LCES Panther Cub Communication #24
Week of February 3-6, 2025
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| LCES Families, Happy February! We are excited for the month ahead and have some fun things planned. Please pay close attention to the important dates section and reach out if you have any questions. Second semester is already flying by! Here is an update on our most recent DIBELS testing for K-2 students: We are excited to share an update on how our DIBELS middle of the year benchmark reading assessment went in kindergarten through second grade. This assessment focuses on students’ literacy skills and development. First, thank you for your partnership in sending your students to school during the testing window as we were able to test 100% of our students. In looking at the data as a school, 47 students moved up a color band. This means their skills improved so much that they moved from red (well below benchmark) to yellow (below benchmark), green (at benchmark), or blue (above benchmark). One student in Mrs. Compean’s crew moved from red to blue! That is amazing growth across the school and something we are really proud of. Teachers recently came together and engaged in a data talk where they noticed that every single student in our school showed growth in at least one sub-skill from the beginning of the year to middle of the year. Even if it’s just a couple of points, growth is something to be celebrated. At the beginning of the year, 30% of our students were reading at grade level. Our middle of the year DIBELS data shows 35% of our students are reading at grade level. At LCES, we are addressing this issue head on by increasing student engagement in the classroom and creating a data driven culture of responsive planning and instruction with our staff. This work has been and will continue to be our highest priority throughout the second semester. We also really need your support. Two ways you can support accelerated reading growth is by reading everyday with your student for at least 10 minutes, and / or helping your student log on to Boost through their Clever badge. Currently only 9% of our students are meeting their recommended minutes for Boost each week. Boost is a research based program based on the Science of Reading to help improve student’s foundational literacy skills through an interactive platform. If you are needing help getting logged on to Boost, please reach out to your child’s teacher. I am certain that if we all work together we can make sure all of our students will read at grade level. Together we can and GO PANTHERS! Have a great “Leadville winter warm” weekend! Brandi Lovely, Principal blovely@lakecountyschools.net  | |
| K-2 Specifics | |
| Jump Rope for Heart Update: All donations for the Kids Heart Challenge are due back to Mrs. Ayers By Tuesday February 4th! We hope you have been enjoying our Lake County Elementary School’s KHC so far! We are entering our final week, so calling all heart heroes!! So far we have raised $4,110.70 of our $2,500.00 goal! If you were HOPING to achieve some of our school special incentives.. Here’s how!Any student who raises $50 will qualify to purchase discounted tickets and get a special ON COURT experience with the Denver Nuggets! The Colorado Springs Switchbacks have a special opportunity for kids that raise $25 to come to a game! The Highest Raising Class gets a FREE PE CHOICE DAY!Congratulations to the following students who have already earned our school’s challenge: “Romie” Rose S , Braelynn S , Jocelyne K , Bri’Ella H , Adelynn K , Madelyn G , Greyson D , Jazmine J , Julian C , Avalee M , Harper M , Parker K , Ryland C , Gemma S , Allie N , Ivan R , Jack G , Mya R , Ben FIf you haven’t had the chance to yet:DOWNLOAD THE APP (iOS/Android) AND SIGN UP on our school’s KHC page http://www2.heart.org/site/TR?fr_id=11259&pg=company&company_id=495423Share your KHC Page via text and/or socialsGive or receive one more donation if you’re able!  When you sign up or share your KHC Page, that brings awareness to heart disease, stroke, and CPR. Awareness leads to funding, and funding leads to hope <3Not sure what to give as a donation if you’re able or set your personal goal at?$12.79- 127.9 Million US Adults have some form of cardiovascular disease$19.78- The year Jump Rope for Heart was established$40- Every 40 seconds someone dies from a stroke in America$53- How much it costs to fully certify someone in CPR giving them the ability to save a life$60- the suggested amount of minutes of Daily Physical Activity for kids$70.50- Since 1968 the reduction in cardiovascular mortality is for 70.5%$81- 81% of youth who have used a tobacco product have started with a flavored product$100-$110- to perform hands only CPR, press hard and fast in the center of someone’s chest at the rate of 100-110bpm   ¡Esperamos que hayas estado disfrutando de nuestro reto de KHC de la escuela Lake County Elementary School! Estamos entrando en nuestra última semana, ¡así que llamamos a todos los héroes del corazón! ¡Hasta ahora hemos recaudado $4,110.70 de nuestro objetivo de $2,500.00Si ESPERABAS lograr algunos de nuestros incentivos especiales escolares. ¡Así es como se hace!Si aún no ha tenido la oportunidad de: DESCARGA LA APLICACIÓN (iOS/Android) Y REGISTRATE en la página KHC de nuestra escuela http://www2.heart.org/site/TR?fr_id=11259&pg=company&company_id=495423Comparte tu página de KHC a través de mensajes de texto y/o redes sociales.¡Da o recibe una donación más si puedes! Cuando te registras o compartes tu página de KHC, esto da a conocer las enfermedades cardíacas, los derrames cerebrales y la RCP. La concienciación conduce a la financiación y la financiación conduce a la esperanza. ¿No está seguro de cuanto dar como donación si puede, o establecer tu objetivo personal?Entre $12.79 y 12.9 millones de dólares. Adultos que tienen alguna forma de enfermedad cardiovascular.$19.78: El año que se estableció Jump Rope for Heart (Saltar la Cuerda para el Corazón).$40: Cada 40 segundos alguien muere por un derrame cerebral en los Estados Unidos.$53: Lo que cuesta certificar completamente a alguien en RCP, dándole la capacidad de salvar una vida.$60: La cantidad sugerida de minutos de actividad física diaria para niños$70.50: Desde 1968, la reducción de la mortalidad cardiovascular es del 70.5%$81: $81% de los jóvenes que han consumido un producto de tabaco han comenzado con un producto saborizado.$100 -$110: para realizar RCP solo con las manos, presione fuerte y rápido en el centro del pecho de alguien a una velocidad de entre 100 y 110 LPM (latidos por minuto). February Reading Challenge: Families, please be sure to look in your child’s Thursday folder this week to participate in our February Reading Challenge. This is a great opportunity to further motivate students and celebrate the joy of reading in all languages at home. Happy reading! -Mrs. Mulcey, Literacy Specialist January Panther HOWL (Habit of Work & Learning) Focus: CraftsmanshipFor the month of January, we celebrated the HOWL of Craftsmanship. Craftsmanship means, I can reflect on and revise my work by accepting feedback. I take ownership of my learning, my actions, and my mistakes. Congratulations to our students of the month who received their certificates at our community meeting this week! The HOWL we will be focusing on next for February is compassion.  January Attendance Challenge: For the month of January, crews participated in an attendance challenge! The crew in each grade level with the best attendance for the month of January were:Kinder: Mrs. Compean’s crew with an attendance percentage of 84%!First Grade: Ms. Enriquez’s crew with an attendance percentage of 91%!Second Grade: Mrs. Regan’s crew with an attendance percentage of 89%!Congratulations to our winning crews! These students will get to go sledding and have snowcones with Mrs. Lovely and Ms. Rapke as a reward! Semester 2 Attendance Challenge:  We also have an exciting semester-long attendance challenge to share! This semester, K-2 students who have 1 or fewer absences will have the opportunity to attend a Rockies baseball game in Denver at Coors Field on May 22nd! We will be checking attendance from Jan 6th-May 1st to see who qualifies. Families will be notified if your student has earned this opportunity the week of May 5th. The game is at 1:10 pm so students will come to school as usual, board the buses at 10:00 am, enjoy the game, and return back to school between approximately 5:30-6 pm. The tickets are offered to only students and staff at a reduced rate so we are unable to welcome parent volunteers for this event. Students may opt out of attending if parents so choose (Opt out deadline: May 7th). LCIS is also doing an attendance reward at this Rockies game as well so please look for specific information from LCIS in their parent communication as the criteria is slightly different between schools. Make sure your student is present at school every day as long as they are healthy in order to earn this opportunity! We are so excited for this special event! HOWLs Challenge: It is a new quarter which means we have a new HOWLS challenge! Your student will try to earn as many HOWL Dollars as they can by March 20th for the chance to make an indoor snowman craft and drink hot chocolate with the principals on March 26th or 27th during our spring conference half days! The top six HOWL dollar earners in each class will win. If your student wins, we will send home paper communication as well as a message from the front office. Students can earn HOWL Dollars by showing any of our HOWLs to any staff member in the school. The HOWL that we are focusing on for January is craftsmanship. Parent Volunteers: If interested in volunteering, we encourage parents to reach out to their child’s teacher or Mrs. Lovely to see where the biggest need of help may be. Sometimes this may look like making copies or laminating new math materials. We always appreciate the extra help! Food Program: Smart Bellies delivers kid-friendly food weekly and a bag of produce for our families. Register by filling out the form at https://forms.gle/5KyNS6wkEVv89uns6. We will leave the bags of food outside of your door each week. Lake County deliveries happen on Thursday each week. Please feel free to reach out to Smart Bellies at smartbelliesco@gmail.com or 970-368-2848 if you have questions, need special accommodations or more food. Smart Bellies entrega semanalmente comida para niños y una bolsa de vegetales para nuestras familias. Regístrese completando el formulario https://forms.gle/5KyNS6wkEVv89uns6. Dejaremos las bolsas de comida afuera de su puerta cada semana. Condado de Lake: Las entregas se realizarán los jueves de cada semana. No dude en comunicarse con Smart Bellies en smartbelliesco@gmail.com o al 970-368-2848 si tiene preguntas, necesita adaptaciones especiales o más comida. Interested in more arts experiences for youth/kids in our community? Please take this 1 minute survey to help guide the Tabor Opera House’s growing youth/kids arts programs.https://bit.ly/tyckids | |
| K-2 Project Dream Information | |
| Hello Project Dream Families, Elementary School Information & Policies Raquel Contreras | LCES Site Supervisor | 719-293-5363 | rcontreras@lakecountyschools.net Project Dream is Hiring Crew Leaders!Do you know someone who would be a great crew leader for afterschool and Friday programs? If so, Project Dream is hiring! We are looking for responsible adults to have fun teaching and playing with our students. Wages begin at $16 hourly, with bonuses for experience. If you know of anyone who would be interested, please connect them with Project Dream Director Mike Adler: madler@lakecountyschools.net 719-427-7003 Late Pickup Fees & Policy ReminderFor afterschool programs, students must be picked up by 6:00 pm. For Friday programs, students must be picked up by 3:30 pm.Late Pickup: a fee of $1.00 per minute will be charged for each minute after Project Dream closes (6:00 pm Monday-Thursday, 3:30 pm on Fridays) for each student still in our care. If we are unable to contact a parent or emergency contact within 30 minutes, the Department of Human Services will be called. El Camioncito Returns in January!An exciting announcement, El Camioncito, Project Dream’s Mobile Learning Center, will be returning soon!El Camioncito is a school bus that has been redesigned for tutoring and enrichment activities. El Camioncito visits different neighborhoods in Lake County to bring fun and learning directly to students after school. Students do not need to register to attend El Camioncito programs. However, students do need to be dropped off by a parent/guardian, and a parent/guardian needs to be available in the case of an emergency or issue while their students are on the bus.Stay tuned for more updates, including a start date and weekly schedule. Look for texts from the Project Dream team! | |
| Preschool Specifics | |
| Hello Center Families, With the end of January, comes February! We have some fun events planned for preschool in the month of February! We will celebrate Mail Month and Valentine’s day! Be sure to check your child’s yellow folder for fliers and detailed information. We are in need of clothes! Sometimes preschool can bring a need to change a child’s clothes throughout the day. This can be through a spill or an accident. It is always good to have an extra set of clothes in your child’s backpack. However, we also keep clothing on hand here in the program “just in case.” Our extra clothing reserves are running low, specifically little boy pants. If your child has come home in borrowed clothing please return it to the program. If you happen to have some clothing that your child has outgrown, we would appreciate any donations. Feel free to drop these off in the main office or with your child’s teachers. Help us replenish our extras! Child care tax statements are ready and in the front office. If you paid tuition in 2024 you can pick these up from Marissa in the LCES main office. Enjoy your weekend! See you Monday! Tanya Lenhard PreK Director Office phone: 719-486-6928 Cell: 719-293-1055tdlenhard@lakecountyschools.net Classroom and Curriculum Updates: This week our preschool classrooms have been learning about the classic tale The Little Red Hen. Here is a link to the story on YouTube The Little Red Hen On Thursday, your child got to taste test different types of bread and then vote on their favorite. For home to school connection, encourage your child to retell the story using the visuals that your teacher sent home. Room 130 continues to learn about clothing. This week they retold the story of The Mitten and acted the story out.The letter of the week is Oo. Help your child look for and identify the letter over the weekend.  We want to introduce you to Marie! Marie is our Early Childhood Mental Health Consultant. She collaborates with The Center through SolVista to provide virtual consultative services to our program, our classrooms, and individual children/families. Marie will be sharing a parent connection tip in our newsletter: We all tend to have busy lives and sometimes it makes it hard to find time to connect with the people you love. If you’re looking for a way to make your child feel loved and save time for yourself you can try this connecting activity for 5-10 minutes every day, or as often as you can. Begin by joining or inviting your child to play with you and set a timer for 5-10 minutes. It’s very important to let your child pick and lead the activity. Play is a form of communication for children, so you’ll be the sportscaster saying everything they are doing, but you’re not directing any of their play. “Oh, you made that fly!” or “I see you’re really enjoying playing with that.” It might feel weird, but your child appreciates it. If you’d like to add some regulation, take deep breaths every few minutes. Your child eventually will take those deep breaths with you!It’s that time of year again! Mail month is coming soon! Please click on this link to get more information about Mail Month at The Center. Kelly Horning Assistant Director Office Phone: 719-486-6927 khorning@lakecountyschools.net Family Engagement Corner Building Positive Self-Esteem in Preschoolers Continuing with our focus on helping children feel good about themselves, check out the chart below for some great tips to help your child build lasting and positive self-esteem.  Each interaction and activity we engage in with preschoolers is an opportunity to nurture their self-esteem and help them blossom into confident, resilient individuals. By offering love, support, encouragement, and a safe space to explore their abilities, we empower them to embrace their uniqueness, handle challenges with confidence, and value their own self-worth.These formative years in children’s lives are what will help them grow into confident young adults who feel loved and supported in their decision-making. Guiding them through challenges and encouraging them to find creative solutions will improve their problem-solving and resilience, which they can take with them into adulthood. I hope that after this series on Positive Self-Esteem in Preschoolers, you feel better prepared and encouraged to create nurturing environments, embolden healthy peer interactions, foster growth mindsets, and celebrate each child’s individuality. Together, we can help the preschoolers in our lives thrive, believing in themselves and their limitless potential.Blessings to you and your AMAZING PRESCHOOLER!Rhonda H. DeVoe Preschool Family and Community Engagement Manager Office Phone: (719) 486-6925/Cell Phone: (719) 293-1403 rdevoe@lakecountyschools.net  | |
| PK-2 Important Dates | |
| Important Dates: January 14-February 13: ACCESS testing for multilingual students in K-2 February 13: Panther Day during K-2 Specials, Valentine’s Day Celebrations in Class (see the letter below) February 27: K-2 Community Meeting- Compassion led by 1st Grade March 3-6: Dr. Seuss Spirit Week (flier below) March 6: Panther Day during K-2 Specials: “The Lorax”, K-2 Dollar Day: Mustache March March 10-14: Spring Break, NO SCHOOL | |
| Fliers | |
  One Community Project 12/19/24Leadville and Lake County have launched the One Community Project, a year-long initiative to create a shared vision and comprehensive plan for the future of our community. Guided by input from the people who live and work here, this plan will shape the policies, programs, and projects of both the City and County for the next 10 years to ensure a future that reflects the values of our diverse community. Whether you’ve lived here for generations or just moved in, your voice matters in shaping Leadville and Lake County’s future. We need your help – Share what you love, fear, and hope for Leadville and Lake County by completing a quick Values form (bit.ly/One-Comm).Visit https://onecommunityproject.com/ to learn more about the project, explore upcoming events, and find ways to get involved. Your voice matters—together, we can shape a future that reflects the heart of our community!_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Leadville y el Condado de Lake han lanzado El Proyecto Una Comunidad/One Community Project, una iniciativa de un año para crear una visión compartida y un plan integral para el futuro de nuestra comunidad. Guiado por los aportes de las personas que viven y trabajan aquí, este plan dará forma a las políticas, programas, y proyectos tanto de la Ciudad como el Condado durante los próximos 10 años, garantizando un futuro que refleje los valores de nuestra comunidad diversa. Ya sea que haya vivido aquí por generaciones o que se haya mudado recientemente, su voz es fundamental para dar forma al futuro de Leadville y el Condado de Lake. Necesitamos su ayuda – Comparta lo que ama, teme y espera para Leadville y el Condado de Lake completando un breve formulario de valores (bit.ly/41qxjTe). Visite https://onecommunityproject.com/ para obtener más información sobre el proyecto, explorar eventos futuros y descubrir formas de involucrarse. ¡Su voz importa – juntos, podemos construir un futuro que refleje el corazón de nuestra comunidad! ~*~      ~*~ This project is focused on creating a vibrant community space on the 12-acre open area adjacent to Lake County Elementary School. The Harrison Park Master Plan aims to incorporate affordable housing, open space, and recreation based on community feedback. We know how important more and affordable housing is to you as an employer and business owner. We want to hear from you and your employees on how we can best serve the community as a whole. Here are what some of our business owners and major employers have to say about housing: “Housing continues to be a significant challenge to our ability to staff our schools with qualified educators. An entry-level teacher has a gross monthly income of $3,600. A goal of spending no more than 30% of their income on housing would require monthly housing costs of under $1,200. This is nearly impossible in the current housing market.” Kate Bartlett, Superintendent of the Lake County School District “Because Leadville’s housing market has been turned upside down by forces out of our control, it is harder than ever for local businesses to prosper here. If we don’t create more housing for our workers, our business community and the diverse nature of our town (and downtown) will be forever changed.”Fritz Howard, Melanzana Here’s how you can get involved:Take the survey – Your input is essential to ensure the plan reflects community needs. (https://survey.alchemer.com/s3/8129093/Harrison-Park-Master-Plan-Community-Survey)Join us at the next Open House – Meet the project team in person, share your ideas, and learn more about the planning and design process. The Open House will take place in January 22nd in the Amax Room of the Lake County Public Library. Stay tuned for updates! To learn more about the project, take the survey, or join our mailing list, please visit harrisonparkmasterplan.comThank you for being part of this important community effort! Your feedback will play a crucial role in shaping a future that benefits Lake County residents.      | |
