Weekly News

Monday, January 25 - Green Day A-L students in person

Monday, January 25 - Boys basketball games

Tuesday, January 26 - Silver Day A-L students in person

Tuesday, January 26 - MAP testing in all grades

Wednesday, January 27 - Green day M-Z students in person

Wednesday, January 27 - MAP testing in all grades

Thursday, January 28 - Silver Day M-Z students in person

Thursday, January 28 - MAP testing in all grades

Thursday, January 28 - Boys basketball games

Friday, January 29 - Green Day A-L students in person

Friday, January 29 - MAP testing in all grades

Your child’s online safety, in the palm of your hand. We recognize that student safety and well-being in the online world is a shared responsibility between our schools and families, especially during this time of In-person and VirtualED modes of learning. As part of the Blue Valley’s commitment to digital safety, families can download @SecurlyHome Parent Portal app for opportunities to monitor your child’s online activity, set custom filters, pause the internet and more on their child’s district-provided device device. Download today on iTunes or Google Play!

• Parents that have “Education Rights” and “Lives With” in Synergy/ParentVue will have access to an account. The login for the Securly App will be the parent email address listed in ParentVue. Put in a BV Care Technology ticket if you have trouble getting started.

Click here to learn more about Securly Home Parent monitoring.

First semester grades will be viewable in Parentvue after 4 p.m. on Monday, January 25.

We will be MAP testing next week in all grades Tuesday through Friday. Testing will occur when students are in the building only. Core schedules will be adjusted for students and will be communicated with students from their teachers. In some cases, Zoom times and at home class work may be impacted. 6th and 8th graders will test first thing in the morning and 7th graders will test at the end of the day.

Math Counts will meet on Wednesday, January 27th from 3:00-3:30 pm in person in room 313 or via Zoom using the information below.

https://bluevalleyk12.zoom.us/j/98090235797

Meeting ID: 980 9023 5797

Passcode: MATHCOUNTS

School pictures will be taken on Monday, February 1 and Tuesday, February 2. Students will be called down to the commons by grade level. The photographer will be available from 7:45 - 10:00 a.m. and virtual students who would like to have their picture taken can come either day during this time frame. See the attachment below for ordering information and deadlines.

Cast and crew of The Aubry Bend Anthology, please continue to check the Canvas page regularly. There have been some changes with schedules and assignments, and some may continue to happen. The Canvas page will ALWAYS have the most updated and recent information.

Some news to note:

• Cast: The script is up and available for you to take a look at. Please read through your scripts before we meet for your rehearsal! We will have printed copies available for you to take when you come for rehearsal.
• Cast and Crew: Make sure to check the calendar on the home page. This calendar has been updated recently and includes days and times cast should report.
• If you have questions, please reach out to me on Canvas, or at my email: jmgarcia02@bluevalleyk12.org.

Prairie Star Virtual Students

All PSMS virtual students will take the Winter Measure of Academic Progress (MAP) tests during the testing window of January 25th-28th. Students will take the math MAP test with their mathematics teacher and the reading MAP test with their English Language Arts (ELA) teacher. The data obtained through MAP testing measures each student’s progress on specific standards and provides PSMS staff members with information that allows us to better support your student(s).

• VirtualEd: VirtualEd teachers will communicate to students/families the day or days that will be utilized to complete the MAP tests within the January 25th-28th testing window. Some students will take both tests on the same day.

Aubry Bend 7th Grade Virtual Students

Virtual students with a 7th grade teacher can click the below hyperlink for the schedule:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1g2kPaZgTxIIPFL1yOV_8BE5Kl9rF0PjignD9DE5ksmY/edit?ts=600b381a#gid=0

· Invest in ABMS/PTO membership - Make your tax-deductible donation! Any and all support is very much appreciated!! Log into ParentVue to donate.

· DONATION LETTERS - Stay tuned! Your donation receipt letter will be arriving via email and/or mail later this month.

· AMAZON SMILE - Did you know you can support ABMS by shopping through Amazon Smile? It's an easy way to help, but you must shop through our link.

· "BE IN THE KNOW WITH ABMS PTO"- Be sure to follow us on FB (@AubryBendMSPTO) and twitter (@AbmsPto).

· STAFF APPRECIATION - The staff appreciation committee provided treats on Tuesday to welcome back our staff!

Welcome Back!

The ABMS Library was a busy place all week! All ELA classes visited the library to check out ELA novels and/or free reading books. It was so great to see the students in the library and getting books into their hands! THANK YOU to all the students who returned books from last quarter!

7th & 8th Grade ELA - Virtual Students

All virtual students may pick up a copy of their class novels for ELA in the ABMS main entrance vestibule beginning Tuesday, Jan 19th during school hours. Students will find their copy with a sticky note attached with their name. The books will be placed on a cart clearly labeled within the entrance vestibule. This is for Virtual students only! All in-person students have received their books during in-person classes.

If virtual students have library books to return, they may place them on the cart as well, on the bottom shelf.

Please email if you have any questions.

accooper@bluevalleyk12.org

🖤 Blind Date with a Book 🖤

Blind Date with a book is back! Students willing to take a chance can choose a book that is wrapped with a small clue of what the book is about. After reading, they may fill out a small book review and turn it into the library. At the end of February, there will be a small prize drawing for students who completed the book and review!

ELA

ELA kicked off 3rd quarter by reviewing class notes and learning new terminology and vocabulary for the quarter. We also introduced the Teacher Led Argumentative Writing Unit.

Math

Math classes finished up ratios this week and will be moving on to percentages next week.

Social Studies

Our classes zoomed with docents from the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art and saw artifacts about the Silk Road (the unit we just finished)! Ask your student what they saw on the tour. The docents invited them all to come to the museum. With pandemic protocols in place, you must reserve free tickets online before your visit. See https://www.nelson-atkins.org/ for more info!

Science

Science classes are continuing to talk about inside Earth and the processes that take place.

ALL

Click the hyperlink below to access the modified 7th grade schedule for the week of

January 25 - January 29:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xK82obTGnoBzK1xiuP_RUMy5c--g2fJAvLF7Ifyix7M/edit?usp=sharing

Math

Students are working on 2-step inequalities in real world situations! Map testing is next week. Stay tuned for information from your teacher!

Science

Students explored information processing through various eye activities in class. At home, they were introduced to genetics vocabulary to prepare them for our next unit!

Social Studies

As our unit on Human Geography winds down, it’s amping up in a very empowering, positive way. Our students learned about what daily life is like for people all over the world in extreme poverty living on less than one dollar a day, and how they use their community and resources, such as microfinance, to care for each other and better their quality of living. As a follow-up to that, this week they explored a microfinance website, Kiva.org, and held amazing discussions about who they would give a loan to. As a surprise, and using a small gift from the district, we will be funding a few $25 microloans of the students’ choosing to make a positive change in the world on behalf of ABMS.

ELA

Students are diving into reading Where the Red Fern Grows. They are looking at character development, figurative language, flashback, and symbols while enjoying this classic novel.

Farris Science

Students will begin the Roller Coaster Project. All materials will be provided in class. The project will run until the week of Conferences.

Math

Algebra 1: Linear forms unit. Exploring linear relationships and how they are expressed in various forms of data. A emphasis put on slope.

Math: Geometry

Social Studies

We are continuing are exploration of the novel “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” in the context of how slavery was a contributor to the Civil War.

ELA

We will be completing the final revision of our Literary Analysis essays. We will also begin our Holocaust unit by visiting the library and checking out Night by Elie Wiesel.

ALL

All of ABMS will be taking the winter MAP test this week. Our schedule will be quite a bit different. If students have any questions about where they need to be, please do not hesitate to reach out to one of their teachers.

(Students will be testing when they are IN-PERSON ONLY. On days they are remote, they will have asynchronous activities to complete after checking in with their teachers)

Schedule for the 8th grade BVSW and MAP Week:

It’s so good to have kids back in the building! This has been a fantastic week! First of all, our awesome PTO surprised us with breakfast snacks Tuesday morning to welcome us and usher in a new semester with some treats. Thank you for your thoughtfulness and support; we feel it and appreciate it!

Thank you, also, to all of our families for making the move back into hybrid smooth for students and teach-ers. I realize we’re always going to have hiccups and tech issues, and I appreciate the way everyone simply rolled with the punches Thursday morning when Zoom was struggling across the district. I’m so proud of the resilience of our students…they are amazing!

I want to share a special thanks to Mr. Colburn and Mr. Holsapple who worked for hours sorting student re-sponses and meeting with kids to form new lunch cohorts. It was important to us to respond to the kids’ re-quests to sit with at least one friend this semester, and Mr. C and Mr. H made that happen. Lunch is such an important “down time” to our kids during their day, and they look pretty happy this semester.

Late yesterday, the district announced that middle and high schools will remain in the hybrid model through the end of February. Included below is a visual of that schedule. I’ve heard from many parents/guardians that this visual is helpful in keeping track of attendance days (A-L/M-Z) and class days (Green/Silver). This information is also available on our ABMS website in the calendar section.

Next week may be a busy week for our staff and students. This year we will give all students a winter MAP test to measure the current instructional levels of our students. As a reminder, the MAP test is not an achievement test; it is a formative diagnostic test that measures student progress on specific standards and provides us with information and insight that allow us to better support our students. Our ABMS students will take a math test and a reading test while they are in attendance at school (on their in-person days). Virtual students will take their tests with their virtual teachers on the virtual platform.

This testing window will allow our team to analyze real-time data that will inform our instruction and pro-vide time to address needs within the second semester framework. Thank you for supporting this endeavor by sharing our positive intent and supporting our kids throughout the testing.

Thank you for your continued support and love for ABMS. We love our community and want you to know that you can count on us.

Sincerely,

Diana Tate, Principal

Email: AubryBendMiddle@bluevalleyk12.org
Website: www.bluevalleyk12.org/ABM
Location: 12501 West 175th Street, Overland Park, KS, USA
Phone: 913-624-2300
Facebook: facebook.com/Smore
Twitter: @smorenewsletter