Good evening, Waters Landing family,
November is Native American Heritage Month. There is a resource above that explains the significance of this month of recognizing the contributions of Native Americans to our world.
Marking Period 1 ended on 10/31/23 and Marking Period 2 began on 11/2/23. Report cards will be coming home on Thursday, November 9, 2023. Please also look for information from your child's teacher about signing up for conferences. Conferences are an opportunity to have a one on one conversation about your child's academic and social progress in school. Of course, you can request a meeting with a teacher at any time during the school year, but November is the time we set aside specifically for that purpose.
The November meeting of our PTA will be Tuesday, November 7, 2023 at 7:00pm in the Media Center. PTAs serve as a type of forum where parents, teachers, administrators, and other concerned adults discuss ways to promote quality education, strive to expand the arts, encourage community involvement, and work for a healthy and safe learning environment. We would love to see you there. As this week's quote states, involvement is important. Your presence would make a difference.
On Monday, November 13, 2023 we will live stream from the Landing the MCPS Parent Academy "Parenting Strategies for Managing Behaviors". This will be presented by Dr. Susanna McQuarrie and Dr. Rachel Singer, who both specialize in behavior management. You may feel you don't need the support, but there's always something new to learn. The reason we are offering this opportunity is because one of our main concerns is the impact of behavior management on school safety. We are all in this together as a team. The relationship between home and school is important. It has been a challenging couple of years with some of the behaviors we have seen, so we are offering parents an opportunity to gain some support and strategies to implement at home that we can also transfer into the classroom and school environment. Challenging behaviors not only cause stress for parents and teachers but create challenges for our students as well. We want to encourage all our parents to take advantage of this opportunity to join us. The class with the most parent participation will receive a special class party and a gift card for the teacher. Please register here.
Mother Figure Monday is Monday, November 13, 2023, Father Figure Friday is Friday, November 17, 2023. This is your opportunity to come see what your child is learning in school and to experience firsthand how they interact with staff and peers in the school setting. Remember that young children may not accompany you on these visits. Please let us know you are coming by clicking the links below.
Attention families of Grade 2 students: As part of the Universal Screening of second graders for Gifted and Talented (GT) Identification and to help inform your child’s teacher about how your student learns, your child will take the Cognitive Abilities Test (CogAT). The CogAT provides a snapshot of your child’s verbal, quantitative, and nonverbal reasoning abilities. Waters Landing Elementary will be administering the test on Ms. Armogida, Ms. Galdo, Ms. Pham, Ms. Morris, and Ms. Reyes on Monday, December 4. Ms. Theodore and Ms. Watkins will test on Tuesday, December 5. Testing will take place during the school day. The testing session will be scheduled for 2 hours and consist of 9 subtests. The tests are untimed, but each subtest typically lasts approximately 10 minutes. The CogAT is an abilities test, so children do not need to study or prepare for the test. Instead, they will be able to become familiar with the test format and items through teacher-directed practice activities before testing. Additionally, practice questions will be administered during the testing session to familiarize students with the online testing environment. It can be helpful for students to be well-rested and have a good breakfast on the day of testing. Here is a video link that explains more of what CoGAT is.
Have a wonderful week.
With Dolphin pride,
Mrs. Hammond, Principal
Mrs. Nelson, Assistant Principal
Mr. Kim, Assistant School Administrator
