Principal's News
January 16th, 2018
Teacher of the Year and Support Staff of the Year
All of the nominees deserve to be celebrated for their contributions to Harvest Ridge. Below are the names and positions of the other nominees.
- Nathan Mackiewicz- Fourth Grade Teacher
- Michele Kelly- Special Education Teacher
- Tony Beer- Special Education Teacher
- Jamie McCoy- Special Education Teacher
- Jodi Fitzgerald- Literacy Coach
- Melissa Barth- Kindergarten Teacher
- Kristy Giocommarra- ESOL Teacher
- Julie Myers- Special Education Para
- Megan Brown-Special Education Para
- Ronna Thornhill- Special Education Para
- Stephanie McCoy- ESOL Para
- Matt Faust- Custodian
- Jane Helpler- Head Administrative Assistant
- Tessa Golden- Building Information Specialist
- Josh Weber- Custodian
Boosterthon
Link to Information about Boosterthon
Curriculum Connection
First Grade
Second Grade
Third Grade
Fourth Grade
Fifth Grade
Mindful Moments in the Classroom
During our most recent professional development day staff members learned a little bit about mindfulness, which is defined as the conscious awareness of the present moment by focusing our attention and controlling our breath. By doing so we can reduce stress and optimize the learning capacity of the brain. Staff were given a number of resources to help implement mindfulness in their classrooms.
With the start of the new year we are going to have a school wide mindful moment every morning called Drop Everything and Breath. Teachers are also encouraged to take a mindful moment with their class prior to lunch, after recess, and prior to dismissal at the end of the day. Our school counselors have taught mindfulness in classroom lessons and in our intervention groups, but now we will have a school wide time to help teach kids mindfulness skills.
Below are some of the resources that have been provided to teachers. Feel free to use them at home too.
Attendance Updates
Our attendance goal for the year is to have 96% of students coming to school 90% of the time. One of our strategies to reach this goal is to decrease the number of students who have missed ten or more days of school for the 2017-2018 school year from 119 students to 96 students. Currently, we have 28 students who have missed more than 10 days of school.
Thank you to our parents who have done a great job at getting kids to school on time and making sure they are here to learn. We were very excited to be able to recognize over 350 students with perfect and outstanding attendance at our end of the quarter celebration! Thanks to all of our families for helping us reach this achievement!
Behavior Data Updates for First Semester
When we look to determine if our Positive Behavior Intervention Support is improving student behavior our data indicates that we are on track. Our positive system should keep at least 80% of our students from needing a behavior intervention. Currently 92% of our total student population is not receiving a behavior intervention. Tickets, Harvey High Fives, and Hawk Feathers are part of our Positive Support. This year we have an outside consultant working with a team of teachers to improve the implementation of our positive system. Teachers are being given professional development and periodic observations occur to monitor the implementation.
Many times people inquire about the difference between physical aggression and fighting. We code physical aggression as behavior when one one student makes physical contact with another student. For example, if a student is upset over something another student does they may react by biting, kicking, or hitting the other student. A fight is when two or more students make aggressive physical contact with each other. We are working hard to teach students the appropriate reaction when they get mad or upset with another student as the safety of students is our top priority.
Upcoming Events
Our annual One Book, One School event is quickly approaching. Students and parents voted on the book this year and The Mouse and the Motorcycle by Beverly Cleary has been selected. Please join us for our event on January 25th from 5:30-7:30. More information will be coming home with your child and in the Soaring Hawk. We are looking forward to seeing all of our families at this great event. Each family will receive their book at the night of the event. We will have a free pancake dinner and lots of fun activities!
Culture Night
Join us for a fun night of learning about all the cultures that represent Harvest Ridge. The event takes place on Tuesday, February 27th from 6:30-8:00. There will be food, performances, and fun activities for all ages. We hope you can join us.
MAP Night
This year we will be hosting a parent night prior to MAP testing. The event is March 7th at 6:30. More information will be coming, but we hope you can join us to hear from our Director of Assessment and our English Language Arts Content Leader. Parents will also get to see what it is like to take the MAP test. We are looking forward to sharing this important information with you and letting you experience what our students experience during the testing.