FMS Update 11.26.23
Good Morning, Trojan Families!
I hope this message finds you well and that your family enjoyed a restful and rejuvenating Fall Break. As we gear up for the second half of the semester, I wanted to take a moment to welcome our students back to Ferndale Middle School!
I trust that the break provided an opportunity for your children to recharge and spend quality time with family and friends. Now, we're excited to resume our academic journey with refreshed minds and a renewed sense of energy.
In the coming weeks, we have a lot in store for our middle schoolers. From engaging classroom activities to exciting extracurricular opportunities, we are committed to fostering a positive and enriching environment for every student. As always, our dedicated team of teachers and staff is here to support your child's academic and personal growth.
We encourage you to stay connected with us by attending school events, checking in on your child's progress, and participating in our parent-teacher communication channels. Your involvement plays a crucial role in our students' success, and we value the partnership between home and school.
If you have any questions or concerns, please don't hesitate to reach out to us. We look forward to a fantastic remainder of the semester filled with learning, growth, and memorable experiences.
Thank you for entrusting us with your child's education. Here's to a successful and rewarding post-Fall Break period!
You may have heard that some school nutrition staff may be planning a walkout on Monday, November 27, 2023. We are aware of the concerns raised by our school nutrition employees, and we are actively working to address these issues.
Our top priority is the well-being of our students, and we want to assure you that students will be served meals on Monday, November 27.
PBIS (ClassCraft)🏆
Teachers will award each student Class Craft points this year for meeting classroom and schoolwide expectations and showing Positive Attitude, Respect, Integrity, Dependability, and Excellence (PRIDE). PRIDE is our school-wide acronym for Positive Behavior Intervention and Support (PBIS).
Class Craft points will allow your student to receive multiple incentives throughout the year. Class Craft points have allowed students to qualify to participate in an ice cream social, a staff vs student flag football game, and attend a Charlotte Hornets vs Milwaukee Bucks game. Our next event will include a Staff v. Students Basketball game and a Popcorn and movie event.
You, too, can award your students points when they are showing PRIDE outside of school and monitor your student's school behavior by creating a Class Craft account. Your student's homeroom teacher has sent sign-up information specific to your student home. Please contact your student's homeroom teacher if you have not received this information. Lastly, use the attachment to set up your account or click on the image to receive video instructions.
Welcome Back!
We hope you have enjoyed a restful and enjoyable fall break and look forward to welcoming your student back to school tomorrow.
Did You Know?
If your student has missed 12-13 days thus far this school year, they are considered to be chronically absent. Partner with us today, to create a plan for your student to be present at school to ensure academic success.
Attendance Percentages-Week of 11/20
- 6th Grade: 88.7%
- 7th Grade: 76.3%
- 8th Grade: 81.9%
- Overall: 82.6%
IB Learning Concepts
Ferndale Middle Schools IB Middle Years Program (MYP) is an inquiry-based learning framework that attempts to develop the complete child while emphasizing the significance of children's intellectual, emotional, social, physical, and cultural development between the ages of three and twelve. The curriculum expects higher grade level expectations from pupils and sets high standards. The IB MYP Key Concepts can assist learners in dealing with knowledge in transdisciplinary topics, which is something the IB wants to foster. This type of learning is not confined to factual notions and information but rather helps students interact with bigger concepts that can inspire inquisitive, creative, and critical thinking. The Learning Concepts are identified as follows: Aesthetics, Change Communication, Communities, Connections, Creativity, Culture, Development, Form, Global Interactions, Identity, Logic, Perspective, Relationships, and Systems, (Time, Place, and Space)
Hello Ferndale Family.
We begin this week with a Math Walk Through on Monday with our partner school, Welborn. We will observe teachers and best practices at Welborn in the morning and they will come to Ferndale in the afternoon to observe Marvelous Math instruction.
Additionally, teaching will continue from Units 3 and 4 of Open Up, the GCS district supported Math Curriculum.
Please click on the link below if you are interested in exploring the content.
https://access.openupresources.org/curricula/our6-8math
Please find below the Math Content that is planned for this week in each grade level:
6th Grade Math, taught by Ms. Spears and Ms. Rudesill, will begin teaching about Dividing Fractions in Unit 4.
7th Grade Math, taught by Ms. Scarlett and Mr. Lee, continue teaching about Proportional Relationships and Percentages from Unit 4.
8th Grade Math, taught by Ms. Clarke-Huie and Ms. Nelson, will begin teaching about Linear Equations and Linear Systems from Unit 4.
Math 1, taught by Ms. Clarke-Huie, will continue teaching about Functions.
Math 2, taught by Ms. Clarke-Huie and Dr. Cole, will begin teaching about Trigoonometry and review Rational Exponents. .
Dr. Li will continue to provide targeted Math Support across all grade levels.
Thanks so much for your continued support.
Dr. Cole
ELA AT Home:
Writing is a key part of the ELA classroom almost daily at FMS. However, it isn't a skill that should be limited to the classroom. In reality, writing is a LIFE skill and it's benefits are far-reaching. The most common writing done at home is journaling. Here are five reasons to encourage journaling at home.
1. Journaling supports academic skills.
In an age when most writing is done on computers, journaling provides access to benefits that only writing by hand provides. By improving penmanship, the practice of journaling can directly impact academics. According to Steve Graham, a professor at Vanderbilt University, good handwriting can improve a classroom test score from the 50th to the 84th percentile. He also notes that “people judge the quality of your ideas based on your handwriting.” Researchers have also found that writing by hand helps with learning shapes and letters, and may support the development of fine motor skills in young children. For older children, the skill of organizing their thoughts and ideas is developed through journaling. Though we might assume children are given plenty of handwriting opportunities at school, this is not always the case. By journaling at home, children have access to a host of academic benefits they might not otherwise encounter.
2. Keeping a journal stimulates creativity.
When it comes to starting a journal, the options are limited only by your child’s imagination. Journals can be anything they wish–from a loose collection of thoughts or drawings to recordings with a specific purpose and format. To generate interest, define journaling as an outlet for your child’s expression. Allow them to decorate and fill their journal with anything that appeals to them. Materials like markers, colored pencils and stickers are motivating too. Most importantly, remember that journals are meant to encourage expression–not perfection. If parents critique or criticize the journal’s content, creativity and motivation will almost certainly diminish.
3. Keeping a journal promotes self-exploration.
Journaling is a tool for self-discovery and exploration. When children have access to journals, the seeds for personal growth and deepening self-awareness are planted. Many journals created for children have writing prompts, questions, and engaging illustrations. Prompts allow children to reflect on their values, hopes, and beliefs. The resulting journal entries can also provide a touchstone, showing kids who they were at the time of writing and ways in which they’ve changed or grown.
4. Journaling sharpens memory.
Not only does journaling let children record memories, it actually improves their memory. Studies show that writing in a journal benefits working (short term) memory.
Research on expressive writing at the University of Texas at Austin revealed that by writing about an experience, the experience becomes graspable. Writing down events as they happen preserves the memory, and children can better comprehend their lives. While journaling cannot change the events that happen during the day, it does afford children some choice about how to remember them. Children have the freedom of what to record, and how they’d like to revisit each event.
5. Journaling helps address big feelings.
Many children have difficulty verbalizing their emotions. Therefore, providing other outlets for expressing feelings is key. Journals should be a safe, judgment-free zone. Children must feel secure in order to sort through their complicated (and uncomfortable) emotions like sadness, anger, and disappointment. Before encouraging your child to journal about feelings, consider that journals are for their eyes only. Says Amanda Morin, child development writer, “If you can’t make this promise, you can’t expect your child to take on this type of journaling.” Journaling about feelings, especially for those who struggle with open communication, is a much healthier alternative to bottling them up.
Ferndale Middle School, Home of the Trojans
Website: https://www.gcsnc.com/ferndale_middle
Location: 701 Ferndale Boulevard, High Point, NC, USA
Phone: 336-819-2855
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FerndaleTrojanPride
Twitter: @fmstrojanpride