Paola Middle School Newsletter
November
IMPORTANT DATES- NOVEMBER
Nov. 4th- 4:00 Girls Basketball- 8th @ Eudora/7th @ Home
Nov. 7th- 4:00 Girls Basketball- 8th @ Paola/7th @ Spring Hill
Nov. 7th - 4:00 Wrestling @ Paola High School
Nov. 8th- Yearbook Group Pictures
Nov. 9th- 9:00 a.m. Wrestling @ Emporia
Nov. 11th- 4:00 Girls Basketball- 8th @ Paola/7th @ Ottawa
Nov. 11th- 2:00- Veteran's Day Assembly in PMS Auditorium
Nov. 12th- 4:00 Girls Basketball- 8th @ Woodland Spring/7th @ Paola
Nov. 12th- 4:00 Wrestling at Louisburg
Nov. 14th- 4:00 Girls Basketball- 8th @ Paola/7th @ Trail Ridge
Nov. 16th- 9:00 Wrestling League @ Louisburg
Nov. 18th- 4:00 Girls Basketball- 8th @ Wheatridge/ 7th @ Paola
Nov. 19th- 4:00 Girls Basketball- 8th @ Paola/ 7th @ Baldwin
Nov. 21st- 4:00 Girls Basketball- 8th @ Paola/ 7th @ Louisburg
Nov. 25th- 4:00 Girls Basketball- 8th @ Spring Hill/ 7th @ Paola
Nov. 26th- KAYS Rake & Run
Nov. 27th-Nov. 29th- NO SCHOOL
Paola Panther Booster Club Student of the Month- Academics
Paola Panther Booster Club Student of the Month- Athletics
Paola Panther Booster Club Student of the Month- Arts
Band students selected for honors!
Congratulations to Lexi Agnew, Emma Haley, Maddi Markovich, and Fischer Woolsey for being selected to participate in the Kansas Music Educators Association 2019 Middle School Honor Band. These students will represent our school by performing as members of the honor band on December 7 at Blue Valley High School. The KMEA district honor band students were selected from all Franklin, Johnson, Miami, and Osage county schools.
Veteran's Day Assembly
8th GRADE experiment with Hot Air Balloons
6th Grade enjoys "Maddi's Fridge"
From the book and play "Maddi's fridge", some things we learned that will help childhood hunger:
1. Donate to food pantries! They need supplies, especially canned food.
2. Volunteer at food pantries and soup kitchens if you can. They need all the help they can get!
3. When friends visit your house, have a healthy, filling snack! Fruit, milk, veggies, etc can help keep tummies full. This is important because we never know who is struggling around us to make it to the next meal.
4. Don't be scared to ask for help! Asking for help does not mean you are not strong!
If you have a 6th grade student, talk to them about the play and ask them what they learned!
New Teacher Spotlight
Ms. Johnson, 6th Grade teacher
Written by: Ashley Winterscheid, 8th Grade Journalism; Leigha Cox, 8th Grade Journalism; and Greta Cole, 7th Grade Journalism
Some of you may know Ms. Johnson as a 6th grade math teacher, but do you really know that much about her? At first, she didn’t think she wanted to be a teacher. In fact, being a teacher was the last thing she wanted to do because she saw how much her mom, who was a teacher, had to do. It wasn’t until she volunteered in a classroom of a family friend of hers in her senior year of high school that she fell in love with teaching. From the moment she helped out in that classroom, she knew that was what she wanted to do. However, there were moments during her school experiences in college, at K-state, where she doubted her ability to become a teacher. But, she was a very hard worker and she kept working at it. She graduated college last year and became a teacher here at Paola Middle School.
One of the reasons she loves teaching is being able to help kids understand different things. “When they’ve had an aha moment that’s how you know you’ve done a really good job,'' she said. She also loves helping kids learn how to be good people, to her, that is more important than learning anything in the books. However, there are also things about teaching that can frustrate her. She hates laziness, and that’s when she knows a kids ability to do something but their grade doesn’t reflect that ability because they don’t put forth the effort. Of course, she loves all of her students, but sometimes she wished they had more confidence in themselves, enough to show her that they really do understand what their learning and they can prove it to her by doing their work, but they sometimes choose not to. That is something that bothers her about teaching at times.
Ms. Johsnson has many strengths, along with some weaknesses. Her strengths include that she is very optimistic, but she’s also a realist. “I understand that sometimes you can get down on yourself, but I also understand that there are ways that you can get out of being down on yourself,'' she says. Another one of her strengths is that she’s a very organized person, which would help out a lot being a teacher. She also loves to make things fun and keep things light hearted, not only when she’s teaching, but also during volleyball practices. Keeping things fun is a much better and more effective way to teach kids the material that your trying to teach them, it helps them enjoy it, and most likely remember it more. “Life’s too short to stress about an assignment that you might have missed or something like that, you can always make it up,” she said. Some weaknesses she has would include, she can be very impatient at times, and also pessimistic. She also said that she has anxiety which is a weakness of hers.
There are many interesting things about Ms. Johnson that you might not know. For example, she absolutely loves volleyball. She is the 8th grade varsity volleyball coach at the middle school. She’s even going to be playing in an adult volleyball league in a couple of weeks. She also loves to dog parks and going on walks with her dogs. She has two dogs, a shitzhu named Aggie that lives with, who is four years old and her best friend. She also has a 3 legged dog that she adopted, but that stays at her parent's house, named Pogo. She counts him as her dog though because he stays at her house a lot when her parents are out of town. There’s a lot of other things that she likes to do. For example, something she likes to do is just chill and watch Netflix, but don’t we all?
There are reasons that Ms. Johnson is a great teacher. One of the reasons is that she is very driven. When she wants something done she doesn’t wait for someone to do it for her, she gets it done herself. She is also very compassionate. She’s a great teacher because she can connect with her students and she has a good relationship with them. People-pleaser is another word to describe her, because she tries to make everyone happy. When she’s teaching, she tries her best to help her students and give them what they need, which helps make her a better teacher.
Something that helps make Ms. Johnson a good person is the verse she chooses to live her life by, Romans 12:12, it says, “Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, and faithful in prayer”. Mrs. Johnson said, “They way I take it is you need to be patient and wait out the storm, if there are storms.” Living her life by that, helps her to be the person she is. All around Ms. Johnson is a great person, and we are happy she decided to join the staff at Paola Middle School.
Second Step Every Wednesday in Seminar
We want your child to be successful in school, and that means going beyond the basics. Excelling in academic classes is important, but students also need to know how to learn, make good decisions, handle strong emotions, and get along with others.
Here are the topics that are covered and discussed as part of the curriculum:
Mindsets and Goals: Students learn about ways to grow their brains and get smarter, along with research-based strategies for achieving goals and handling difficult situations.
Values and Friendships: Students learn to identify their personal values and use those values to make good decisions and build strong, positive relationships.
Thoughts, Emotions, and Decisions: Students learn the positive role emotions play in their lives, how to handle unhelpful thoughts and strong emotions, and specific strategies for calming down.
Serious Peer Conflicts: Students learn how to identify and avoid serious conflicts, resolve conflicts that can't be avoided, think about other people's perspectives, and help stop bullying and harassment at school.
If you have any questions about the Second Step Middle School Program, please do not hesitate to contact Mr. Bloustine or Mrs. Wright for more information. Thank you for supporting your child in learning the skills and concepts that lead to success in school and in life.
Officer Hale visits 8th Grade Social Studies
H.O.P.E. Club
Paola Middle School
Email: amy_wright@usd368.org
Website: www.usd368.org
Phone: 9132948030
Twitter: @PaolaMiddle