Month: May 2021

Greetings All,
I hope you had an AMAZING long weekend! My plans to head to the Alvord Desert changed at the last minute so we made the best of a staycation. We loaded up the canoe and spent a phenomenal night out on Sparks Lake!

A few notes to get us going:
1) No Staff Meeting Tuesday. I think we all have plenty going on this week!

2) We’ll have our final EBISS meetings this Wednesday. This is a time to start planning support for kiddos for next year so we can hit the ground running. Please come to the meeting ready to share concerns and bring work samples/assessments that will be helpful. Below is the schedule, Brad will be covering your class (if he’s not covering for Ray, in which case we will need to adjust). Sara will also attend these meetings as she will be part of the support team for next year.
8:30-Matt
9:00-Frans
9:30-Lindsey
10:00-Amanda
10:30-Stephanie
*No Grade 5 meeting

3) No SIW this week. This week and next week have been set aside to give you time to start your End of Year Celebrations.

4) Application screening Wednesday from 3-4:30. Everyone is invited to join and be involved. We’ll meet in Amanda’s room.

5) Community Time this week, starting at 1:30pm:
Thursday-Grade 3
Friday-Grade 2

Next week:
June 10-Grade 1
June 11-Kinder

6) Reminder: We are scheduled to attend a gender workshop at Westside Village at 3pm on Thursday. Out of respect for the kiddos organizing this for us please be on time.

7) Here is a link to the Field Day document I created to get us organized–please take a moment to sign up for an activity: Field Day 2021

8) Nancy Hitchcock, the OT that serves Amity is looking for some things that we had here at Amity prior to the remodel. Please see if any of this is in your room:
Dark slant board #21070
Red round air cushion #1843410
Black medicine ball #22487
Chalkboard 10″x17″ #14274
Handwriting without tears Kindergarten teacher guide #20799
Poster-“I can calm myself” #2036

9) A big Happy Birthday to Brad this week–Thursday!

Upcoming
June 2: EBISS (see schedule above)
June 3: Gender presentation @Westside Village, 3-4pm
June 16: School lets out at 2:30pm
June 16: Grade 5 Graduation, 4pm
June 17: Last day! 1pm dismissal
June 17: Staff gathering, 3:30pm

Lastly, I’d love to hear your answer…

Here’s to a great week ahead…3 more to go!
Andy

Happy 4th to last Monday of the year!
I hope your weekend was great. I spent most of the weekend gearing up for camping season–as a new travel trailer owner I am discovering all that needs to be done to get a rig “season” ready!

Believe it or not, we have only 4 weeks of school left, and only 3 more AM notes left after this one!

Here’s what’s up this week:
1) Fire Drill on Tuesday 10:45am

2) SIW on Wednesday, 2pm. We’ll spend the time planning out the last week of school.

3) Screening of the Variety Show will happen this Thursday at 10:30am in the gym. I hope this doesn’t interfere with anyone’s previous plans for that time. I’ll send a link home to families that night so they can watch it, too.

4) The Annual Mr. Z Table Top Football Tournament is this week, initiated by Taran and Kai. I’m working with the boys to get the brackets set up. Youngers will play Youngers and Olders will play Olders for the first few rounds so we can have the games during recess. Once we get further along games will take place across the grades and we’ll do them at lunch recess. There will be practice games at recess on Monday with the tournament starting on Tuesday and hopefully finishing up on Friday. Taran and Kai will come around to make an announcement on Monday before recess.

5) If you need to use tape on the stage for Community Time, please use blue (or green) painter’s tape. Masking tape leaves a sticky residue. Thanks!

6) Community Time schedule for the rest of the year–I’ve sent the info in a separate email. Please block 1:30pm on Thursday and Friday for the next 3 weeks.

7) End of Year Celebrations templates are ready for you. I will soon share with each of you the Google folder for your class.

8) We’ll have our final EBISS meetings next Wednesday, June 2. This will be a time to start planning support for kiddos for next year so we can hit the ground running. Below is the schedule, we’ll have someone to cover your class. Sara will also attend these meetings as she will be part of the support team for next year.
8:30-Matt
9:00-Frans
9:30-Lindsey
10:00-Amanda
10:30-Stephanie
*No Grade 5 meeting

9) FYI, the last Wednesday of school will be a full day (2:30), and the last day of school will be early release (1pm)

10) Last day of school adult celebration. Let’s plan to get together right after school gets out on June 17. Venue to be determined (BBC has always been fun the last day), but please save this time so we can gather before we all head out for the summer.

Upcoming
May 25: Fire Drill, 10:45am
May 26: SIW, 2pm
June 1: Staff Meeting, 2:45pm
June 2: EBISS (see schedule above)
June 3: Gender presentation @Westside Village, 3-4pm
June 16: School lets out at 2:30pm
June 16: Grade 5 Graduation, 4pm
June 17: Last day! 1pm dismissal
June 17: Staff gathering, 3:30pm

Here’s to a great last month of school!
Andy

Greetings y’all,
I hope you enjoyed the amazing weather this weekend. We had our grandkids overnight on Friday and most of the day on Saturday and we spent Sunday recovering! Yikes, it’s a lot of work! I hope your weekend was equally as fun but less exhausting…

A few notes to get you going:
1) Tom is out through Wednesday. Derek is covering Tom’s AM duties and we have a sub covering the evenings. If you have any concerns or needs please let me know.

2) I sent you all a Save the Date for Grade 5 Graduation–June 16 at 4pm. We’ll also do a school-wide celebration earlier that day. I’ll keep you updated as plans develop. We’re still waiting for info from the district before proceeding.

3) In the next week I’ll be creating a Google folder for each of you with End of Year Celebration templates for each of your students. Like last year I’ll name each document with a student name so they will be easy to find. Having this shared folder with me and Patti greatly helps as it allows us to help out with formatting issues that arise and will allow us to print directly from the folder.

4) Staff Meeting on Tuesday at 2:45pm. No SIW this week.

5) Art is back this week! Regularly scheduled times.

6) Kinder will host Community Time this week!

7) Subs are extremely hard to get right now--as a result admin received this email from HR on Friday: We will not be approving anymore personal days unless a substitute can be found.  If we have already approved a personal day, then we will honor that decision.  Moving forward, however, if an employee, either classified or certified, asks for a personal day, we need to know that positions will be covered before okaying the request.  We also would like to remind you that we’ve made special agreements with both associations that employees will be paid for unused personal days. If you have plans to use a personal day between now and the end of the year let’s get working on finding a sub!

8) I’ll likely be out part of Wednesday and Thursday helping my gal post-surgery. At this point we don’t know what time her surgery is scheduled for on Wednesday so we’re keeping things flexible. I’ll update you when I know.

Upcoming
May 18: Staff Meeting, 2:45pm
May 25: Fire Drill, 10:45am
May 26: SIW, 2pm
June 1: Staff Meeting, 2:45pm
June 2: EBISS–more details later
June 17: Last day! 6 weeks left…

Here’s to a great week ahead!
Andy

Greetings all,
I hope you had an amazing weekend, and a big happy Mother’s Day to all the mamas! I got to spend the weekend with the youngest member of our family–it’s been a few months and she has grown up so much! This is Aurelia at the sweet age of 7 months, and a picture of the treehouse Kaila and I stayed in a few miles outside of Corvallis.

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A few notes to get you going this morning:
1) Big thanks to those of you who were able to help out with Bike and Walk to School event last week–it was a huge success, and more importantly it was a nice community bonding experience!

2) SIW this week starts at 1:30pm. We’ll meet in Matt’s room so we can use the projector. We’ll be discussing what it means to be a “good fit” at Amity as we prepare for upcoming interviews. Please give this some thought prior to the meeting.

3) Last week I sent you a copy of the End of Year Celebrations (Grows and Glows). Please take some time to chat with at least one other teacher before Wednesday’s SIW time.

4) I’m trying a little experiment with re-zoning in an effort to expand options in each zone. I’ll cone off each zone early Monday AM and it would be great if you brought students out a little early for first choice time to orient them.

Zone 1: 4 swings, jungle gym, play structure, one side of wall ball, slice of field
Zone 2: 2 swings, climbing wall, basket ball court, slice of field
Zone 3: Four square, Gaga, table area, slice of field

5) Grade 2 will host Community Time this week, Kinders next week.

6) Planned staff meetings for the rest of the year:
*Tuesday, May 18, 2:45-3:30pm
*Wednesday, May 26, 2pm
*Tuesday, June 1, 2:45-3:30pm
June 2 and 9 will be time for you to write End of Year Celebrations
Save the afternoon of June 17, our last day of school, for some kind of social gathering–it’s a tradition!

7) School cleaning schedule. Several of you have asked what the cleaning schedule is now that we’re back at Amity. Tom has shared the following with me-if you feel that things on this list are not getting done as indicated please let me or Tom know. Thanks!

Daily
Clean and sweep classrooms 
Vacuum carpet
Empty trash and recycling
Clean sinks
Check (and if needed replace) paper towels
Clean and mop bathrooms (including paper towels, toilet paper, soap)
Check teacher bathrooms to see if they need cleaning
Sweep hallway
Empty trashcans
Sweep gym
Scrub gym floor (most days)
Help clean-up after lunch (in kitchen, empty garbage)
Health room
Check “TO DO” list in office—all staff can add to this list

Weekly—Tuesdays and Fridays
Mop classroom 
Staff lounge: sink, mop, vacuum, tables
Empty large blue recycling 
Playground 
Office

8) Please drop by my office this week to sign your SLGG. You need to sign now and again at the end of the year.

9) Reminder: No art again this week.

10) Just a heads up I’ll be out on Wednesday, May 19 to be with my gal who is having a knee operation…finally. I’ll just be attending to a heavily medicated patient so I’ll be available by text and phone all day.

Upcoming
May 12: Interview Prep, 1:30-3pm
May 18: Staff Meeting, 2:45pm
May 26: SIW, 2pm
June 1: Staff Meeting, 2:45pm
June 2: EBISS–more details later
June 17: Last day! 6 weeks left…

Here’s to great week ahead!
Andy