FROM MY DESK TO YOURS #2
August 19, 2017
“The Heart of St. Paul … Growing Together in Faith, Knowledge, and Virtue”
St. Paul Pray for us
Dear St. Paul Families:
Happy New Year to all!!! We had a wonderful first week of school with your children. Our first full day with our new lunch program went well and after this next full week of schedules we will be back in the swing of things. Don’t forget to sign up for our new lunch program. The food is awesome, and the kids love it!
Once again, I will be posting each week my Sunday bulletin board. This will always include a prayer for the week, any messages that I need to communicate, Hats Off Section to acknowledge special achievements of our students and school community and the week at a glance for the following week. Upon the suggestion of PTO, I will also be posting this message on our bi-weekly Newsletter that goes out to all parents on Monday and Thursday with school messages and forms for all to have at your fingertips. My message will only be in the Monday Newsletter for those who may have missed it. Hopefully it will aid in closing the communication gap for parents that may not have looked at my Sunday Bulletin board in past years.
Most of the teachers have already updated their bulletin board for this week. Our “golden rule” is that these will be updated every Mondays by 11:00 am. I was pleasantly surprised so many of the teachers were already on top of it!!!!
Please join me in welcoming Mrs. Tricia Benac to the staff as our new 6th grade Language Arts and Social Studies teacher. By adding Mrs. Benac to the staff, we are now able to offer smaller core classes for our middle school students and another group to our Advisory program. Mrs. Benac comes to us from St Joseph Manchester Parish where she has a daughter, Grace, enrolled in 7th grade. She is a veteran teacher of 17 years in Parkway School District with certification in both Middle School Language Arts and Social Studies. Let’s extend a warm St. Paul Welcome to Mrs. Benac, our newest staff member.
Both our new Advisory/Morning Meeting program will begin this week in all grade levels. As I mentioned last week this is a school-wide initiative that we are excited to offer our students. (Last week’s bulletin contains a description of this new programming.) I know that many of our Middle School students were apprehensive about this and I met with the students on Wednesday, first thing, to give them a more in-depth explanation for the programming. I think initially the students thought that ALL their classes were going to be a combination of 6-8th grades and they would never get to be with their grade level classmates! Once they realized that this was not the case and they would be with these groups the first 30 minutes of each day and then back together in grade level groups they were relieved.
Eighth grade was genuinely concerned that they would not be together for any of those special 8th grade activities! In our schedule we have 50 minutes allotted each day where the entire 8th grade class will be together for Confirmation prep and special event planning. Once they were assured that they still had this; they were all smiles.
I am looking to this year as one of growth opportunities and exposure for our Middle School students. We are offering an additional class three times a week for 50 minutes. This is our E-hour. E stands for enrichment. Each of our students will be given the opportunity to experience 6 weeks of special classes that are designed to expose our children to a higher level of thinking and learning. They will include: Equations Team, Publishing (newspaper, magazine and possibly media publications), Engineering is Elementary Class, Robotics, Music and PE Enrichment through STREAM education, and Genius Hour which is a project-based program.
Every student in Middle school will enjoy the opportunities offered in each of these enrichment classes. This class will NOT be given for a grade, although an end project will be required for all students. Enrichment of learning and student exposure to the different types of learning opportunities they will experience in the years to come are the main goals for these classes. The topics for classes were carefully chosen to include areas of writing, science, social studies, math, and the arts. E-hour classes will begin this week so don’t forget to ask your middle school student about their new classes!
Thanks to Mother’s Club and our participation in last year’s Spirit Sprint, we have installed new water fountains that are made to especially fill water bottles. Because of this, all children may bring water bottles to school to have in their classrooms. All bottle must have closable lids so that we do not have water spills everywhere. The younger students must be able to open and close the lids on their own, please. Regular store-bought plastic water bottles (that the kids can flip) are not permitted. Please make sure that your child’s name is on the bottle in magic marker.
In closing, please mark your calendars for St. Paul Annual Curriculum Evening which will be held for Primary classes, 1-3 on Wednesday, August 29th and Intermediate/Middle School on Thursday, August 30th. I will give you more information on this event in my bulletin next week. I am changing the format a little for the Intermediate/Middle School meeting to accommodate parents that have children at both levels. Stay tuned. Until next week …
With blessings from my heart,
Fran
HATS OFF TO THE FOLLOWING:
THIS WEEK AT A GLANCE:
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