We are officially half way through the school year!

As we reach the midpoint of the school year, it’s a great time to reflect on all that we’ve accomplished and refocus for the months ahead. Here are some tips to make the most of the second half:

1. Celebrate Progress: Take a moment to acknowledge your hard work and successes so far—big or small, they matter!

2. Refocus on Goals: Revisit your goals from the start of the year. What’s going well? Where can you adjust or set new priorities?

3. Stay Organized: Now’s a great time to tidy up your notebooks, refresh your calendar, and create a plan to finish the year strong.

4. Support Each Other: Remember, we’re all in this together. Offer encouragement to classmates, reach out if you need help, and stay connected with your school community.

5. Keep a Positive Mindset: Challenges may arise, but with focus and determination, there’s so much more you can achieve this year!

We also want to celebrate some amazing things that our students have accomplished:

Cell City Project: Seventh grade science students completed second quarter with a summative showing off their knowledge of cells and cell parts. They created a piece of art depicting a city or community and related each part of it to a part of the cell. Students then wrote a justification for each part they included in their drawing, showing off their knowledge of biology.

History Day Project: All students in every grade level have been working on a History Day Project for the majority of this quarter. Students were able to select their own topic, but each topic had to relate to this year's theme of Rights & Responsibilities. Some examples of topics chosen include:

• The Secret War in Laos
• Martin Luther King Jr's I Have a Dream speech
• Women's Right to Vote
• American Indian Movement
• The Equal Rights Ammendment

Students took on the challenge of researching their topic, writing a thesis statement, and creating a presentation showing off what they have learned and how it relates to the theme of Rights & Responsibilities.

Comparing Courage: Eighth grade ELA students completed a presentation comparing and contrasting the themes of courage in two poems of their choosing. Students had to analyze each poem by identifying and showing an example of how the author uses figurative language to highlight the theme of courage. The poems available for selection included:

• "Still I Rise" by Maya Angelou
• “Invictus” by William Ernest Henley
• “Sonnet” by James Weldon Johnson
• “A Litany for Survival” by Audre Lorde

All in all, our Online Middle School students had a very busy first semester of learning! Second semester is sure to be just as exciting! Let's make it a great second half of the year together!

-The Newsletter Team

Teacher Grading Day

President's Day

We will be bringing January's students of the month to you with the next newsletter! Teachers are currently casting their votes!

Keep an eye out in the next newsletter for the quarter 2 honor roll!

Arctic Wolves Math Team won 3rd place in Division 2 of the Minnesota Junior High Math League. Eighth grade student Kellyn Y. placed 1st in the individual high score out of 53 other students.

The Math Team was coached by: Donna Ryder/Math 6,7,8 Math Teacher

The Online Middle School, "Icebergs" competed in the first Lego League Tournament. They have been working since the beginning of October building Lego components and programming robots to accomplish missions with the lego structures that they built. There was also a research portion of the competition that they presented to the High Tech Kids Lego League Judges. Teams explored life beneath the surface of the ocean. Along the way, they uncovered the potential to strengthen our community and innovate for a better world with healthy oceans.

The Lego League Team was coached by: Chris Turnbull and Donna Ryder

"We are excited to announce a new partnership in January with EveryMeal.

Families will have the opportunity to pick up a bag of food with shelf staples on Fridays at Como Park Elementary between 11-2 at the small parking lot entrance of Door 6. Families must fill out a survey to be eligible to pick up a bag of food. Bags will not be available other days of the week unless there is an appointment scheduled with an SPPS Online staff member.

We’ve moved!

We are now located at Como Park Elementary School!

780 Wheelock Pkwy

St.Paul, MN 55117

Enter through Door #6 and come to room 1001.

The Minnesota Department of Health has reported that Pertussis (whooping cough) exceeds 2,000 cases in MN. Please consider getting your child vaccinated for Tdap if their vaccine isn’t up to date. You can find more information about the pertussis health advisory at this link.

Please contact Contact Nurse Jenny if you want more information on any other health related topic at 651-419-1219 or Jennifer.martineau@spps.org.

Check out this link! It is updated frequently with the latest information!

If you live outside of Ramsey County call 211 for help or reach out to our social workers:

Kim Stout (651) 401-5595 or Steph Abbas (612)548-1841 for other ideas.

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7:00AM to 3:15PM

Thank you families for helping be sure your students are logged in for every class every day. As we enter cold/flu season, here is a great guide to use for "How sick is too sick for online school?

Joshua Thao, iPad Manager: ‪

612-699-4161 / joshua2.thao@spps.org‬

In person appointment with Joshua: https://calendly.com/joshua2-thao/tech-appointment