December Newsletter Win the Day! Zach Dillavou Middle School Principal zdillavou@forestcity.k12.ia.us 641-585-4772 Issue note: Different email clients have different displays. If you see a small box with dots in it, please click it and it will expand to view all of the articles

Happy December from the Forest City Middle School.  As we quickly move through the month of December, we want to take the time to thank our students, teachers, school staff, parents and community for a great school year so far. Students will be dismissed on December 22 at 2 p.m. and return on January 3, 2018. I sincerely hope that your family will have the opportunity to spend time together during the students’ break. Although maintaining a close relationship with your young adolescent can be challenging, parents are still the most influential people regarding their child’s values and performance at school. Best wishes for an enjoyable holiday season and Happy New Year! Sincerely, Zach Dillavou, Middle School Principal

Click here to view the KIMT video We would like to recognize 7th grade teacher, Mrs. Kari Olson, on being selected by KIMT as a Golden Apple Award Teacher for the month of December. Kari has taught at FCMS for 11 years. We are thankful and proud to have Mrs. Olson working with our students at FCMS on a daily basis. Congratulations!

Students Raise $200 for ACS

Mrs. Park's Life Skills classes baked holiday treats and then held a bake sale to benefit the American Cancer Society. Mrs. Parks said that most of the kids were covered in flour; however, it was worth it because they raised more than $200 in 30 minutes! Way to go students!

Yearbook Order Form Coming Soon!

The middle school yearbook staff has been busy on a variety of tasks in the creation of our yearbook. It looks to be full of student activities, portraits, autographs and artwork, to name a few. Although our final product will not be available until May, it is about time to get that order in, so each student is guaranteed a yearbook this spring. After the winter break, all middle school students will be receiving information on cost and how to purchase one of these wonderful middle school memory books. There will be directions on how to order online, as well as, with cash or check in the middle school office.  Please look for this information to come home the first week in January with your student. Additional order forms will be located in the middle school office.

Student Artwork Selected for Calendar

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Since 2015, the Clear Lake Arts Center has distributed a calendar for donors. This year, they selected artwork from the March 2017 Student Art Show. Two FCMS students' art was selected to appear in the calendar. Congratulations to Adisyn Erdman (grade 8) and Samantha Buffington (grade 6). Art teacher Mrs. Beach said, "We have some very talented students at FCMS. I hope to bring out the inner artist in every child and cultivate a lifelong love of creative expression in the field​s​​​ of visual arts."

Adisyn Erdman Colorful origami folds and shapes create fanciful 3-dimensional designs when arranged into a circular pattern. Students learned to fold paper into many different styles and forms, expressing color burst designs reminiscent of ever changing kaleidoscopes. Each student's work was unique and individual, reflecting symmetry and colorful exuberance.

Samantha Buffington "Snowman Races" Light bounces magically off a snowy landscape at night. The students captured this mood by using chalk pastel on dark blue paper. The white chalk pastel creates a luminous effect when blended with blue shadows under the moonlit landscape. What fun to imagine snowmen playing together at night as inspired by a children's book, "Snowmen at Night".

Band and Choir Holiday Concert

We are very pleased with the large number of students involved in band and choir. The groups held their holiday concerts on December 18. Currently, 121 students are participating in band and 129 students are participating in choir. Each activity has about half of our student body participating. Fantastic! Congratulations to the students, Mr. Schmidt and Mr. Teske. Your hard work over the last several weeks paid off!

Food Drive Service Project

During the month of December we held our annual food drive at the middle school. This is a great service learning project for the students. Teachers and students are teamed up in Dugouts to see which teams can bring in the most canned goods. Friday, Dec. 8, was the final collection day and all items were taken to the local food bank in Forest City. This year over 800 canned goods were delivered! Great job!

Parent Resources: Digital Citizenship

Mr. Van Oort shares this video with middle school and high school students to help our students understand the risky forms of self-disclosure and the consequences. This article from Common Sense Media provides tips on how plugged-in families can have a device-free (ish) holiday: Click here to read article

Twitter Talk

Follow us @ ForestCityMS Teacher Twitter accounts: @fcms_read_gal @zdillavou @FCMSOlsonK @WedemeierMr @Uhlenhopp15 @ELPFC @helgesont @dcbang

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Forest City Community Schools Website

Forest City Middle School (641) 585-4772 www.forestcity.k12.ia.us

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