End of Day Pick-Up
Please remind your children with younger siblings that they should check out with their advocacy teacher and then immediately go to stand with their youngest sibling for pick up. This speeds the process up and helps us to load cars more efficiently. Older siblings standing with younger ones are expected to follow all of the same rules and be respectful to the teachers they are standing with.
MAP testing will be this week on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday
We will be going over expectations for computer use on Monday and assign computers in order to begin testing on Tuesday morning. We will begin switching for Social Studies and Science classes in the afternoons this week but will remain with advocacy classes for testing in the mornings.
Picture Day is this Friday, August 17th!
Forms for ordering are in your child's Friday folder. (I forgot to send Friday Folders home last Friday, I will send them home on Monday!)
Please send a Healthy Snack
Students are already beginning the year trying to have candy at snack time. We have snack daily in the morning and would like each student to have access to a healthy and appropriate snack at that time. Candy is never acceptable for a morning snack and suckers are not appropriate for school at any time. Please send a healthy snack for your child to have at that time. I do typically have emergency snacks on hand but it gets expensive for me if I am giving several a day out to students who regularly don't bring a snack. If you would like to send a box of something shelf-stable for your child to have on hand here we can find a place to store it.
Lunches
Please be sure that your student has an appropriate and adequate lunch each day. We are required by law to offer them a balanced lunch so we must have them get an emergency lunch that you will pay for if they are not bringing one with them from home. Please send utensils with your child for lunch, we are trying to lower the waste that we have at school, and plastic utensils aren't recyclable.
Toy Policy
No card games of any kind are allowed in the 3-4 pod (such as Pokemon or Magic the Gathering). We find that it is always a distraction and students begin to have issues with trading and selling cards, none of which we want to have here at school. Also, there is really not enough time for them to play with them at recesses and the clean up is frustrating. Please do not allow any cards to come to school.
All other toys can come out at recess only unless it is an approved fidget for use during classes. Slime or putty of any kind is generally not acceptable for classes but can be used during recesses and quiet time.
Personal Items in Specials Policy
Our pod has decided to strictly enforce students not taking personal items of any kind with them to specials. These are times when students should be actively engaged in other things and should not have personal items with them as a distraction. Our policy is that we will take it if we see it and they will get it back at the end of the quarter in which it was taken. This includes purses or bags of any kind, toys, journals and pens or markers, and fidgets. Water bottles are allowed for PE only. Please contact your child's advocacy teacher if you have concerns or questions about this policy.
REVIEW FROM LAST WEEK
Communication
The best method of communication for all 3-4 teachers is email. You should always receive a response within 48 hours (excluding weekends). We love communication and believe it is valuable for our students to know that their teachers and parents are working together for their benefit. Please see the communication pathway in the Community Handbook which suggests always communicating with your child's advocacy or content area teacher first regarding concerns or questions and then moving to contacting the team lead teacher, Cassie Seybold, if that becomes necessary.
Hot Lunches
Our hot lunch provider has changed, please reference newsletters coming from the school for more information. Also, be aware that individual milk purchase is no longer available. If you still have punches available purchased last year you can be refunded for those.
Advocacy
The school-wide advocacy focus for the month of August is Starting Strong! This includes relationship and community building, social and emotional integration and regulation, academic tools, organization and time management, as well as the culture of school in general. We will be talking a lot about procedures, expectations and class/school norms this first month in order to set the stage for a productive and successful school year.