Tiger Tales
Gust Elementary School Newsletter January 2020
Contact Gust
Website: https://gust.dpsk12.org
Location: 3440 West Yale Avenue, Denver, CO 80219
Phone: 720-424-6560
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gustelementaryschool/
Note From the Principal
Greetings Gust Community,
Happy New Year! We hope that you all had a wonderful break and enjoyed the company of loved ones. With our 1st semester behind us we begin the 2nd semester with anticipation of the continued growth of our students, academically and socially.
Upcoming important dates include:
January 14: Gust Community Partnership Meeting at 9:00 a.m. & 3:40 p.m.
January 15: School Choice Enrollment opens (Online). For information on School Choice, visit: http://schoolchoice.dpsk12.org/
January 22: School Choice Expo at Abraham Lincoln High School from 6:00-8:00 p.m.
February 2: Gust Community Partnership Meetings at 9:00 a.m. and 3:40 p.m.
February 5: Art Night from 5:30-7:00 p.m.
Spring Chocolate Sale - information coming soon
Spring Parent-Teacher Conferences will be scheduled by classroom teachers on an as-needed basis. If a conference is necessary, teachers will send home a letter with available conference times. If you would like a parent conference, please contact your child’s teacher.
Gust provides before school and after school care via our Kids SmART program for those families that need coverage before 8:30 AM and after 3:30 PM. We offer flexible hours and payment structures. Please visit Kids SmART at www.kids-smart.com or stop by our office for more information.
Please remember to check our Gust website for information, use our Gust App, and find us on Facebook. We hope to reduce our “carbon footprint” by providing digital information tools.
We are off to a great start in 2020 and look forward to working together to ensure success for all of our students!
Joanne Lander, Principal
Brent Westrop, Principal Resident
Gust Elementary School
A Note from the Assistant Principals
Entering the building
Safety is one of the most important elements for the Gust community. In order to help keep everyone safe, please remember that playground supervision begins at 8:30. Students are not to be dropped off and should not be on the playground prior to 8:30 AM. The morning entrance bell rings at 8:40 AM and the day officially begins at 8:45 AM. Prior to 8:45 AM, students and parents should not be in the hallways or in the classrooms unless arrangements have been made with the teacher in advance. Teachers often have morning meetings in addition to morning duties.
Toys and Electronics at School
Please remember that toys should not be brought with students to school. Also, electronics including cell phones brought to school are at risk of being lost or stolen. Gust Elementary is not responsible for lost or stolen electronics. While we will attempt to assist in recovering items, it is best to leave those items at home as they are difficult to recover.
ACCESS Testing
Beginning on January 13th, English Language Learners (ELLs) in grades kindergarten through twelfth grade will participate in the ACCESS 2.0 for ELLs assessment. This assessment measures a student’s English language skills in the areas of speaking, listening, reading, and writing. ACCESS 2.0 is a state assessment and is used by classroom teachers to determine the level of language support that a student may need during instruction. With this information, we are also able to monitor student progress on an annual basis, and determine when a student is ready to be placed in mainstream instruction. To learn more about this assessment please visit the following web page: https://wida.wisc.edu/assess/access/tests.
Gust will be administering most sessions of the assessment between January 14th - January 24th. Please be sure that your student arrives on time during these days so that they do not miss sections of the test, as this would require a make-up session. If you have questions regarding the assessment, please contact your student’s teacher.
Thank you from the Assistant Principals
Kathleen McLaughlin Marucheau
Brent Westrop
Early Childhood Education (ECE)
Happy New Year! We hope everyone had a great winter break. This month ECE finished our unit on recycling and have begun our “buildings” unit. Now that we are back from break, we will be reinforcing rituals and routines in our classrooms. Parents please continue to read to your child every evening for 15-20 minutes, and work with them on skills they are learning such as counting to 20 or more, identifying shapes, colors and patterns, identifying letters and beginning sounds, grouping objects according to a variety of attributes such as color, size, texture and purpose and writing their first and last names. Thank you for your continued support.
Mr. Befus, Ms. Davila, Mr. Fale, Ms. Borick, Ms. Holguin, Mrs. VanAlstyne & Mrs. Way
*1/15/20- Field Trip to The Museum of Nature and Science
*1/20/20- No Classes- Martin Luther King Jr. Day
Kindergarten
Dear Kindergarten Families:
Welcome back! Can you believe it’s 2020? We are so excited to start this next part of the school year with your students and we have a lot to accomplish. This month in math we will be working on addition and subtraction, counting to 50 by ones, comparing quantities using the words “more” and “less,” and identifying shapes such as trapezoid, hexagon, and rhombus. In literacy, we will be learning about technology. We will continue to work in writing on composing two or more sentences using capitals, periods, spacing, and sounding words out. There are a couple of important dates for this month: on January 17th we will have a hot cocoa party for our kinders (details to come) and on January 20th there will be no school for students in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Thank you as always for all you do to support your child’s learning and success in kindergarten!
In partnership,
Your Kindergarten Teachers
First Grade
Happy New Year First Grade Families! We hope you enjoyed the holidays and were able to share some special time together. Thank you for supporting your students the first semester. We are looking for a busy learning time in January.
With the start of a new semester we have the opportunity to give new motivation and support to the students in Reading, Writing, and Math. In reading, our next unit of study will be about fairy tales. We will be working on skills that include retelling key details, sequence of events, comparing and contrasting fairy tales, and long and short vowels. The writing we will be doing goes along with our reading units. We will begin working on opinion writing and narrative writing. We will continue improving our writing by adding details as well as writing strong topic sentences and conclusions that summarize our writing.
The next few weeks in math we are working on larger numbers of our number line. We are counting forward, backward and counting on from numbers other than 1. We are also working hard at looking at our 2-digit numbers in terms of tens and ones. We will also continue adding and subtraction to 20. Please continue to support your student with numbers that are all around us.
*Fieldtrip: January 14th at the Denver Performing Arts Center to see “Goodnight Moon”
Mrs. Lavelle
Mrs. Tejeda
Ms. Siddens
Ms. Boniello
Mr. McManus/Ms. Gianulis
Second Grade
This month in Literacy, we’ll begin our new unit: Solving Problems Through Technology. The essential questions of this unit are:
1) How do inventions help people?
2) Where do inventors get their ideas from?
3) How do some inventions change the world?
This week, we’ll apply these questions to three inventors: Anna Connelly (inventor of the fire escape), Mary Anderson (inventor of the windshield wiper), and George de Mestral (inventor of Velcro).
In math, second grade students are continuing to use number lines to solve equations. Our next unit builds on this by comparing number lines to measurements in inches, feet and yards. You can help your students by reviewing their homework and ensuring they understand the questions. If you have flashcards, please also continue to practice basic addition and subtraction facts.
Ms. Roybal and Ms. Brown
Mr. Williams & Ms. Valero
Ms. Gomez
Third Grade
In literacy, we are continuing our unit about different cultures and traditions around the world. We will be working in research teams to study three countries around the world. Students will read nonfiction books to learn facts and become an expert on one country. We will then be doing informational writing for students to teach others about the new knowledge they have gained. Students should continue to read for at least 20 minutes every day at home to improve their comprehension and fluency and to foster a love of reading.
In math this month, we are continuing our unit on measuring mass and liquid volume. We are doing many fun, hands-on activities to help our 3rd graders learn! Soon, we will begin some work with multi-step word problems where students pretend to be detectives and find “clues” to help them find solutions.
Fourth Grade
In literacy, we are finishing up our unit about animal defense mechanisms and starting our next unit, which is learning about women’s suffrage through the historical fiction novel The Hope Chest.
In math we will be finishing our unit on fractions and decimals. Additionally, we will be reviewing word problems, multiplication, division, and place value. Please continue to support your student at home by helping them practice multiplication and division facts.
Fifth Grade
Math: In January, 5th graders will continue to work on Unit 4 of the Bridges Math Curriculum which focuses on multiplying and dividing whole numbers and decimals. In this unit students will use a variety of strategies for multiplying and dividing multi-digit whole numbers. Practice using the standard algorithm to multiply multi-digit whole numbers. Begin multiplying and dividing with decimal numbers. While working on this unit we will continue to review skills learned in previous units: adding and subtracting with fractions, comparing and rounding decimals. Please continue to support your child at home by making sure they complete their homework each night and continue practicing their multiplication and division facts.
Literacy: In January, we will be studying the impact of sports on American culture by looking at the lives of Jackie Robinson and other influential athletes. We continue our focus on academic talk, ensuring students are able to provide evidence for their claims. Schoolwide, we are gearing up for ACCESS testing in order to track the English language development of our ELLs. Tuesday After School Reading Club resumes next week.
Art
Welcome back to a new year! Gust artists are continuing work with the units they have started before break.
ECE are learning about lines and shapes. Kindergarteners are learning about creativity, collage and using their imaginations to tell stories. 1st graders are putting the finishing touches on animal sculptures that aligned with the research they did in their homerooms. 2nd graders are learning the skills to draw portraits. 3rd graders are learning about Public Art and are acquiring the skills for finger weaving. 4th graders are becoming Bob Ross masters and will be creating their own imaginative landscapes. 5th graders are learning about color theory and how to manipulate color and emotion in their artwork.
Be on the lookout for projects coming home soon.
-Mrs. Martinez
Library
Physical Education
Welcome back! We hope everyone had a wonderful winter break and is ready to get back in the swing of things!
In January in PE, we will be beginning our gymnastics unit. This is a fun unit where students get to work on their strength and flexibility through tumbling activities on the mats, climbing on the traverse wall, and using the ropes.
Please be sure your child is coming prepared for PE wearing tennis shoes. In addition, during the gymnastics unit we also require students to wear long pants when using the ropes.
Reach out to us if you have any questions or concerns about your child in PE.
Ms. Templeton
Mr. Bowen