HAWK'S NEST
Newsletter, October 2019
Leaping into Q2
Sincerely,
Kyley Gatz, Principal
The mission of Hiawatha Middle School is to provide all students with life-long learning skills and opportunities for academic, personal, and social growth in a safe and orderly environment. The educational program is designed to enable students to become productive citizens in an ever-changing society.
New Teachers at HMS
Terilyn Bufkin, 5th Gr. English Language Arts
Danielle Hill, 5th Gr. Social Studies
Diana Bray, 6th Gr. History
Brian Lillie, 8th Gr. Science
Billy Hatfield, 5th-12th Gr. Vocal
Tom Schmitz, 6th Gr. Math
So, what is intervention?
If you have any questions regarding intervention, please feel free to contact your student's teacher, counselor or the building principal.
Mrs. Gatz
Behavioral Assessments: SAEBRS and mySAEBRS
Along with new assessments for Math and Reading this year at HMS, students and teachers completed a behavioral assessment to assist in identifying daily behavioral needs of all students at HMS. The SAEBRS (Social, Academic, Emotional Rating Scale) is a 19 item assessment used to identify risk for social-emotional and behavioral problems that is completed by teachers for each student. Students also completed a self- assessment called the mySAEBRS, which has questions similar to the Teacher assessment.
The data from the SAEBRS assessments will be utilized to identify students who might benefit from additional behavioral support beyond those provided to all students. Research shows that teaching students the “right” behaviors for each school setting result in students displaying more positive behaviors and fewer “wrong” behaviors. This year all students have spent time reviewing those “right” behaviors by learning what it looks like to be Safe, Responsible and Respectful in all school settings--classroom, hallway, cafeteria, bathroom, bus, restroom, gym, events, etc.
Teachers and staff will continue to remind and review what it looks like to be Safe, Responsible, and Respectful throughout the school year with all students. Students whom are identified as at risk may participate in small group interventions as a tool for strengthening positive behavior in school. The current plan is for students and teachers to complete the SAEBRS assessment three times each school year. If you have any questions regarding the SAEBRS assessment or behavioral expectations, please don’t hesitate to contact the school.
Tami Shefferd, LMSW
District Social Worker
Hiawatha Schools
1st Quarter Happenings From Your School Counselor
The beginning of the year comes with some great things to celebrate and learn from a counselor’s perspective. September is Suicide Awareness Month. To teach our students the signs of suicide and what we should do to help ourselves and others, we use a program called SOS (signs of suicide). This program follows the ACT protocol. A- Acknowledge, Acknowledge that the person is struggling. C- Care- Show the person you care, by telling them you are there for them, or you want to help them. T- Tell- Tell a trusted adult. We look at different scenarios and discuss how we would ACT in those situations. There is more information available to parents for anyone interested. I urge you to speak with your students about what they have learned.
October brings two very important weeks. Kindness Awareness Week is the first week of October. This week focuses on what it takes to be kind to others. We had many different activities during the week, prepared by the Student Council members. Along with kindness, we focus on character traits and what each of those traits mean. Some character traits we focused on were kindness, loyalty, and fairness. Each day, the character traits were read and processed at lunch. We finished off the week with a fun activity in the gym. Please be on the lookout for many positive pictures from this week on our Facebook page.
Red Ribbon Week is the second big week in October. We will celebrate it October 23rd- October 31st. This week focuses on staying drug free. This year's theme is: Send a Message, Stay Drug Free. The students will learn about the effects of drugs and alcohol on the body and how to “say no to drugs." Educating our students and having honest conversations about the effects of drugs and alcohol is extremely important.This week will also be filled with activities organized by our Student Council.
Another fun activity going on in guidance is the color code test. This test is a series of questions that ask about your personality as a child. It then gives you a color that correlates to a personality. We have been working on this in guidance and the students are enjoying understanding what their color is and how they react to different situations. The results talk about how to build relationships with each of the colors and why some people react to situations different from us. I encourage you to talk with your students about their color and also take the quiz yourself. There is a free version at colorcode.com.
We truly have an amazing bunch of kids in our building and I enjoy getting the chance to interact with them daily.
Mrs. Krauter, Counselor
Quarterly Nurse News
With an increase in illnesses around our schools and community, please remember that students should not return to school until they are 24 hours fever free without the use of Tylenol, Ibuprofen, Motrin, or other fever reducing medications. The “Flu Season” is also just around the corner, October to May, with a peak in cases from December to February. Once students have returned, please encourage frequent hand washing, or use of hand sanitizers, and I strongly encourage sending a water bottle for students to drink from instead of using the water fountains. Not sure if a member of your family is getting just a cold or the flu; hopefully the chart below will be of assistance!
Change in weather also brings a change to our closets! Please remember HMS is always willing to take donations of personal hygiene items, feminine products, or gently used clothing items that your child(ren) have grown out of. Already this year we are seeing an increased need of both boys and girls deodorant, coats, hoodies, shoes, and pants.
Per district policy, students’ immunizations should be up to date as of October 15th. Letters were sent to the address we have on file with a reminder of what your child still needs. If you didn’t receive a letter, your child is up to date! Please feel free to call the middle school and ask for me, Erin, school nurse, if you have any questions or concerns.
Nurse Erin
Have you done the math? Attendance matters!
K + 12 = 13 yrs. of school
Missing just 1.5 days per month x 9 months in a year = 13.5 days
13.5 days X 13 years = 175.5 days = Almost 1 whole year of school
Helpful Tips:
Remind your child that school is their first and most important job! Tardies, late arrivals, and early release times matter. Being out of the classroom means that valuable learning time is lost.
Communicate the importance of regular school attendance to your child so that he/she is hearing the same message from both home and school.
If at all possible, please schedule appointments after school or on days off. Recognizing that this is not always possible, please work with your child's teachers or school counselor to identify the best time in the day to schedule these visits.
Thanks,
Mrs. Gatz
Teachers meeting after school to learn more about interventions
Creating beautiful sound
Volleyball, Football and Cross Country engaging in some friendly competition
Adhesion, cohesion, & surface tension, oh my!
Working on our books in History
Learning how to handle our trumpets
Community member teaching about the importance of healthy soil
Design and Modeling class displaying their vehicle entry assistance device
Using whole brain teaching to learn our vocabulary
Mr. Schmitz engaging his students in best mathematical practices
Students enjoying Red Ribbon Week activities led by Student Council
Congratulations to our Cross Country League Medalists!
Elective teachers making plans
Preparing for Science Olympiad competition
Learning about the dangers of vaping
Prepping for our landfill lab
Environmental designs using food
We appreciate our bus drivers!
Mrs. Kyley Gatz, Principal
Email: kgatz@usd415.org
Website: http://www.hiawathaschools.org/
Location: 307 South Morrill Avenue, Hiawatha, KS, USA
Phone: 785-742-4172