Hawk News
September 17, 2020
Spotlight: Virtual Physical Education
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FAST Testing
Hanawalt will begin assessing students starting next week. Your child's classroom teacher will be scheduling one-on-one times with your child. This literacy assessment is very important.
What is FAST Testing?
FAST stands for Formative Assessment System for Teachers and was created in 2010 by the University of Minnesota with a goal of making it easier for teachers to collect and use data more effectively. In early 2015, the company FastBridge Learning was launched, which included the assessment platform. FAST has been adopted by schools in 35 states, including a statewide adoption in Iowa. The FAST assessment system includes assessments of reading, math, and social, emotional, behavioral skills.
earlyReading (K-1)
The earlyReading measures students’ foundational reading skills and provides one overall score of broad reading ability as well as individual subtest scores based on which subtests are administered. For the Fall screening window, the subtests are: Concepts of Print, Onset Sounds, Letter Names and Letter Sounds. For the Spring screening window, the subtests are: Letter Sounds, Word Segmenting, Sight Words, Nonsense/Decodable Words. Each subtest is administered individually and takes approximately 1-4 minutes. The total testing time ranges between 4-16 minutes on average.
CBMreading (2nd - 5th)
A timed measure of oral reading. The student reads out loud for 1 minute while the teacher records any errors. The score shows how many words were read correctly and is a widely-used indicator of reading performance.
PTA Notes
Block Party & Book Fair:
Hi All! We look forward to celebrating our annual Book Fair virtually! The Book Fair will run from September 20th-24th, please visit the Scholastic Book Fair! This not only gets your child reading, it helps raise Scholastic dollars for our school!
On Friday, September 25th, we will have our first Drive-Thru Block Party! At 6pm, please start the line of cars (car riders only) on 56th Street and someone will flag you onto Robertson Drive when we are ready to start! Feel free to decorate your car, we will have sidewalk chalk out on the sidewalk for several evenings so families and staff can come by and decorate the sidewalk in a festive and school appropriate manner! When you drive-thru, each student will receive their goodie bag with their Hawk tees, masks, and more! If you cannot make it to the drive-thru, please contact us and we will arrange a pick-up or drop off. We look forward to seeing everyone there!
Fundraiser:
Many of our teachers need a second screen to see their students' faces! Please consider donating HERE to assist in raising money for the HDMI cable and monitor! Each monitor and cable is $100 per teacher. If you have any questions, please email us at HanawaltElementaryPTA@gmail.com. Thank you for supporting our staff!
Membership:
If you have not registered as a PTA member yet, please do so HERE! Thank you to all of you who joined us for the PTA meeting this week and thanks to Mrs. Mireles for presenting! Again, if you have any interest in joining the Executive Committee or volunteering with the PTA, please contact us at HanawaltElementaryPTA@gmail.com.
Virtual Teacher Appreciation:
During this time when we do not have the opportunity to regularly see our teachers, please don’t forget to thank them, show grace, and show virtual appreciation! Some ideas for virtual teacher appreciation include:
- · Send a personalized e-card
- Have your children write or color a picture or write a poem and mail it to their teacher
- Send an email to your teacher expressing gratitude
- Record your children singing a thank you song, send it to the teacher, post it on Facebook and tag it to the PTA Facebook page.
Upcoming Dates
September
23rd: Early Out
25th: Drive-Thru Block Party
Hanawalt Elementary
Email: jolene.liebl@dmschools.org
Website: hanawalt.dmschools.org
Location: 225 56th Street, Des Moines, IA, USA
Phone: 515-242-8411