The Wildcat
Wamsley Elementary School Newsletter - February 2021
Important Dates
February 11th - Classroom Valentine's Day Parties
February 15th - Presidents Day - No School
February 16th & 17th - Virtual Parent Teacher Conferences
March 2nd - Virtual PTAC Meeting at 4pm
From the Principal
The days are getting longer, the ground is peeking out from under the snow, and baby cows are arriving in the fields around us! Fabulous February is finally here and it is bringing signs of spring with its arrival! I hope this newsletter finds you and your family safe and healthy! Your kids had a great month in January and we are looking forward to meeting with you during conferences on February 16th and 17th to share their successes! Please look for information from your teacher about these dates.
Classroom Valentine parties will replace our annual Love The One You Read With family event this year. We look forward to returning to this fun family event next year! Teachers will be contacting you about treats and Valentine cards for parties on February 11th. For safety reasons, we are asking that Valentine cards arrive at school on Monday, February 8th so have fun picking out cards and writing names this weekend!
Have your students shared about their “Why Try?” learning and adventures? Students have been learning about effort and positive talk. Then they have been putting forth their best effort on math and reading tasks to reveal codes to locked boxes. The boxes have contained treats and activities that celebrate the students’ efforts. These lessons are helping us refine our focus on Effort = Achievement! Ask your students about what they are learning! As a way to connect you with the learning, we have started sharing the links to our weekly “Why Try?” video lessons on our weekly autodialer that comes out every Sunday night. Click on the links and you can start using the learning with your children at home.
This week we have exciting news - The Wamsley Zoo is now open! As a part of our Experiential Education focus here at Wamsley, we have adopted 5 tree frogs, 2 very large hermit crabs, 3 small hermit crabs, 1 crested gecko lizard, 2 giant Texas gold millipedes, 5 hissing cockroaches, and 1 box turtle. In the coming months, classes will begin taking care of the pets. In the process, they will research and write proper care manuals and posters for the pets. The halls have been alive with excitement this week!
As we begin February and COVID continues, I want to thank you all for continuing to monitor symptoms and keeping your children home when necessary! We have had one quarantine so far since November and continue to avert others because of you and your diligence with helping us! Remember to keep your children home and call us if they have any symptoms. Also, please keep your children home if they have been exposed to COVID or to someone who was exposed or if anyone in the family is being tested! I cannot thank you enough for your efforts! We are able to stay open and keep as many kids in person as possible with your support!
This past week, we hosted our monthly PTAC meeting and had live Spanish translation! Please tell your friends about this new option at PTAC and mark your calendars for our next meeting on Tuesday, March 2nd! We have an amazing group of parents that support our efforts here and we always welcome anyone who would like to join us and help support your teachers and students. See you at 4pm on Tuesday, March 2, 2021! Call the office and we will share the meeting link with you. See you there!
Here’s to a Fabulous February! Thank you for all your support!
Art
Hello Wamsley families! This month in Art we are learning about the art career of Printmakers and how important they are in our community. The kids have been making multiple prints and trading their printed creations with their friends in class like trading cards. It has been a lot of fun! We are also making some really cool Valentine's day prints. A big congratulations to our Minecraft Architecture Contest winners! Fernando, 1st place, Jose, 2nd place, and J.T., 3rd place! Thank you to all the kids that entered. I see some future architects in our midst!
Music
In music 3rd-5th graders are FINALLY playing ukuleles to learn some of our melodic musical concepts!
On top of learning string names and rhythms we have learned our first TWO chords: C7 and F!!
It has kept us busy (with learning, sanitizing, and playing) but we are starting to get the hang of everything and we look forward to playing everyday!!
Go WILDCATS!!
Physical Education
Preschool
Kindergarten
First Grade
February brings exciting things with it! First is our Valentine’s Day party which will be held on Thursday, February 11th. Your child will be bringing home a note with the details. We’re also excited to be able to meet with you for parent/teacher conferences via Google-Meet on February 16th or 17th. We are looking forward to sharing how your child is doing in class, so please fill out and send back the conference time sheet if you haven’t already. Here are some things we’re working on this month. In social studies, first graders are learning about national symbols. We will also learn about civic holidays, like the Fourth of July and Flag Day. We started a new Superkids Reader and Superkids workbook this week! We are focusing on knowing sounds to decode unknown words, memorizing sight words, and reading fluency. You can help at home by encouraging your child to complete weekly homework and rereading stories that we’ve read in class. These stories can also be found in the Superkids Online Fun portal where your child can listen to the stories and read along. In writing, we are focusing on personal narratives, and we will be learning how to write some different types of poems in the coming weeks. In math, we are learning about halves and fourths of shapes. We will be looking at combinations of 10 and balancing equations later this month. February is going to be a fantastic month! Thank you for your continued support!
Second Grade
Third Grade
Fourth Grade
Fifth Grade
5th grade has kicked off the new year with a lot of exciting learning. Sit down with your child and ask them about their new found knowledge! Here is what they have been doing.
In Math the students have been mastering 2-digit by 4-digit division! They are moving right along to converting fractions to decimals, comparing decimals and adding/subtracting decimals. We are excited about where we are headed and super proud of our division accomplishments.
In ELA the students are currently reading about “real-life superheroes.” They are learning why the people in this book have been titled as such. They are also researching further into these characters lives to write research essays on one of their choosing.
In Science the students are learning about Earth’s Systems. Ask your child what the four Earth systems are! Ask them what hydro, bio, geo, and atmo mean. Ask them what can be found within these four Earth systems!
In Social Studies, the students are working hard on uncovering events that lead up to the American Revolutionary War and also events that occurred during this war. They have been making an amazing flip book filled with amazing knowledge on this specific topic. Ask your child what it was like to be “taxed” without representation.
These 5th graders are amazing, hard working students who come to school each day with a passion to learn. We look forward to more learning with them this year.
Experiential Education
Digital Citizenship
Parents' Ultimate Guide to TikTok. Click the link below for a quick 60 second video about TikTok and some detailed information about things like user safety and parental controls.
https://www.commonsensemedia.org/blog/parents-ultimate-guide-to-tiktok
Sent from https://www.commonsensemedia.org
Common Sense is the nation's leading independent non-profit organization dedicated to empowering kids to thrive in a world of media and technology.
From the Health Room...
Wamsley Elementary School
Office Hours: 7:30am-4:00pm
Email: wamsley@garfieldre2.net
Website: wamsleywildcats.net
Location: 225 East 30th Street, Rifle, CO, USA
Phone: 970-665-7950
Facebook: facebook.com/WamsleyWildcats