LCES Panther Cub Communication # 20

Week of December 25th- January 4, 2024

Para traducir al español, desplácese hasta el final y haga clic en la bandera ..

Hello Families, 

We had such a great holiday spirit week.  Thank you to Trail 100 for the incredible donation that allowed all our PK students to receive a gift from Santa.  What a magical time.  We also had a great time dressing up all week to show our holiday cheer and during our class parties on Thursday.  

It has been such a great first semester and we want to thank you all for allowing us the opportunity to work with your students throughout the first part of this school year.  We are excited for all the growth students have been making, which we will be measuring with our middle of the year assessments for K-2 in January (more information is below).  

We wish you all the best winter break and look forward to seeing students back on January 8th.  Please note that offices will be closed December 25-January 5.  

Warm wishes for this holiday season, 

Katie Pongrekun

Principal, LCES

kpongrekun@lakecountyschools.net

Staff of the Week Highlight!

Each week this year in family communication, we will be highlighting a staff member in the building.  If you want, please feel free to send emails, handwritten notes, or letters of encouragement to that staff member.

Ms. Casey Curry- Art Teacher

 

Casey is our very talented art teacher here at LCES. She is an artist herself and has tried many different forms of art including paper making, ceramics, welding, glass blowing, painting, but her main form of art these days is metalsmithing and jewelry making. Ms. Curry grew up in upstate New York and her dream vacation would be to visit Japan to go snowboarding and to see the art in Japan. She finished her degree at The Academy of Art University and she has worked as a metalsmith, making and teaching jewelry classes before she started as the art teacher here at LCES three years ago. Ms. Curry is inspired by her family, the kids at school, nature, and the fact that there is always more to learn. Thank you for all you do, Ms. Curry! 

Send an encouraging note to Ms. Curry at ccurry@lakecountyschools.net 

K-2 Specifics

January is a very important month for attendance!  We do a lot of mid-year assessments throughout the month to help us know where your student is at with specific skills.  Please help your child with these assessments by ensuring that they are in school and rested.  We will be having an attendance challenge for the month of January where the crew with the highest attendance percentage from each grade will receive a popcorn and movie party at the end of the month. We hope to see your child here each and every day! Here are the details of each assessment:

• ACCESS testing for all K-2 ELD students will begin the week of January 8th.  This is a test that helps us determine what language services are needed for students in the areas of listening, speaking, reading, and writing.  Results of the assessment will be shared with families in the Spring.  
• DIBELS 8 Middle of Year assessments are scheduled for the week of January 15th.  This will help us see what growth your student has made throughout the first part of school in literacy.  Results of this assessment will be shared with families with a report sent home after testing and at conferences in March.  
• NWEA Math assessments will happen in classrooms the week of January 29th.  This will help us determine where your student is at with their math skills.  Results of this assessment will be shared with families through a report sent home and gone over at conferences in March.

Preschool Specifics

Curriculum:

• Preschool Room – The animal domain is designed to teach young children appropriate nonfiction content about the animal kingdom. 

Children will be learning the following nursery rhymes: 

• An Old Person of Ware 
• Here is the Beehive
• Five Little Ducks
• The Eensy, Weensy Spider
• Hickety, Pickety, My Black Hen 

• 2 ½ Years Old Room – Children will continue learning the routines and expectations in the classroom as well as potty training. As they are transitioning with Creative Curriculum Infant and Toddler Curriculum. 

• We are taking a little pause with Second Step till January 18, 2024. During this lesson pause, we will be learning more about the Pyramid Model and the different components of it to best support children on managing emotions, problem solving, and making friends. 

December Activity Bingo and In-kind Form: English and Spanish 

Reminders:

• With current staffing shortages, there is a chance that your child’s class will be split into other rooms and closed on any given day. This may occur after your child has already been dropped off. 
• Reminder school doors open at 9:00 am each day, we ask that you wait until you schedule hours listed on your signed tuition agreement. Any time that is outside these hours are billable to you. 
• Be sure to put your student’s yellow folder in their backpack to return on Monday so that we can fill them back up with important information.   Thanks for helping with this.

As you may know, in addition to having a Head Start preschool program for children ages 3 to 5, there is also an Early Head Start program providing individualized, in-home services promoting early education and connection to families with children from birth to age 3 and pregnant moms.

The Center is currently involved in a Full Enrollment Initiative with the Office of Head Start designed to boost enrollment in this program to the total enrollment of 12 children or families.  

Efforts have been centering on recruitment, that is reaching out and finding families who are interested in these kinds of services and who are eligible for services based on Head Start criteria.  We also realized that having bilingual staff would enhance the effectiveness of both recruitment of families and offering meaningful services to the entire community.

We reached out to the existing Family Connector program, hoping that their established networks and connections to families would be helpful in finding families who might be interested in our program.  The Connectors had great suggestions for rebranding the program to better reflect the benefits it actually provides to families.  They also already knew of families who had expressed interest in making a connection to school for their very young children and were very happy to now have something to offer them.

As conversations continued about the Early Head Start mission, everyone realized how closely the goals of Head Start and the existing work of the Family Connectors matched up.  When the Connectors indicated they would be interested in actually delivering services to Early Head Start families and getting the training they would need to do this effectively, the idea took root that this would be a great way to both fulfill the Early Head Start mission in a way that would benefit our particular community and also to expand the work connectors were doing to families with children younger than had previously been able to work with.

Work is currently being done to complete applications with families who are interested in the program, enroll families who meet Head Start eligibility requirements, train the Family Connectors in the type and scope of services required by Head Start, acquire materials for services to be provided on the Mobile Learning Center, the EHS classroom at the Center, and family homes, and create a schedule and budget for the additional time commitment for the Family Connector staff.

We are very excited about this transition.  When the Early Head Start program was started, we knew how valuable it could be for our community.  We are grateful to have the opportunity to adapt this program to our diverse and unique community in a way that will also foster meaningful relationships between families and the school district to support the learning of the youngest members of this community.

Important Dates PK-2

January 8	ACCESS Testing Begins
January 15-18	DIBELS 8 middle of year reading assessment
January 18	January K-2 Dollar Day (flier below)
January 25	K-2 Community Meeting the Gym at 8:00, HOWL of the month is Craftsmanship and the meeting will be led by 2nd gradePanther Day during Specials: “Winter Wonderland”
January 29	NWEA math assessment testing

Public Library Schedule:

December 5	PreK – Rm. 133 (Steph & Sheryl)
December 12	PreK – Rm. 135 (Noemi & Donna)
December 19	PreK – Rm. 137 (Nancy & Katie)

LCES Menus:

Project Dream Information

Project Dream will be hosting the film, “Advice for Girls” on January 11th at Freight. The event will be at 6:30pm. Tickets are $15 and can be purchased here: https://gofan.co/event/1307104?schoolId=CO11697

“Advice for Girls” puts a spotlight on the collective experience of women in the ski industry. The film highlights skiers across generations – from women who hold first descents to young skiers ready to make their mark on the slopes. With advice from three generations of female skiers, the film’s central message reminds women and girls that they are worthy of success, allowed to take up space, and are valuable to their world. 

Check out the trailer here: https://f.io/Z5QG_3db 

Please be on the lookout for a text/email with information for spring programs. Your student’s days in Project Dream will remain the same unless you request otherwise. There will be some edits to our transportation route which will be sent out next week. 

You can find the full Project Dream calendar here.

If you ever have any questions or concerns about Project Dream, please reach out to Raquel Contreras, our LCES Site Supervisor (719-293-5363 or rcontreras@lakecountyschools.net). 

Community News

Fliers