To be Grateful

In addition to scrumptious turkey, delectable mashed potatoes, and the crème de la crème of the meal - cranberry sauce, Thanksgiving is about gratitude.  It provides a checkpoint in the year for all of us to take stock of our lives. Family, friends, and the people with whom we interact everyday are enriching; they teach us to love, to laugh, to forgive. They show us examples of PRIDE in big ways and in small.

On this eve of Thanksgiving, I'd like share with you a few of things I am grateful for:

• Our new redesigned Reading Room! Ms. JoAnn, Mrs. Pringle, Mrs. Worthington, & Mrs. Doukakis have spent countless hours preparing a new fantastically comfortable space for our students

• Teachers who are willing to step out of their comfort zone and use Number Talks and Three Act Lessons to engage students in deep mathematical thinking.  Just recently, I've observed Mrs. Dougherty, Mrs. Costello, Mrs. Hansberry, and Mr. Grundel doing exactly that!

• Rori and Jahnesha - two 5th graders - who consistently perform their role as morning announcers with aplomb

• All of our staff who agreed to be Student Success Mentors and focus on improving student attendance this year; thank you!

• Students who do the right thing, even when no one is looking.  This type of integrity is on display in each of our classrooms everyday

• Classes that have worked hard reading as many books as possible to win Humphrey for a week.  Thank you to Mrs. Pringle, Ms. Savage, Mrs. Costello, Ms. Saeger, and Ms. Frazier's students!

• For our support staff who strive everyday to help our neediest students to fulfill their infinite potential

• The smiles and hugs of students I receive every day; it means the world to me!

Having numerous things to be thankful for, I could not possibly list them all in this post. Surely, many of you feel the same way.  However, in the comment section below, please share with me two or three things you are grateful for in your life.  I would love to hear about them!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Staying Safe While Walking

Below you will find a letter I sent home to all of your parents today.  Students please read through it and in the comments section offer suggestions on how we can help keep our friends and classmates safe:

Podcast - Episode 3 - An Interview with Ms. Swanson - 1st Grade Teacher

Below you will find our third podcast episode.  This is an interview with Ms. Swanson our new 1st grade teacher at Evergreen.  This is an opportunity for students and parents to get to know a little bit more about Ms. Swanson. We hope you enjoy it!

Download the MP3 file

Podcast Episode 2 - An Interview with Ms. Bhatia - 5th Grade Teacher at Evergreen

Below you will find our second podcast episode.  This is an interview with Ms. Bhatia our new 5th grade teacher at Evergreen.  This is an opportunity for students and parents to get to know a little bit more about Ms. Bhatia. We hope you enjoy it!

Download the MP3 file

A 5th Grade Perspective

This school year has gotten off to an auspicious start.  Everyone - parents, students, and teachers - have adjusted well to the new drop off loop, parking configuration, new classrooms, and new office spaces.  These many changes have been taken in stride.

To keep this positive momentum going specifically for our students, I asked one of our 5th graders - Rory - if she had any advice she could offer her fellow classmates on what they should focus on at this early juncture in the school year.  Here is her response:

"Something we have in our school is the acronym “P.R.I.D.E.” It means to be positive, respectful, to have integrity, to be dependable, to show effort. We talk about that word everyday in class because it is important. But being everything that word means can be challenging.

The new school year has started! Now that it is the second week of school, we’re all starting to get back to our school mindsets; though many of us still aren’t sure how to start this year off right. None of us have anything to worry about though, because we’ve got the whole year to figure things out! Following the P.R.I.D.E. acronym can be hard, but if you focus on one word at a time then you will have a good beginning. Later on, you’ll want to embrace all of the P.R.I.D.E. words.

I recommend the word “respect” as the starting point, though they are all important. Respecting everyone else helps them to have respect for you too; and the classroom will be much more harmonious. Respect can be as basic as listening to your teacher when he/she is talking, or it can be being friendly and not rude. It keeps us from fighting and arguing. If someone gives a wrong answer in class, don’t laugh and make fun of them. If someone has respect for me, I then feel valued and important.

This new school year is going to be fun for me, and I hope it will be fun for everyone else too!"

What great advice she shared and how eloquent she put it! I am super thankful that she agreed to put it in written form for this blog post; thanks Rory! 

Evergreen students, what are your thoughts on starting with the "R" in PRIDE and really focusing on being respectful?  Will that help you get this year off to a great start?  Please share your thoughts in the comment section below.

Welcome Back to School!...the Podcast - Episode 1

Welcome to the 2015-16 school year!

Below you will find a link to a podcast that you can download.  It contains useful information about all of our procedures and changes that have occurred over the summer.  Please listen and let us know what you think in the comments section below.

A Teacher I Will Never Forget

We are excited to welcome Mrs. Campbell back to school and even more excited to have her as our guest blogger today! 

A Teacher I Will Never Forget

It was my first day of 3rd grade. It was also my first day at my new school. I was beyond nervous because I didn’t know anyone and I knew what it was like to be the new kid. I remember walking down the hall hoping that all the kids would be nice and that I would have a great teacher. Before I even walked into the room I saw my teacher’s bright sweet smile as she greeted each and every student. She must have noticed the scared looked on my face when I reached the door, because  she immediately bent down and said, “Good Morning, you must be our new student Sara! We are so excited to have you as part of our family here at Stone Academy!” From that moment I knew that Mrs. Baugh was going to be an amazing teacher!

Mrs. Baugh took the time to work with us one on one. At first I had trouble learning multiplication facts, but she found a way to make learning easier by sitting down with me and walking me through each step. She made sure that she read with each kid at least once a week. We always enjoyed our reading time with her!

Each morning we would write to her in our writing journals. We could write about what we did over the weekend, if we had a question about something new we were learning, or anything else we had on our mind. I would always tell her about my favorite things to do. I told her about riding four-wheelers, the exciting new book I was reading, and about my clogging and ballet lessons. Mrs. Baugh was always very eager to hear about my dance lessons because she used to dance as a little girl too! She even asked me when my recital was because she wanted to come watch me! When she came, I felt like a million bucks because she came to watch ME dance!

Throughout the school year Mrs. Baugh taught us how to multiply, divide, read and write; more importantly, she made each and every student feel special. I will never forget Mrs. Baugh--ever.

Have you ever had a teacher that made you feel special? I would love for you to share who your favorite teacher has been and what he/she did to make you feel important!