The Cape St. Claire Gazette

Dear Cape St. Claire Elementary Families, 

It is hard to believe that we have been in school for over a month! Time has moved quickly and it has been exciting to see our students learning and engaging in lessons daily. They all are truly Soaring Seagulls!

Thank you to all of the families who took the time to attend our Back to School Night last month. Your response to the event has been overwhelmingly positive and I am so happy that our staff was able to connect with you. 

This month’s newsletter includes curriculum updates from our grade level teams. This is just another way we are strengthening our home school connection. We hope that you find the information and updates from grade levels beneficial. We will continue these updates throughout the school year. 

Also beginning this month, in our effort to reduce our percentage of chronically absent students, our newsletter will also include information about Cape St. Claire’s monthly attendance rate. We will also include information about the positive impact that routine, consistent, and satisfactory attendance has on your child’s overall achievement as well as social emotional development . As always, please reach out with any questions and concerns you may have. And thank you to those parents and families who have reached out to us with praise about the great things that are happening at Cape St. Claire. We really are #TheFlockThatRocks! 

In partnership, 

Tamara Kelly-Molock- Principal

Rochelle Barrett- Assistant Principal 

The School Counselor’s Corner

Happy Fall!  September’s Counseling Lessons focused on the Role of the School Counselor and reviewing school rules. In October, Counseling Lessons will focus on Healthy Friendships and Bullying Prevention. We take bullying and personal safety very seriously.  Please let me or administration know if you feel your child is being bullied. You can also fill out the Bullying, Harassment or Intimidation Reporting Form at https://www.aacps.org/page/anti-bullying-reporting

The Kids Helping Kids Harvest for the Hungry Campaign starts soon!!  We will be collecting non-perishable food donations during the month of October.  Monetary donations are also accepted, all you have to do is write a check to the school with “Food Drive” in the memo or donate online at aacps.org/harvest.  Each dollar donated is equivalent to one pound of food!  We will be collecting canned goods, dried goods, and high-priority items like baby food & formula, healthy snacks, rice, and of course PB and J! I’m looking forward to reaching our goal of 700 pounds this year.  If each student brings in one pound, we will have 670 pounds!  If each student brings in 2 pounds, it’s 1,340 pounds! Let’s help the hungry!

Mrs. Bachman

hbachman@aacps.org

410-222-1685

Please feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns. 

PBIS: Positive Behavior Intervention and Supports

We are off to a great start this school year! Students are excited about our Soaring Seagull of the Day initiative. It is great to see the smiling, proud faces of the students who earn them daily.

Children can earn individual recognition with a seagull feather for following the school rules. Classrooms can earn pompoms for their Class Respect Jar and earn group recognition. Classroom celebrations are occurring and students remain excited about them. Our quarterly event will occur early next month; it is extra recess. That is always a favorite event with our students.

The PBIS committee oversees spirit days too. We will have spirit days on the second Friday of every month. Here is a list of the sprit days for this school year!

· October 11th: Sports Day

· November 8th: PJ Day

· December 13th: Wacky Sweater Day

· January 10th: Dress in your best!

· February 14th: Wear Red

· March 14th: Decade Day

· April 11th: Superhero Day

· May 9th: Mismatch Day

· June 13th: Beach Day

We are excited to promote school spirit and positive behaviors through our PBIS program. Cape St. Claire is truly #TheFlockThatRocks!

Cultural Arts

Art

Intermediate art students have been exploring the power and possibilities of working as a team while creating collaborative works of art. We have constructed sketchbooks that will remain in the art room for the duration of the year. These will be used to plan through the creative challenges of our units of study. As we move into the month of October, intermediate students will begin diving into independent projects where we will explore the elements of art and principles of design. Primary students have already begun independent projects. With each of these projects we have focused on the preliminary elements of line, shape, and color. While exploring the art room, we are practicing our studio expectations and learning how to properly use and care for a variety of materials.

Triple E: Global Studies

We have enjoyed teambuilding activities while incorporating the Success Skills of communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and creativity in our Triple E classrooms through September. As we move into October we look forward to watching our learning grow through these Success Skills as we begin project-based learning. 

General Music 

The students are having fun singing, playing instruments, and moving to music. Primary students are working on steady beats, simple rhythms, and high and low sounds. Intermediate students are working on rhythm patterns, note and rest names, and treble clef line and space note names. Fourth graders will be preparing for the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra field trip on October 23rd by discussing concert etiquette while watching a live performance and listening/analyzing the music they will hear at the program. 

Media

In September, students became familiar with our new library center layout and routines. We have reviewed book care, our sections in the center as well as call numbers to locate books. As we move into October students will focus on literature appreciation, inquiry, and digital citizenship. If you have any newer games (ex. games, chess, checkers) that you want to pass along, we would greatly appreciate any donations! 

PE

It was a fast-paced start to the school year in PE. All grades began the school year focusing on moving safely. Then, grades 3 - 5 completed a unit on football skills (throwing, catching, kicking), while grades PK - 2nd focused on locomotor skills (walking, running, galloping, skipping, sliding, jumping, and hopping).

Please be mindful of what days your child has PE to ensure that they are wearing athletic shoes. Thank you for your support and we are looking forward to another great month in October!

Pre-Kindergarten

In Pre-K we have been working hard to learn the routines of school. We continue to practice social skills and study the 5 senses. As we get into October, we plan to learn about environments; those close to home and others not as familiar, such as a coral reef!  We will learn about plants, animals, resources and how to protect them.  We will count objects, and compare/contrast shapes. We also plan to do lots of rhyming and listen for the beginning sounds of words.

Kindergarten

It has been an exciting start to the year in Kindergarten!  Students are making friends and are learning the routines, rules, and expectations of school. 

See below for exciting things we will be learning in October! 

• Language Arts Skills: We will be working on Unit 2 and Unit 3. In Unit 2, students will focus on blending sounds and chunks in words. In Unit 3, they will start learning sounds. 

• Language Arts Knowledge: We will be starting Unit 2: Five senses and then finishing the month with Unit 3: Stories. 

• Math: We have been discussing how math is all around us and looking for different places we see and use math everyday.  Our new unit will focus on counting and representing numbers with groups of objects up to 10.  

• Science/Social Studies: We will end Unit 1 by talking about how to keep ourselves healthy by keeping our bodies clean. In Unit 2 students will learn ways to be a good friend, how to be a responsible citizen at home and at school, and what humans need to live and grow.

1st Grade

Our first graders had a fabulous first month of school! During October, our readers will be learning about body systems as well as different organs that are part of the body and the jobs they do. They will dive into informational writing and will learn to identify important information from texts. Students will also be introduced to themes in fairy tales and folktales through stories from different lands or countries. They will develop a strong foundation to understand and enjoy similar stories from different lands. As students listen to stories, they will also increase their vocabulary and reading comprehension skills. First graders will enhance their letter and sound identification skills while working on segmenting and blending sounds to read and write words. They will study words with long vowels and identify proper and common nouns. During social studies and science, students will identify elements of the four seasons and determine how weather impacts the world. Students will discuss how their environment affects their lives and how they can protect their environment. As mathematicians, students are going to be exploring place value, comparing numbers and adding two numbers within 20. 

2nd Grade

In second grade the students will have a lot of fun and learning during October.  

During the Knowledge Block, the students will learn about the early civilizations in India and China and how they were both able to form because of mighty rivers.  We will be reinforcing the content through the informational/explanatory writing genre.  

During the Skills Block, the students will continue to review spellings, practice reading one and two syllable words and learn new tricky words.  We will begin contractions and provide their non contracted equivalents.  The new decodable for this unit is called “Bedtime Tales” and we will learn the use of quotation marks as we see them in the stories.  Lastly, the students will begin instruction in the writing process, with a focus on writing narratives.  

In Math, the students will review counting by 1s using a number chart and move into identify patterns when skip counting by 5s, 10s, and 100s, which will then be used to solve problems. Students will identify patterns within even and odd numbers.

In Science/Social Studies, the students are learning about the qualities of a good leader and participating in group projects where they can practice leadership skills.

We are looking forward to our Halloween parade and parties at the end of the month!  

3rd Grade

Third grade is off to a fantastic start!  In reading, we have been studying classic tales and reviewing story elements.  In math, we've studied what it means to be a mathematician as well as addition and subtraction strategies.  Students have been learning about different forces (push, pull, gravity, etc.) that make an object move through fun and exciting investigations in science.  Our social studies lessons so far have focused on the 4 disciplines of social studies (economics, civics, history, geography).  Please continue to remind your child of the 4R expectations at Cape St. Claire (respect for self, others, learning, and property).  We appreciate your support and enjoy learning with your children!

4th Grade

Science - Our first unit is going to delve into the survival structures of plants and animals.

Social Studies - We are learning about West Africa and the Indigenous People of the Americas. Next, we will meet the European explorers.

CKLA  (Core Knowledge Language Arts)-  We are studying personal narratives as a genre with the goal of writing their own. The next topic we will explore is “Empires of the Middle Ages.”

Math -We are working on place value concepts and will begin addition and subtraction with multi-digit -numbers. It is important that your child is fluent with multiplication facts.  It is a great idea to practice facts 0-12 with your child at home!

5th Grade

In 5th grade this month, we will be going on our first field trip, Water Ready Environmental Literacy, formerly known as Drownproofing, which teaches students life saving skills to keep them safe around the water.  Mr. Poorman and Mrs. Ciancaglini’s classes will be going on Tuesday, October 1st and Mrs. Vickers and Mrs. Knower’s classes will be going on Wednesday, October 2nd. 

In integrated knowledge, we will continue utilizing our new CKLA curriculum.  We will be transitioning from unit 1, Personal Narratives, to unit 2, Early American Civilization.  This unit orients students to the geography, climate, flora, and fauna of the Americas. It also presents an overall history and timeline highlighting the rise and fall of the Maya, Aztec, and Inca civilizations. In addition, the unit describes innovations and discoveries of the Maya, Aztec, and Inca and features myths from these ancient civilizations.

In math, we will be finishing up unit 3, Place Value and Number Relations, and will be going into unit 4, Adding and Subtracting Decimals.  Please continue to practice multiplication facts at home to build the student’s prerequisite skills needed for these units. 

In social students, students will finish unit 1, Development of American Government and will be transitioning into unit 2, Challenges of a New and Expanding Nation.

In science, we will be transitioning from our first unit, Food Webs and Ecosystems to unit 2, Stars and Constellations. 

Cape Families - Please keep in mind that domestic pets, such as dogs and cats, are not permitted on school grounds. Thank you for working with us to keep all students safe!

When visiting the school, please remember to bring your government issued photo ID