Canvas account from home for assignments and learning resources. They have practiced this at school and know what is expected of them.
Additional information for Students and Families can be found here: https://app.smore.com/n/wgz62
iPads and Chromebooks were sent home with each student earlier today. We will not have in-person learning in the schools, but students are expected to connect to their Canvas account from home for assignments and learning resources. They have practiced this at school and know what is expected of them.
Additional information for Students and Families can be found here: https://app.smore.com/n/wgz62
This morning, students gathered in their MI Family groups for MI Exchange. They listened to Martin’s Big Words, a picture book about the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and how he used his words to spread a message of equality for all. The book’s stained-glass style illustrations inspired the art focus for the lesson. Students learned about stained glass and explored famous examples from around the world, then reflected on a “big word” they would like to share with others. Using their word and stained glass as inspiration, students created artist trading cards for their designs. ✨🎨
Here are some more moments captured at our EFA+ smArt Bowl! 🧠🎨
We are so proud of our students and grateful for the families, friends, and volunteers who helped make this fundraiser such a success.
📸 Photo credit: Emily Spartz Weerheim
🎨🧠 What a fantastic day at our smArt Bowl! 🧠🎨
Today’s smArt Bowl was a huge success and an important fundraiser supporting our A+ program. We are so proud of our students for their hard work, dedication, and enthusiasm as they learned their answers and confidently showed what they know!
A big thank you to our volunteers who joined us today to quiz students and help make this event run so smoothly—we couldn’t do it without you.
We are also incredibly grateful to the parents, friends, and family members who supported our students by helping them study and by generously pledging money. Your encouragement and support make a meaningful difference.
Thank you to everyone who helped make the smArt Bowl such a fun and successful celebration of learning! 💛✨
🎨🧠 VOLUNTEERS NEEDED — TOMORROW MORNING! 🧠🎨
Our EFA+ smArt Bowl is happening tomorrow, January 16, and we are short on volunteers to help quiz students.
Students have been working hard—gathering pledges, studying, and practicing their quiz questions—and we need a few friendly adults to help make this exciting event a success!
👉 No special expertise required—just a willingness to read questions and encourage our amazing kids.
👉 Short time commitment, big impact
If you’re available tomorrow morning and can help, we’d love to have you! Please use this link to sign up:
https://m.signupgenius.com/#!/showSignUp/904044FAEAB2CA02-60488218-smart
Thank you for supporting our students and the arts! 💙🎭📚
