SMS Newsletter

Believe it or not, the sixth grade students have learned so much in just a few weeks!! They have learned how to work their lockers, change classes, walk up and down the stairs and we will be completing some school safety drills this month. We are proud of the independence that they are gaining. Just a couple reminders….students should all be writing down their assignments in their learning log (planner), so feel free to ask them to look at it. It is a great habit of writing down things that need to be done at night.

Please check TeacherEase for the most accurate grade. If you are not one to check on line weekly, you may want to start getting in that habit. Teachers post grades once a week, so this is a great way to keep an eye on how your student is doing. We have talked to the students about it as they can access it as well. If there is submitted work in Google Classroom it may or may not be graded and in TeacherEase yet.

Any questions, please feel free to contact us via email or calling 786-2138. We will have a great year in sixth grade! So much fun that some teachers have been here for over 20 years!!

Congratulations to our first Students of the month, Andrew Kamper & Lyndsey Hintz! Way to kick off the school year! !

Welcome to the 2023-2024 school year! Just a few reminders from the 7th-grade team: Please ensure that Chromebooks are charged nightly and brought to school with the charger. Please check Google Classroom and TeacherEase for work and grades. We are still learning the TeacherEase program and finding that it has complications with Google Classroom in terms of grading. If you are seeing an assignment marked as “missing” but it has a grade, please go to Google Classroom and hit “turn it in” or “ mark as done.” This will take care of the “missing” label.

The 7th-grade team will be implementing the BUGS (Bringing Up Grades Successfully) program beginning the week of September 11th. Students will have the opportunity to stay after school on Tuesdays and Thursdays until 3:45 or come in early on Wednesday mornings at 7:15 each week. During this time, students will be able to get extra help that may be needed in their classes. BUGS will take place in various 7th-grade classrooms each week. Students should look for the BUGS sign that will be located outside of the classroom where BUGS is taking place each day.

We are enjoying getting to know the students this year. We look forward to a fantastic year. The Students of the Month for August are Jason Rieser and Gwen Minard. We appreciate their hard work and dedication to their studies.

Instructional Language Arts: Instructional LA students have been working hard with beginning of the year placement tests. Students will be assigned passages through readworks.org to enable students to work at their current independent levels. Students started a writing “bootcamp” stressing basic writing skills. Students will be working on a variety of comprehension skills, starting with main ideas & details and cause and effect.

Art students are off to a great start at all levels. 6th graders are working on gaining confidence in their abilities while learning about the basic fundamentals of drawing. We began drawing eyes, will be working on shading, and then will also be getting into color theory, cartoons, portraits, and painting. 7th and 8th graders began with a review of eyes and will be working on their portrait drawings at the end of August and first weeks of September. They will get into cartooning, painting, pen and ink work, and more work with portraits and the human figure. As always, I am really looking forward to seeing what the students create this year. I try to display student artwork in the SMS Cafeteria and also share on Instagram @sandwichmiddleschoolart.

I will be starting up an Art Club as well. In the past it has typically been limited to 8th graders due to limited supplies, but I’m going to be looking into opening up to 7th grade as well this year. Students interested should contact me for more information.

Mr. Lay

1st quarter is off to a great start in STEM classes!

6th graders in Introduction to Engineering have been learning about engineering careers and working on technology activities to better understand Google Applications like sheets and drawings. In September the focus will be the Engineering Design Process.

7th grade students in Design & Modeling will be learning about different types of sketching and technical drawings used by engineers to document and communicate designs. They have been working with an internet based CAD program, called TinkerCAD, to explore the possibilities of computer modeling.

Finally, 8th grade students in Automation & Robotics started the quarter learning about current robot technology. This month they will be building mechanisms to better understand how automated systems work. They will later design and build projects which include the mechanism they have studied.

Welcome to Speech & Drama 2023-2024

Hello, My name is Mrs. Kat Sgiers and I’m delighted to be teaching Speech & Drama here at Sandwich Middle School!

A few things to know…

• If you want to ACT, join the SMS speech team. We have a competition where students perform monologues, 2-5 person scenes, and compete with theatre games. It starts a few weeks after school starts and we would love to have you. We hope to repeat these performances at the spring Fine Arts Festival or at a Speech Night here at the school.

6th Grade

• In 6th grade, students will have the opportunity to practice delivering short speeches to the class. The goal is to get them up and speaking to get more comfortable speaking in front of a group.

• 6th grade will also be studying characters and doing plot diagrams. We will focus most of our attention on the play (and movie) of Arsenic & Old Lace.

7th Grade

• In 7th grade, students will continue to develop their talents in speaking in front of a group by working on adding effective introductions and conclusions to their speeches. They will also present a speech using props to teach us how to do something they are good at doing.

• 7th graders will also work on combining speaking with performing by practicing and presenting character monologues to the class.

• Finally, we will continue to work on play analysis by reading the play, Steel Magnolias and comparing it to the movie.

8th Grade

• In 8th grade, students will continue to hone their speaking skills while presenting an informative speech with a Google Slide Presentation, without reading word for word off the slides. They will also analyze a famous speech, listen to some excellent TED Talk Speeches, and persuade us to adopt their view on something they care about.

• We will continue to work on play analysis by moving to the musical. We will see the differences the songs make in telling a story. They will present a review of the movie as well.

Hello from the P.E. Staff!

We’d like to welcome you all back for another exciting school year. Our students have already seen so much action within the start of our school year and we are thrilled to see what is going to happen next. Students will be participating in several activities throughout the first quarter of our school year, such as….flag football, soccer, ultimate frisbee, fitness testing, and various other activities. Spirit, energy, and anticipation is at an utmost high amongst our students to dive into our curricular units. If there are any questions or concerns at any time, please feel free to contact us.

SMS P.E. Staff

Please take a moment to review the districts new security policy below.

Visitor Security: Every school in the district will be rolling out a new security protocol and technology for guests and volunteers entering the buildings. This system will require identification from visitors (i.e. state ID, driver’s license, etc.), and all visitors will be photographed. A quick background check will be performed by searching US sex offender databases (with the option to expand this to criminal databases.). This system will also link with our student database to provide an extra layer of protection for students with no contact orders.

As you may know, we have a new SIS system (Student Information System) this year called TeacherEase. As you may have noticed through my failed attempt at sending a newsletter last month, we are all going through a learning curve with the new system. Thank you for your grace in this manner. That being said, we thought it would be helpful to inform you that the great majority of our communication will be sent to you through this system. Therefore, please be cognizant of these emails, as they look different than last year. Below is a screenshot of Mr. Sodaro's first communication to stakeholders. You may have noticed that the sender was "T. Sodaro via TeacherEase." So, when your teacher emails you through the system, it should look similar. We have had some issues where these emails have found their way into a Spam folder or have been Whitelisted. Please check out your email account and ensure you can view these communications. Below is an image of what all emails will look like.

In 2018 the Sandwich School District entered an agreement with the Sandwich Police Department to provide School Resource Officer (SRO) services to the school district. This included an on-site officer present at our schools for most of the school day, the DARE program, supervision at larger events (i.e. football games, homecoming events, etc.), and safety education. Starting last year, it was necessary to assign our SROs to some daily patron activities, which resulted in a reduction of some of these services.

This 2022-2023 staffing model will continue into the 2023-2024 school year. The two officers assigned to be our School Resource Officers have just been recertified and will continue to be our main contact at the Police Department. They will respond to calls at the school and/or be present in the school whenever possible. They will continue to be our DARE presenters and help out at large after-school activities. We will continue to work together to increase their presence at the school.

Cameras: Starting over 10 years ago the district began installing cameras in large traffic areas including hallways, entrances, playgrounds, and parking lots. With better technology, the district has taken a large step forward in purchasing new cameras for these areas, while reutilizing the older cameras to lower traffic areas. At this point, over 80% of the new costs have come from grants.

With the new 45 cameras we purchased, we have a total of 121 cameras and 6 vape sensors deployed throughout the district. With our recent purchase, we used the organization “22Vets” to review our building blueprints and recommend camera placements. This organization is owned and run by US Military Veterans..

2023-2024 Safety Goals: Each year the Board of Education adopts goals for the school year. This year, in addition to academic and financial goals, the board has adopted the following 4 safety goals:

• Review SRO expectations and contract with the city.

• Research and begin implementation of a new safety protocol.

• Work with a consultant to review current safety practices.

• Develop a plan to provide safer alternatives to building access.

Please feel free to follow our Sandwich Middle School Facebook Page at https://www.facebook.com/people/Sandwich-Middle-School/100044267353557/ This is a place where we share celebrations, community information and school reminders for various events. Please note that all important information and announcements will go home to you in our newsletter, classroom newsletters or in your student's backpack. The page is not intended to be your primary source for communication, but instead an extra one. Please avoid sending messages or posting school related questions as the page is only monitored intermittently. Instead, always contact our school office for school related questions or to communicate about your student. We appreciate it!

Are you struggling to pay for fees, lunches, field trips, and/or extra fees? Please be aware that there are opportunities to get help with school fees, field trips, lunches, and other fees.

We currently utilize the free and reduced waiver program through the USDA. If you qualify, this waiver may cover lunches, registration fees, sports fees, field trips, etc.

If you would like to know more about this program, what the qualifications are, or how to apply, please call Mrs. Kruswicki at 815-786-2187.

Please remember, this program must be renewed every year. Since we utilize the guidelines of the USDA program, we must use their forms. Please make sure to do this as soon as it is available.

For those who would like to apply for free/reduced lunch, please do so using the following link: Online Application. Families who qualify for free/reduced lunch will have their registration fees waived or reduced.

Note: You can also learn more about this program through the USDA Income Eligibility link.

I’m looking forward to partnering with you to ensure your student’s health and safety

while they are at school throughout this school year!

Medication - All medications, including cough drops and over-the-counter products,

require a Medication Authorization Form to be completed and signed by a student’s

healthcare provider and their parent/guardian.

If your student has a health concern that we have not already discussed this year,

please call (815-786-2138) or email me at sjoiner@sandwich430.org that we can set up

a time to discuss your student’s needs.

6th Grade Requirements - If you have not yet submitted your students 6th grade

physical and immunizations, please send them in as soon as possible to avoid

exclusion until those requirements are met.