The staff of Coloma Elementary wishes you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Be safe and be well over the holiday break.

Thank you ALL for your support to make our 7th annual Kindness and Compassion Drive a tremendous success! Thanks to the outpouring of family, community, and staff support Coloma Elementary collected:

• More than $150 in cash donations and gift cards for the Wonderland Toy Store.
• 28 boxes of non perishable food items, paper products, and personal care items for Hope Resources including more than 560 lbs. of food!
• More than 25 new or gently used winter wear items.

Thank you for encouraging our ongoing efforts to teach and model empathy by consciously focusing on the message of kindness and compassion through giving!

Our focus at Coloma Elementary is to BUILD A COMMUNITY OF READERS. In order to accomplish this goal we have been, and continue to be, engaged in some very intentional work in regards to how we teach reading:

1. The district invested in purchasing curriculum resources that provide all students access to quality reading material and instruction that is aligned with state standards.

2. We continue to develop and refine our assessment and intervention procedures to ensure that all students are receiving additional support exactly where they need it.

3. We have used data to identify areas where all students would benefit from additional opportunities for practice and have added resources and whole class instruction to provide these opportunities.

4. Teaching and support staff have been engaged in professional development to stay current on the most effective practices for teaching reading.

5. We are in the process of aligning our phonics instructional routines and procedures across K-3 to ensure explicit and consistent instruction.

6. In November we were able to use grant money along with a generous donation from the PTO to purchase classroom sets of decodable readers for K-2. Decodable readers allow students to apply the phonics skills that we have been explicitly teaching.

The most rewarding part of this work is seeing our students growing and developing as readers at rates faster than ever before. We truly have come so far in this journey but there is always going to be room to continue to learn and grow on our end.

A new initiative that is currently in the planning process for us is how to engage parents and families in this work. We would like to provide those interested with training, tips, and tools to empower you to help your child continue to grow at home. If this is something that you or your family would be interested in planning or participating in some time in the future, please click on the link provided and take the short survey. As always, we can do so much more together!

We will randomly select three survey responses to receive gift cards. Here is the survey link:

Short Survey Link

The Play It Safe!™ child sexual abuse prevention program was presented to our Coloma Elementary students last week in every classroom Y5s through 3rd Grade.

The Play it Safe! Program is a research based curriculum that meets the requirements outlined in Erin's Law (signed into law January 2013; www.erinslaw.org) for Michigan students. You can find more information and previews of the lessons at www.PlayitSafe.org. These age-appropriate lessons are facilitated in your child’s classroom with their regular teaching staff present. While the topics vary with age, each elementary level lesson teaches children general concepts like:

• Identifying the safe adults in a child’s life they can go to if they need help.

• Recognizing 3 different kinds of touches: Safe, Unsafe, and Confusing.

• Using the 3 part safety rule: Say no; Get away; Tell a trusted adult.

• It’s never too late to tell, and child abuse is never the child’s fault.

These lessons are designed to build off each other year after year and reinforce these messages over time. We encourage you to talk openly with your children and if you would like additional resources please visit the Children’s Advocacy Center of Southwest Michigan’s website or call their office at (269) 556-9640.

Our hope is that by providing our children with information of how to avoid sexual and physical abuse, report it if it has occurred, or help a friend in need, we can proactively reduce child abuse in our community.

❤ ~Mrs. DeMercado, School Social Worker

When dropping off or picking up your student in the car rider lane, we ask that you:

• Pull all the way forward so that we can unload/load as many students as possible. This will make the process more smooth and efficient.
• Do not attempt to make a left turn into the car rider lane. Traffic is often backed up down S. West St. for drivers making a righthand turn into the lane. Instead, join the back of the line and make the righthand turn.

A safe and smooth process is our priority. Thank you for your support!

When it comes to responding to calls, emails, or messages Coloma Elementary staff follows the "24 hour rule." In other words, we will make every effort to respond within 24 hours. We often do so before that, but sometimes our schedules can get busy. We appreciate your understanding.

Don't forget that we have a late start on Wednesday, December 16th!

Communication is a priority for all Coloma staff. We use SchoolMessenger to share information electronically with our families. Over the last few months we have received feedback from parents that they are not receiving emails with important messages, reminders, and newsletters. If you find yourself in that group, please reach out to our office staff to make sure we have a current email address in PowerSchool. If we have the correct email address, then the situation is that the parent may have changed their settings to have our emails blocked. If you would like to fix that, our office staff can help you with that too.

Coloma Elementary's schoolwide expectations for student behavior follow the acronym CARE. It stands for:

• Come ready to learn
• Always respectful
• Responsible
• Exceptionally safe

Expectations for the hallway, bathrooms, cafeteria, playground, arrival, and dismissal are posted throughout the school. We teach the expectations and review them throughout the school year. Students also earn CARE tickets when they follow the expectations. The office does a ticket drawing where students pick a prize from the CARE Box.

One of the most commonly asked questions is: “How long will someone have to quarantine if there’s a case of COVID-19?" Our response is:

“The health and safety of our students, families, and staff is and will always be our primary concern. We have been working diligently over the past several months to prepare for the safe return to school for our students and staff—implementing sanitization and social distancing protocols across the district. In the event of a COVID-19 situation in one of our buildings or classrooms, we will work with the Berrien County Health Department to assist in contact tracing to determine who needs to quarantine and for how long as every COVID exposure is unique. Ultimately, the BCHD will provide specific guidance related to quarantining and isolation.”