Pershing Middle School Newsletter

UPCOMING EVENTS:

November 23 - Boys Basketball vs Carver (3:00)
7th grade - at Carver
8th grade - Home

November 25 - NO SCHOOL-Professional Learning Day

November 26-27 - NO SCHOOL - Thanksgiving Vacation

November 30 - December 4 -
YEARBOOK SALES (this week only)

December 2 - Boys Basketball vs Reed (3:00)
7th grade - at Reed
8th grade - Home

December 5 - Boys
Basketball vs PV (9:00 am)
7th grade - Home
8th grade - PV

December 8 - 2 hour early release - Professional Learning Day

December 8 - H1N1 Vaccine Clinic (more information to be sent home)

PERSHING ATTENDANCE
Please call if your child will miss school for any reason or if you need to check your child out early.
523-2415

Check out Pershing Middle School's updated website:

Pershing Middle School Website

Greetings!

We had a great turn-out at our November PTSA meeting-thanks so much to all of you who attended. We voted to replace the clear plexi-glass on the marquee because it is stained and broken, and to purchase some gift cards for giveaways at the Student Council dance.

Pershing had a great showing at the PTA Clothing Bank on Wednesday, Nov. 11. Thanks to everyone who volunteered. I had never been to the Clothing Bank, and I was so impressed! The Clothing Bank serves a real need in our community. Families are recommended through their schools, and once they receive that voucher, they can shop up to three times a year. Each child can receive an allotted amount of clothing at each visit as well as new underwear and socks once a year. The children and families were so grateful; it was an amazing volunteer experience.

At the PTSA meeting, we discussed our desire to be more involved in the Clothing Bank. To that end, we have scheduled a "Jeans in January" drive. The Clothing Bank simply cannot keep enough jeans in stock, so we will ask the students to donate gently used and new jeans throughout the month of January. We are hoping to involve a little friendly competition, so look for more details soon.
Many PTSA committees are continuing to work hard, and for that I am especially appreciative.

At this time of Thanksgiving, I feel especially blessed that my daughter attends Pershing. Did you know that Pershing Middle School was one of seven Springfield schools to appear on the Top 10 Lists for Highest Performing Schools? This list was published in March 2009 by the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. Pershing has it all-wonderful, creative teachers; dedicated coaches and sponsors; committed administrators and staff; smart, enthusiastic students; and parents who truly care.

It is an honor to lead your PTSA this year.
I hope you enjoy many blessings with your families next week!

Sincerely,
Martha Crise
PTSA President

Yearbooks On Sale
One Week Only!

Pershing yearbooks will be on sale before school
in the school office
November 30 - December 4
$17.00
Cash or check
(Please make check payable to
Pershing and include a telephone number on it)

***We do not order extra books so if you want one, you must order it NOW!

From the Principal

Dear Pershing Families,

It was great to see so many of you here for Parent-Teacher conferences. Many thanks to our PTSA for providing dinner and snacks to our teachers as they worked many long hours during conference week. The treats made the long evenings much more enjoyable.

While I do not like to wish time away, I am glad that October is behind us!! We had many students and staff members catch the various illnesses going around and the absentee rate was extremely high for Pershing. Our worst day saw about 12% of our students out. Our daily attendance rate for the month of October was 93.04% which is down over 3% from last October! Overall, year-to-date, our attendance rate is 94.88% which is down 1.88% when compared to the 08/09 school year. Compared to other SPS Middle Schools, our attendance rate puts us at 5th place out of the 9 middle schools. On the bright side, November is looking up. While we do have some illness, we are back to our normal trends for absentee rates. Parents, thank you for doing everything in your power to get your student to school each day he/she is able and for keeping him/her home when he/she is ill. It is imperative we do all we can to NOT spread illness.

We are all looking forward to the upcoming Thanksgiving break. It is a wonderful time to be with family and to reflect on all of the good things we have in our lives. I would like to say that I am very appreciative of the fact that I work with an outstanding school community. I appreciate the dedication to education I see from our students, parents, and faculty. Pershing is an awesome place to be and I consider it a privilege to be the principal here! Thank you for all of the support you have shown to me as well as the Pershing staff and, most importantly, thank you for the support you show to your student. Enjoy the break!

Educationally yours,

Dr. Natalie Cauldwell

Stay connected with SPS

Springfield Public Schools has several new ways for you to stay up to date with district news and information. By signing up for the SPS E-Newsletter, Twitter and Facebook, you can receive time-sensitive news and helpful information including school cancellations, news releases, messages from the superintendent and school board meeting summaries. The E-Newsletter allows you to select the types of information that is most important to you.

To get connected:

Join the SPS group on Facebook
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Follow SPS on Twitter
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Congratulations to the Star Generals for November!

The following students were chosen as Students of the Month for their outstanding work and attitude in the classroom.

Travelers Team-   Bobby Spence
Voyagers Team-   Alec Jarvis

E-Corps Team-   Zach Miller
PRIDE Team-   Sarai Cox

Green Team-   Jacob Trammell
Screaming Eagles Team-   Tyler Hedrick

Counselor's News

Let's Cooperate

How can your child be a contributing
member of your family, her class, and
her community? By cooperating.
Here's how to encourage a spirit
of teamwork in your youngster:

November 2009 Middle Years Newsletter

TEAM NEWS

Team News articles are published quarterly. Additional articles will be communicated as submitted.

Link to the Pershing Middle School Team websites here:

Travelers
Voyagers
E-Corps
Pride
Green Team
Screaming Eagles

TRAVELERS NEWS

Thanks to all of the parents who helped with pumpkin carving! The kids had a blast, and the jack o' lanterns looked great. Our next community service project will be holiday baskets, so please keep an eye out for information coming home soon.

Midquarter reports for second quarter will be coming home the week of November 30. Please also keep in mind that you may check your child's grades at any time on STI Home.

If your family will be traveling during the holidays outside of the scheduled vacation days, please let us and the office know ahead of time.

We hope you've had a chance to check out our new team web page. If you haven't, the address is:
http://springfieldpublicschoolsmo.org/pershing/middle/6thgrade/travelers/

Voyagers

We can't believe it's already 2nd Quarter! A few things we've been up to on our team...

�        This year, we will adopt a family to receive a holiday basket from our team. We will begin collecting items near the middle of November. We'll send a letter home with specific requests for donations at that time. Thank you for your generosity for allowing our adopted family to have a wonderful holiday season.

�        Thank you for keeping our students on track by checking those assignment guides at night! You can also stay connected through STI at home, and the Voyagers' website is now up and running with specific assignments and content being covered.

�        Mrs. Scholz is pleased to introduce Miss Amanda Porter, her student teacher from Evangel University. Miss Porter began her student teaching during 1st Quarter at Hillcrest High School, and we are lucky to have her through December 4th.

�        A big thank you to all of our Voyager students who participated in this year's PTA Reflections contest! We have such a talented group of students this year, and we can't wait to hear the results of the contest!

�        Parents should be seeing some familiar math problems coming out of Mrs. Shantz's math classes! She is teaching the traditional method of long division. Please help your children practice this at home, as it is necessary for working with decimals!

�        Parents- ask your children to show you "The Way"! They should all be VERY familiar with this, as we require all questions to be answered this "way" in all classes!

�        Keep working on those multiplication and division facts!

E-CORPS

E-Corps teachers would like to invite you to take a look at our team website home page. Although it is a work in progress, we are currently able to post our assignments and other information about our classes We will be adding information about our team and our classes throughout the year. You will find information on how to request homework assignments when your 7th grader is absent, how to schedule a conference, our team policies and a syllabus for each of our classes. We hope you will find the information helpful. You may visit our website at
http://springfieldpublicschoolsmo.org/pershing/middle/7thgrade/e-corps/index.htm.

In the past, the E-Corps teachers and students have adopted a family for the holidays. We have been so fortunate to have such caring students and parents who are willing to help make the holidays brighter for those less fortunate. Instead of adopting a single family this year, we would like to sponsor a food and toy drive. We would like to donate the food we collect to the Food Harvest and any toys, games or stuffed animals to Toys for Tots. We will begin collecting items upon return from Thanksgiving break.

Just a few reminders to help your 7th grader:

Please remind them to turn in homework when they return from being absent.

Also remind them to go to each teacher during Advisory the first day they return from an absence to collect make up work.

If you have not signed up for STI, you may do so in the office. STI is the grade book program which allows you to find out a student's current grade.

PRIDE TEAM

Happy Holidays from the Pride team. Keeping with the holiday spirit, we will be collecting food for the Ozark Food Harvest
Nov. 30th-Dec. 21st. Please send in nonperishable food items and personal hygiene items.
Hopefully we can make someone's holiday a little brighter.

The Pride Team would like to congratulate the November "Student of the Month", Sarai Cox. Sarai was chosen for her outstanding citizenship, strong work ethic and academic performance.

We would like to pass on a few reminders regarding make-up work during this cold and flu season.

�        Please request work by 10:00 in the morning if your child is absent two or more days.

�        Work needs to be picked up in the office by 3:00 in the afternoon.

�        Please check to see if textbooks are needed for assignments. We suggest you come with your child's locker number and combination.

�        Remind your child to turn in completed work upon returning, and check to see if any other work was assigned while he/she was gone.

�        If your child is only absent one day, remind him/her to get make-up work immediately upon returning to school. Do not wait until class.

WOW! This year is just flying by. Everyday Pride teachers feel so thankful to be working with such a wonderful group of children. Your support from home is greatly appreciated. We wish all of you a safe and happy holiday season.

GREEN TEAM

          As we celebrate Thanksgiving this month, the Green Team would like to give thanks for our wonderful group of students this year. Hardly a team meeting goes by without us commenting on what a nice eighth grade class we have. It makes such a difference in teaching when the students are friendly and polite.

          This month finds Ms. Adams and the Student Council raising over $500.00 for the Pupils' Consolidated Fund Drive, celebrating a fantastic Spirit Week, and gearing up for a fundraiser to benefit the Humane Society in December. Ms. Adams is also busy with cheerleading, and her classes are studying the Constitution.

Mr. Apperson is in the process of working on algebraic units in Math as well as powers and exponents. Algebra students are working with various forms of linear equations, slopes, and intercepts.

Mrs. Oelschlaeger's classes are doing an in-depth study of Anne Frank and the Holocaust by reading a play based on Anne Frank's diary.

Mrs. Walker's classes are working on their atom projects that are due November 23rd. Check out Mrs. Walker's website for more information.

          The Green Team will be collecting donations of food, toiletries, toys, clothing, money (which will be used to purchase gift certificates), and gift certificates for the Christmas Basket family we are helping this year. Please look for more information from your child after the Thanksgiving holiday.

          The Green Team appreciates the parental support we have received this year. If any parents were unable to schedule conferences and would like to meet now, please contact Mr. Apperson at 523-2510 or email him at eaapperson@spsmail.org to schedule a meeting. We would also like to thank our PTSA for the delicious meals, snacks, treats, and other various ways you support us.

          We have a new webpage with lots of information for parents and students. Please check it out for Green Team news, assignments, and project information. You can get there by going to the main Pershing website, clicking on 8th grade, and then clicking on Green Team.

Screaming Eagle Team News

Mrs. Brown's students are working on a Holocaust unit and reading the play, The Diary of Anne Frank. They will have a major project due before the holidays. You may access this information at her website.

Mr. Davis's students are studying the periodic table. They will be making a poster and model of the element of their choice to present to the class in December.

Mr. Baker's Screaming Eagles American History students have completed their study of the American Revolution. They are now concentrating on the Constitution and the early administrations under our Constitutional government. During their study of this fascinating time, the Screaming Eagles will be working on a major project entitled "Colonial Alphabet Book."

In math, students have completed a unit on equations and inequalities and are now working on exponents, square and cube roots, and scientific notation. This will be followed by a unit on percents. Algebra students have completed a unit on graphing linear equations and are now working on writing linear equations in various forms. All students in Mrs. Dorris' classes are working on a portfolio of their work so far this year. These portfolios are due January 7 and 8. Parents, please encourage your students to be working on it throughout the next month. The portfolio project is not a difficult project; however, it is lengthy and not to be put off until the night, or even the week, before the due date!

We enjoy working and learning together with our students. Thank you for sending us such a great group of young people! If, at any time, you have concerns or questions, please let us know.

R.E.A.D.

R.E.A.D. classes are continuing to work on reading and writing! Please make sure your students are completing their five entries and book club assignments for reading weeks.

The sixth graders are beginning a unit on approaching and navigating text during reading weeks. During writing weeks, we will be finishing up a study of the 6 + 1 traits. The seventh and eighth graders are continuing a unit on strategies to help them read and understand fiction stories. They are also working on elaborating their ideas during writing weeks, and have made a lot of progress in their writing!

I will be sending home grade checks for my class during the week of November 30 through December 4. Please look over your child's report and feel free to contact me with any concerns.

Christina Burt

523-2604

cjburt@spsmail.org