4th grade Transition Info
Information from ZWest
Dear Fourth Grade Parents & Families,
Most of our process for the next few months will take place behind the scenes - conversations with your child’s current school, programmatic tweaking to ensure that ZWest continues to meet the needs of incoming students, and schedule planning in order to provide the appropriate number of classes, etc. for a new group of 5th graders. Then next month, on February 27, 2020, fourth graders will be visiting ZWest during the school day for a music concert performed by our choir, band and orchestra students. Along with the concert, we will be giving tours of the building and the students will have the opportunity to ask questions about Zionsville West. Later that same evening, 2/27/20, we will be hosting an important meeting for parents that will take place at 7:00 p.m. in our ZWMS West Hall. West Hall is our cafeteria/auditorium located near the gymnasiums in our building (enter through our main South entrance, Door 4). The purpose of this meeting is to discuss more about the middle school environment, structure and student experience.
The ZWMS staff and PTO also would like to invite and encourage all 4th grade students from Boone Meadow, Eagle & Stonegate to join us for our annual 4th Grade Social. The event will take place at ZWest a bit before and during the parent meeting (on 2/27/20) from 6:30-8:00 pm. This is a great opportunity to reconnect with old friends and meet new classmates from all three schools that will come together for 5th grade at ZW next year. Entertainment activities and snacks will be provided and we plan to have some current 5th grade students and teachers there to meet and interact with incoming students. We hope this will be an opportunity to grow more comfortable with the building, peers, and teachers and we hope all 4th graders will attend!
After these events on February 27th, the 5th Grade Music Course Request form will come home with your child. We will request that this form be completed and turned into your child’s 4th grade homeroom teacher by Thursday, March 5th. Descriptions of the Music Courses for 5th grade students will be available on the back of that form and a digital version is available on our website HERE. Zionsville West music teachers will be visiting elementary schools on April 9th & 10th to share more about their choice of voice/instruments (more building-specific information to come), and Paige’s Music will be at ZWest later in the semester to explain how to rent a band or orchestra instrument specifically (again, more info to come). Please prepare to bring any family-owned band or orchestra instruments to the meeting for Paige’s Music to examine and check for any defects.
In August, we hope that you will be able to join us for Back-to-School days. You will receive more information about these events and any other important items as we get into the summer and closer to next school year. We look forward to welcoming your students to their first day of 5th grade on Tuesday, August 4th, 2020.
Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions along the way. This is a very important transition in the K-12 journey of our ZCS students and in your families, and we want to partner with you to support your children as they make their way to ZWest next year. We are very excited to have them (and you!) join us for the 2020-21 school year!
Sincerely,
Matt Doublestein, ZWMS Principal