CFL April Family Newsletter

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As we enter the final weeks of the school year, we will review our most recent data to ensure we are being intentional with our instruction and that students continue to progress in ELA and math. With just over eight weeks remaining, both students and staff will begin reflecting on the incredible growth and accomplishments we’ve made this year. I am so proud of all that our students have achieved, and I want to express my gratitude to our teachers for their unwavering support, encouragement, and dedication to the academic, social, and emotional growth of our students. This journey is truly a team effort, and partnering with families plays a key role in helping students develop strong character, make thoughtful decisions, and show empathy towards others.

Please stay in touch with your child’s teacher if there is anything happening at home that might be affecting your child's experience at school. If a teacher reaches out to schedule a meeting, please take this opportunity to demonstrate to your child that we all care about their well-being and value them as individuals. I’m excited to see what the last few weeks of the school year have in store for us.

Wishing everyone a Happy Spring!

Respectfully,

Kim Frees

Principal

Dear Preschool Families,

We hope you had a wonderful and restful spring break with your family! As we return to school, we want to take a moment to thank you for your participation in the Clayton Survey. Your support means so much to us, and we truly value your feedback. We look forward to reviewing the results, which we expect to receive at the beginning of May.

April’s Learning Focus: Insects!

This month, our preschoolers are diving into an exciting new unit of study—insects! The children are fascinated by these small creatures, and each classroom has its own caterpillars that we are eagerly watching as they transform into butterflies. Ask your child about the stages of a butterfly's life—they love sharing what they’ve learned!

Learning at Home

To continue the learning at home, here are some fun activities you can do together:
Counting Practice – Count insects in the yard, books, or pictures. Ask, "How many legs does this insect have?" or "How many butterflies do we see?"
Letter Recognition – Find letters in bug-related words like "B for Butterfly" or "C for Caterpillar." Look for letters on signs, in books, or even on food packaging!

We look forward to another month of learning and exploration with your child! If you have any questions, please reach out.

Thank you for your continued support!

Best,
Nicole Hills

🎨🖍️🖌️📚🍎🚌🎨🖍️🖌️📚🍎🚌🎨🖍️🖌️📚🍎🚌🎨🖍️🖌️📚🍎🚌🎨🖍️🖌️📚

Spring has sprung. I hope you all had a wonderful break. This last bit of school goes so fast. There is so much to do, and so little time. Students will be getting ready for the end of year benchmark testing, as well as Student Led Conferences. If you would like to help ensure your child is ready for these important events, please talk to your child’s teacher. I know that they will have plenty of great ideas, and would love to share them with you. As the Reading Interventionist I have one obvious suggestion. Read! Read! Read! I know it sounds redundant, but reading is the best way to help your child succeed. If you don’t already, you may want to set up a reading time at home where everyone in the family looks at books for even 10 minutes each day. I promise this will help more than anything else. Parents who read daily, have kids that read. If you can model for them how important reading is, they will start a lifelong enjoyment of reading. Have a wonderful spring, and as always, keep reading.

Sincerely,

Melissa Bradley

Reading Interventionist

Hi CFL Families,

Happy Spring!

We’ve been discussing technology’s effect on children. In a technology driven day and age, we want to teach our children how to interact with technology in healthy ways, as we learn ourselves.

This month I’d like to talk about the concern of reduced physical activity in children who have too much screen time. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), children ages 5 and older should have no more than 2 hours of screen time a day. Keep in mind that they are having about 30 minutes to an hour of screen time at school.

It breaks my heart when I ask students at our school, “How was your weekend? What did you do?” All too often their responses are something like, “I played video games all weekend!” or “I scrolled on my phone” or “I watched videos on youtube!”

That being said, one of the biggest concerns about technology for young children is lack of movement in their day. Think about when we were growing up, I would get home from school and ride my bike or play basketball outside. Studies have shown that children are spending less and less time outside. This leads to an increased risk of obesity, poor physical health, and children are less likely to play outdoors, which is crucial for their physical development.

I encourage you as the weather warms up, take an active role in your children’s well being and mental health by getting them outside to play. Decrease screen time in your home. Engage your students in nature, sports, go for a walk and enjoy this beautiful place that we call home.

Thank you,

-Ms. Landry

Welcome to Spring..! 🌷💐🌷💐

(We think!)

We are in the home stretch to summer break. We have learned so much this year so far but have so much more to learn! Reading books at home is such a great way to help your child learn and grow with not only reading, but speaking. Talking about the pictures in the story helps so much with vocabulary too.

We will keep our focus strong on speaking, reading, writing and listening. We are such strong and willing learners, We feel so positive we will continue to grow in our knowledge. Let’s continue our great attendance and keep the positive flow going!

We love each and every one of your children and their unique personalities and look forward to continued learning.

Melanie Kerrigan and Jessica Cornejo

ELL-CFL

mkerrigan@garfirld16.org

mkerrigan@garfield16.org

Hello CFL Families,

This month in Physical Education we will be doing some gymnastics. We will cover basic stunts, jumps, rolls and partner work. During this unit we will also cover ways to be a good teammate and how working with others can be enjoyable. Please send your kiddos to school everyday with tennis shoes for class. This is the first reminder that Field Day will be on the last day of school, more information to come later. As always, reach out to me with any questions.

-Mr. Cora

Hello CFL Families!

I am blown away by the support we saw for the Kindergarten and 1st Grade Concerts! It was a joy to see so many people there and it was amazing to see the students' hard work pay off!

As we continue through the school year, we will be learning about musical concepts such as melody and rhythm in 1st grade and musical opposites in Kindergarten.

Thank you all for the support you continue to give and please reach out if there are any questions!

Musically,

Mrs. Volk~

April

• April 7th Conferences, Read Act Parent Meetings
• April 11th Spring Pictures
• April 11th Coffee with the Principals @2:30
• April 21st PK Round up open from 9:00am -12:00pm
• April 22nd Bus driver Appreciation Day
• April 24th Focus Kids

May

• May 5th Cinco de Mayo
• May 5th Student Led Conferences
• May 11th Mother's Day
• May 12th Student Led Conferences
• May 14th PK-K Transition (More info will be coming out)
• May 20th-23rd K-1 Challenge Course
• May 29th Field Day
• May 29th Last day of school

Email: kfrees@garfield16.org
Website: https://cfl.garfield16.org/
Location: 100 E 2nd St, Parachute, CO 81635, USA
Phone: 970-285-5702