GCIS Weekly News 1/08/2016
Weekly Celebrations, Successes, and Up Coming Events!
GCIS Office News
Welcome back!!!
We have had a great start to our first week back from break!
The weather has been getting a lot colder so please make sure your students are dressed appropriately for outdoor play! Students go outside everyday for about 25 minutes is the actual or feels like temperature is at or above zero degrees!
If you are in need for winter gear, please feel free to contact us at the school to see what we can do to help!
Please remember to call us if you student will be out for the day, leaving early,be in late, etc. They will be marked UNEXCUSED if we do not have contact from you! We appreciate your efforts of calling between the hours of 8:30 AM and 2:30 PM.
GCIS Key Players of the Week!
Next PBIS Incentive Day!
Students actually get to choose what trip they would like to work toward with their safe, respectful, and responsible behavior. The following choices include,
- Sledding at 7 Oaks in Boone
- Swimming, Game Room, and Open Gym at Hidden Acres in Dayton Iowa
- Skating in Jefferson
How does my student qualify to attend one of these trips?
- Students need to complete a reading challenge in addition to positive behaviors in order to attend one of these trips. (These are coming out soon!)
- Students will be earning key cards in all areas of our day as they demonstrate safe, respectful, and responsible behaviors. Each homeroom sets a goal and works towards earning key cards.
Recess Reminders & Private Dining Tickets
- You will be notified from homeroom teachers if your student has earned one of these.
- These are issued at recess and in the lunchroom.
- Recess: Students are given a verbal warning, then asked to take a 5 min break. If students are still making a choice to not be safe, respectful, or responsible, a recess reminder will be issued.
- Lunchroom: Students will be given a verbal warning reminding students of the desired behavior in the lunchroom. If students are still deciding to make choices that are not safe, respectful, or responsible, the student will be removed and will eat in a different location, along with getting a private dinning ticket.
- Any student receiving more than 3 of the Recess Reminders and/or Private Dinning tickets, will stay back at school during the PBIS incentive trips.
If you have any additional questions, please don't hesitate to call the office or your students homeroom teacher. All students attending one of these trips will have to return a parent permission slip. These will go out when it gets closer to the trip date.
-Mrs. Van Cleave
GCIS Principal
4th Grade Happenings!
Hope everyone enjoyed Winter Break! We are back and ready to rock. We are learning about the life of Ruby Bridges through a read aloud. We will be having good conversations and discussion about Civil Rights as that goes right along with this story.
5th Grade Happenings!
Math: We are continuing to work on fractions. We are adding and subtracting mixed fractions which has been a challenge. We have about a week left on this chapter. Testing will be coming up for this unit 3.
Science: We are finishing up our Unit on Animal Adaptations and will be testing on Monday the 11th. Please study over the weekend.
Lit/SS: In reading we wrapped up our unit on quoting accurately from a text when making inferences. We will be starting our next unit on understanding the elements of the plot of a story. In writing, we are working on a five paragraph research paper using the writing process.
Congratulations to the following winners of the Flag Essay Contest sponsored by the Jefferson American Legion. They were: 1st place- Isabella Schroeder, 2nd place-Kali Nelson, 3rd place- Alexa Peters. We are proud they represented our Greene County Intermediate School!
6th Grade Happenings!
Sixth grade has noticed that students are coming to school without coats and/or choosing not to wear them at recess so they can stay inside. Please talk to your child about the importance of wearing your coat at recess.
In reading, we are starting our peace and conflict unit. We will be talking about some controversial issues that are going on in the world right now. We encourage you to speak with your child about the topics that we are covering. Throughout this unit we will be finding the authors claim, purpose, and evidence in the text.
In science, students are exploring the elements of the periodic table by creating a poster with important and interesting information about the element. We will also be looking at how the table is arranged and patterns in the table.
In math, students are working on multiplying and dividing decimals. They have also started to work with algebraic expressions.
Midterm is coming up next week. Students are given at least one opportunity to redo any assignment or assessment. You can log on to Infinite Campus to view your child’s grade. We encourage you to talk with your child about redoing assignments if needed.
Music Mania
General Music
Students in grades 4 and 6 have been viewing a video by professional artist, conductor and educator Wynton Marsalis. This week we reviewed the concepts of steady beat, rhythm, melody, meter, measure, tempo, accents, and rests. Students added the concepts of Ground Rhythm and Syncopation. We clapped, spoke and performed patterns from a two-part rhythmic system. 6th grade added an additional melody system on with the Glockenspiels.
5th Grade read through a sports musical. We will be dividing into groups a researching each of the individual sports covered in the musical. Students will cooperatively share definitions of terms and interesting facts about each sport mentioned in the lyrics. This will help them to better understand the content of what we are singing to create a more meaningful overall experience.
6th Grade Honor Choir
The Central District Iowa Choral Director’s Association will be hosting an Honor Choir on Friday, March 11th in Webster City.
Students will be selected for this honor choir. This is an honor choir experience to reward students, help motivate them, and teach them to be leaders in our school choir. Students that can conduct themselves appropriately, that can match pitch, that will be musically prepared, will be selected for this honor. The expectation is that the songs will be sung from memory. I will select 16 students for this choir. More info. to come.
P.S. We are still in need of clean 5 gallon buckets. Thank you for your help!
Physical Education
After getting back from a good Holiday break, we have started working on our basketball skills and fundamentals. This week has been spent on dribbling, ball handling and passing. Next week we plan on focusing on shooting and layups. Our bowling unit is coming up at the end of January, starting Jan 25th. Below is the link of the letter that will be sent home starting Monday. You may print this out yourself or wait for the one coming home from your student.
FCS
Back from break, we are finishing up our foods unit, evaluating what we made before break. Many have forgotten what it tasted like but remember how well they worked together so I would call it a win.
They have begun their sewing unit. The 5th graders are hand sewing fasteners on felt and the 6th graders are machine sewing upholstery fabric into a pencil pouch with a zipper. Hopefully, we will have pictures in the next few weeks.
If you have any sew through or shank buttons that you don’t want anymore consider donating them to our program.
Art
In 6th grade art, we talked about perspective. The definition that students came up with is: how you see things. So they were asked to draw a snowman from one of two different perspectives… They could choose to draw it from a squirrel’s perspective looking at it like it is on the ground or from a bird’s perspective, looking at it like it is in a tree above it. Here are what some students came up with!
GCIS T.A.G.
7th!
4th grade’s mock battle will be sometime in early May, but the date is to be determined yet. Get reading and writing!
Tech Lit & Media
Have you ever wondered about things like: what is margarine? Or, have you ever played possum? How about if Rome was actually built in one day?? Well, some of our sixth grade students might be able to answer those questions for you. They started working on a project using the website Wonderopolis.org, where they chose a “Wonder” that interested them and recorded some facts about that “Wonder”. The facts will then be used to create a Word Cloud, demonstrating their learning to the rest of the class. I look forward to sharing some of those with you in the next few Newsletters.
If you like to explore this site at home, here are the username and password. Have fun!!
username: 50129jshs
password: plaea8
The fourth graders began a project using the drawing feature in Google Docs. This tool allowed the students to insert different graphics and text into a plain document. They seemed to be really excited about learning the different tools and making changes to their graphics. (I think they will be even more excited when they learn how to insert photographs!!)
Counselor's Corner
Word of the Month for January
The word of the month for January is RESPONSIBILITY. In school, work and life, taking responsibility for one’s actions and learning allows that person to grow.
Studies show that students who take greater responsibility for their learning…
- achieve at higher levels because of the self-reliant, self-directed nature of their learning (Hom & Murphy, 1983)
- are more motivated to learn, and are more efficient in their learning (Hom & Murphy, 1983)
- better understand their strengths and weaknesses as learners, enabling them to leverage their strengths in learning situations (Blakey & Spence, 1990).
Nurse News
Your child’s permanent teeth are starting to come in. They are getting the teeth that will last them a lifetime. Make sure they are brushing and flossing twice a day. It is important they are getting enough fluoride. Your child should see the dentist on a regular basis. Also, talk to your child about the harmful effects of sugar in snacks and drinks on their teeth.