Beagle 
Bugle

PTA Newsletter 09.28.15
  Website: 
In This Issue
Art Docent Orientation
Art Contest - PTA Reflections
Scholastic Book Fair
Redmond SchoolPool
Enrichment Class: Chess Club
Enrichment: IXL Math
Enrichment: Spelling Bee
Yearbook Photos Please
Box Tops Contest!
Long-Term Facilities Planning
Extra - Extra! (Little bits of news)
Quick Links
IMPORTANT DATES
(Filtered for Rockwell)

Sept. 28th, Monday
Art Docent Orientation/Training
7pm - 8:30pm in the Library

Sept. 28th, Monday
Long-Term Facilities Planning Task Force
Meeting-Open to the Public
Redmond High School
6:30 pm- 8:30 pm

Sept. 29th, Tuesday
Middle School Quest Info Night
*for 5th graders and parents
LWHS-Performing Arts Ctr
7-8:30 pm

Oct. 12, 13, 15 - M/T/TH
Half-Day Elementary Conferences 
(11:30 am Release)

Oct 12, 13, 14, 15 - M/T/W/TH
Scholastic Book Fair in the Library
(See times in article below)

Oct. 16th, Friday
No School/L.E.A.P. Day

Oct. 20th, Tuesday
School Picture Day

Oct. 22nd Thursday
**First PTA General Membership Mtg of the school year - all invited!

Oct. 30th, Friday
All-School Costume Parade
2:00 p.m.
ART DOCENT TRAINING AND ORIENTATION MEETING

Calling all classroom art docents!  

It's time to kick off the art docent program for the year with an orientation meeting for new and returning art docents!

 ART DOCENT ORIENTATION DATE:
 Monday, September 28th
 7:00 pm - 8:30 pm
 Rockwell Library

Art Docents Chair
PTA REFLECTIONS ART COMPETITION  - 2015/16

Participate in the PTA Reflections Art Competition:
"Let Your Imagination Fly"

Do your kids love to create pictures? Write stories, poems or essays? Take photos? Compose music? Create dances or movies? Sign them up for the Reflections Art Competition!

The Reflections Art Competition is a National PTA arts in education program that provides an opportunity for students to use their creative talents and to be recognized for their work. There are four rounds of competition starting at the Local PTA level with the possibility of progressing to Council, State, and National PTA competitions. Students who win the top prizes at the National competition win cash awards and a trip to the National PTA convention and Reflections awards ceremony.

Each year, Reflections challenges students to create art that supports a specific theme. This year's theme is "Let Your Imagination Fly".
Students may enter through their school PTSA in any of six art categories: literature, music composition, photography, visual arts, dance choreography, and film production.

Reflections Participants will:

* Have fun creating works of art at home.
* Have their work displayed at a school art show.
* Receive a certificate and ribbon for participating and be recognized at school art walk.
* Have their work reviewed by local art professionals.
* Outstanding work may be sent to the PTSA Council, State, and National competitions.

To get started with Reflections, download and read the rules and guidelines for the art category your child plans to enter. (Click on the links below.) Please also download and read the General Participation Rules that apply to all art categories. Download our PTSA's student entry form HERE.  Please also find the hard copies of the entry forms in the Rockwell office. 

* General Participation Rules- Applies to all entries. 

* Literature -- Works of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, prose, drama, short stories and lyrics. 

* Music Composition -- Original musical composition, with or without words. 

* Photography - NEW MAXIMUM SIZE: Prints up to 18 x 2" and 3/8" thick in color or black and white, including the matt (if desired), techniques allowed: photogram, retouched, montage, sandwich and multiple exposure. Adding words to the photo is not allowed. 

* Visual Arts - NEW MAXIMUM SIZE: 18" X 24" and 3/8" thick. Painting in tempera, oil, acrylic, watercolor & t-shirt paints, computer generated art, two-dimensional collage, printmaking, needlework & leather tooling. Nothing dimensional such as string, noodles, buttons, etc. may be attached to the surface the work. 

* Film/Video -- Original works, with or without sound, of animation, narrative, documentary, experimental or music video/film. Student must be writer, director and camera person. 

* Dance Choreography - Choreographed dance created by the student. 

Find more information about the Reflections program at 


For more information, please contact:
Rockwell Reflections Co-Chairs
SCHOLASTIC BOOK FAIR IN THE LIBRARY

Download Copy of Flyer here:
REDMOND SCHOOL POOL - ATTN: WALKERS/BIKE RIDERS
Join the Redmond SchoolPool at Norman Rockwell!
Norman Rockwell and the City of Redmond are partnering up to encourage our students to walk, bike, carpool, and ride the bus to school in October!  

The Redmond SchoolPool is a secure, online network for our school that helps families find carpool partners, form 'walking school buses' and start a 'bike buddies' program.

Just by participating, you help raise money for our school's PTA. We'll earn $10 from the SchoolPool when you sign up online and another $10 when you take a walking, biking, carpool or bus trip and add it to the online calendar ($20/per family).

How To Participate
  • Verify your account You'll receive an email with a link to join the secure online network for our school. This usually takes 24-48 hours to get set up.
  • Log In! Once logged in, you can search for carpool partners and neighboring students to walk or bike to school with. Not sure how to find SchoolPool matches? Instructions are here.
  • Add trips to your calendar! Add all your walking, biking, carpooling, and bus trips to school on the calendar to earn rewards for the school. Adding trips to the calendar is how the PTA will earn an additional $10 and how you will be entered to win prizes for you and your student.
You can email the SchoolPool staff if you have any questions at redmondschoolpool@redmond.gov, or call (425) 556-2442.
 
Thanks for helping us raise money & reduce traffic around Norman Rockwell!

Rockwell Secretary
-and-
PTA Co-VP FUNdraising
CHESS CLUB - REGISTER NOW
Chess Club at Rockwell / ALL AGES & ALL SKILL LEVELS

Mondays, 3:00 - 4:00 PM
10/19 - 12/7 (10 classes) 
$122 registration for the session, includes a T-shirt

Fridays, 3:00 - 4:00 PM
10/23 - 12/18 (10 classes) 
$122 registration for the session, includes a T-shirt
*No Class Friday, 11/27

All classes will take place in the Rockwell Library.

Are you looking for a quality after school program that encourages self confidence and an increase in memory and math skills for your child? Please consider signing up for Rockwell Chess Club! Chess is a fun way to improve patience, concentration and sportsmanship. The Rockwell Chess Club accepts players of all ages and with all levels of experience. 

Rockwell Chess Club is a PTA sponsored enrichment program. Please note that by signing your child up for Chess Club, you are also committing to volunteer during ONE chess session (volunteer responsibilities are easy and will be explained in a detailed email once you register). Volunteers will
not be required to teach chess.

To sign up, register with Chess4Life at the links below. Please note that you are registering for ONE day of chess club - either on Monday or Friday. 

Monday Registration here

Friday Registration here

If you have any questions, please contact:
PTA Chair, Vani Jain at nrchessclub@gmail.com.
IXL Online Math Program Has Begun
The Lake Washington Schools Foundation has again awarded Rockwell with grant funding for IXL Math subscriptions for all students. IXL Math is an excellent tool to help sharpen students' math skills; featuring comprehensive coverage of math concepts, immediate feedback and question-specific explanations to solidify understanding of each concept practiced - from pre-K to algebra, geometry and pre-calculus.

All students received their IXL Math Login ID and password. Students can use IXL at school or at home by accessing https://www.ixl.com/signin/nres

Parents, please take advantage of this opportunity to strengthen your child's math education, by encouraging them to practice on the website regularly and/or as assigned by our teachers.

Fifth grade parents, the Lake Washington Schools Foundation also
provided grant funding for the IXL program at Redmond Middle School.
Helping your child to become familiar with this program now will make the transition to middle school easier next year.

Our PTA is again sponsoring the Prize Program; with small prizes students can earn each time a milestone is reached at bi-weekly checkpoints throughout the year. The first progress checkpoint is September 30th.

Minerva Butler and Susan Reiger
IXL Math Coordinators
SCHOOL SPELLING BEE - REGISTER NOW
Registration for the School Spelling Bee for all students from 
grades 1-5 is still open!

Go to www.youthspellingbee.com to register. The fee is $25, with checks made out to "Rockwell PTA/Spelling Bee Club" and dropped off at the office or to the student's teacher. The fee covers enrollment, a participation certificate, and entry into the Final School Spelling Bee provided that the student qualifies by first passing the Written Round Test. 

If the registration fee is a financial challenge for you, then please contact us at nrspellingbeeclub@gmail.com. 
 
This year's program is structured to be a self-study program and there will be no weekly coaching classes. We will hold mock bees for practice and will send out the dates shortly.  All necessary information will be posted on our website www.youthspellingbee.com.  Please check back regularly for updates.
 
Please email nrspellingbeeclub@gmail.com with any questions. We look forward to helping your child achieve their goal!
 
Sarita Valji, Barbara Puk, and Chamu Kallem
YEARBOOK PHOTOS NEEDED!
The yearbook staff can only create an amazing yearbook if we have 
your great photos. Did you take cute first day of school photos? We need them! Did you take cute back to school BBQ photos? We need them.

Please upload them directly to the secure LifeTouch website by visiting
https://community.lifetouch.com. 
Register and use our NEW school
access code: PHEBEV.

Interested in helping out on the yearbook staff this year? The
software is easy to learn, the yearbook staff is fun and the kids are
cute! You can work on the yearbook from home at any time
convenient for you. Send an email if you have questions or would love
to join the team.

Thanks,
Minerva Butler
Gaby Olson
Maya Shani
Yearbook Co-Chairs
2015 BOX TOP & LABELS FOR EDUCATION CONTEST
We will have an All School contest starting October 12th!! 

Our goal is to collect 10,000 Box Tops and 5000 Labels for Education!!

Go through your pantry and start clipping today $$. Have your relatives send you their Box Tops and Labels for Education! 

DO NOT send them in until the contest starts. Additional information is coming soon!

More Info/Where to find Box Tops and Labels For Education:

Box Tops: Click here to sign up for an account and learn more about this program that gives money to our school! You get points ($$$$) for the school from buying qualifying General Mills products like Cereal, Hanes, Ziploc and Land O Lakes. Every Box Top given to the school or registered online earns the school 10 cents.

Labels for Education: Click here Labels for Education is a fun and easy program where families work together to "Earn Free Stuff" for Rockwell! By collecting UPCs from our many participating products like Goldfish Crackers, Campbell Soup, and V8, our school earns points that can be redeemed for recess materials (Balls, Chalk and more fun stuff)!
LONG-TERM FACILITIES PLANNING
As you may be aware, the district is outgrowing its school buildings and some buildings are aging. The Long-Term Facilities Planning Task Force met on a regular basis for the past year to discuss this issue and come up with a draft recommendation to the district to resolve this issue.
 
You can provide feedback on the draft recommendations through following methods:

-       Visit the online open house

-       Join the conversation in person by attending a community meeting: Mon, Sept. 28th, 6:30 - 8:30pm at Redmond High School

-       Attend the Task Force town hall meeting: Wed, Oct 7, at 6pm, at Rose Hill MS (13505 NE 75th St, Redmond)
 
The Task Force will consider all the input and make final recommendations to the school board, which will take the final action.

Emily Papel & Sayo Hinitz
LTFPTF Members, Rockwell Elementary & Redmond Middle School
EXTRA - EXTRA! (SMALL BITS OF NEWS)
  • Local Businesses - Advertise in our Rockwell School Directory! Find out pricing and submission guidelines here.  
  • Rockwell PTA is looking for a Charitable Giving Chair to organize and communicate details to our school community for the upcoming Northwest Harvest's 2015 Kids for Cans Food Drive Challenge (and possibly a similar drive in the Spring). Contact Cari Scotkin for more information. 
  • A few more PTA chair or committee positions remain for this school year (5th Grade Promotion Chair, Rockwell Awards Committee and Volunteer Tea, and a few more)...can you help? Check them out here! 
  • Don't forget to PASS THE HAT - Rockwell PTA's annual fundraiser. Click Here for more information, where the funds go, and why we suggest a $75/donation per student. Or, click here for our Pass The Hat video!
  • We also rely on Corporate Matching. Many local companies will match your Pass the Hat donation - more money for our students! Submit your matching request to your company today and reference Norman Rockwell Elementary PTA.
  • LWPTSA/Seattle Sounders Night: Sounders take on the LA Galaxy at Century Link field on Sunday Oct. 4 at 6:30 p.m. Find out more and get tickets HERE. $2 from each sale goes to our school's PTA!
QUICK LINKS - IN EVERY ISSUE

-AmazonSmile: Give a little back to Rockwell PTA by using

our AmazonSmile link!  Bookmark it and use the link every time you shop.

 

-Volunteer Application:   LWSD Volunteer application. It's easy to complete and is good for 2 years. Fill yours out or check your renewal status today!

 

-Rockwell PTA Facebook Page: Stay connected and updated on  Rockwell PTA & school info. Stop by and "Like" us!  


 -Bookmark & Register for your account on our  New PTA  Website. Calendar info, announcements, forms, ordering items, and much more!

Subscribe!
Join Our Mailing List
Bugle Article Submissions Welcome
  
The Beagle Bugle welcomes article submissions from students and parents.  Student journalists may submit articles about current events, students opinion-editorials and poems or short stories.  Parents may submit articles about PTA events and school related topics. 

Any article that is unrelated to PTA or Rockwell must be approved by the Lake Washington School District, and, upon approval, will be posted in the Peachjar eflyer system.  The Lake Washington School District website has more information on the submission and approval process.

Short pieces will be edited for inclusion in the Bugle, longer pieces will be posted on the website with a link in the Bugle.  The Deadline for submissions for the next weekly Bugle is the preceding Thursday.  The Bugle Staff reserves the right to be selective regarding the materials that are publicized.

Contact the Bugle staff or submit articles at rockwellbugle@gmail.com. 
  
Sincerely,
Angie Ballas
Beagle Bugle Editor
Norman Rockwell Elementary PTA