ACADEMY ADVENTURES MIDTOWN
Building on Strengths and Filling Buckets!
WELCOME TO THE 2021-2022 SCHOOL YEAR!
We are so excited to have the students back at school this year both our new students and returning students! It is definitely a more joyous start of school this year having everyone back on campus. There have been some significant changes to the school and program this year that we are very excited about. We know that the students will find it to be a fun, engaging year. Read about all our changes in the "New Year, New Program, New Beginning" section of this newsletter.
Our hope is that this school year will return to a more normal year and we will be able to reestablish many of our traditions such as, but not limited to: school performances, family movie nights on campus, Taco Tuesday, Love of Reading, tamale making, lasagna making, chili cook off, the end of the year family field trip, fundraising and more! We have built all these exciting events into our calendar for the year and will publish all the dates soon!
Please remember that if you have any questions or concerns, to please contact Mrs. Angela, Mr. Jack or your child's teacher. We are here to help!
MANDATORY FACE MASKS REQUIRED
The health and safety of our students, staff and families is a top priority. With the increase in COVID19 cases in all age groups, we feel it is essential that we do what we can to protect everyone. After a lot of consideration, research from the CDC, Arizona Department of Health and Pima County Health Department we will reinstate the mandatory face mask requirements and enforce it for all students, staff and visitors who are on campus.
We have face masks available for both adults and children who need them. This mandate will remain in effect until further notice.
If you have any questions, please contact the school at 520-777-3757 and speak with your child's teacher, Mrs. Angela or Mr. Jack.
We appreciate your cooperation in keeping everyone as safe as we can!
New Year, New Program & New Beginnings is our motto this year! Mrs. Angela and Mrs. Gilbert spent much of the summer reinventing the program at Academy Adventures Midtown! The program is 100% student based and designed to build on each and every child's strengths to help build confidence and be successful.
We have purchased all new curriculum that is designed to help make students successful! Our new ELA program is myView which also has an online component the students will utilize to work on assignments to help build their skills. Our new math program is Math in Focus and also has a computer component that the students will access assignments and practice to increase their math skills. We have reestablished the daily Social Emotional Learning (SEL) Program. Every morning the entire school will participate in SEL through Zoom. Our new SEL program is called Momentous and will be led by Mrs. Gilbert.
This year, we will be using Renaissance Star instead of Galileo for our Benchmark Assessments. Renaissance Star is an amazing assessment program that is more intuitive and the assessments are a bit shorter. It is an adaptive test, meaning it will give us information on what grade level your child is learning at so that we are able to address any learning gaps and get them on track. In addition to the benchmark assessments, Renaissance also has a supplemental math and ELA programs we will be using with the students. The math program is Freckle and ELA is myOn and myOn News! Teachers will post assignments for each child based on their needs. These programs are all online and teachers will be able to monitor student progress.
Not only do we have all new curriculum, we are changing the schedule of the day. Every morning students will have SEL before beginning their ELA and math curriculum. Monday-Thursday, Mrs. Gilbert will be teaching K-5 ELA in the mornings and Miss Emily will be teaching K-5 Math. These will be small groups of direct instruction at grade level and then students will have assignments to work on and will be monitored and assisted by our parapros. Every Tuesday morning, all students will have PE with Mr. Dan. On Monday, Wednesday and Thursday all students will have a chance to be in Bookworm Reading Club with Ms. Lia. Fridays are going to be dedicated to short 5-10 question assessments for all children using Renaissance Star. The assessment will be based on math and ELA standards they are learning. We want students to get comfortable and confident taking assessments. We also want the students to take testing seriously and show us what they know and not just rush thru to finish. These assessments do not affect their grades, but are designed to help the teachers and interventionists know where your child needs help. Students will get their scores right away thru conferencing with their teacher. If they are doing well, they will finish the morning doing some STEAM rotations. If they need more support, they will work in small groups or independently with their teacher and target the areas they are struggling in. In the afternoon, small groups and independent instruction will continue for those how need it.
After lunch, all students will have 15 minutes of silent reading. Once silent reading is complete, students will do two rotations that may be anything from Social Studies, Science, Technology/Computer Programming, Art, STEAM, Creative Writing or SEL Journaling. These rotations will be about 35 minutes each.
The new program provides many opportunities for all students to be engaged in learning and successful! It is very similar to our summer program where we saw a 68% increase in assessments scores in only 4 weeks! Think about how much progress our students can make in 180 days of school!
If you have any questions on your child's schedule or want more information, please do not hesitate to speak with their teacher!
Did you know that if your child is only 5 minutes late or leaves 5 minutes early every day, that equals almost 3 full days of school that they have missed?! Although Early Release days are shorter, it doesn't mean there is not just as much learning going on! Did you know if your child misses all the Early Release days that is 6,045 minutes or 100.75 hours OR almost 20 days of school?
Every minute counts. For many students it is not just the learning, but how being late and having to walk into their classroom when it has already started throws off their day. For some it is uncomfortable, for some they start the day feeling lost...not to mention the distraction it makes for the rest of the class.
This year, we will be making attendance a big focus. We know that students cannot learn if they are not at school. To encourage good attendance, we will be giving out weekly awards to individual students who have perfect attendance (no tardies, no early releases, no absences), monthly perfect attendance awards and weekly class perfect attendance awards (all students in class, every day of the week on time and no one leaves early)!!
Let's work together to make our students successful!
Welcome to Academy Adventures Midtown 2021-2022 School. I hope ALL of you have had an amazing summer, and have prepared for an AMAZING school year. One of the mottos that I have adopted over the last month has been NEW YEAR, NEW PROGRAMS, NEW BEGINNING. I cannot explain the excitement I have for our students for this year. Our amazing administration has approved BRAND NEW Social Emotional Learning program, as well as two new, highly recommended curricula for English Language Arts and Math.
For this year, the new schedule has the intent to keep students highly engaged, meet all required minutes for each subject, STEM/STEAM, computer coding, and individual/small group instruction to bridge educational gaps. With the new schedule, I am beyond stoked to be ALL grades English Language Arts Teacher.
As the ELA teacher, I have a new approach to the subject. Each grade will receive High Frequency Words, weekly spelling lists, and exploration of genres of reading, creative writing and journaling. The focus is to have the curriculum student-lead with individual support, as it is imperative to recognize each student learns with different styles. At this time, I do not intend to send homework home. I highly encourage every student to read to parent, pet, friend and/or stuffed animal for 15 minutes a night. I am more than happy to provide reading material if needed!
Please keep updated on Class Dojo for exciting upcoming events! If you ever have questions about your student, I am available via Class Dojo in between classes, and after school from 2:30 PM - 4:00 PM.
Again, I can never truly express how blessed I am to be a teacher at this school. I thank every single one of my students' parents for your continued support. We will always be here to support your students academic path!
homeroom teacher for grades 3-5. On my career path, I found that my true
passion is working with kids and became lucky enough to join the Academy
Adventures Midtown staff. Math has always been one of my favorite topics in
school and I am so grateful to be able to share my knowledge of the subject to
help guide your children into deeper understanding.
our 30 minute Zoom meeting for Social Emotional Learning. They then can work
on their assignments in Renaissance, our new online testing and supplemental program, based on their schedule. In Renaissance, the students can dive into books of their interest
through MyOn, our supplemental reading program and can complete any assignments that
Mrs. Gilbert assigns them. They can also use Renaissance to access Freckle, our
new supplemental math program, where they can practice math skills and complete any
assignments I give them with the incentive of customizing their avatars after they
spend a certain amount of time completing tasks. During homeroom, students
not only are able to work on their computers with the programs, but are
able to work on any hand-outs and use manipulatives to help with their learning.
A schedule for each grade is posted so that students know where they need to
be at what time, and are guided into the routine for each day.
which covers reading and writing in the morning with Mrs. Gilbert. Also in the morning, when not in Math or ELA, students are pulled for PE, BookWorms (our new reading Club) and individual or small group intervention/tutoring. In the afternoon, students get to participate in Social Studies, Science, STEAM, Art, Cubetto and SPLATS.
our students’ skill levels are at, so that the teaching and differential learning
is best suited for each student. This week and over the next month, our
Kindergartners are working on their numbers to 10. Our first graders are also
working on numbers to 10, but are incorporating addition and subtraction in
order to build on their prior knowledge. Second grade is working on numbers to
1,000 and are learning to incorporate addition and subtraction as well. Third
grade students are focusing on addition and subtraction for numbers to 10,000.
Fourth grade is working on whole numbers, and are learning to expand their
knowledge of addition and subtraction with multiplication and division. Fifth
grade students are working on whole numbers and incorporating all four
operations (adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing) into their skills when
looking at numbers as big as 10,000,000. All of the grade levels follow the same
topic in regards to numbers, but are building on their skill levels by adding place
values, learning how place values increase as the numbers get bigger, and by
incorporating more complex operations as the grades progress.
able to work with your students. The 3-5 graders are an amazing and unique
group of students and it brings me so much joy to see the progress they’ve
made since day one. I am excited for what the year has ahead of us and am
ready to learn from them, hopefully, as much as they are ready to learn from
me.
STARTING MONDAY, AUGUST 23, 2021!!
We are excited to bring the After School Enrichment Program back this year! The program will run from 2:30-5:00 PM on days that are not early release. All enrolled students are welcome to participate.
More information on the program will be available as it gets closer. Watch Class Dojo for details!
We are happy to announce that we will continue with the CEP (Community Eligibility Program) which enables ALL of our students to eat for free without having to qualify! Students will receive breakfast daily from 7:30-7:55 AM. This year, we will be offering lunches even on Early Release Days! Students will be given a sack lunch to take home with them.
In addition to free breakfast and lunch, we will be providing students snacks daily. Many of our snacks this year will be donated from Cakes for Causes again! They have been kind enough to volunteer to bake healthy snacks for our students to enjoy! Check them out at: https://www.cakesforcauses.org
We know that the more involvement parents have in their child's education, the more successful the child will be! We are always encouraging parents to be involved. Some of the ways that you can be involved include but is not limited to:
- Volunteering to help with projects in the classroom
- Sharing your talents or hobbies with the students
- Helping with fundraising events
- Participating in school family events
- Making donations to the school or your child's classroom
If you would like to be more involved, please contact your child's teacher. We are always open to new ideas and suggestions!
AUGUST 19-20, 2021 -- EARLY RELEASE (11:30 AM)
MONDAY, AUGUST 23, 2022 - AFTER SCHOOL ENRICHMENT PROGRAM BEGINS!!
ACADEMY ADVENTURES MIDTOWN
Email: info@academyadventuresmidtown.com
Website: https://academyadventuresmidtown.com
Location: 3025 North Winstel Boulevard, Tucson, AZ, USA
Phone: (520) 777-3757
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/academyadventuresmidtown