Emerson Cheetah Check-In!
Emerson Parent Newsletter: August 15th, 2020
Looking Ahead: Students, Families & Teachers Will:
Week 2: 8/17- 8/21
Attend Class Morning Meeting on Zoom every day at 8:30am or 9:00am
Attend Virtual Home Visits
Work on Distance Learning Plans (posted on Clever)
Week 3: 8/24- 8/28
Attend Class Morning Meeting on Zoom every day at 8:30am or 9:00am
Students Take Assessments with their Teachers
Work on Distance Learning Plans (posted on Clever)
Upcoming School Site Council Meeting
Upcoming SSC Meeting:
Tuesday, August 18th, 5:30-6:30pm on,
Zoom Link Here, Mtg ID 821 7693 3937
Wondering how kids’ well-being is measured at our school?
Wanting to know more about how public school funding works?
This is the meeting for you!
Please consider joining!
All families are welcome and encouraged to participate!
Attendance & Engagement!
Keep it up Emerson Community! Remember - students should be at EVERY Morning ZOOM Meeting AND Logging into Clever Everyday to access the Learning Plans!
Enrollment Count!
Hello Emerson Families!
Thank you for a great first week back! It was great to see students in Morning Meeting, building community with teachers and getting to know new friends. We know this is a wildly different start of the school year and we appreciate everyone leaning in with positivity and support for our community.
Thank you families for dedicating time for virtual home visits with our teachers. This is a crucial part of us building community virtually and getting to know each others hopes and dreams for the year, as well as how to best support you and your child with school!
As you may have heard OEA and OUSD have reached a tentative agreement. The vote will likely happy next week, and we will be sharing information regarding the implications for our school year accordingly.
If you saw last week's newsletter the information below, is a repeat. I'm including it for new families to have access to information as well!
COMMUNICATION
Talking Points
We will be using “Talking Points,” as our main communication to our families. This will be used both school wide and for individual classes. You can download the free Talking Points app or use it through your text messages. Your child's teachers will be contacting you via Talking Points! Talking Points will also be used to share "Cheetah Check-In Newsletter."
Note: If you'd like to add a parent/guardian to Talking Points Communications, just respond to a TP message with the guardians, name & number, and we will add them. ALSO - many of you reached out already about adding a contact, thank you!... but when the Talking Points system reset for the new class lists, we lost all that info! Apologies. You will need to communicate with us, about adding additional contacts again.
School Messenger
School Messenger is an email based system that will be used to send school-wide communication, like "Cheetah Check-In Newsletter" as well.
Google Classroom
3rd-5th grade classes will be using google classroom to organize their work for students, post announcements, and receive student work and take daily attendance. Google Classroom will be accessible through Clever. Your child’s teacher will reach out through Talking Points to help get your student connected to their new online classroom.
SeeSaw
TK-2nd grade classes will be using the platform SeeSaw for students to access their work. SeeSaw will allow students to send their teachers work in a format that is accessible for younger students. Your child’s teacher will reach out through Talking Points to help get your student connected to their new online classroom.
FIRST TWO WEEKS OF SCHOOL
The first two weeks will be focused on supporting our students and families to get adjusted to distance learning.
Attendance
This year teachers will be taking daily attendance to track student’s engagement in distance learning. This is required for all California students, per state law (AB 77 / SB 98). Examples of “engaging/participating in distance learning” are logging into a live on-line class, logging into google classroom, platforms or apps, responding to an email, text (to the teacher of record), or completing an assignment for the day.
Home Visits
Teachers will be making one-on-one contact with each family from their classroom during the first two weeks of school, for a virtual home visit! This will be an opportunity to discuss your student’s strengths, challenges during distance learning and your concerns/questions around distance learning. Teachers will also provide a checklist with expectations for their students and parents can use this as a way to support your child during the school day.
Morning Meetings
Starting on Monday, August 10, teachers will be hosting morning meetings, immediately following our whole school Welcome Back Kick-Off! These morning meetings will be a space where students can get to know their new teacher and peers, teachers can set norms around distance learning, and start to create daily routines around the first two weeks of school. We hope all of our students will participate in these meetings especially since it will be our way of creating community for our students and class.
Academics
During the first two weeks of school, student work will be posted on Clever, for all Emerson students. Teachers will be sharing with you and your child the information for how to access Clever. Assignments will have a variety of work students can do at home, independently, while teachers and families work together creating systems for successful distance learning.
Materials
In the first two weeks of school, teachers will be in contact with parents regarding plans to pick up materials (notebooks, books, instructional materials, etc).
Please reach out with questions.
Much appreciation,
Heather Palin
Principal @ Emerson
Vision
Mission
We are a relationship-centered school:
students are known, valued and celebrated.
We support all students:
academic and social emotional programs meet students where they are and accelerate them forward.
We are committed to equity:
we eliminate racial, socioeconomic and gender inequities through culturally relevant learning experiences.
We are a learning community:
with a learning stance, we use inquiry and reflection to improve our practice.
Food Distribution Changes!
Now serving only students enrolled in OUSD
- Bring the letter mailed by Nutrition Services this week, that explains the changes and includes your child’s ID# and a scannable barcode.
- Bring your child’s student ID card with their Aeries ID# from the previous year (and ideally have a barcode in order to be scanned)
- Wait in a separate line and have your child’s information looked up in a district database at the food distribution site (this could be a slow process and we highly recommend families bring a copy of their letter).
Families can pick up food at any of the 22 meal service sites. Monday and Thursday 8am-1pm
Back to School Night
- TK-2nd Grade - September 9th, 5:30-6:30pm
- 3rd-5th Grade - September 10th, 5:30-6:30pm
Cheetah Scholar Challenge!
We invite all Emerson students to our Cheetah Scholar Challenge!
Students can take a picture or a video doing the dance that Ms. Kemp-Sellers is doing!
The challenge will be in effect from August 10th-September 1st!
We are asking that students upload a picture or the dance on Instagram tagging our:
- Emerson's Cheetah Squad Instagram @emersoncheetahsquad and
- hashtagging #emersonscholarchallenge
If students can't upload picture or video to Instagram - they should send it to their teachers!
Emerson Softball Field Update
Hello Emerson Elementary School neighbors,
School is officially in session this week! We are starting this school year in Oakland via distance learning, therefore we are not hosting students at the Emerson Campus at this time. The Emerson Elementary Project continues to progress as we are targeting to complete it by this fall. Following is some of the work that we are planning on doing:
- Demolition of a portion of the sidewalk on Shafter Avenue will start this week. As a result, the sidewalk will be inaccessible for at least the next week. We will be leveling the uneven pavement and taking the proper precautions to ensure that we don't damage any trees.
- Continue to form and pour concrete band around the play equipment area and start to form and pour behind our fence
- Continue drilling for fence foundations and setting posts
Please feel free to reach out to me with any questions or comments. Please keep safe.
Emerson Elementary School
Email: heather.palin@ousd.org
Website: https://www.ousd.org/emerson
Location: 4803 Lawton Avenue, Oakland, CA, USA
Phone: 510-654-7373