Miller Elementary Weekly Update

Hello Miller Families!

I hope this message finds everyone safe after our crazy storms last night! Please reach out if your family needs anything and we hope that you have an easy clean-up or that your power returns in your neighborhood quickly. We obviously would have never expected a calamity day in August! I found this cute picture from earlier in the week when I was playing with trees with this little one in preschool only to be cleaning up much bigger trees in my backyard today!

Please advise that Mr. Roberto sent out a message indicating how we will accomplish our Kindergarten Autumn Assessments due to this unexpected day off. (This does not impact preschool and we will continue to follow our Monday-Thursday program next week).

Kindergarten Reminder:

Monday, August 28th - Kindergarten KRA-R Assessment Days - Kindergarten Students Whose Last Name Begins with M-Z Attend School (A-L Does not attend school this day)

Friday, September 1st - Kindergarten KRA-R Assessment Days - Kindergarten Students Whose Last Name Begins with A-L Attend School (M-Z Does not attend school this day)

I'm sure you may be experiencing the first few days of the school year as a big adjustment period for your child. Remember that they are adjusting to being away from home all day or half the day as well as learning many new faces and names of classmates and staff members. We still have some tears which can be expected, but we want to assure you that we are here to give that extra hug, sit and comfort your child, or offer a calming toy or activity. As the weeks continue, your child will feel more comfortable with all the new faces at school and continue to build strong relationships that will last throughout their years as a GREENMEN! These relationships will be the foundation of many exciting learning opportunities.

We had our first fire drill this week and your little ones did a great job! We all read a social story about Fire Drills so they knew what to expect. I always come on the announcements and have them begin to evacuate and we don't sound the alarm until everyone is outside. This helps them hear the sound that our alarm makes in the event of an emergency. This is a great time to talk about fire safety and storm safety at your house too since we all heard the sirens and alarms last night.

We've had a few families ask about picture day at Miller since the other schools have their picture day very soon! Ours will take place on Wednesday, September 13th and more information will be forthcoming!

Finally, we would like to make sure every child has a change of clothes either in their backpack or sent to school in the event of an accident or spill. They are still learning how to alert an adult, stop playing when they "have to go" and the location of our restrooms in our buildings. We are busy teaching them all of these skills so please remind them to tell an adult right away and we're here to help! Then if your child comes home in their spare clothes, don't forget to send in a new set. Thank you for your help and we will reach out if we need anything further!

I hope you have a wonderful and safe weekend!

Go GREENMEN!

Maria Goodman

Miller Elementary Principal

330-954-2189

Email mgoodman@aurora-schools.org

As students begin their educational journey, there are some state-mandated checkpoints and assessments to ensure that we are monitoring your child's growth and development. To accomplish these activities, it's best if we bring small groups of children to school to work on these various assessments.

UPDATED

All K-5 (NOT PRESCHOOL) will students participate in the Fall Assessment Days on Monday, August 28th or Friday, September 1st.

Monday, August 28th - Kindergarten KRA-R Assessment Days - Kindergarten Students Whose Last Name Begins with M-Z Attend School (A-L Does not attend school this day)

Friday, September 1st - Kindergarten KRA-R Assessment Days - Kindergarten Students Whose Last Name Begins with A-L Attend School (M-Z Does not attend school this day)

In addition to our assessment days, we will be completing many of our kindergarten assessments during our normal school day. These screening assessments are required by the State of Ohio and they provide us with information to better know your child and to kickstart the school year to best meet their needs. We wanted to share what assessments they will be participating in and the expected dates so you know what is happening at school.

The dates listed below show the various windows of time we will be conducting assessments.

AIMS Web Benchmarking - A 3-minute kindergarten universal screener to check your child's incoming knowledge of letters, sounds, and phonemic awareness. (August 23rd & 24th)

Speech & Language Screening - Kindergarten Students (Week of August 29th)

Your child will work one-on-one with one of our speech and language pathologists to conduct a speech and language screener.

Kindergarten Readiness Assessment (KRA-R) - Kindergarten Students (Aug. 28th & Sept. 1st)

This assessment looks at your child’s readiness for engaging with instruction aligned to the kindergarten standards. These assessments are completed through observation in the classroom and via an interactive assessment on an iPad. Here are the skills that are checked:

• Social Foundations- including social and emotional development
• Mathematics
• Language and Literacy
• Physical Well-being and Motor Development

Vision & Hearing Screening - All Kindergarten Students (Month of September & October)

Our school nurse will conduct a vision and hearing screening on all students.

Ohio English Language Proficiency Screener - (Week of September 5th) -

Students whose families speak a 2nd language in the home as reported in Final Forms will take a language proficiency screener. This assessment is given by Mrs. Levey or Mrs. Flannery our English Learner educators.

We will communicate any results that require follow-up or reach out to you if we have any further questions. We are looking forward to getting to know your child a bit more!

STARTING ON MONDAY, AUGUST 21st, car riders must park their car and walk their child to our main doors or the preschool entrance. Please see the important reminders below about our arrival windows and which doors to drop your child at each day.

Preschool Arrival and Dismissal Times:

AM Preschool Arrival 8:45-8:50 & AM Preschool Dismissal 11:30 - Lower Prescchol Doors - Door 3

PM Preschool Arrival 12:45-12:50 & PM Preschool Dismissal 3:20 - Upper Main Doors - Door 2

Kindergarten Arrival and Dismissal Times

Upper Main Door Entrance - Door 2

Full Day Kindergarten: Arrival 8:55-9:05 and Dismissal 3:25-3:35

AM 1/2 Day Kindergarten: Arrival 8:55-9:05 & Dismissal 11:40-11:50

PM 1/2 Day Kindergarten: Arrival 12:45-12:50 & Dismissal 3:25-3:35

Please try to stick to these windows of time in order to smoothly get all children in and out of our building with adult support.

We are working really hard to streamline communication so we can be as efficient as possible when getting your child home safely and reporting attendance. To do that, we are adopting an electronic reporting system that all PK-5 families will use this upcoming year!

If you want to change your child from a bus rider to a parent pick-up, please scan the QR code below or click the button to fill out our Google form. This can be done from any device and your reply will be sent immediately to our secretary, Mrs. Wolf.

If you need an alternative bus stop or a change in busing, we also have attached the transportation forms to change your child's busing information. These forms need to be completed and sent to our transportation department at transportationinfo@aurora-schools.org

Also, if your child is absent, instead of calling us, you can also use this code to report the absence and the reason for the absence. We are working really hard to reduce the amount of phone calls, emails, or notes that we receive. We ask that you reserve those modes of communication for emergencies only. Thank you in advance for your help and let us know if you have any questions at all!

Kindergarten Only

• Monday 8/28 - KRA-Kindergarten Assessments/Autumn Assessments - Students Whose Last Name Begins with M-Z (A-L Do not attend school this day)
• Friday, 9/1 - KRA-Kindergarten Assessments/Autumn Assessments - Students Whose Last Name Begins with A-L (M-Z Do not attend school this day)

August

• Monday 8/28 - Board of Education Meeting @ 7:00 PM at the Conference Center
• Tuesday 8/29 & Wednesay 8/30 - Kindergarten Speech and Language Screenings

September

• Monday, 9/04 - NO SCHOOL (Labor Day)
• Friday, 9/08 - Aurora Spirit Day for AHS Homecoming- Wear Aurora Spirit Wear
• Wednesday, 9/13 - Miller School Picture Day - More Information Forthcoming

Has your child come home talking about earning a warm fuzzy pom? We have officially kicked off teaching our learners about school expectations. At Miller, we work to help our children develop skills to be respectful, responsible, and problem-solvers. However, what does that look like and sound like in our school building? Each week we target a skill that supports the development of social and emotional skills that help all children be a member of a safe and fun learning environment. We will teach them a new skill for the next 9 weeks that helps them be safe, happy, and ready to learn.

This week we have targeted "I can use walking feet," to ensure we all are traveling safely throughout our school building. Please see the charts below to give reminders about this skill at home! If we see a child using walking feet, they can earn a warm fuzzy pom and add it to their class Proud Greenmen Bucket. Once filled, we will have a special event to celebrate our hard work. Be on the lookout for your child earning a Proud Greenmen Pom!

Hello Miller families!

It has been such a pleasure welcoming and getting to know the incredible students at Miller Elementary. We are off to such a great start! I am excited to introduce myself as the Kindergarten MTSS Coordinator and Interventionist. I am so thrilled to be at Miller Elementary this year! I am honored to work with the amazing students here during these very special and important years. I have begun conducting assessments and screening with Kindergarten students and will be working with students who would benefit from intervention in the areas of reading and math.

What is MTSS?

MTSS stands for multi-tiered system of supports. The MTSS framework has a tiered infrastructure that uses data to help match assessment and instructional resources to each student’s needs. Students who need additional support for enrichment or remediation are identified by data and provided that support with the right focus and intensity.

This school year will be my tenth year in education. I have spent the past five years at Leighton Elementary in Aurora as a third grade teacher. I have an educational background in both early childhood education (PK-5) and special education, as well as a master's degree in Elementary Literacy. I am a Mom to my daughter, Adelyn (3) and am expecting my second child in February. My family and I stay busy spending time at the Aurora parks and watching our daughter swim, dance, and most recently, play soccer! We have a black lab named Ares and our rescued cat, Turbo.

I encourage open communication at all times and am eager to continue working with the students at Miller Elementary. Please do not hesitate to reach out with any questions or concerns this year. I look forward to a fantastic school year!

Mrs. Jade Core

Reading Specialist & MTSS Coordinator

Miller Elementary School

Hello Miller! It has been such a treat to welcome your capable, adorable and kind Kindergarten and Preschool students to our wonderful school! I am honored to introduce myself as the school counselor. I am available to support students and families with needs in social emotional learning, academics and believe it or not- career exploration. Focusing on student strengths and learning about careers that help our community would be an example of how the career standard is covered in Kindergarten.

The 23-24 school year will be my nineteenth year in education. I have spent the previous years working as a classroom teacher, middle school counselor, and an elementary school counselor. Helping students is what I love to do! When I am not at school, you can usually find me at a sporting event for one of my three children: Dominic (12), Daniel (10) and Elle (10). We live right around the corner in Hudson with my husband, Brian and goldendoodle, Lila.

I encourage and welcome open-communication. During the school day, I provide individual counseling, small group counseling and classroom guidance lessons. Classroom guidance topics will be shared as they are introduced in this newsletter. Should your child be recommended for a small group or individual counseling, I would notify you in order to obtain your consent. Initially, I will ensure that all students continue to transition from summer break to their school day with ease.

This school year, I will be at Miller three days each week. Those days will typically be Monday, Wednesday and Thursday. When I am not at Miller, I’ll be very close at Leighton Elementary working with the third, fourth and fifth graders.

Next week will be a longer one for your child, so I thought it would be beneficial to share a resource this Separation Anxiety.pdf should your child experience any uncertainty when getting on the bus or out of the car. While I know it’s useful, my hope is that you can simply file this resource and not have to utilize it!

Please don’t hesitate to contact me at any time. I look forward to an excellent school year!

Mrs. Lindsey Ambrosia

School Counselor

330.562.6199, ext. 5414

Here are some important reminders to ensure the safety of our school community each day:

• Check your child each day for illness symptoms. If they begin to feel ill, please know she will assess your child and make contact with a family member when necessary.
• Students sent home with a fever or vomiting, may not return to school until they are fever or vomit-free without medication for at least 24 hours. This means if your child was sent home on Tuesday with a fever, he/she may not return to school until Thursday. If your child does return the next day, our school will be calling for you to come and pick him/her up. Please help to support our efforts in this area.
• We will use Final Forms to communicate any health concerns or communicable diseases that may arise in your child's class. Such examples include strep throat, pink eye, and COVID. This will allow you to closely monitor your child for any similar symptoms.
• Please make sure your Final Forms medical information is up to date. We will closely read the health sections to address any medical concerns.

Please make sure your child has extra clothes in his/her backpack. Accidents and spills happen all the time and it's safe to always have their own clothes in their book bag instead of wearing our spare clothes that they may not feel comfortable wearing.

If you have any questions, please feel free to email our school nurse Jackie Pawlowski at jpawlowski@aurora-schools.org.

This is a friendly reminder that we have sent out tuition reminders to any families that have an upcoming payment due on September 1st.

Our total tuition cost for preschool is $2000 and full-day kindergarten is $2500. Many families have paid the initial down payment and we will be collecting the next set of fees on September 1st and the final payment will be due on January 15th.

Hello Miller Families!

Below are the AEPTO updates for this week:

1. Join the AEPTO! It is super easy! All you need to do is visit https://auroraelementarypto.org/join The deadline to join is October 1.

2. Our FIRST AEPTO meeting is Thursday, September 7 at 6:30pm at the Aurora Inn & Conference Center (30 Shawnee Trail). Please join us for appetizers and to discuss the upcoming school year. We hope to see many new and returning members!!

3. Class shirts are now available to order online using the link below. These shirts are optional. Your child's teacher may ask that your child wear this shirt on special days. Deadline to order is September 8th! Shirts will be delivered to the classroom about 2-3 weeks after the deadline.

https://rdpsports.com/product-category/aurora/aurora-class-shirts

4. If you ordered a Class of 2036 shirt during kindergarten registration and were not able to pick it up during Meet & Greet, I dropped those off at school on Friday. If you ordered one and have yet to receive it, please let me know.

5. Our Mumkins fundraiser started this week! Your child brought home a flyer with information. If you did not get one, visit https://www.fundraiseit.org/ and click on the green "Online Shopping" button, and then enter your child's name and school's name to generate your order link. Make sure you enter "Aurora" for the school.

The sale ends on September 6th. You will pick up all orders for your child on September 17th in the Aurora Board of Education Office parking lot (102 E. Garfield Road).

6. The Giving Pump! When you need to get gas, make sure you use pumps 5 or 6 at the Shell gas station in Aurora! Shell will donate to the AEPTO to help our students. This is for a limited time, so look for the "Giving Pump" signs!

7. Box Tops! Another easy way to help out our schools. Just download the app and then scan your receipts to earn box tops.

Important Upcoming Dates

9/4 - Labor Day, no school

9/7 - AEPTO Kickoff Meeting 6:30pm @ Aurora Inn & Conference Center (30 Shawnee Trail)

9/6 - Mumkins sale ends

9/13 - Miller Picture Day

9/17 - Mumkins pick up (Aurora Board of Education Office)

10/1 - Last day to join AEPTO

If you have any questions, please let me know!

Maria Goodman

mgoodman@aurora-schools.org

Principal

Vicki Wolf

vwolf@aurora-schools.org

Secretary

Email: mgoodman@aurora-schools.org
Website: aurora-schools.org
Location: 646 S Chillicothe Rd, Aurora, OH 44202, USA
Phone: 330-562-6199