Estrada's E-Notes
January 2023 Edition
Principal's Post
Happy New Year! I hope that you had a wonderful holiday season and joyous New Year!
We have a lot to look forward to in this second half of the school year. This month we will participate in "The Great Kindness Challenge" during the week of January 23rd. Throughout the week there will be opportunities for students to show kindness to their schoolmates, families, and community and participate in fun activities. More info will be coming soon.
This week I'm reading The Creature of Habit to each class. It's got a great message about creating habits, trying new things, and having a growth mindset. It is a great connection to the goal-setting activities classes are doing to celebrate 2023.
Keep being awesome!
Principal Estrada
#growwithgratitude
Grow with Gratitude
Having a growth mindset means believing that our most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work - brains and talent are just the starting point. This view creates a love of learning and a resilience that is essential for great accomplishment. Those with growth mindsets embrace challenges, persist through obstacles, learn from criticism, and are inspired by the success of others. With a growth mindset, we can acknowledge our failures and find inspiration to keep improving. It's not that we can't learn a new skill - it's that we haven't mastered it yet.
On the other hand, those with a fixed mindset believe their intelligence, talents and personalities are fixed traits that cannot grow. They believe we are born with a certain level of ability (or special skills) and we are unable to improve our level abilities over time.
3 ways adults can encourage a growth mindset in children:
- Recognize your own mindset: We all have a mix of fixed and growth mindsets. Be mindful of your own thinking. Model positive self-talk and the power of "yet".
- Praise the process of learning: Praising kids for being smart suggests that innate talent is the reason for success, while focusing on the process helps them see how their effort leads to success.
- Model learning from failure: When parents talk positively about making mistakes, kids start to think of mistakes as a natural part of the learning process.
Spotlight on Safety - GoGuardian App
GoGuardian is a tool used within classrooms across NMUSD to monitor students' online activity during class when using their district-issued chromebook. This tool is very helpful to teachers during the school day and now this tool will be offered to parents. We are thrilled at the opportunity to offer this to our parent community and appreciate your feedback over the next couple of months.
GoGuardian Parent is a mobile app designed to provide parents/guardians insight and control over their student's online activity when on school-managed devices and accounts.
The GoGuardian Parent app provides an overview of your children's online activity on NMUSD Chromebooks - including apps, extensions, docs, and sites your student visited. It also provides you with an additional set of internet controls that you can set for out-of-school hours.
There is a lot of information to ensure proper set-up. Please spend time reading through this document to access this app on your child's school-issued chromebook.
January 11th: Newport El Teachers receive training on GoGuardian Parent App
January 11th - ongoing: Newport El office staff "cleans up" the contact data in Aeries. Parents ensure their email and phone numbers are correct in Aeries
January 30th: GoGuardian Parent App will be enabled for Newport El parents.
February: NMUSD Ed Tech supports parents to ensure they have successfully logged into the App
Student Leadership Crew in Action
Mac 'n Cheese Drive
Packing and Prepping
Selling Candy Grams
Shout Out for First Grade
Newport Elementary first graders have been little busy bees learning so much this year! In two areas specifically, math and writing, they are having so much fun!
Currently, in math the students are reading, writing and solving word problems, learning place value (tens and ones) and equivalencies (4 + 6 = 5 + 5). In writing the students are expanding their use of Thinking Maps to generate, organize and sequence their ideas. Most recently the children wrote about a Christmas or Chanukah gift that they wished to receive. The use of Tree and Flow maps assisted them in organizing their thoughts and reasons for their wish. They loved sharing their work with their classmates.
Important January Dates
January 13 - Flag Deck @ 8:15
January 13 - Foundation Meeting after Flag Deck
January 16 - No School - MLK Jr. Day
January 27 - Flag Deck @ 8:15
January 27 - PTA General Meeting at 1:30
School Volunteers
All interested volunteers are asked to complete these 3 steps annually:
- Read through the Newport El Volunteer Orientation slide deck.
- Complete the Newport El Volunteer Agreement.
- Complete the district's volunteer approval process.
As always, every teacher utilizes volunteers in different ways. Teachers will be communicating with the approved volunteers from their class about their need for volunteers and scheduling.
Our Office Staff is Here to Help
Main Line: 949-515-6965
Absence Line: 949-515-6832
Attendance and enrollment questions:
Debbie Kandel - dkandel@nmusd.us
Health, medications, and immunizations questions:
Dana Hansen - dhansen@nmusd.us and
Nurse Sarah Hacker - shacker@nmusd.us
All Other Inquiries:
Susi Mendoza - ajimenezmendoza@nmusd.us
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Direct questions to contact@newportelfoundation.org