MEMORIAL SCHOOL NEWSLETTER

December 1, 2017
Upcoming Events
Tuesday, Nov. 28 - Tuesday, Dec. 5
Scholastic Book Fair

Saturday, Dec. 2
PTO Santa Breakfast
8:30 AM - 11:00 AM
Gym 

Monday, Dec. 4
Parent/Teacher Conferences
3:30 PM - 6:30 PM

Wednesday, Dec. 6
Early Release Day

Thursday, Dec. 7
PTO Meeting in the Library
7:00 PM

Tuesday, Dec. 12
Holiday Shopping for Students

Thursday, Dec. 14
Winter Concert
SRHS - 6:30 PM
(Snow Date: 12/18)

Monday, Dec. 25 - Monday, Jan. 1
No School
Holiday Break

Wednesday, Jan. 10
Early Release Day

Thursday, Jan. 11
PTO Meeting in the Library - 7:00 PM

Monday, Jan. 15
No School 
MLK, Jr. Day

Wednesday, Feb. 7
Early Release Day

Thursday, Feb. 8
PTO Meeting in the Library
7:00 PM

Thursday, Feb. 15th
5th Grade - Underground Railroad
(Snow Date - 2/22)

Monday, Feb. 26 - Friday, March 2
No School
Winter Vacation

Thursday, March 8
District Band & Art Show
SRHS - 6:30 PM
(Snow date - 3/12)  

Thursday, March 15
PTO Meeting in the Library - 7:00 PM

Friday, March 16
No School
Staff Workshop

Thursday, March 22
Parent/Teacher Conferences & PTO Spaghetti Dinner





31 West Main Street Newton, NH  03858
603-382-5251
Principal, Dr. Patricia Haynes
Assistant Principal, Donna B. Johnson
Morning Drop-Offs
In an effort to speed up the drop-off process in the morning and avoid traffic delays, our staff will be assisting with unloading students from your cars starting on Monday.  We hope that this will make the morning drop-off faster while continuing to ensure the safety of all of our students.  

Thank you for your cooperation!
Principal's Message
Dr. Haynes
One of the cornerstones of Memorial School's philosophy of "Learning for All" includes a focus on work study practices. Your child has likely come home talking about CARES, which is our work study practice acronym. CARES stands for Cooperation, Assertion, Responsibility, Empathy, and Self-control/regulation.  These work study practices enhance learning achievement and promote a positive work ethic, and are becoming more of an emphasis across the country because of their necessity in the workforce.



Even though some of these attributes have large vocabulary words associated with them, our students really grasp their meaning. In class, teachers review each of the five attributes at the beginning of the school year in many creative ways tailored to the students' grade levels.

Each of the attributes has "I Can" statements associated with it so that students are able to learn their importance at their developmental level and begin to apply them at school.  Cooperation is a relatively easy concept for students to learn; however, assertion can be a bit more challenging. This is where the "I Can" statement comes in to help. In learning about assertion, students know it means: "I can ask for help", "I can use my words", and "I can advocate for myself as a learner".

Students spend time throughout the year learning about how these attributes can be demonstrated on a daily basis. By working on assignments and assessments, students demonstrate these attributes within the learning community. Our students set goals for themselves related to applying the attributes and then they self-evaluate their progress. The CARES attributes are assessed in the classroom and appear on your child's progress reports and report cards throughout the year.

We believe that CARES is critically important to our students' development as learners and as citizens. Multiple times throughout the year, we have assemblies recognizing students who demonstrate these attributes. Our most recent assembly was held on November 21 st, and featured numerous student stories of perseverance, compassion and responsibility. In true Memorial style, everyone was enthusiastic for their friends and supportive of their achievements.



Memorial Elementary School is proud of the work we do with the work study practices encapsulated in our CARES attributes. Our teachers and staff creatively design lessons that enable all students to demonstrate their understanding and afford them an opportunity to shine under many different circumstances. Together we are helping our students become strong learners and positively contributing citizens. 
Cafeteria News
December is right around the corner, and we are looking forward to a few new offerings for our students! We will be serving a Burrito Bowl, meatball subs, and on December 14, we will celebrate a Winter Luau with Huli Huli Chicken, Hawaiian Rice, and roasted plantains. Breakfast offerings for December will include cereal, Chobani yogurt, bagels with cream cheese, and granola bars. 
 
We would like to thank our Senior Community of Newton for visiting our school on November 16 for our annual Thanksgiving feast. Also, thank you to our students and staff for their help. It was a very successful and rewarding day.
 
Please remember to check your children's backpacks for any notices sent home regarding low balances in their lunch accounts. Payments can be made using MySchoolBucks or sent in with your child. MySchoolBucks can also be used to check cafeteria balances and purchases, and to receive low balance alerts. Thank you in advance for your cooperation.
 
If you have any questions, concerns or suggestions, please contact JoAnne Smith at Memorial at 382-3326, or Kimberly Adkins, Food Service Director at 642-3341 x 132.
Giving Tree 
 
Parents,
As we approach the holiday season, Memorial school will once again sponsor local families in need with our annual "Giving Tree".   Please consider stopping by the main lobby to select an ornament during arrival or dismissal, or during parent/teacher conferences.
Paper ornaments with the child's gender and specific gift wish will be placed on the tree (i.e, boy, age 4, winter coat size 4T, or girl, age 5, Holiday Barbie, etc.) Names of families or children are never used .
Parents who would like to help are asked to choose a paper ornament, purchase and wrap the item, and return it to the main office with the paper ornament taped to the package no later than Wednesday, December 13 th .   
We realize that you may want to involve your own children in the giving process by allowing them to shop and select gifts.  Please remember that the families we sponsor are within the Newton community.  Discretion is appreciated, especially when selecting articles of clothing, as they may be easily recognizable.   It is important to share in this season of giving, but also to preserve the privacy for those that we support.
We thank you in advance for your generosity.  The community response to "Giving Trees" of the past has been AMAZING, and we are sure Christmas mornings for the families that we sponsor are so much brighter because of it.   
(If you select an ornament and are unable to find the item or fulfill your commitment, please return the ornament so that we can be sure that everyone's wish is filled.)
News from the School Nurse
  A Health and Wellness Update from the School Nurse :

This is the season for an increase in the number of cases of colds, flu, intestinal and  GI  viruses, conjunctivitis, and even strep throat and pneumonia.  Parents are asked to consider the following suggestions from the school nurse in order to limit the exposure of healthy children to those who are ill, and to ensure that those who are ill will have as rapid a recovery as possible:

  1. If your child has a fever (99.6* or above), please keep your child at home for an additional 24 hours of fever-free time (OFF fever-control medicines) to ensure adequate rest and the opportunity for the immune system to recover.  Your child may still be contagious if he/she has a fever at night, but is fever-free in the early morning.  
  2. If your child has vomited during the night, keep him/her home for at least another 24 hours until you know that he/she is eating regular foods without difficulty and is no longer experiencing nausea or abdominal pain.
  3. If your child has a persistent cough not controlled by over-the-counter medications, please contact your health care provider, as they may have an underlying bronchial or lung infection or pneumonia.
  4. If your child has one or both eyes with a red appearance to the sclera (white area), and/or drainage from the corners which is yellow, and/or yellow crusts on lashes and lids which are itchy and/or swollen, please keep them home and consult your health care provider.   Conjunctivitis is very contagious, and children with this infection must be on medications for a minimum of 24 hours and no longer draining from the eye to attend school.

Frequent hand washing is the number one prevention for the spread of germs and disease within your family as well as in school.  Concerns regarding your child's illness, or duration of his/her symptoms should be addressed to your family health care provider.  Thank you for your assistance to help ensure the health of all students (and staff) at our school.

Outdoor Recess Clothing:

The cold weather has finally arrived, and we want to remind parents to be sure that your child/children are dressed appropriately for outdoor play daily.  Please remind them to wear warm winter coats, hats, mittens and bring boots.   We also suggest that you send an extra change of clothing (especially socks and pants) to be kept in  that your child's cubby for those days when he/she may get wet from playing in the in puddles after rains showers.  (Remember to send sneakers or shoes, as children cannot wear boots in class all day)  Thank you for preparing your child to enjoy outdoor play this winter.
Student Council News




The Memorial School student council is off and running this school year. We are promoting and organizing the Crayola Colorcycle program at our school. Students are encouraged to bring in any used markers that have run out of ink and place them in the collection boxes around the school and they will be sent to Crayola to re-purpose them. For more information, the link is:

2nd Grade News
Can you believe it is the second trimester?! Second graders just wrapped up their unit on Landforms. We were so excited to research some of Earth's landforms. We even conducted experiments to see how land erodes by water and wind. Our first experiment used a chocolate chip cookie; we submerged it in water, poked holes in it with a toothpick and rubbed it with a Q-tip to simulate weathering and erosion. In our second experiment we became engineers. We created a hill out of cornmeal and used supplied materials to stop a landslide from happening (see pictures below). For our final project, students used model magic to shape 5 landforms found on water and land, with proper labels, showing us what they learned. We are so excited to go explore the Boston Museum of Science on Dec. 1 to further our scientific excitement!




Library News with Mrs. Tamayoshi

Music News with Ms. Cunningham
Students in fourth and fifth grade have been working on a composition project for the past two weeks. They are creating a thirty-two beat composition that is both Fall and Thanksgiving themed. Students have created their rhythms and have paired up to make their compositions in AABA form. With the rhythm and lyrics all set to go, students will soon be adding the melody to their composition by utilizing wooden soprano and alto xylophones. The project will conclude with a performance day, where all students will share their pieces of music with their class.
C:\Users\lcunningham\Downloads\IMG_2655.jpgC:\Users\lcunningham\Downloads\IMG_2656.jpg
C:\Users\lcunningham\Downloads\IMG_2653.jpg


Grade 1 and the Science of Sound
Students in first grade have been learning all about the science of sound with their classroom teachers. What better classroom to reinforce these concepts than the music room? This week, first graders put these theories to practice. Students got to peek inside a baby grand piano and see all of the strings that vibrate when a key is pressed. Students also explored why some instruments are bigger and why some are smaller-it all has to do with whether the pitch is high or low. To show this, we looked at metallophones, xylophones, boomwhackers, and guitar strings.
C:\Users\lcunningham\Downloads\IMG_2659.jpg
PE News with Mr. McKenney & Mrs. McNamara
In PE classes students are focused on fitness. We have been learning about and working to improve our levels in the different components of health-related physical fitness. In the coming weeks, students in grades 2-5 will be participating in the Fitnessgram physical fitness testing. Students have been enthusiastic about learning ways to stay healthy and strong.


STEAM News with Ms. Lebs



Reading Specialist News with Dr. Corbin
Tips for Supporting Readers
As  readers there are times when we get stumped on a word or look up after reading and say "What did I just read?" or "What does that mean?" At these times your brain is telling you that you can't keep going because the process isn't working, so you stop and usually reread, or read aloud, or ask for help.
A strategy to use with practicing readers is called Pause, Prompt, Praise. Pause refers to giving the reader time to think and try to solve the problem. Prompt refers to encouraging the reader to try different things such as look at picture, think about the meaning, look for patterns in words, etc (click here for more). Praise refers to acknowledging the readers effort.
You can follow up the reading with questions to support comprehension.
1.  Questions don't have to be saved until the very end.
  • If a reader seems a bit confused over a particular passage, stop right then and ask, "Did that makes sense to you?"  or "What was the author saying right there? Can you put it in your own words?"
  • Students who struggle with attention span many times do better if asked questions  while  reading versus saving all of them until the very end.
  • Asking questions is also an effective comprehension strategy good readers use throughout reading, not just at the end.
2. Questions that start with "how" or "why" tend to delve deeper into comprehension.
  • "Why do you think the main character did that?" or "How do you think she is going to solve this problem?"  These questions require young readers to "read between the lines".  They must take what they know (their schema) and add it to what the author is telling them to create an answer.
  • Answering the deeper questions requires your child to know the basic answers.  For example, if you ask your young reader, "Why do you think the main character did that?", listen for him to use the main character's name while answering.

 3.  Questions can lead to more questions.

  • Instead of simply being satisfied with the answer your child gives, you can follow up with another  great  question: "What makes you think that?"
  • Asking how your child got the answer requires her to think about the strategies she used to get the answer.
  • Be explicit about identifying the strategy she used to help her think about her thinking (metacognition).

4. Questions Don't Have to Have ONE Right Answer

While some questions only have one right answer, I cherish the questions that don't for two reasons.
1-They lead to great conversations and discussions between you and the child.
2-They put the child at ease.  When children struggle with comprehension, the last thing they need is the added pressure of trying to figure out the one answer you want them to give (on top of simply coming up with an answer).  Try adding, "In your opinion..." or "Why do YOU THINK..." to the beginning of questions to indicate to the child that their opinion and thinking matters more than getting the "right" answer.
School Counselor News with Mrs. Collins 

 
Memorial PTO News
IMPORTANT
PTO ANNOUNCEMENT

  • Our next PTO Meeting will be held on December 7 th at 7:00 in the library. We hope to see you there!

  • We are gearing up for the holiday season! Our Santa Breakfast will be on December 2 nd and Holiday Shopping will be December 12 th and 13 th .

  • Theme Baskets flyers went out recently, it's a great time to start getting items. Themes this year are: Family Fun Day, We All Scream for Ice Cream, S.T.E.A.M. (Science, Technology, Arts), A Night at the Movies, Willy Wonka Candy Craze, Imagination Station (Reading,Writing,Creative Fun), Gift Cards Galore, Lego-tastic, Day at the Spa , Patty Cake, Patty Cake, Let's go Bake, NERF-tastic, Coffee Lovers, Summer Vacation Survival, Pot of Gold Lottery Ticket, Date Night

  • And with the holidays approaching don't forget The PTO is registered as a nonprofit on GuideStar and is registered on AmazonSmile. Please consider using those sites for all your shopping needs!
Gale Library News
Gale Library Holiday Fun
 
Join in the holiday fun and excitement at the Gale Library, Newton! Listen to some special favorite holiday tales and make Holiday decorations, ornaments, cards, and crafts during the month of December.

On Monday, Dec. 4 at 6:30 PM there will be a workshop of Holiday Crafts to try your hand at making for your home or a special someone, several Glittery Tree ornaments to a Sparkling Luminary Jar or Snowman. All materials will be supplied but if you have a favorite ribbon or decorating theme, feel free to bring them. 

On Early Release day, Wednesday, Dec. 6 at 2 PM there will be a Holiday Video. Bring a friend to watch this new, fun movie. Snacks will be provided. You can bring your own drink. 

Register for the Cookie Swap and Decorating Nite on Monday, Dec.11 at 6:30 PM. Bring your homemade goodies and go home with a festive variety. Cookie baking done! All those cookies are a temptation to eat so cookies, frosting, and decorating candies will be provided for you to decorate your own to eat. Please call 382-4691 or drop in to register to ensure we have adequate supplies. You may also bring any other special additions you would like to make your cookies extra special.

Drop-In Holiday craft  on Saturday, Dec. 9. Drop in anytime until noon in the Children's Room to make an easy, quick craft.

Need a gift- Come to the library, check out all the great gift baskets and take chances on the Friends of the Library Basket Raffle. There are many beautiful baskets to choose from, filled with great gifts for each member of your family and friends.  Baskets will be raffled on Friday, Dec. 15 at 1 PM. Buy your tickets now, $1 each-6 for $5.

Storyhours on Tuesdays each week at 10:00 AM will highlight more of our favorite holiday stories, crafts and songs. Come decorate our tree, make ornaments, and enjoy a party with games and goodies. Polar Express Storyhour will be held Dec. 12th so wear your PJ's, come hear the popular story and have cookies and cocoa. Storyhour Holiday party will be held Dec. 19 at 10:00 AM. 

Drop in any time to make your own Holiday Greeting Card from the materials in the Children's Room. Stickers, stamps, old cards, markers, and lots of imagination can create a very special card for Mom, Dad, or Grandparents.

Our Christmas Candy Contest is ready for your best guess. Make the closest guess of the number of candies in our Christmas Tree and you can be the winner of them all. Yummy! 

Make someone's holiday happier. The Angel Tree is filled with children's Christmas wishes. Come pick an angel tag off the Tree at the Library. Purchase a gift for that child, wrap it, and return it to the library so it can be distributed to a happy Newton child.

Many thanks for a successful Food Drive to all those patrons who paid their fines with food. Our local Food Pantry will be well stocked and able to help many during the holidays thanks to your generosity.
SRHS - 12 Days of Caring
Happy Holidays!

The Annual 12 Days of Caring is coming up at Sanborn Regional High School.  This year, the event will be run a little differently; we will have six boxes set up in the atrium for ALL 12 days.  This means that any of the items listed can be dropped off on any of the following dates: December 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th, 15th, 18th, 19th.  Also, a note that we will not be taking any clothing donations- we are including a clothing drive during our Winter Carnival event in February.  All items will be donated to many great causes- so let's make this the best 12 Days of Caring yet!

Items will be:
-Toys (going to Toys for Tots)
-Holiday Decorations/Wrapping Paper (going to Colonial Poplin Nursing and Rehabilitation Home)
-Canned Foods (going to local food pantries and 68 Hours of Hunger)
-Pet Supplies (going to the NHSPCA)
-School Supplies (going to students in our district)
-Personal Care Items and Letters to the Troops (going to the military troops)

Upcoming SRSD Winter Concerts
The Sanborn Regional School District is proud to present the Music Department's upcoming winter concerts.
 

Wednesday, December 13 at 6:30 p.m. SRHS Auditorium

The 6th Grade Band, Combined 7th and 8th Grade Band, and High School Band
 

Thursday, December 14, at 6:30 p.m. SRHS Auditorium

The D.J. Bakie and Memorial Elementary Bands
 

December 19, at 6:30 p.m. SRHS Auditorium

The Middle School Chorus and the High School Chorus

Sanborn Youth Lacrosse

Sanborn Youth Basketball

Girl Scouts

Snowmobile Safety Classes

Contact
Dr. Patricia Haynes, Principal
phaynes@sau17.net

Stay Connected

Follow us on Facebook at:
Newton Memorial