Toasty and Roasty

It's been a short week, so says the calendar, but it sure feels like a full one. Thank you for continuing to push diligently to the finish. 

Closing Conversations
As we close the year, it is good to look back both to celebrate and set goals for growth in the upcoming year. I'm trying to organize and schedule these conversations on Doodle. If you received an emailed invitation to the Doodle calendar, please select a time that is convenient for you and we'll celebrate the year together and talk about next year. If you did not receive an email, but would like to talk through a few items, please don't hesitate to grab a time slot following this link. 

End of Year Folder
The end of the year checklist was placed in your mailbox. You will also receive a class set of Student Communication Checklists for your students. As was mentioned in our staff meeting, these are to be completed and passed on to next year's teachers. You may also access these documents in a Google Drive folder called "End of Year"

Report Cards
Are due by Thursday, June 4 at 8:00 a.m. Pat and I will get your cards printed and stuffed in envelopes for your students' last day of school. You will also receive a set of report cards to be placed in each child's cum.

School Specialty
We will again be placing our order online. When you log in, you should be able to pull of last year's order for reference or to simply tweak and submit. Once submitting, the order will go to Pat's account. She will place the order in July.

Staff Get Together
How does it sound to get together on Thursday early evening, say 5:00ish?, for a dinner with our SS staff to celebrate all of this year's goodness and anticipating the summer break? Rather than eating a lunch together on Friday with only a portion of our team, perhaps after school on Thursday would be a better time to all break bread (or tip a glass of wine) together?

June 5
We will hold our final chapel time together from 10:45-11:15 on Friday, June 5. Please be sure to give each child their report card as well as their baton. For staff members who are present on Fridays, let's meet together in the staff center to spend a little time in celebratory prayer together.

PD Days
For your calendars, the afternoon of June 5 is yours to close the room and work through the check-out process. Monday, June 8 will be at the high school. Breakfast will available on mainstreet beginning at 8:00. Our meeting will begin at 8:30. Lunch will be served in the cafeteria. Our day will close around 3:30. Tuesday, June 9 will also be at the high school. Breakfast will be available beginning at 8:00. You will be dismissed before lunch.

Your Calling

There's a beautiful (albeit busy and sometimes all consuming) ebb and flow to the rhythm of the school year. We are deep in the midst of the end of the year preparations. I can't help but feel a bit nostalgic as I reflect on all that has occurred in this 2014-2015 school year. Our children have grown in every way. Spiritually, they know and have meaningfully and tangibly seen God. They have practiced what it means to walk in the footsteps of Christ. Our children have gained a better understanding of who they are and how God has uniquely equipped and blessed them. By listening to your words, observing your actions and heeding your advice, God's newest kingdom builders are learning how to respond to God's love by giving their lives to him. Thank you for giving all that it takes to pour into the hearts, minds and lives of the children that God has placed in your care. These children are your calling. This is your mission field. You have served God so well!

"Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age." Matthew 28:29

Assessment Day
Tuesday, May 26 will be our assessment day from 8:30-11:30. Here are our times, lists and locations for that day.

End of Year Folder
The end of the year checklist was placed in your mailbox. You will also receive a class set of Student Communication Checklists for your students. As was mentioned in our staff meeting, these are to be completed and passed on to next year's teachers. You may also access these documents in a Google Drive folder called "End of Year"

Report Cards
Are due by Thursday, June 4 at 8:00 a.m. Pat and I will get your cards printed and stuffed in envelopes for your students' last day of school. You will also receive a set of report cards to be placed in each child's cum.

School Specialty
We will again be placing our order online. When you log in, you should be able to pull of last year's order for reference or to simply tweak and submit. Once submitting, the order will go to Pat's account. She will place the order in July.

Staff Get Together
How does it sound to get together on Thursday early evening, say 5:00ish?, for a dinner with our SS staff to celebrate all of this year's goodness and anticipating the summer break? Rather than eating a lunch together on Friday with only a portion of our team, perhaps after school on Thursday would be a better time to all break bread (or tip a glass of wine) together?

June 5
We will hold our final chapel time together from 10:45-11:15 on Friday, June 5. Please be sure to give each child their report card as well as their baton. For staff members who are present on Fridays, let's meet together in the staff center to spend a little time in celebratory prayer together.

PD Days
For your calendars, the afternoon of June 5 is yours to close the room and work through the check-out process. Monday, June 8 will be at the high school. Breakfast will available on mainstreet beginning at 8:00. Our meeting will begin at 8:30. Lunch will be served in the cafeteria. Our day will close around 3:30. Tuesday, June 9 will also be at the high school. Breakfast will be available beginning at 8:00. You will be dismissed before lunch.

Key West...Michigan

How's the wedding, Karen?

We missed you today at school and at our staff meeting. We had some really great pitas from Mr. Pita. We just can't imagine anything in Key West could compare with Mr. Pita! But they just didn't taste the same without you. I'm sure you were feeling a little homesick for South Side today as well! ;) We pray the wedding is beautiful and your family has a lovely time together. No worries. The running records will be here waiting when you return. ;)

Batons
Please copy and paste this into your blog as an explanation for the baton which will go home with your students on the last day of school:

Holland Christian Schools has developed a strong culture of adults investing in and mentoring students, cultivating a fruitful context for positive spiritual formation of our students. From Preschool through senior year, Holland Christian students know they are loved, affirmed, instructed and nurtured to become all that God has gifted them to be as his agents of shalom in our world. This happens in one-on-one conferring between teacher and developing reader; on the field, court, pool or stage between coach and performer; over coffee or breakfast between teacher and teen. HCS staff members invest into the lives of students, helping to create a “fabric of faithfulness” surrounding students who are encouraged to grow and “stay strong in their faith.”

One way that we tangibly can represent this “life-on-life” influence institutionally is to pass a customized HCS track baton from teacher to student, and student to teacher each year that a student is at HCS. Inside of this baton that follows each student throughout her or his HCS years is a scroll of paper with the accumulated personal messages of recognition and encouragement that will be added by that student’s teacher each year. 

Please watch for this special baton, labeled with your child's name, to come home with your child on the last day of school, June 5. Read the scroll inside, celebrate and pray together with your child over the growth that has taken place throughout this school year filled with God's providence, guidance and love. You may feel free to write a note to your child on this baton scroll as well and invite another mentoring adult or two to write a thoughtful note encouraging your child as well. We recommend that you store this baton in a safe place throughout the summer months so that your child can pass this baton to his/her new teacher next fall. 

End-of-the-year Checklists

Will be in your mailboxes next week!

Discovery Assessment

Next week is the last week to administer the assessment with your students. Please plan accordingly.

Student Communication Form

There will only be one to complete this year. As we discussed at our staff meeting, please report only the information that is exceptional and impacts the student's teacher next year. Use your professional discretion when you feel a conversation would be most beneficial. 

Paper and Printer

We're running low on white. Please use colored paper when you are able or perhaps screen shots of work, uploaded to Dropbox, students upload to Doodle Buddy, use image as background and complete their work. Email the assignment to you. Hello, Jetsons! 3 Mars bars to the first teacher who pulls this off. I'm not kidding! I'm putting myself in the running, but I'm out of the building for most of the day tomorrow so you get a head start!

Our color printer drawer in the library is "grindy". Please utilize the front feeder tray in leu of our grindy drawer. 

Assessment Day

Tuesday, May 26th. Support team, let's start thinking, talking and planning for the fun activities we'll do. Outdoor learning, digging, exploring? Sidewalk chalk number line jump? Claymation Smoovie? What's your pleasure? 

Chapel with Rus

May 27. NOT May 20. Please take note of the change in date.

Field Day

Tuesday, June 2. Let's make sure it doesn't rain that day. Otherwise, I'll go invest in Advil right now!

Blessing Ceremony 

Friday, June 5 at 10:45. We'll line the hallway by 11:10 and send our nearly newly crowned third graders through the tunnel of love. Please remember to send the batons home on that day along with report cards.

Oh, yeah, Report Cards

Due Thursday, June 4 so we can print and stuff them for your kids.

Surrounded in His Glory!

Assessment Day

Perhaps you've noticed, we're nearing the end of the school year ;) That means we find ourselves once again at the base of the running record mountain. Let's think and talk about the best day to pull that off again. Thank you to the support team that is willing to make that happen again. 

Staff Meeting

We have a few staff members who will not be able to attend the meeting due to other obligations, but the calendar is pretty full to try to arrange an alternate date. We will carry on with the Love, Logic and Lunch meeting as planned. The training sessions are now available on DVD, which are still in process of being sent to us. I can make you aware of the session we covered during lunch and give you the DVD to enjoy and learn from on your own. You can even take a bag of leftovers if you'd like ;) 

Class List Meetings

First Grade--Monday, May 11 @ 7:30 a.m.

Kindergarten--Thursday, May 14 @ 7:30 a.m.

Second Grade--Thursday, May 14 @ 1:00 p.m.

Discovery Assessment

The testing window will be open for two weeks, May 11-May 22. First and second grade teachers, please generate a code and run the kids through the ringer. Please don't hesitate to ask for support or staff to help the testing move along as smoothly as possible.

Staff Appreciation Lunch

So this day, Friday, May 15, was a bad pick. We're missing too many staff members who we appreicate the daylights out of!!! If you're not typically a Friday staff member, but you're out running errands or heading to the beach, PLEASE stop in to partake in the lunch. It's meant for ALL of our hard-working, appreciated staff members. By accepting this gift, we accept parents' gratitude.

Chapel with Rus Blondin

Rather than our scheduled chapel time, May 20, we are going to move the date to Wednesday, May 27. Same time. Same place. Different day.

Moving Up Day

At 11:30 on Wednesday, May 27, our second graders will travel to Pine Ridge to get a taste of the third grade lifestyle *sniff, sniff. Our kids are getting big and we've prepped them with nearly everything we are equipped to give them. God has readied them. 

Kindergarten Visiting Day

Speaking of God readying kids, our brand new kinders will visit their new school for the first time on Friday, May 29 at 9:00. If you see a wee one wandering the hallway, redirect them back to the kindergarten wing, please ;) It is a joy to welcome and get to know the newest families who are entrusting us with their precious littles.

Field Day

Will take place on Tuesday, June 2 in the afternoon. Chris is using 6th graders to volunteer rather than parents.

Final Chapel

We will close our year together in chapel on Friday, June 5 at 10:45. We will close chapel by huddling our second graders in the center of the gym, praying over them, having first and kinders line the two sides of the hallway with proud parents and clapping as the second graders walk through the tunnel. Please feel free to add other ideas to this celebration to make this moment super special.