On Monday of this week, the kindergarten classes had a special visitor who read the book, The Napping House, to them.  The visitor was our Superintendent, Dr. McKersie, who reads to every kindergarten class in the district every year and whose visits are very well received by everyone.  Not only does he have a special way of communicating with the young children which they enjoy immensely, but the visits provide him a snapshot of the students in each of the schools.  

 

All students have taken the winter screening of the STAR assessments in recent days or will be in the coming days.  You may recall students in grades one through five took the assessment in the areas of reading and math in the fall and parent reports were issued at the conferences.  The assessments are being administered again, including to our kindergartners, who will take them for the first time, for a winter benchmark measure.  Parent reports will be sent home in the coming weeks.  Please remember this is one piece of information that is gathered, among many other pieces of information, regarding student performance and provides feedback to teachers for instructional purposes.

 

This year's ISD School Improvement Plan is now on our website.  The plan focuses on the area of math, specifically, communicating mathematical reasoning.  The tool chosen as a means of measuring growth is the 2016 SBA math results in that particular claim.  As I have shared in the past, our 2015 SBA results were very good but this was one area that was not as high as the others.  The teachers are using a variety of methods to accomplish this goal, with all of them using the teaching strategy, feedback, to further advance student thinking in this area.

 

Next Thursday, Feb. 4th, I will conduct a lockdown drill to review emergency practices with the staff and students.  Representatives from central office, as well as the fire and police departments, will be here to facilitate the drill.

 

During the month of February, we are conducting a "dried marker" drive.  Have your children round up all the dried out markers you have at home and bring them into school.  Mrs. Hartofilis, who coordinated our battery drive (it's not too late to bring any dead batteries if you are attending Movie Night - a collection box will be there) is coordinating this drive as well.  She is our "Green" committee representative and passionate about her role.  Thank you and have a great week.