December/January 2016 Newsletter

Tiger TimesMission: At Eugene Field School, we challenge and inspire

students to become productive and successful citizens.

Dear Field Families,When I read this I knew immediately I had to put it in

for the many blessings I count this time of the year.I Am A Teacher & Administrator

“I” was born the first moment that a question leaped from the mouth of a child. Throughout the course of a day I am called upon to be an actor, friend, nurse and doctor, coach finder of lost articles, money lender, psychologist, substitute parent and a keeper of many.

I am the most fortunate of all who labor. I know that what I build with love and truth will last forever. I am privileged to see that life is reborn each day with new questions, ideas and friendships.

And whom do I have to thank for this wonderful life I am so fortunate to experience, each and every parent, guardian, or community member. Thank you for entrusting me with your greatest contribution to eternity, your children.

I have wept for joy at the weddings for former students, laughed with glee at the birth of their children, and stood in awe for professions they chose.

I have a past that is rich in memories; I have a present that is challenging and fun, because I am allowed to spend my days with the future.I Am A Teacher And I Am Thankful For It Every Day. “By John Wayne “Jack” Schlatter

Wishing everyone a HAPPY NEW YEAR too!!!! A new calendar year filled with inspiration and promise. Here at Field we are ready to make 2017 a year filled with success through hard work and dedication by providing students with daily opportunities to grow and be challenged. The

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Upcoming Events

Announcements:December:

2nd: Character Kids Teach 3rd: Tiger Choir Sings @ Felix Street Square 6:2013th: Freddy’s Night 15th: Basketball/Volleyball Team and Individual Pics16th: Choir Tour am19th: Reading Counts Skating Party20th: Sing Along, Early Dismissal, Christmas Break beginsJanuary:

3rd: No school for Students-Teacher PD4th: Students start back6th: Awards Assembly am/ Character Kids teach13th: Spelling Bee16th: No School MLK17th: Come in from the Cold event @ 5:30 pm20th: Blood Drive during school hours24th: 6th grade to EmpowerU

hard work is the responsibility of us all – teachers, students, staff, families and myself. I know together we will continue making learning authentic and meaningful to prepare them for life after graduation.

Mrs. Small’s Class enjoying Olive Garden

STUCO and Character Kid Information:

Please be watching for a note coming home stating Dress-Up days and information about a Warm Clothes Drive. We will collect any warm item in the month of December. Last year we met downtown and decorated everything we could with warm items for those in need. This is one of our favorite events!

*Please mark your calendars for January 17 th in the evening was we will host Come in From The Cold Night here at school. We have an evening of fun activities in where it is warm! More information to come soon!

Respect Winners for September:Kash Modlin, Jonny Sang, Jolie Proffit, Karina Zhou, Sophie Walker, Abriel Knapp, Caylee Turner, Rocael Hernandez, Airyonna King, Payton McCarthy, Ireland Johnson, Gunner Coons, Addie Bramlage, Jett Winn, Emma Ray, Noah Green and Sarah Jones

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In the Community:

5th grade participated in a CPR session presented by Mosaic. While doing the CPR they also completed the Mannequin Challenge!

Citizenship Winners for November will be in the next newsletter!

The Character Word for December is Compassion, which is caring for others with kindness. The character word for January is Tolerance meaning to accept differences of others and celebrate the common ground we share. Teachers

will be on the lookout for deserving students throughout both months!

Top TigerCounseling

Connection:You might be getting a call from me in the next week where I tell you that your child has been chosen as the TOP TIGER for his/her classroom. What does this mean you might be wondering? We are trying something new this year by recognizing two students per classroom per year (one in January and one in May) during an assembly that you will be invited to on the down low. Being a TOP TIGER doesn’t mean that you have to have the best grades and be the best at everything necessarily, but if your child has worked hard to turn things around, pull grades up, get things on track, be a good friend to all, show amazing character and just be an all-around good kiddo and student, then they might be chosen to be the TOP TIGER! The assembly is January 8th and not only will TOP TIGER be announced, but attendance, effort, reading, achievement, art, music, and PE awards will also be given out! Mark your calendars!

Huge Success at Basket Raffle and Chili Supper

A huge shout out to all the volunteers who helped with the basket raffle and

chili supper!! Thank you to all the children and families who donated items

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Below is a picture of an activity Mrs. Bramlage completed with 5th graders about dealing with peer pressure. Peer pressure is defined as the influence of one’s peer group. Peer pressure can take place at any age we know! Whether it is positive or negative peer pressure here are some tips to help those situations:

Step 1: Responding to your peers by dismissing the question, telling them no, making a joke, changing the subject, making an excuse to leave or turning the pressure around.

Step 2: Avoiding the problem by being careful who you hang out with, avoiding situations that lead to peer pressure, keeping busy with healthy activities, and finding a better way to impress friends.

Step 3: Building your confidence by establishing and reinforcing your convictions, finding other exciting things to do, doing

to the baskets. They were as wonderful as usual. Your participation and support for one of our biggest fundraisers of the year was gratefully

appreciated. Finally, a BIG thank you to Coach Snider for announcing the winners

Let’s Play School: Ireland JohnsonFamily Fun Night: Maclin McCullySnow Fun: Jordan MezaTailgate: Kalon White Lego’s: Jordan TuckerBook Basket: Yannick Eichenmiller

Dog Lovers: Sophie HarlowJunk Food: Callie Thompson Nerf: Joel GentryCampout: Abby LylePokemon: Joel Gentry Stuffed Animal/Plush: Ava KingSports: Lijia XieArt: Kaliana GinnMovie Night: Madison AlbanoAll Girls: Marin GrimsingerAll Boys: Kalon White

MUSIC NOTES:Thank you Veteran’s and Field Families for attending the assembly. Special thanks to Mrs. Becerra, Tiger Choir and 1st grade for helping to make it special. Thank you

for your service.

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Practicing Math Fact Fluency with Reflex

Do your kids enjoy playing video games? Silly question, right?? Now, a not-so-silly question. Does your child like math?

Whether or not your answer was yes or no, do you know that math fact fluency is a big part of whether or not students enjoy math and have confidence in their mathematical abilities? Math fact fluency is also a significant predictor of a student’s ability to perform on standardized tests-not to mention do their daily math work!

Math fact fluency is the fast, automatic recall of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division math facts. Many students struggle to obtain fact fluency, even after timed tests and flashcard practice.

Our SJSD Reflex program engages kids in video game settings, but all that fun hides a rigorous program developed with understanding of how the brain learns and retains math facts. The program is also adaptive to each user, going at the pace of the student. Students in grades 2-6 are using Reflex in their classroom, but they are also able and encouraged to use Reflex at home as long as they have access to a computer or the Internet.

Kids in Kindergarten and 1st grade can use Reflex when they are developmentally ready and have a conceptual understanding of numbers. If you are interested in having your Kindergarten or 1st grade student use Reflex at home, please talk to their classroom teacher.

It’s wonderful when fun and the learning of crucial content come together. If you have access at home, please watch your student use the Reflex program so that math fact fluency will be one “problem” solved.

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From the Clinic:

Just a reminder if your child is running a fever, vomiting or having loose stools, please keep them home. We encourage 24 hours free of symptoms

before sending them back to school. I encourage

healthy eating, drinking plenty of water, exercise,

getting enough sleep each night and frequent

handwashing to stay healthy! Remember, WATER IS YOUR BEST

FRIEND!

*If your student has forgotten their password please contact their teacher and they

can give it to you.

From our school family to your family, Happy Holidays!

Around the classrooms:

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Our lucky kindergarteners received new rekenrek rods from a PTA Tiger Mini-Grant. The rekenreks helped the students in math with the skill of finding the “partners” of a number. For example, for the number “8”, the partners could be “1+7”, “2+6”, “3+5”, etc.

In science, the students are investigating the concepts of pushing and pulling. They loved doing the online simulation and seeing what happened when an object was pushed or pulled with varying amounts of strength. So far, they have discovered that the more force you apply, the further an object will move when pushed or pulled. It has been an interesting unit so far!

1 st : Our first grade students had a wonderful time learning about what the Pledge of Allegiance means and presenting it during the Veteran’s Assembly! Students worked very hard practicing their reading parts, reading

together and performing!

2 nd : It is hard to believe that we are about to embark on our 16th week in school for this academic school

year. Time sure flies when you are learning. With that being said, we have come a long way as learners since we walked in the doors on the first day of school back in August. Second graders are adapting well to the increased use of technology in the classroom as they hone in and work on specific skills and concepts using the I-Ready program that we are piloting this year. We have completed our second diagnostic and continue to incorporate I-Ready reading and math lessons within the classroom every day. Their love for exploration in all things science related is unwavering. We are not only learning about science, but more specifically learning “how to” do science through active, hands-on, learning activities and experiments. Our latest exploration took our students’ level of understanding about matter to a deeper level as they had to predict what type of materials were best for building, in our case- building a boat that would float. Second grade students devised a plan for building and then put it into action. Once their boats were complete, they had the opportunity to be Scientists once again as they tested their models, recorded their observations, and analyzed the data collected.

3 rd : Third grade has been busy with a new unit of math. We have been measuring everything from length to mass. We have also learned about finding

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the author’s point of view and discussing whether that differs from our own point of view. We have many opinionated third graders This will be advantageous when we begin our opinion writing next week. We are very proud of our third graders and the growth we have seen already as we round out our first semester of third grade.

4 th : 4th grade has been doing some extensive research on the Mayflower in Writing. We have spent several days taking notes from several different sources, and practiced organizing the notes into paragraphs on specific topics regarding the mayflower. We discussed why the pilgrims left England, what life was like traveling on the mayflower, and what happened once they reached the New World. The students have enjoyed learning about history, and how the settlers came to America in search for a new world.

5 th :

Time sure is flying! Fifth grade has been learning a lot about plants and the different parts of a plant cell. They can even tell you that the chlorophyll in plants is what gives them their greenish color. How cool is that?

The students have also really focused in on finding the theme of various texts read in class. A theme is the big message that the author is trying to get across throughout the story. Students have had to find and use text

evidence to support the theme. 6 th :

The past couple of weeks, the sixth graders have been researching natural disasters and creating “textbook pages”

presenting their information.  The students recorded the information they found from their science textbooks and the internet on notecards, focusing on using their own words and learning the

importance of avoiding plagiarism. They then presented their Google slide

textbook page to the class, after

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posting it to their blogs, so that the students could learn about other natural disasters as well.  The sixth graders enjoyed this science/writing collaboration!

Please Check out the Lost and Found! The pile is growing!

SJSD Winter Recess Weather Protocol:32-90 degrees-comfortable for outdoor play20-32 degrees-use caution and may be necessary to reduce time outsideBelow 20 degrees-children SHOULD not go outside

!

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