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From The Principal's Desk We would like to thank all of our parents for coming out to our first Parents Expo on October 30. This special meeting provided parents an opportunity to hear our wonderful SSES Innovation Choir, pick up report cards, meet with the teachers to monitor your child's progress, and to fellowship with each other over a delicious meal. Parents, we encourage you to enroll your child in our site-based after school tutorial program. Currently, students in grades 3-5 are provided tutorial services to assist with the mastery of skills that will be assessed on the FCAT. We have been able to work out limited bus transportation for some of our students. In addition, we are looking to start providing services for our first and second graders in December. Notices will be sent home informing parents of the starting date. As always, we solicit your support in our school. Please sign up to volunteer for at least 30 minutes once a week or come out and mentor a child. These small acts of kindness could make a huge difference in the life of a child. Pre-K News All of our Pre K students have enjoyed their Christmas break and Pre K is ready for new beginnings in the month of January. To start the year off, Ms. Grandstaff's and Mrs. Moore's classes have planted seeds and they will doing activities related to watching their plants grow. Mrs. Powell-Jones's class will be discussing the importance of dressing properly for the winter. They made snowmen, mittens, hats and other warm clothes to be worn for the winter. All Pre-K classes will be listening to stories about Dr. Martin Luther King while doing related activities about peace, kindness and sharing. Ms. Baker has moved on to Tallahassee Community College and we wish her well. She will be missed at Stewart Street Elementary School. The Pre-K is delighted to welcome Ms. Candida Gil from Tallahassee Via Miami. She is a graduate of FSU and she has a three-year-old son. Kindergarten News Kindergartners returned from Winter Break eager to conintue learning about grouping, cardinal numbers, money and time in Math. The next DIBELS testing will be done this month and we expect to see great student gains, after all-MUSTANGS ARE NUMBER ONE First Grade News We welcome Mrs.Newmyer, our new first grade teacher to Stewart Street Elementary. We have had a wonderful, productive nine weeks and the rest are sure to be just as fun filled and academically challenging. Students have made tremendous gains in their reading skills. This nine weeks, we are working on singular and plural nouns, possessive nouns, comparing and contrasting, and building fluency in reading. Please continue to encourage your child to read his/her decodable books daily. In math, we are furthering our studies in addition and subtraction. We are using Second Grade News The second graders are continuing to work on reading fluency and comprehension. Our Reading Unit is on Kindness. The students are participating in writing complete sentences for the concept question boards in the classrooms. In Math, we are continuing to practice regrouping with 2-digit addition and subtraction. Homework is sent home for additional practice. We visited the William A. "Bill" McGill Library in Quincy on November 1, 2007. Mrs. Chris, The librarian took us on a tour of the library and went over the literacy program with us which encourages reading and fluency. Please talk with your child about the skills he or she is learning in the classroom. Your conversation helps to reinforce your child's knowledge of the concepts as well. Thank you parents for your participation, support and encouragement. Ms. P. Potter, (2-1) 2nd Grade Chairperson Mrs. L. Davis, (2-3) Lead Teacher Mrs. S. Daniels (2-2) Mrs. H. Pete (2-4) Third Grade News
Fourth Grade News November is going to be filled with lots of great learning and fun. The 4th grade team is looking forward to the fall carnival, Thanksgiving, and well as our end of the month bake sale. We are planning to take an end of the year trip, and in efforts to raise money for this field trip we are looking to have a bake sale at the end of the month. Parents feel free to donate any items that may be of use at this event. However, make sure all items that are donated is packaged Please continue to support us as we work on our focus calendar skills for this month. In Reading, Mrs. Lightfoot-Brown will focus on Plot Development/Resolution, Author's Purpose, Comparing and Contrasting, and Reference/Research. Also, remember to help your child with their reading homework packet. In Math, Ms. Norton will focus on teaching your child measurement and fractions. Ms. Johnson will be working on Expository Prompt Writing and Writing+: Focus, Supporting Details. Please encourage your child to use the strategies and skills that we are teaching weekly on their focus calendar assessment. Together we are going to make great strides in the month of November. Fifth Grade News The fifth grade departments have covered all of the FCAT tested benchmarks in the area of Reading/language arts. We are currently reviewing each of these skills on a weekly basis. Our new theme in reading for the 2nd nine weeks is entitled "Astronomy". Please have your child bring in personal artifacts, magazine articles, newspaper clippings, or information via the internet that relate to the theme. Students are currently working on Math skills covered in Unit 8: Measurement and Unit 9: Probability. It is extremely important that students study and memorize their multiplication facts. Science classes have begun studying "Formation of Landforms"(Strand C). Students need to wear protective goggles during science experiments. Experiments are conducted weekly. As a fifth grade class we are looking forward to having a wonderful yet educational end-of-the-year field trip. There will be a parent survey sent out within the next two weeks concerning several trip destinations and their cost. Also parents it is extremely important that your child attends school everyday. There is an incentive for those students who have 100% attendance for the 2nd nine weeks. Attendance will also be a key factor in attending all field trips this school term. SPECIAL AREA NEWS We would like to extend a warm welcome to our new media specialist Mrs. Myrna R. Linsangan. She comes to us from the Philippines where she has been a High School Librarian for 34 years. Since her arrival, she has been teaching the students about the different sections of the media center and testing them using a media center diagram. For the K -2 students she has been using a game called "Comprehension Climb". This simple game tests the students' listening and comprehension skills by asking them questions based on a book that has been read to them. Mrs. Linsangan would also like to inform everyone that November 12 - 18 is Children's Book Week. Let's encourage the students to read! In music, Mr. Critelli has started a new unit on pitch. Pitch is the highness or lowness of a sound. The K-1 classes are learning to discriminate between high and low sounds and are also learning that pitch can move up, move down or repeat. The 2nd grade classes are preparing for the Christmas Program. The 3-5 classes are learning how to read pitch using standard notation. In Physical Education we have just completed our Soccer unit, working with the four basic kicks, (inside of foot, top of foot, outside and heel kick) dribbling, trapping, and heading the ball . In every class students are being challenged with the warm up run and classes are running ¼ mile - hopefully non-stop. Some of our students have figured out their "jogging pace" and at this time can run a full half mile! Some of our children are going to be in an art show!!! Stewart Street Elementary has been chosen from the pool of all Gadsden County Schools to represent the county school system in the Gadsden Arts Center's 19th Annual Art In Gadsden Juried Show and Exhibition. The Center has requested that the works of roughly ten children be selected to represent our school. What an honor!!!! The "Art in Gadsden" event is a prestigious, juried (judged) exhibition for grown up artists. One hundred talented artists living within two hundred miles of Quincy have been selected to compete for cash awards totaling $2,000.00. Their work was juried by Mark Messersmith, a painting professor from Florida State University. Messersmith is also a member of the Gadsden Arts Center. Come and find out which grown up artists are taking home this year's awards, while proudly supporting our children's efforts. They represent us, but our school was chosen above all of the other schools in Gadsden county to be a part of this important show. We have good cause to be proud of all of our children. Everyone is invited. The Awards Ceremony and Opening Reception is on Friday, November 9th. It begins at 7:00 p.m. Visitors will enjoy delicious homemade food and refreshments after the awards are presented. Attire is nice church clothes. The Gadsden Arts Center is located at 13 North Madison Street, on Quincy's historic courthouse square. Please come on Friday evening, or drop in to see the show during regular gallery hours through December 29th. Regular gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday 10:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. For more information, call Cynthia Kent-Toussaint, Art Instructor, at Stewart Street Elementary or the Gadsden Arts Center at (850) 875-4866. You can also check the center's web site at www.gadsdenarts.org.
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