Timberwolf Times - October 31, 2022

T. Clay Wood - Facts at your Fingertips

Welcome to T. Clay Wood ES

Welcome Back to School - 2022-2023

"It's A Great Day to be a Timberwolf""

Dear Timberwolf Families,

Tonight is our PTO Costume Bingo. YAY!

T. Clay Wood has a new Twitter and Instagram site.

Twitter site is @TClayWoodElem
Instagram is; TClayWoodElementary

Please note, Monday, October 31, 2022. will be a teacher work day. There will be no school for students.

Picture Days will take place on November 1 and 2. Please check with your child's teacher on the date.

As we are entering the cold and flu season, this is a reminder of the best health practices to decrease the spread and transmission of viruses in PWCS schools. Please remember to cover your mouth and nose with a tissue when you cough or sneeze and throw used tissues in the trash. If you don't have a tissue, cough, or sneeze into your elbow, not your hands. Wash hands often with soap and water for 20 seconds, dry hands with a paper towel, and use the paper towel to turn off the faucet. If soap and water are not available, hand sanitizers may also be used to preform hand hygiene. Remember to stay home when you’re sick until at least 24 hours without a fever or the use of fever reducing medicine. Together we can help stop the spread of germs that may make you and others ill."

At T. Clay Wood Elementary School, we love to have visitors and volunteers every day. To help ensure the safety of our students, visitors to Prince William County Schools are expected to report promptly to the school’s main office when entering school buildings. Visitors and volunteers will be asked to provide a valid government issued photo identification. There are no exceptions. Every visitor to our school must bring with them a photo id. Visitors will then be issued a temporary identification badge. We will not permit any visitor or volunteer into the building without this identification. Our main goal is to ensure the safety and security of our students and staff at school.

2022-2023 – Back to school information: https://www.pwcs.edu/parents/backtoschool

2022-2023 – Calendar link: https://www.pwcs.edu/cms/one.aspx?pageId=654031

Code of Behavior link: https://www.pwcs.edu/cms/One.aspx?portalId=340225&pageId=767701

Link to Family Life Education objectives and Opt out - https://www.pwcs.edu/academics___programs/science___family_life_education/family_life_education

PLEASE NOTE - if Packers/Lunch Bringers would like to purchase school milk, the cost this year is $1.00. If a student who has purchased lunch, would like a 2nd lunch, the cost this year for the 2nd lunch is $4.00

Masks will continue to be optional if students would prefer to wear them.

We truly do Everything Better Together as a Community of Leaders and Learners Achieving Excellence.

I hope you all have a wonderful week.

Dr. Andrew Buchheit

Principal

#TimberwolvesROCK

“Like the Sun, I am here to Shine”

Parent Handbook Correction - Dismissal

If you must pick your student up early, please arrive before 3:15 pm. We will not be able to call students to the office after 3:15 pm until all car riders are picked up. Students called for dismissal after 3:15 pm will be sent to the car rider area and will be brought up after all car riders are dismissed with the supervising teachers. This way we can reduce interruptions to the classrooms, provide continual supervision for all our students and give our focus in the office to dismissing students. Parents coming in after 3:15 pm will be asked to wait in the vestibule outside of the office and once their students are brought up to come in and sign their students out.

Changing Dismissal Routine – Parents, if you are changing your child’s dismissal, you must send an email/note to the office or notify the office by 3:15pm. The teacher and bus driver cannot accept a change if a student just tells him or her about the change without a note. In these cases, students are sent home the original way. In addition, please try to avoid changing dismissal procedures in the middle of the day and please send all dismissal changes to our office by calling our office at 703.594.3990 or sending a note in the morning. Emails sent to the teacher in the middle of the day may be missed if there is a substitute that day or if the teacher is not able to check his or her email.

Attendance Email: cwes-timberwolf-attendance@pwcs.edu Phone:– 703.594.3992

STRINGS SCHEDULE

Next week of Nov 1st

Monday 10/31 NO SCHOOL

Tuesday , November 1-- Day 3 -- West Wood and Aracich Browning

Wednesday , November 2-- Day 4 -- West Wood

Thursday, November 3- Day 5 -- Smith Warren and Young Cortash

Friday< November 4, - Day 6 -- Smith Warren

Donations for a Student Leadership Project

Our T. Clay Wood Service Leadership Team would like to make and donate enrichment toys for homeless cats and dogs. We are looking for donations of...

empty water bottles
empty paper towel and toilet paper rolls
old knee-high socks
old tee shirts
old tennis balls

Please put donated items in a box outside the front office.

We are proud and excited to announce that T. Clay Wood Elementary has received the Purple Star Designation Award

What's Happening at T. Clay Wood during the week of October 31 - November 4, 2022

Monday, October 31, 2022 Day --

No School for students - Teacher Work Day

Tuesday, November 1, 2022- Day 3

Picture Day - See your teacher if your day is today or Nov. 2

3rd grade Field Trip

Wednesday, November 2, 2022 - Day 4

Picture Day - See your teacher if your day is today or Nov. 1

2nd grade Field trip

Thursday, November 3 2022 - Day 5

2nd grade field trip

Friday, November 4, 2022 -Day 6

2nd grade

1st grade field trip

Saturday, November 5, 2022 ----

PTO Fall Vendor Event - 9am - 1pm

2022-2023 Calendar - As a reminder, due to current supply chain issues with paper, the Communications Department will not be printing the 2022-23 School Guide and Calendar at this time. A printable PDF version of this year's School Calendar and Reference Guide, as well as a printable PDF Month-at-a-Glance Calendar, are available on the PWCS Calendar webpage.

Volunteer Opportunities

Interested in Volunteering at T. Clay Wood? You can first check with your student's teacher. Then you can also look into these areas:

1. Welcome Table:

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0F4FAFAD28A4F5C52-welcome

2. Library Volunteers -

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/4090C4AA4AF2AA5F94-library

3. Book Fair- -

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/4090C4AA4AF2AA5F94-tcwes2

PTO Corner

11/5 We will host our 2nd annual Fall Vendor Event welcoming over 25+ vendors and hope you'll join us from 9am-1pm.

EVERY TUESDAY between now and the end of the school year we have a spirit night at Papa Johns.....40% off for you and 10% back to the school. Order from the Gainesville location every Tuesday and use code: TCWES4010

Thank you again for your support and as always we look forward to seeing you soon! You can also email us at anytime: tclaywoodpto@gmail.com.

Warmly,

Your TCWES PTO Board (Nicole, Margy, Jess, Cooper, Erin

SAVE THE DATES FOR UPCOMING TCWES PTO EVENTS

October:

Tuesday, October 11th-6:30pm Back to School 2nd/3rd
Monday, October 17th - 6:30pm Back to School K/1st
Wednesday, October 19th - Crumbl Cookies
Friday, October 21st - Patriot Football Spirit Night with Cedar Point Elem PTO
Friday, October 28th - 6:00pm-8:00pm Costume BINGO

November:

Saturday, November 5th - 9:00am-1:00pm Fall Vendor Event
Monday, November 7th - Velocity Wings Spirit Night
November 17th--Nothing Bundt Cake Fundraiser Orders due

December:

Monday, December 5th-9th - Penguin Patch Holiday Shop for Students
Tuesday, December 6th - Foster's Grille Spirit Night

January:

Tuesday, January 10th - 6:30pm PTO Meeting
Tuesday, January 17th-27th - Read-a-thon

February:

Saturday, February 11th - 7:00pm-10:00pm PTO Parent Prom

April:

Tuesday, April 11th - 6:30pm PTO Meeting

Friday, April 28th - STEAM night Fun
Tuesday, May 23rd-31st - Boosterthon Fun Run

LEADER In ME Moment -

As a Leader in Me School, one of our 5 Core Paradigms is that parents and teachers partner to support the whole child. What this means is that we value you as your student’s first teacher. You know your student best! Oftentimes it’s easy to assume that teachers are the only ones who are responsible for a student’s academic and social success in school. As a parent of a Leader in Me student, we believe that you are a valuable member of our Learning Team.

As teachers and parents conference together, and move into the second quarter, we want to focus on supporting this partnership. A partnership is not only about being physically present at the school, volunteering, or being on committees—that is only one aspect of partnership. If you’re working full time, travel for work, or simply cannot be physically present to engage that doesn’t mean you’re not our partner. There are other ways to engage such as:

• Set up regular times to check in with your student about what they enjoy at school or what is a challenge.

• Regularly check emails or other communications from your student’s teachers and respond. Ask questions when clarification is needed.

• Model a positive attitude about school.

Let’s keep the communication lines open! We may have questions or concerns. Let’s create space to ask questions and listen to each other. We want to be there for you! Just like you, we can’t do this alone. We must come together as a Learning Team to support your student and ensure they have every opportunity for success. We look forward to our partnership!

LEXIA

Dear Parents,

T. Clay Wood ES and Prince William County Schools has purchased an incredible reading program for your student for this school year. It is entirely free for your student to use this year. We are encouraging all students to use the program each day.

Lexia is a program to help your student with reading. We are encouraging all students to use Lexia for 10-20 minutes per day. (at least 40-60 minutes a week). Lexia is engaging and works at your students personalized reading level.

All students have been shown how to access Lexia. Please help your student remember to log on to Lexia and work on Lexia each day.

Below are the 3 step directions to access Lexia:

1. Go to https://clever.com/in/pwcs

Log in - Clever

https://clever.com/trust/privacy/policy. https://clever.com/about/terms

clever.com

2. Log in with Office365

3. In Clever, scroll down until your see the blue globe for Lexia Core 5- Click on the Lexia

DIRECTIONS FOR ACCESSING LEXIA:

-Login to your child’s Office 365 account

-Click on the 9 dots (also called the “waffle”) on the top left-hand side of the screen

-Click on “Clever”

-Scroll down to “Apps purchased by schools”

-Click on “Lexia Core5”(The app with the world)

OR

-Login to Canvas

-Click on account

-Click on “Clever”on the right-hand side

-Scroll down to “LexiaCore 5” under “PWCS Resources”

-Click on “Lexia Core5” (The app with the world)

Online tutoring available to all PWCS students free of charge

PWCS has partnered with Paper to provide K-12 students with unlimited tutoring, 7 days a week—at no cost to families.

Students can get help with their homework, receive feedback on their writing assignments, or ask questions about any academic subject. Experts are available to assist students with any subject or content area via a secure, chat-based platform.

Tutors are currently available to help students in English, Spanish, French, and Mandarin.

You can access Paper right from your student's Clever Account. Or you can use this Link to Access Paper: https://paper.co/

Learn how to use the Free Online Paper Tutoring Service by clicking on this PWCS Link: https://www.pwcs.edu/departments/Instructional_technology/paper

Transportation Department

Our Prince William County School Transportation Department continues to update and implement some tools to help us all when it comes to buses. I have included some helpful links below that are now on their PWCS Transportation Webpage. I believe these will help families throughout the school year. Please take a moment to check these out.

1. The main Transportation Website - most of the below links can be accessed from this site: PWCS Transportation

2. Delayed Bus Page will inform you of any buses that are expected to arrive at least 15 minutes late. Delays will be removed after 12pm for morning runs and after 5:30 pm for afternoon runs. Bus Delay Site

3. Here Comes the Bus APP - See real-time map location for students' buses and get push notifications when the bus gets close by - Info on Here Comes The Bus App

4. Looking for your student's bus schedule? Remember it is located in the Hub which you can access in your ParentVUE account -

5. Transportation Contact for T. Clay Wood (PWCS Western Area Transportation): trns-westernbusroutes@pwcs.edu or 571-374-6593

Some reminders

Early Dismissal

We encourage all families to avoid, when possible, taking students out early from school. Instruction and learning continues until the end of the day. If you need to pick up your child for an appointment, please notify your teacher and school office at cwes-timberwolf-attendance@pwcs.edu and plan to arrive before 3:15pm.

Please park and report to the office. Please do not leave your car unattended in the pickup line. All parties picking up a student from the office must show a photo id.

Please do not make changes to your child’s dismissal time after 3pm. Anyone other than parent/guardian must have prior written approval to pick up a student even if listed on the emergency card.

Dress Code Reminders

All students are expected to dress appropriately and maintain a reasonable appearance. The Prince William County Schools’ Code of Behavior has addressed several areas that are considered improper dress in any Prince William County school. Please refer to the Parent Handbook in the Timberwolf Folder and the School Division’s Code of Behavior.

Volunteering

Please feel free to coordinate times to volunteer in the classroom with your child's teacher. Teachers and students appreciate our volunteers. Thank you again for everything you are doing to help us build our Positive School Community. I want to formally invite all parents to become involved in your child’s education at T. Clay Wood Elementary School. It has been shown that strong parental involvement and interest in education is a crucial factor in student success. There are many ways to volunteer at T. Clay Wood Elementary School as well. Joining the PTO or Advisory Council, helping out in your child’s classroom, volunteering in the library, working at our Welcome Table Counter and chaperoning field trips are just a few of the many, many ways you can become a part of our Community of Leaders and Learners. Please review the regulation on volunteering: Regulation 511-10

Classroom Interruptions

In order to limit interruption to the teaching and learning environment and protect instructional time, if you drop off forgotten lunches, homework or materials, we will ask you to leave these in the front office. We will inform the teacher who will pick it up at a more convenient time. We want to thank you in advance for your understanding of this procedure and hope you know that our only intent is to maximize your children's instructional time.

Change in Transportation Home

If a situation occurs which makes it necessary for your child’s transportation home to change, please send in a note with your child in the morning giving clear directions as to how your child should go home at the end of the day. Only a parent/guardian can change their child’s transportation plan for any given day. A note from the parent must be received by the office AND the teacher before noon that day indicating the change. This is for the safety of the children and will alleviate any confusion at the end of the day.

Bus Passes

If it is necessary for a student to ride a bus home other than the one he/she is normally assigned, a bus pass is required and must be approved by the office. A note must be sent to school indicating the bus number that the child should ride and a phone number to verify the information. Thank you for helping us ensure the safety of all our students.

Drop Off and Pick Up

Drop off and Pick Up - When dropping your students off in the morning, please drive all the way around to the front of the drop off area in front of our school. Please do not allow students to exit your vehicles until staff members are outside. If you will be picking your students up frequently, please come into our office to sign up for a car pick up tag. You can get a tag on August 19, 2022 during the Open House Meet and Greet and Orientation times. If you choose to park in the parking lot, you will need to park your car and walk your student to the cross walk.

Drive Carefully

Drive Carefully - Drive carefully and obey the posted speed limits around our parking lot and the neighboring streets. Please pay close attention to posted speed limits and reduced speed limits during the start and ending of our school day and Patriot High School’s day. There are many students and families driving in our two parking lots and around these neighborhoods. Please be extra careful and follow all signs and cones and directions. Please do not enter the parking lot through the exit lane. Car drop offs and pick up should enter through the T. Clay Wood Entrance and not through Patriot HS.

Student Inclement Weather and Emergency Dismissal Plan

In the event of inclement weather, power failure or any situation in which we are faced with an early closing of our school; we will activate our Automated Auto Dialer Calling system to inform our parents of the early closing. We will send out both a phone message and email message with the early closing information. Please make sure your phone number and contact information is updated. We will also place this information on our school website, Facebook and Twitter sites.

I encourage you to sign up for PWCS Weather alerts from PWC Schools. You can access this link from the PWC website or by this link:

https://www.pwcs.edu/departments/communications/p_w_c_s_weather_alerts_subscription

Kindergarten teachers will contact their students’ parents to confirm dismissal.

If schools close early, the SACC program will not open. Parents of students who attend SACC will be contacted by our SACC staff. Parent of SACC students should have an Emergency Back-up Plan.

When school does close early, we will send your children home via their regular dismissal method for that day, unless we hear differently from you.

Please contact the school office immediately in case of a change to their dismissal procedures

Device Reminders

All Students in Prince William County Schools will be issued a school laptop or similar device. Students and their families are responsible for the safe and appropriate usage of the devices.

Families can opt to purchase low cost insurance to protect the device in case of accidentally damage. Here is the link for information on the optional digital device insurance. https://securranty.com/pwcs If purchased, the insurance covers unlimited repairs or replacements for everything from broken screens, lost chargers, and accidental damage, with a zero deductible for one year on a school-issued HP device. The insurance cost is $32.95, which may be significantly less than repair or replacement costs without insurance.

I do encourage all families to consider the optional low-cost insurance. After last year, I observed it was very beneficial for families to purchase the insurance PWCS was offering for the devices.

As we get ready to start using the devices again, please look for emails from Mr. Taylor about how to reset passwords, etc.

Also this is a good time to remind all families to always know what your students are doing when they are on the internet, using devices to complete their school work, using social media, texting with friends, or playing online games. We continually are reminding our students about appropriate and acceptable use of technology. I encourage all parents and guardians to regularly check what their students are doing on the internet and while using technology -(school devices, gaming systems, home devices, phones, etc). Just as you monitor where your children go in person, I encourage you to monitor where they go on the internet.

I would also encourage all families to consider adding parental controls on their personal devices that students use. If you have any questions about student devices, please feel free to reach out to Mr. Taylor, our Instructional Technologist at TaylorBi@pwcs.edu. Thank you.

Phones - Reminder: If students bring in phones to school they must remain in their backpack and turned off. Please let all your family members know not to call your elementary school student during the day. If you need to change dismissal, please let our front office know by calling 703.594.3990.

Also I recommend that all parents and guardians turn off the Air Drop feature on their Iphones. I have heard of students at secondary schools air dropping inappropriate photos into all phones that can receive airdrop and then other students accepting those photos. You can turn this off on your students' device.

PWCS is now a fully one-to-one School Division; laptops are provided by PWCS for every student and all instructional staff. As such, the use of personal devices by students and staff for any instructional or official PWCS business is strongly discouraged. The PWCS technology support will not support issues with Personal Technology Devices.