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Principally Speaking
By Patricia Alexander & Derrick Hartley
Habit 7
As we all know by now, Habit 7 is Sharpen the Saw. While coming back to school after Spring Break, it may seem easy to have spent time sharpening the saw with an entire week away from school. It truly is easier to sharpen the saw while we have time away from work and have down time to spend with the family. The key to true balance, as viewed in the 7 Habits, is to be able to sharpen the saw during our work time. While there are many ways to accomplish this, one of the best ways is to be able to set aside just 5 minutes per day to reflect on your personal goals and personal victories. By doing this you can truly live the 7 Habits not as a program but as a part of your life
We would like to give a heartfelt thank you to the staff and students of PLE who collected and donated $188.71 on behalf of Mrs. Alexander and Mr. Hartley for principal’s day. It is truly great to see our PLE family synergizing and helping those in our community out.
The efforts of students from PLMS and PLE have successfully achieved their goal. They had petitioned the city to change the name in front of the 2 schools officially to Tiger Terrace. Mrs. Miller brought students over to share the good news with their neighbor to the west. Now, all students who will most likely be tigers for their entire public education will have the name of their school street be reflective with the tiger name also.
Principal (Cont’d on page 2)
Principal (cont’d from page 1)
Voting and affect of PLE
There is an election coming to the LSR-7 school district. We want to encourage all of our parents to try to get out and exercise their right to vote on this day. The April 7th no tax bond issue is a big plus for PLE and the Lee’s Summit School District. With the passage of the bond PLE is set to receive some major improvements and changes. PLE will be getting all new hallway flooring throughout the building. Our current flooring is going to be 50 years old next year and is greatly in need of improvement. Our HVAC system continually needs improvements and repairs and along with replacement of the building’s single pane windows this will save the district lots of money in utilities and heating and cooling expenses. The building is also slated to get 2 new pieces of equipment for the playground with the safer and more durable Synlawn turf. Unlike the wood chips this surface will not need to be raked and will not have the freezing or insect issue as currently experienced with the wood chips.
Progress reports for 3rd Quarter are coming out Thursday, March 26 . Please take a moment to go over this with your child. This is an opportunity for students and adults to take a minute to reflect of how the year has gone so far and to begin the discussion about what goals they want to set for the rest of the year. Without a goal as to where you want to end up, it becomes extremely hard to get there. We encourage each student to have a goal in each area.
Our Map assessment window for 2015 will be from April 27th –April 29th for 3rd grade, April 30th and May 1st for 4th and 6th grade and 5th grade will be testing from April 27th to May 6th. Please try to schedule appointments around these dates so that our students will be able to test with their peers in as normal as an environment as possible.
Congratulations goes out to our recent Optimist Award recipients:
Kindergarten: Gavin Straley, First Grade: Trystan Wiseman, Second Grade: Jayden Sumler,
Third Grade: Mara Bannister, Fourth Grade: Christian DePeralta, Fifth Grade: BayleeNevels,
Sixth Grade: Mallory Butler
1st Grade News:
First graders at Pleasant Lea Elementary have been working hard to learn all they can so they are prepared for second grade. We’d like to share a little of what we’re learning with you.
Pathways to Reading with Vowel Town and all its strategies has helped us learn sounds and then apply them to our decoding skills in reading as well as help us develop our spelling skills. As we build a strong foundation in decoding words, we are also developing comprehension skills by using our thinking strategies such as schema, making connections, questioning, determining importance, visualizing images, making inferences and synthesizing while we are reading. By thinking about what we are reading, our brain can make connections to previous learning so that we understand and remember more. Additionally, we are excited that many have already earned a Home Reading Award to be presented in May because they have read over 100 books outside the classroom.
We’ve written some really creative stories and illustrations, too. Some of our 1stgraders ( from 1st grade entries throughout the entire district) were chosen as winners of the Young Authors Conference by the Lee’s Summit Reading Council. Those awards will be presented at an upcoming ceremony which will feature author Lisa Campbell Ernst. Now we are beginning to read more non-fiction materials and writing facts about what we’ve learned.
In social studies, all first grade classrooms are also participating in a Flat Stanley project. The boys and girls learned to write friendly letters and then each one sent a letter with Flat Stanley to family members and friends living around and outside the Kansas City area. Response letters and pictures are beginning to arrive at PLE. We will plot his adventures on a big map and learn more about our country and world. Flat Stanley and his pictures will be on display outside our rooms for you to see.
In science we will be carrying out scientific inquiry practices with our plant study as well as learning about the structure and needs of plants and animals. We will culminate our living organisms study with a field trip to Burr Oak Woods in April. First graders have had an exciting year of growth and learning!
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