BARFIELD BANNER

It is hard to believe that we are entering the last month of the school year. Just like years past, it seems to have flown by! While we only have a few short weeks left, we have many more academic and celebratory events taking place! My hope is that students, staff, and families take the time to enjoy these next few weeks and the memories they will create. Our students have grown as leaders this year, and it has been a joy to watch them continue to develop their own unique genius.

As we move through the month of May, there will be quite a bit of testing taking place. Please note the section below with specific grade level dates. It is important our students come to school on these days and are well rested and ready to do their best! We want to ensure they are set up for success and are provided with the best environment to demonstrate what they have learned this year.

The week of May 6th, TBE will be celebrating Staff Appreciation Week! We always look forward to this week and thank you for your continued support throughout the year. Our TBE staff is like none other and certainly deserves to be celebrated and recognized.

We look forward to celebrating our current 5th Grade students in our annual “Moving Up” Ceremony, which will take place on Friday, May 24th at 9:00 am. More details about this ceremony will be sent home to 5th grade parents.

Please note there are two Early Release Days in May, including Friday the 24th and May 30th, which is the last day of school.

All final report cards will be available via the portal in early June. Final report cards will not be mailed.

Just as a reminder, while we look forward to several exciting events happening in May, we still expect our students to follow school-wide expectations of being Respectful, Responsible, Leaders. Please remind your child(ren) that they should be proactive in following these expectations and encourage others around them to do the same. We are always better when we support one another!

I would like to wish each one of you a healthy, happy summer. Please take the time to sharpen the saw with friends and family. Enjoy the slower pace and less hectic times. Have fun making memories as a family.

We look forward to welcoming you back in August!

Proud to be…TBE!

Mrs. Ledbetter

Principal

Parents,

Personal Electronic Devices- if your child has a personal cell phone at school, they are to be powered off during the school day and stored in your child’s backpack. Smart watches that come to school need to be powered off and put in your child’s backpack as well. Watches that tell time only can be worn in school. Students should not be communicating via personal cell phone or smart watches during the school day.

AM Car Line Drop Off- We try our best to help students get out of the car in the morning with staff and safety leaders. However, there are days when we are short-staffed. Thank you for your patience and understanding in providing this courtesy service. If you are interested in volunteering from 7:45-8:10 any morning, please contact Mrs. Hope @ 377-8506 to set it up! We need the most help on Tues-Thurs!

Lost and Found-we have numerous items in our lost and found. Please make sure your child’s name is on their water bottle, lunch box, eyeglasses etc. so if they are misplaced, they can be returned to you.

Birthday Treats-please refrain from sending in unhealthy treats for your child’s birthday. We are a Blue Zone school and try to provide healthy options for students.

Laptop-if your child brings their laptop home to work on homework, please help your child be proactive and make sure it is fully charged and returned the next day, so they are not interrupted to call home to have it brought in.

Attendance- Please refer to the CCPS academic calendar when planning vacations and appointments as much as possible. Vacation days are not excused absences and students miss valuable instruction by the teacher on the days they are not in school. A doctor’s note excusing an absence must be turned into the school office within 24 hours of the student returning to school to be marked excused in the computer. Parents will receive a letter in the mail when the student has excessive absences whether they are excused or not. Habitual absences are monitored by the County Attendance Officer and may result in Truancy Court. Students who have been approved for Out-of-Zone permission to attend Tommie Barfield may have their permission revoked if they accumulate excessive absences and/or tardies and/or early pick-ups from school. Students are recognized quarterly and annually for perfect attendance.

Please call 377-8500 to report your child’s absence each day your child is absent. Calling the school will validate the absence and will avoid the “unexcused” marking on your child’s record.

Arrival and Dismissal- Please review these arrival and dismissal procedures to keep all our students safe. Adult supervision starts at 7:45 in the morning. and our WTBE News starts @ 8:15! Dismissal begins at 2:50 p.m. For the safety of our students, please have your car rider sign visible and remember that the car line is a No Cell Phone Zone. Thank you for helping us greet and dismiss our students safely every day! If you would like to change your child’s dismissal routine, please email tbedismissal@collierschools.com

Florida B.E.S.T Standards-The teachers are teaching the rigorous Florida B.E.S.T Standards. These standards as well as other parent resources can be accessed through the Florida Department of Education website below.

https://www.fldoe.org/accountability/assessments/k-12-student-assessment/best/

Testing Information for your Calendar-

Below are the specific dates each grade level will be taking state tests for ELA, Writing, Math, and Science. Please avoid these dates when scheduling appointments.

Obtaining Your Child’s State Test Results

FAST Kindergarten - Grade 2 ELA Reading and Mathematics

· Scores will be available on the FLDOE Family Portal three days after a student takes an assessment beginning April 29, 2024.

· Individual Score Reports will be available on the FOCUS Portal:

o ELA Reading - May 3, 2024

o Mathematics - May 17, 2024

· Parents can login to the FOCUS Portal, which contains a link to the Florida Department of Education’s Family Portal, for results beginning April 29, 2024.

FAST Grades 3-5 ELA Reading, Grades 3-5 Mathematics, and Grade 5 Science

· There will be one week (May 1-8) where scores are not reported in FLDOE Family Portal.

· After May 8, 2024, a detailed Individual Score Report will be available within 24 hours of taking an assessment.

· Parents can login to the FOCUS Portal, which contains a link to the Florida Department of Education’s Family Portal, for results beginning May 8, 2024.

Toys from home: Safety is a priority at TBE. Please check and clean out backpacks to make sure your child is not bringing things to school that can cause a distraction. Toys, Pokémon, or other trading cards, pop its, squishies, or any other items that are a distraction will be collected and parents are free to come and pick them up in the front office.

Dress Code Policy-Please visit TBE website for specific dress code information. https://www.collierschools.com/TBE

Dana Franklin

Assistant Principal, Curriculum & Instruction, Tommie Barfield Elementary

Our Kindergarteners are continuing to work hard and learn so much as we approach the end of the school year.

We want to thank everyone for helping to make TBE’s Spring Fundraiser a success! Students had a blast synergizing and team building during the fundraiser celebration!

In reading, students will continue to work on describing characters, setting, and events in a story, as well as identifying the topic and multiple details of a non-fiction text. They will also work on identifying and using text features and descriptive words to better understand what they are reading.

During math, students are learning about and practicing all kinds of measuring – length, height, weight, and capacity! They are also learning how to describe and compare objects using these measurements. As we get closer to the end of the year, we will begin to review the many topics that were covered in Math throughout Kindergarten.

In science, students are learning about the pattern of day and night, as well as things they might notice during the day or at night. We will wrap up with how different objects in the sky look from Earth and learn about gravity.

During Social Studies, students have been identifying needs and wants. They will also be learning about the different forms of money we can use.

Please continue supporting your students at home by reading and practicing high frequency words each night. You can reinforce math concepts by counting forwards to 100 from any number, counting backwards from 20, and skip counting. Students can also work on representing addition and subtraction problems with numbers and pictures. As always, we appreciate your support at home!

-The Kindergarten Team

Dear Parents,

The students are working hard to get ready for 2nd grade. Reading is improving and we are so glad that you read with your child daily. Sit next to your child and ask questions about what he/her has just read to you. Include “how” and “why” questions to stretch their thinking. Even if they read to you in the car or while you are working around the house it is a wonderful learning experience for them to increase reading fluency while having someone special to read to. The students are identifying topics, details, main story elements and recognizing descriptive words and phrases in their texts. We have been practicing our writing skills by writing about spring and how to make lemonade. This month we are writing expository texts about a topic in order and including details and a sense of closure.

In math we finished learning how to display and interpret data. Talk to your student about tables, pictographs, and tally marks to gather data in charts. As we learned about parts, wholes, halves, and fourths students have done a fantastic job finding equal parts of rectangles and circles around our classroom. We will use games and have fun reviewing everything we learned this year in math.

Science has us comparing and contrasting baby and parent animals and checking out parent plants around our school campus! As we learn about black bears, we are getting excited for our upcoming Black Bear Zoo Con live on April 19th. In social studies we are finishing our economics unit as we discuss opportunity costs as giving up one thing for another and spending and saving money. We will also learn about water safety.

We celebrate our volunteers next month with breakfast and are so grateful to the volunteers who will attend our field trip to the Naples Botanical Gardens in May. We were amazed and excited by the love we felt from the parents and PTO attending the fundraiser event in April. It was a big hit, and we were so grateful to celebrate with them. The students loved all the games and inflatable fun!

We appreciate you going over the daily agenda and attending to the paperwork in the take home binders and Wednesday folders. Ask your child if their headphones are still working well. Please remember to send in a daily snack. Thank you for sending in your child refreshed for testing days.

We are so fortunate to watch your children grow and lead!

Fondly,

Your First Grade Team

Dear Parents,

We can’t believe this will be our last banner of 2nd Grade. We are still working very hard to prepare for end-of-year testing. WE GOT THIS!

In language arts, students will be applying their knowledge of figurative language and author’s purpose to understand the text about different cultures and nonfiction biographies. Using these skills will allow students to ask and answer questions while they read to gain a better understanding of the text. These are just a few of the skills we are continuing to develop this month. Please continue to encourage your child to read nightly so they can take quizzes on the books they have read and earn Reading Counts points. In math, students will be building on prior knowledge of money to solve problems with coins and dollar bills. We will also learn about time to the nearest 5 minutes, 15 minutes, and half hour. You can continue to help your child develop fact fluency by using the addition and subtraction flash cards for nightly practice. In social studies, students are focusing on Economics, supply and demand, buyer, and consumer concepts.

In Science, we are learning about wind moving air, Sun’s energy, and health.

Happy MAY!

The Second Grade Team

Parents,

Third Graders have been working hard this quarter. We had a blast at the PTO Spring Fundraiser Celebration! It was a success because of YOU! We appreciate all that PTO does for our staff, students, and school.

Over the next month, we will continue to review all the content that we have learned so far this year so that we finish third grade strong! On Thursday, May 2nd we will take our FAST ELA test. Our FAST Math test will take place on Tuesday, May 14th. As state testing is right around the corner, please motivate your child to do their personal best and show off all the amazing things that they have learned this year! Homework is a great time for you to sit with your child and see the skills we are working on in the classroom. Homework is always a current learning goal or cumulative review.

The following are imperative for success: adequate sleep, healthy breakfast, being on time for school, and most importantly celebrating their success and hard work!

Thank you,

The Third Grade Team

Parents,

We are ready to finish 4th grade strong! We have testing right around the corner. As a reminder, our testing dates for 4th grade are as follows:

- May 1st ELA FAST

- May 15th Math FAST

Over the next few weeks, review will be incredibly important. During this time, any standards our students need to brush up on will be retaught. This will be done with small groups of students and the whole class. Work coming home will help with the review we do in class, and we need your support more than ever in making sure it is being done. A lot of care is taken to make sure we maximize the time we have left before testing. It is also important that the kids get enough sleep and get to school on time, especially on testing days. Thank you for making sure that happens!

When testing is behind us, we have fun learning activities planned for our students! We will read The Last Egret, which is a wonderful historical fiction novel. It was written by a Florida native and takes place in the late nineteenth century when the Florida Everglades supplied the booming trade in bird feathers for ladies’ fashion. With this novel we pull reading, social studies, and science all together. The students will also do a research project on space exploration, and in math they will be making math board games. An exciting way to end a great year!

Thank you for your continued support,

The Fourth Grade Team

Hello, families!

Happy Spring! We are having an amazing year and are going to finish strong! There is plenty of fun and celebration scheduled as we wrap up our 5th grade year and your child’s time at TBE. But first things first! As you know, testing time is upon us. We are doing our best to cheer your children on to show all that they know from this year and all their years in elementary school! We want your children to know that they are strong, intelligent, hardworking, amazing humans! We are reviewing and practicing our skills to gear them up!

Please help us get your child ready for these big testing days by getting plenty of rest, a nutritious breakfast, and lots of hugs and pep talks. Also, please avoid making any appointments for your child on our testing dates:

May 2-ELA; May 16-Math; May 21-Science

In ELA, we are reading a mystery novel titled Chasing Vermeer by Blue Balliett. As we read, we are annotating the text and discussing the author’s use of figurative language and plot development. This book takes many twists and turns; we are hoping to solve this mystery before the last page.

In Math, we have finished our curriculum for 5th grade math. We will continue to prepare for the FAST Math test with review activities and games in class. The best way to review at home is to continue practicing the same skills covered in class.

In Science, we just wrapped up our unit on Force and Motion and Balanced Forces. Students conducted experiments with toy cars, ramps, blocks, etc. to see these principles in action. Students discussed how they can take this knowledge to the soccer field and baseball/softball field to apply it to their kicks and swings. Science is all around us! We will continue to do hands on activities to review and reinforce science units from earlier this year.

In Social Studies, we continue to learn about the early growth of our nation. We had a delightful time hearing from the Daughters of the American Revolution! These ladies reenacted the Boston Tea Party and then fed us tea and treats while we discussed the historical event.

Please remind your students to read, practice math flashcards, and study science notes each night!

Other important May dates:

May 24 - Graduation in the morning; also, an early release day

May 28 - 5th grade field trip.

May 30 - last day of school; also, an early release day

Thank you,

Your Fifth Grade Team

In PE have been learning routines for various songs, such as Cotton Eyed Joe and Cha-Cha Slide. We also continue to practice good sportsmanship by being respectful to their peers during activities.

Our run club celebrated with their Final Mile Run event at GGHS. An awesome experience for students who completed at least 20 miles by March 1st. Congratulations to all of our runners for their hard work this year.

We had a good turnout for our Final Mile run event! The students did a great job representing TBE and had a fun together. It was hard work but an awesome experience for each of them.

Also, if you see Johnny M (Bonfitto’s class), give him an extra congratulations as he received the Golden Sneaker Award for our school. He was selected as an individual who shows hard work and dedication to running, but also treats others with respect in his actions. So far this year he has run 118.2 miles between run club and PE class.

Students have been creating beautiful masterpieces lately!

If the Dinosaurs Came Back- Kindergarten learned about depth and created these overlapping buildings and dinosaurs:

First learned about Chinese Porcelain and symmetry to create these floral arrangements!

Second grade learned movement in art and created these continuous lines to draw your eyes all around their artwork:

Third Grade learned about Pablo Picasso and created their own Picasso Self-Portraits:

Fourth Grade learned practiced their Zen-Tangles to create these owls:

Fifth Grade learned about New York abstract artist, Yung-Wu and created their own abstract art using her guidelines:

If you haven’t check out your student’s artwork on Artsonia, check out their art here: https://www.artsonia.com/connect/TCCPZFNC

To look at our artist’s work or to see who the Star Student was for each day, follow @beauvaisCCPS on twitter.

You’ve Got to Move it Move it!!!

We enter the time of the year where SPRING IS SPRUNG! That means feeling the Beat in your Feet. Our students are finding their RHYTHM in all sorts of choreography. Line dance, Square dance, Circle dance, and so much more. Popstar Status will be achieved… It’s almost time to CELEBRATE!!!

· 🌻May brings new activities and lessons based on the learning goals for K-5 Technology Classes from the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE). Click to view: Student ISTE Learning Goals.

· 👐🏼 All K-5 students begin Tech Classes with a 10-minute warm-up of typing on the keyboard using the District Program Typing Club. K-1 students learn the location of the keys and to use two hands on the keyboard. Grs. 2-5 students practice proper posture, keeping fingers on the home row, and using finger paths for each finger. ⭐Please encourage your students to practice typing 2-3 times a week at home for 10 minutes to improve these skills. ⭐

· Grades K-1 create digital work demonstrating their learning utilizing programs from Microsoft Office, such as PowerPoint and Word. Students apply their keyboarding skills to type using capitals for proper nouns, punctuation, and proper word spacing. Students learn to format text by changing font, size, and color, proofread and spell check their writing, and insert media such as images.

· Grades 3-4-5 learn creative communication, 3D-thinking and problem-solving, modeling and simulations, engineering, coding, innovative designing, and even electrical circuitry using Redstone through the District Resource Minecraft Education program. Please remind students that they are ONLY allowed to use this program in Tech Class with Mrs. McCarty for Tech Class assignments. We are NOT playing the Minecraft video game nor are we using Survival Mode.

Jody McCarty

Teacher, Physical Education, Tommie Barfield Elementary

Reading Counts updates, Kindergarten through Fifth Graders have 97,648,616 read words so far this year. Students in grades K-5, have taken and passed 12,440 tests on Reading Count Books.

The results are in!!!

Here are TBE’s results:

Here are the Florida State results.

As you can see the SSYRA Jr TBE and state results matched 100% but the SSYRA 3-5 results were a big upset! Reguardless we all got to be introduced to new books and genres.

Here are some photos from our March 26 SSYRA voting event:

We have 19 students coming on Friday April 19th to celebrate our highest level SSYRA challenge reward, our carnival! Look for photos of this event on our TBE social media page.

Dear Parents/Guardians,

Connection is defined as a relationship in which a person, thing, or idea is linked or associated with something else. The informal practices of everyday life – the norms and culture of how we engage one another – significantly influence social connection. A culture of connection rests on the core values of kindness, service, and commitment to one another. Everyone contributes to the collective culture of social connection by regularly practicing these values. The more we observe others practicing these values, the more they will be reinforced. Source: The U.S. Surgeon Advisory on the Healing Effects of Social Connection and Community.

At Tommie Barfield, every Monday classrooms have a Monday morning meeting. It is a time to connect with each other as we create a culture of connection at school. It is a time to “call out the gold” or complement each other. It is a time to share about our weekends. It is important that students feel comfortable in their classrooms.

Even if you cannot sit down for dinner every night, setting aside a weekly family meeting gives time to share the best times of the week everyone has experienced.

Leanne Hope

School Counselor, Tommie Barfield Elementary

Greetings from your PTO,

Thank you to all who donated and helped make our 1st Spring fundraiser such a success. We raised a total of $37,549.53. We are working with Mrs. Ledbetter on the needs and wants for the end of this school year and where best this money will be used to benefit all students and staff. Please note, if you won a gift card for our spirit store, this needs to be redeemed by the end of the school year to be valid. Please go to Shop — Tommie Barfield (tommiebarfieldpto.com) and enter the personalized code at checkout.

The Volunteer Appreciation Breakfast, hosted by Mrs. Hope, is on May 3rd. All volunteers should have received an invitation by email. Please make sure to RSVP to Mrs. Hope or call the school directly.

Teacher appreciation is coming up on May 6th through 10th. We have a fun week planned for all staff. Please reach out to us if you are interested in being a part of it.

As we draw near to the end of the school year, we want to thank you for all your help and support throughout the year. We are excited to finish the year strong. We are planning one more surprise for our students. Stay tuned!

Best

Tommie Barfield PTO Board.