Kildeer Principal's Message- March 22nd

Kildeer Families,

I have one word for what I feel for our students: PRIDE. This week, there were so many examples of how student voice was represented throughout our school. When I think of "student voice", I consider how we invite our students into the learning and listen to their perspective. After all, they are a critical part of what we do here!

This week, our students participated in an "All About You" day. This was a continuation of our theme this year with "All are Welcome" and learning from and about each other. Recently, I had some students approach me with an idea for buddy classrooms. They wanted to continue the power from our family celebration in the fall, and bring that to the school on a smaller level. Thus, students were able to wear clothing, bring in a picture, or share an artifact that demonstrated their identity.

As we listened to our students, they had very powerful things to say! 

TAKE A LOOK at some Kildeer Buddy classrooms as students shared what represents their identity.

*NEW INFORMATION*

Creating Balanced Class Lists - Parent Input for Class Placement

Creating balanced class lists that meet the needs of all students is a tremendously difficult job that takes many hours of thoughtful dialogue between classroom teachers, administrators, and specialists. We at Kildeer School take this process very seriously. The process for class list creation is as follows:

1. Teachers think about the social and academic needs of each of their current students while recording pertinent information to assist in the decision making process.

2. Grade level teachers, the principal, specials area teachers, and specialists meet together to form class lists that are balanced in terms of academic, social, and emotional needs as well as considering friendships. This is no easy task and often takes several meetings. This team of educators considers each child’s personality, academic needs, friendship patterns, etc. as they make a match for each individual child.

3. This team of educators creates a draft set of class lists taking into consideration parent input.  

4. Class lists are then revised in August with summer changes for students who move in or out of the district.

5. Class rosters are never final until they are released to families in August.

This process happens at grades 2-5. Willow Grove creates the class lists for our incoming 1st graders.  Our 5th-grade team provides data to Woodlawn related to placement decisions at the middle school level.

We strongly believe that this detailed and collaborative process creates learning environments that benefit all students. It is a delicate balancing act which takes much consideration and thought by professionals who know and care about your children. Our goal is to create balanced class lists that promote the success of each child. Please know that your child is placed in a classroom for very specific reasons. The process benefits all students.  Because of the input and thought given by teachers, specialists, parents, and the principal, we are very reluctant to make changes once this process occurs, as removing or moving one child can disrupt the balance of an entire class, impacting all students.

I welcome any insight you wish to share about your child’s strengths, needs, and learning style. I will take into consideration pertinent information received on or before FRIDAY, APRIL 26th. Please remember, while we welcome your input, specific teacher requests will not be honored.

If you'd like to share your input, please take the following survey: Kildeer Class Placement Survey for 19-20.  

*NEW INFORMATION*

Coming in Early April: IAR Assessment for Grades 3–8

The Illinois Assessment of Readiness (IAR) is the new English/language arts and math state assessment for Grades 3–8 students in Illinois public schools. 

The IAR replaces the PARCC assessment given the previous few years and is, in fact, very similar.

The testing window is designated as Apr. 8–26, but our students do not test every day during that period. 

Read more info about the IAR, including our Testing Schedule, the impact of participation, and more.

As your building principal, I'm happy to answer any questions you have about the IAR assessment. Please call our school office or send me an email.

*NEW INFORMATION*

Raise a Reader
Parents wanting to raise a life-long reader will appreciate strategies shared by D96 literacy coaches from literacy expert Pernille Ripp. For straightforward advice about nurturing readers in your home, please take a moment to read Parents: Create Joyful Reading Routines at Home.

*NEW INFORMATION*

Kildeer students, families, and faculty truly do make a positive difference! 

The American Heart Association has expressed appreciation to our Kildeer School Physical Education Department (Mr. Emde, Ms. Groessl, and Ms. Almdale) for $7916.00 raised through your very generous donations to our Jump Rope for Heart and Hoops for Heart fundraisers in February.

These activities not only help our students understand the importance of lifelong heart-healthy practices, but also show them that their effort helps fund very important scientific research and education benefitting many people and their families.

We thank our PE Department for their work to offer this opportunity and our Kildeer families for supporting it so generously!

*REPEAT INFORMATION*

Kildeer students will enjoy the opportunity in May to learn from Jeff Weigel. He is an illustrator, author, and designer of children's books, graphic novels, and comics, including the Sunday newspaper comic strip The Phantom. His books are available now for advance purchase and will be autographed by Mr. Weigel. BOOK PURCHASE INFO Please return form with payment to your student's teacher no later than Apr. 5.

*REPEAT INFORMATION*

Let Us Hear From You!
We thank you for participating in Collaborative Family/Educator Conferences. In order to celebrate success and make improvements to conferences, we ask you to share your feedback briefly with us no later than 3 p.m. on Mar. 22. Thank you!
SHARE YOUR CONFERENCE FEEDBACK

Click HERE to catch up on very important information from our PTO!

Highlights:

• 1st/2nd Grade Movie Night is Friday, April 12th from 6:30-8: 20 PM! Order your tickets and concessions on Membership Toolkit Today!

• The Deadline to Order Special Lunch for April is Next Friday, March 29th!

• 5th Grade Girls Night Out is April 26th from 6-8PM at Woodlawn! Register today on Kildeer’s Membership Toolkit

• Our Plans for the Kildeer Family Picnic in May are Underway but we’re looking for a few more people to help organize the event. Please consider donating your time to help run our last party of the year!

• 2019/2020 Committee Chair Positions Forms are Up on Kildeer’s Membership Toolkit, Get Involved and Volunteer Today!

• Our Nominating Committee is Assembled and We’re Looking for New Faces to Help Fill our PTO Executive Board for the 2019/2020 School Year

• Order your School Supply Kits for 2019-2020 on Membership Toolkit

An additional idea born from our talented students was about a very simple concept: Kindness = Happiness. 

My buddy Ben approached me to share that March 20th was "International Happiness Day". With that, he wanted to know if we could do something at Kildeer. That turned into a conversation about how happiness really comes from doing kind acts or being on the receiving end of kind acts. 

This turned into recruting a few key staff members: Mrs. Gruenwald, Mrs. Brandt, and Ms. Raquet, as well as some amazing 5th-graders to pull this all together! Thus, please enjoy the student created video below to strum up business :

Does your family want to be a part of our challenge? The goal is that every single student and staff member at Kildeer performs and records a genuine act of kindness during the month of April. Our students will collect the slips of paper and proudly display them on a bulletin board.

Should YOU accept this challenge, keep the conversation about kindness alive! Talk about this with your children and model this for them. What ways can we all pump a little kindness back in the world? 

I'd love to hear about what your family did to go above and beyond for others. Click HERE to share your story with me. I'll keep this open the month of April, too! 

With that, I hope that your family enjoys the time together over spring break. I don't think I'm alone when I say that we all welcome this time to rejuvenate and spend time with our loved ones.

We will see students return on Wednesday, April 3rd! If you are looking for some cute reading material and to hear more student voice, please enjoy the March edition of Paw Prints–Mar. 2019

Warm Regards,

Mrs. Vail Kieser

Principal