Cheetah Pride Press!

Dear Families,

December break has arrived, and we know everyone is looking forward to the chance to rest and recharge. Hopefully, the week off will also provide time for our learners to gain strength and improved health. Andrea and I are wishing everyone a healthy, happy New Year! And to all who celebrate Christmas, we hope your holiday is magical!

See you in 2023! Thank you for your continued partnership.

Joey & Andrea

Please enjoy this beautiful piece by one of our young learners.

Our Kindergarten students have learned all of the letters in the alphabet and proudly displayed what they learned about each letter’s sound in the ABC Fashion Show!

Memorial Models are chosen weekly by their teacher. These students have excelled all week in taking care of themselves, others, and things. The recipients will dine at a VIP table during lunch every Friday!

A PAWsitive office referral is submitted when a staff member recognizes a student who is going above and beyond to exemplify one of our three school rules - taking care of others, taking care of self, & taking care of things.

Congratulations to Ms. Severance for being recognized as this week's Order Of The Cheetah. Ms. Severance is a long term grade 2 substitute and last year was one of our building substitutes. Ms. Severance is a certified teacher. Ms. Severance goes above and beyond for her students and colleagues.

Happy Holidays to all! I hope that over winter break you have time for rest, and recharge! Baking cookies, decorating gingerbread houses, painting decorations, cutting snowflakes, there are so many ways to create beautiful art during this special time of year!

Here are the classroom expectations for December during art class, as we spent our artistic creativity becoming inspired by the coming winter season;we even had our first snow fall!

Prek: Wrapping Weaving: We created ornaments using the basic weaving techniques of wrapping and placing yarn into slots. This helps students to build coordination skills for learning to weave “over and under” in a traditional weaving pattern as they grow. We then decorated the ornaments with sparkly embellishments and a hanger, so the ornaments can be hung anywhere!

K: We spent the month of December creating PRINTS! We learned that printmaking is a quick artistic process of making “copies”. We created an abundance of copies to fill our whole paper, testing out all sorts of items to make copies of: cookie cutters, tooth brushes, counting cubes, rubber stamps, and stamp rollers. We then took our dried copies, cut them into strips, and rearranged them by gluing them and linking them together. This created a patterned paper chain to hang anywhere we wanted in our homes! They make for beautiful decorations and we worked so hard on them!

1st grade: TINTS AND SHADES!!! First graders have become master painters by learning that adding BLACK or WHITE to any color can create a darker or lighter version of that color. We experimented by combining all sorts of amounts of black, or white, to create endless Tints (light colors; using white) and Shades (dark colors; using black). Once we knew how to was our brush, care for our paint, and mix our colors, we created a HORIZON LINE on a new paper. This new paper is being transformed into a “Landscape” painting with “evergreen trees”. We have learned that we can create a full ground, and a full sky, and that the “Horizon Line” is actually a part of our world, where the sky and ground meet. We have made incredible midnight blues, northern lights in the sky, sunsets of light pink and light blue, and every other variety of color in between. We are exploring “brush strokes” in order to make the texture of soft snow, and fuzzy evergreen branches. We can’t wait to complete our paintings and bring them home!

2nd grade: Students in second grade began at the end of November, learning about the Northwest Coast Native Americans, who lived along the Pacific coast of North America and Canada. We learned the history of their artistic culture, and how they used Totem Poles to tell stories. Every 2nd grade student has created their very own Totem Face, using wood, chipboard and paint! We learned how to design SYMMETRICAL faces, with bilateral symmetry, and then created a variety of colors with the use of paint palettes. We are practicing being painting experts who also know how to remake colors on our palettes, so that we can continue to paint and understand intentional color mixing. To finish our Totem Faces, we have added black tribal designs, often found as a “trademark” to the Northwest Coast Native American artworks.We then read the book “Raven: A Trickster Tale From the Pacific Northwest” by Gerald McDermott, to further expand our knowledge and appreciation of the storytelling by the Northwest Coast Native Americans. We are finishing this unit with the construction of full sized Totem Poles, by combining all of our Totem Faces into ONE classroom Totem Pole! We all are wondering how tall they will be!!!!!

3rd Grade: Choice art continues in the art room! We are so busy working on building our own learning paths in art class. Students are incredible problem solvers, asking each other questions and guiding each other to further learning. Students are sharing their strengths and knowledge with one another, building their empathy and confidence!. As I walk around the art room to see what the artists are working on, I continue to turn their attention to my rubrics. These rubrics are for “self assessment” as students complete their work, and are specific to the different art media students are selecting from: painting, drawing, mixed media, sculpture, printmaking, and graphic arts/photography.. I encourage them during each class to read these rubrics often, and our goal is to receive a 3 or 4 on all projects that we complete. Each time a student brings one of these rubrics home, they have completed and scored their work of art, as well as conferenced with me about their experience! We are having thoughtful conversations about improving our craftsmanship, and understanding the application of any and all types of art media. During this process, students also are expected to represent subject matter and be able to identify the subject matter in their own work. Please remind your child that art subjects help artists to organize their work and ideas. We will continue to learn what each subject matter means and will become experts at this by the end of 3rd grade: Landscape, Abstract, Still-Life, Portrait, Animals, and Design/Typography.

Jerry has been hired to serve as Memorial’s armed security officer. (ASO) He will begin on January 3rd. Jerry will be retiring from the East Hampton Police Department this Thursday, after 24 years of service. He lives in Colchester with his wife, a teacher, and they have a grown son. Jerry will have a desk in the front office, but will spend most of his day monitoring our building.

The East Hampton Public Schools is proud to introduce School Based Health Centers in each of our schools. Soon, enrolled students will be able to receive behavioral health services during the school day. The School-Based Health Care (SBHC) staff are licensed health care providers, who are able to deliver behavioral health services to students during the school day. They work in conjunction with the student’s primary care providers to support their social, emotional, and behavioral health care needs. SBHC is proud to serve over 17,000 students throughout Connecticut. If you are interested in School-Based Health Care for your students, please visit SBCH2.com for enrollment information and forms.

Dear Parents/Guardians of Preschool Students:

This is your final reminder to those families who have not yet submitted documentation regarding flu vaccine.

Per State of Connecticut statutes, all Pre-K students, 24-59 months of age, must receive an annual dose of flu vaccine given between August 1 - December 31. For those children receiving influenza vaccine for the 1st time, 2 doses of flu vaccine are required, administered at least 28 days apart.

This has been a requirement by the State Immunization Department since 2011.

Please have your child’s doctor or office staff complete the necessary form to show that the vaccine was given and send a copy to the school as soon as possible.

If your child does not receive the flu vaccine, they will be excluded from school from 1/1/23 until 3/31/23 or until the child has received at least 1 dose of influenza vaccine.

Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter. Please send in a paper copy or fax to our office at 860-365-4024.

Sincerely,

Katie Williams, RN, Memorial Elementary School Nurse

Joey Bauer, Principal, Memorial Elementary School

Please contact your child’s pediatrician first. If unable to be seen, here is a list of
local walk in/urgent care locations if unable to be seen by pediatrician:
CVS Minute Clinic, East Hampton 866-389-2727
ProHealth Extended Hours, Glastonbury 657-5940
Middlesex Health Urgent Care, Middletown 860-358-4170
Colchester Urgent Care 860-531-9749

1/3 Return to School

1/9- BOE Meeting @ 6:30pm

1/16- No School MLK Jr. Day

1/20- Spirit Day "Wear Your Cheetah Gear"

1/23- Magical Monday in the Cafeteria

1/23- BOE Meeting @ 6:30pm

1/27- Early Dismissal For Professional Learning

The East Hampton Board of Education and the school community as a whole promote a secure and productive school climate, conducive to teaching and learning that is free from threat, harassment, and any type of bullying behavior. Therefore it shall be the policy of the Board that bullying and/or teen dating violence committed against a student by another student is prohibited. The Board believes that a school environment in which students feel safe, supported, engaged and helpfully challenged is optimal for learning and healthy development. The Board seeks an environment in which students and adults feel socially, emotionally, intellectually and physically safe; an environment that is free of harassment, intimidation, teen dating violence and bullying. Our website provides links to various policies and reporting forms including our Safe School Climate Plan. Hard copies are also available in our main office. If at any point you have any concerns, please do not hesitate to reach out to building administration for further assistance.

When considering the number of absences your student has accrued, keep in mind that a student must be present for 195 minutes in order for the day to count! When bringing your student in late, or signing them out early if they have not been in school for a 195 minutes the day will be recorded as an absence.

The East Hampton Board of Education is committed to a safe and secure learning environment that honors and celebrates the diversity of our students, our community, and our nation. The Board of Education in partnership with the school community will not tolerate any threat of violence in the schools or any hate speech that targets any race, religion, sexual orientation, or disability. Each student is held to the highest standards of responsible decision making within a culture that is expected to foster compassion, caring, and empathy.

The school community of East Hampton is committed to the mission of honoring and celebrating the diversity of our students, our community, and our nation. We strive to guide our students to conscious, deliberate, individual and collective actions that cultivate the respect of all races, religions, and social backgrounds. Our school community endeavors to produce graduates who are equipped with a greater understanding of the concepts of diversity, equity, and inclusion.

The East Hampton Board of Education, in compliance with federal and state law, affirms its policy of equal educational opportunity for all students and equal employment opportunity for all persons. It is the policy of the District to promote nondiscrimination and an environment free of harassment regardless of an individual’s race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression, national origin, ancestry, disability (including but not limited to, intellectual disability, past or present history of mental disorder, physical disability, or learning disability), genetic information, marital status, or age or because of the race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression, national origin, ancestry, disability, genetic information, marital status, or age of any persons with whom the individual associates. The District shall provide to all students without discrimination, course offerings, counseling, assistance, employment, athletics, and extracurricular activities. The District shall provide equal access to the Boy Scouts and other designated youth groups. The District shall make reasonable accommodations for identified physical and mental impairments that constitute disabilities, consistent with federal and state statutes and regulations.

Email: jbauer@easthamptonct.org
Website: https://www.easthamptonps.org/o/memorial-school
Location: 20 Smith Street, East Hampton, CT, USA
Phone: 860-365-4020
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ehmemorialschool