The Reed Report 🐾

Welcome to November!

It is hard to believe we are coming into the final months of the calendar year! November is sure to be a month filled with hard work and fun moments! We will be having our 3rd grade Veteran's Day performance and welcoming families to celebrate this special event with us. We will be having our Paws to Read event on November 13th and a SuperU Challenge assembly on November 20th! We will wrap up the month with celebrating student successes during parent teacher conferences on November 25th and 26th.

November will surely be one to remember!

-Mrs. Golden

Reed's 3rd grade students will take the CogAT assessment during the week of November 18th. CogAT measures learned reasoning and problem-solving skills in three different areas: verbal, quantitative, and nonverbal. Reasoning skills develop gradually throughout a person’s lifetime and at different rates for different individuals. Reasoning abilities are good predictors of success in school and are important outcomes of good schooling. CogAT does not measure such factors as effort, attention, motivation, and work habits, which also contribute importantly to school achievement. The purpose of this test is to better plan for your child’s instruction by looking at their specific strengths and weaknesses and to help identify academically gifted students for enrichment and honors programs.

If you have questions about the administration of the CogAT, please don't hesitate to reach out to your child's teacher or Reed's main office.

Will County School District 92 is committed to supporting every student’s academic, social, emotional, and behavioral growth. To continue supporting our students' well-being, our district will administer a Social, Academic, Emotional, and Behaviors Risk Screener (SAEBRS or mySAEBRS) in November and February. Families may opt their child out if they do NOT want them to participate.

This screener is administered in two ways based on the child’s grade level. For students in grades K-1, our teachers will evaluate their students using academic, social, and emotional data categories and complete the assessment for each student. For students in grades 2-8, the screener, mySAEBRS, is a brief rating scale that students will complete themselves.

It's important to note that the SAEBRS screener is strictly confidential, and only a few staff members can access the data. The results from these screeners will allow District 92 to identify students who may benefit from additional support to help them focus on their education and remove social and emotional barriers to learning.

At District 92, we want all our students and families to feel at ease with the SAEBRS and mySAEBRS screeners. We encourage you to contact your school psychologist for additional information if you have concerns about this screener. We are always here to give families the information they need to make the best decisions for everyone involved.

The screeners will be completed in mid-November and February. Students in grades 2-8 will complete this screener, and teachers will complete it for students in grades K-1 as part of their academic benchmark assessments.

Please click on this link to learn more about how social-emotional behavior impacts academic success and to view the questions that will be assessed.

Please complete this opt-out Google Form if you do not wish your child to participate in the Social, Academic, Emotional, Behaviors Risk Screener (SAEBRS or mySAEBRS) screening process. We assume your child can participate if we do not hear from you.

It is that time of year! Winter weather is here and students will continue to have the opportunity to go outside for recess, weather permitting. Please be sure to dress your child in appropriate layers for the weather (ie: coat, hat, gloves, scarf, etc). We want to make sure our students are safe and comfortable during outdoor play time.

NOTE: It's a great idea to write your child's initials or name inside their item(s) so it doesn't end up in our Lost and Found!

Did you know we allow an adult to come in and celebrate their student's birthday by joining them for lunch on their special day? You are welcome to bring your child's favorite lunch (ie: McDonald's, Jimmy John's, etc) to enjoy with them. If your child's birthday is over the summer or over a weekend, you can come in on a weekday during the week of your child's birthday or come in to celebrate their half birthday! While we love having our families in the building, joining your child for lunch is only allowed for birthday celebrations. Thank you for your cooperation and we hope to see you soon!

When a student is not present at school and there hasn't been a parent phone call made, our offices will attempt to contact parents/guardians or emergency contacts listed on PowerSchool. However, if it is approximately one hour after the start of the school day and we are unsuccessful in reaching anyone about the student's whereabouts, it is our policy to contact either Lockport Police or Will County Sheriff's Dept to conduct a wellness check at the student's primary residence.

Please remember to call your child in if they should be late or absent. We appreciate your help in making sure all of our students are safe and accounted for!

The third grade students will be going on a field trip on Wednesday, November 6 to hear some wonderful music performed by the West Suburban Symphony Orchestra. The students will eat a sack lunch brought from home upon their return.

Our annual Reed School Veterans Day music program will be on Monday, November 11. All of the third grade students will be participating. There will be two identical performances, one at 9:30 and the other at 2:00. We ask that if your last name begins with A-M, please try to attend the 9:30 show. If your last name begins with N-Z, please try to attend the 2:00 show. Please invite any veterans that you may know! Students are asked to wear red, white and blue! Choir students may wear their D92 Music shirt if they would like to.

Our Composer of the Month for November is Frederic Chopin.

The 2nd grade classes will begin a project inspired by the art of Brazilian artist Romero Britto. Britto is known for his use of simple shapes, bold outlines, patterns, and bright colors. We'll be drawing a large cupcake shape in the style of Britto, then we'll be using Sharpies to add his signature bold outlines. We'll finish by adding color with watercolor paints.

The 3rd grade students are busy working on their Robin Mead inspired landscapes. We hope to have them finished by mid October and we'll be beginning a fall themed project later in the month.

In the media center, students have been learning how to type and edit fall fun facts and creepy

riddles using Google Docs. They also enjoyed typing in various keyboard symbols to create fall

text pixel art!

In addition to checking out books in the library, students have been rotating through library

stations. They have been building mosaic art in the makerspace station, coloring a giant U.S.A.

map to be displayed in our nonfiction section, and creating fall designs on the Lego wall. The

highlight for us this month was viewing all of the creative entries in the character pumpkin

contest! I can tell the students and families had so much fun creating them together, and they

certainly brightened up the media center! Job well done to everyone who participated!

Congratulations to our 3 winning entries, as voted by the students:

1st place: Elise Rojas-Mario Kart

2nd place: Ethan Hren- Wolverine

3rd place: Austin Nolte-Dragons Love Tacos

During our ELA power time groups, we have been enjoying our first book club of the year! 2nd

graders read “Eerie Elementary: The School is Alive”. Next, they learned about using mood and

tone in writing and illustrating. They observed works by Caspar Friedrich, and created their own

spooky painting. Then, they used what they learned about the elements of a spooky story to

write their own spooky stories! 3rd graders began practicing word analogies in preparation for

our Word Masters competition. They are also enjoying the somewhat spooky, very humorous

novel, “The Incredibly Dead Pets of Rex Dexter”.

Power time math students have been practicing their addition, subtraction, multiplication, and

division facts with a coding activity. Students were given an Ozobot Trick-or -Treating coding

map. They needed to solve the equations on the map, and use trial and error to determine

which path would earn them the most pieces of candy. Once the desired path was outlined,

students coded their path, decorated their Ozobots with a costume, and led it through the maze.

In addition, we practiced some multi-digit addition and subtraction with regrouping, as we

completed some Halloween hidden pictures together. 3rd grade students have also begun

practicing for their first Math Team competition!

Exciting News!!! We will be hosting the Scholastic Book Fair in the Reed Media Center from

November 18th-26th! Students will shop during their technology and library classes during the

week of November 18th-22nd. Families may also shop together during parent-teacher

conferences on November 21st & 22nd. If you’re interested in volunteering for the book fair, a

sign-up sheet will be sent out on Monday, November 4th.

In the gym, we’ve been actively working on learning about food groups through play as we like to focus on health topics from time to time. We enjoy incorporating topics like muscles, bones, dental hygiene, fire safety, and food groups into our lessons to keep students engaged and informed. We’ll continue focusing on these topics throughout the calendar year, along with some fun holiday games! Please remember to check your child’s schedule so they’re prepared for physical education—3rd grade has PE every day, while 2nd grade has it four days a week. As the weather cools and boots become a necessity, make sure your child has a pair of gym shoes in their backpack or locker. For parent-teacher conferences, there’s no need to schedule a meeting with us unless you have specific concerns. However, feel free to stop by the gym and say hello!

Wishing you and your family Happy Holidays from the gym!

Mrs. Kolcz and Miss T

If you have a Reed staff member you would like to celebrate for all they do, please click the button below to fill out a form and share in recognizing their efforts! Your response will be given to the staff member to acknowledge the fantastic work they do and the difference they make! You can find this posted in every monthly newsletter.

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