Cougar Connect: November is Here!

The end of October brought several highlights to Clyde Hill Elementary!  On Friday, October 25th we held our monthly assembly.  In these monthly assemblies we honor the various heritage and awareness months as recognized by the Bellevue School District cultural calendar.  This month our assembly organizers found an elementary-friendly video about Filipino American Heritage Month and also featured a presentation from Mrs. Thompson's first graders highlighting Unity Day.  Friday, October 25th was also the Clyde Hill PTA Trunk or Treat event!  It was AMAZING seeing the creative trunks, the fabulous costumes, and the wonderful fun being had by all who were able to attend!  If you missed the Trunk or Treat this year, we hope you will be able to join us next year!

As we move into November, we will be moving to one monthly newsletter on our school website and shorter emails each week with updates from the central office as those updates are often time sensitive.  

ARC:  American Reading Company - Bellevue's New K-5 Literacy Curriculum

This year, Bellevue adopted a new K-5 literacy curriculum focused on students' knowledge building through reading and writing.  As we enter November, all grades are headed into their second unit of study in this new curriculum.  The first unit of the year focused on setting routines within the classroom which provided teachers time to assess students' reading and writing skills, establish routines for whole and small group instruction, and begin conferencing (or meeting) with students one-on-one about their learning.

As each grade enters their second unit of study, the focus of instruction shifts towards building knowledge through reading and writing

informational text.  Depending on their grade level, students will be delving deeply into a topic, developing expertise in their topic by researching various questions about their topic.  By the end of the unit, they will produce a final project that brings together all the knowledge they have gained about their topic and will be able to share this information with you.  (Note that some grade levels have already started Unit 2 and other grade levels will be starting this coming week.  Not all grade levels are on the same pace given that they are teaching different content to different students)

It has been truly exciting seeing students so excited to be reading and researching about a topic of interest to them.  As I visited a classroom earlier this week, a student was so excited to finish their math lesson and could not wait to get back to reading and researching about blizzards.  If you are a parent of a 3rd grader, be ready to talk about weather and climate - we have a lot of students eager to share what they are learning! 

*Note that another key component of literacy instruction is foundational reading skills - phonics (being able to sound words out), phonemic awareness (being able to hear the sounds in words), and morphology (understanding the parts of words).  We are not using ARC's foundational reading skills and are continuing on with the Heggerty program in grades Prek - 1st for phonemic awareness, UFLI in grades K-2 for phonics, and are piloting materials in grades 3-5 for morphology.

Student Behavior:  Shaping Student Behavior

At Clyde Hill each classroom strives to build classroom communities that provide engaging learning environments that provide emotional and physical safety for all students.  For many reasons, a classroom may have a student or students who demonstrate behaviors that are not physically and/or emotionally safe.  Families often ask teachers and administrators, what do we do when this happens?  How do we handle and support these situations?  

First, know that the educators at Clyde Hill are working to support two sets of needs.  The student who is engaging in the behavior is trying to show or tell the adults in their world something as behavior is communication.  We also need to attend to the needs of the students who are in the class and experiencing the behaviors.  Depending on what they are experiencing, they need to hear a consistent message about what behavior is expected and appropriate for the classroom, and they need to know that the adults at school are going to adjust things to keep them safe.

If a child is engaging in unexpected behaviors, the educators who work with the student work in close partnership with the family to help make sense of the behavior and figure out what the student's behavior is communicating.  As a team, we create and implement individualized plans of support that match the needs the student has shown us.  These plans could include additional breaks or sensory supports throughout the day to increase movement and/or anticipate non-preferred or challenging times in the day.  A plan might include having a check-in/check-out system with a trusted adult outside of the classroom to help prepare for, set goals about, and then reflect on their school day.  We gather data throughout the day to see if the plan is working and adjust based on the data. 

How quickly does behavior change? Not as fast as anyone wants...  We know it takes at least 21 days to form a habit when a focused adult works at changing a behavior.  We also know that growth and learning is rarely linear.  This means that students do not just steadily improve.  There are often jumps in growth and then plateaus and there are even small steps backwards (regressions).  What this means is that when a team of educators is working to shape a student's behavior, we may have a week of great behavior followed by what seems like an unexpected setback, or we may have weeks of improved behavior followed by an unexpected escalation.  However, when this happens, we track this data, review what happened with this event:  what caused the event, what happened, and what happened following the event, and finally, we adjust our plans, if needed, based on what our data tells us.  

While we have guidelines to follow for student behavior such as the elementary matrix of consequences in the Bellevue School District Board Policy, ultimately, we need to work with each situation individually while also looking to see how this fits into the larger picture of an individual student. 

 

Preparing for Family Conferences

If your child(ren)'s teacher have not yet reached out to you, anticipate they will soon be reaching out to schedule your child(ren)'s fall family conference.  These conferences provide families and teachers an opportunity to meet together and discuss both the academic and social emotional learning seen in the first 3 months of school.  If there are specific questions that you are curious about, you are encouraged to reach out to your child(ren)'s teacher in advance to ensure these questions are addressed during the conference.  We look forward to meeting with you and the partnership we will continue to build through the family conferences!

 

Too Sick for School?

With the winter months upon us, the nurses of the Bellevue School District have prepared a guide for our families to help determine when to stay home and when it is safe to return to school.

Symptoms	Stay home from school if...	Return to school if...
Fever	Fever is 100.4 or higher.	They are fever-free for 24 hours without using fever-reducing medication like Tylenol or Ibuprofen, and they are feeling better.
Vomiting	Vomited 2 or more times in the last 24 hours related to illness.	They did not vomit overnight, and they can drink liquids without throwing up.
Diarrhea	3 or more watery stools in 24 hours or if you can’t make it to the bathroom in time.	Diarrhea has improved.
Cough	Symptoms also include a fever of 100.4 or trouble breathing	Cough is under control and is not distracting or disruptive and they are fever-free for 24 hours.
COVID-19, FLU, OR RSV	Follow Public Health-Seattle King County Guidance.	Fever-free for 24 hours and symptoms are improving. Students should wear a mask for 5 days in case they are contagious.
Rash	Rash with fever, blisters, or drainage.	Rash has healed or the child has been cleared for return by a medical provider.
Eye infection or irritation	The child cannot avoid close contact with others Local health jurisdiction or child’s health care provider recommends exclusion Symptoms also include fever or other illness	Symptoms are improving. If a medical provider has excluded a student from school, refer to medical provider guidance for return-to-school guidelines.

If you don’t know whether to send your child to school, have specific concerns regarding your child’s physical or mental health, or are worried your child will spread illness, contact your child’s health care provider, local urgent care, or our school nurse.

If your student comes to school with the symptoms listed above, family members will be contacted by our school nurse or office staff to pick up their student from school.

Seek Medical Care If:

• Your student has a temperature higher than 100.4 and any of the following: ear pain, sore throat, rash, stomachache, headache, or tooth pain
• Your student has stomach pain and fever, blood or black stool, or they are dehydrated (tired and sleepy, dry mouth), and/or they have not urinated in the last 8 hours.
• Your student has persistent cough or trouble breathing, or if they have a fever with a cough.
• They have eye swelling, eye pain, or an eye injury
• They have a rash that has blisters, is draining, is painful, looks like bruises, and/or has a fever with the rash.

Additional health information can be found on the Bellevue School District website at:  https://www.bsd405.org/programs-and-services/health-services/too-sick-for-school

 

News from the Bellevue School District Central Office

King County Library Diwali Celebration

Join BSD Multilingual Learners (MLL) staff and the King County Library for a Diwali celebration for all ages. Learn about Diwali with a story time, cultural presentation, henna art, crafts, and a photo booth to capture the memories. The event will take place on Saturday, November 9, from 3:00 to 4:30 p.m. at the Downtown Bellevue Library (1111 110th Ave NE Bellevue, WA 98004). Come celebrate the Festival of Lights! No registration required. Space is limited.

 

Bellevue Schools Foundation Presents 2024-2025 Education Connections Series

There is still time to register for the Education Connections series through ParentMap for a full year of engaging webinars featuring parenting experts from across the country, brought to you by Bellevue Schools Foundation in partnership with the Bellevue PTSA Council.

Use the discount code “BELLSCHFDN” to register for free for the full series (a $120 value) at ParentMap Speaker Series. This will allow you access to all the recorded sessions. Events this November include:

Level Up: Winning Strategies for Parents of Gamers 

Recovered gaming addict, Healthy Gamer cofounder, psychiatrist and parenting coach, Dr. Alok Kanojia, will share strategies to protect your kids from the all-too-real dangers of gaming addiction, build healthy gaming habits, establish appropriate limits, and work with — not against — your kids as they play and grow. View the event flyer to learn more.

Date: Thursday, November 7, 2024

Time: 12:00 – 1:00 p.m.

Location: Online via Zoom.

 

Education Connections: Dr. Aramaki Book Club

Join Bellevue School District families and Superintendent Dr. Kelly Aramaki for an engaging discussion on The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt! Take part in a dynamic, partially guided conversation as we explore the book’s key themes together. Don’t miss this opportunity to explore crucial issues surrounding adolescent mental health and the impact of our “phone-based” childhoods. If you missed the first webinar on October 15, 2024, with social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, author of The Anxious Generation, register for the series and you can watch the recording prior to the book club. View the event flyer to learn more.

 

Date: Tuesday, November 12, 2024 

Time: 6:30 – 8:00 p.m. 

Location: WISC Rainier Room | 12241 Main St, Bldg. #1, Bellevue, WA 98005 

RSVP online.

 

Finally, as we head into November, this is the weekend where we adjust our clocks to Standard Time.  This means early on Sunday morning at 2 AM, we set our clocks back 1 hour.  What this means for an early start school like Clyde Hill is that for the next couple of weeks it will be bit lighter in the morning as we get our students to school, but it will be darker much earlier!  

 

In partnership,

Amy MacDonald

Principal, Clyde Hill Elementary School

 

Bellevue School District does not discriminate in any programs or activities on the basis of sex, race, creed, religion, color, national origin, age, veteran or military status, sexual orientation, gender expression or identity, disability, or the use of a trained dog guide or service animal and provides equal access to the Boy Scouts of America and other designated youth groups.

The following employees have been designated to handle questions and complaints of alleged discrimination:

Civil Rights, Racial Discrimination, and Gender Expression or Identity Discrimination:Civil Rights/Nondiscrimination Compliance Coordinator Nancy Pham, 425-456-4040 or phamn@bsd405.org

Sex-based Discrimination, including Sexual Harassment:Title IX Coordinator: Jeff Lowell, 425-456-4010 or lowellj@bsd405.org

Disability Discrimination:Section 504/ADA Coordinator: Karen Dejong, 425-456-4277 or dejongk@bsd405.org

Mailing address for all three: 12111 NE 1st Street, Bellevue, WA 98005.