Tuesday, October 14, 2014

Trinity School Virtue of the Month for October: Diligence

Trinity School Virtue of the Month for October: Diligence

Diligence comes from the Latin word diligere meaning to value highly, to take delight in.

A DILIGENT person works HARD to finish a job.

A DILIGENT person is:
  • a hard worker
  • industrious
  • attentive
  • persistent
  • steady
  • earnest
  • energetic
A DILIGENT person:
  • applies himself/herself to the task at hand
  • starts working right away
  • works hard to finish a job
  • invests time & energy
  • does a job efficiently
  • applies his/her God-given talents
DILIGENT is a key ingredient to success in practice, exercise and study.

Virtue of the Month for September: Responsibility

Responsibility is accepting the consequences of your actions.

Seeds to Plant: If it needs to be done, DO IT!

Weeds to Pull: No excuses!

Family/School Rule: No complaining, no blaming, no whining.

Everyone - both children and adults - has things to do in life that are important for their own growth and that of others.  It is each person's job to do these things to the best of his/her ability.

A person who is RESPONSIBLE gets the job done.  You cannot depends on an irresponsible person.

An IRRESPONSIBLE person often says: I don't know; nobody told me; I didn't mean to.

A RESPONSIBLE person will find out the correct information and think before he/she acts.

No one MAKES you do something.  YOU are in charge of yourself.

Whatever choice you make, you also CHOOSE the CONSEQUENCE.

A RESPONSIBLE person accepts the consequences of his/her actions.

List all the RESPONSIBILITIES that you have.

How are you doing?

Monday, October 13, 2014

Education Best Practice: K to 8 Configuration









Introduction


The United States is virtually the only nation where elementary school students spend time in a middle or junior high school before entering high school.  The curricular and non-curricular benefits of a K-8 school have been written about in multiple studies and newspaper articles.  This is what educators, parents and nationally respected research institutes have concluded about the advantages of the K-8 model:

 

Curricular Benefits

v  Studies have found that 8th graders in K-8 schools score significantly higher than those in middle school on standardized tests of achievement in reading, mathematics and science.

v  Attendance, dropout rates and student test scores are better for children attending K-8 schools than for those in traditional middle schools.

 

K-8s are the place where everybody knows your name.

v  Teachers in K-8 settings are accustomed to teaming, planning together and working with the same group of students.  They are also trained to teach elementary students and bring a student-centered approach to their teaching.

v  Children in K-8 schools are able to experience the comfort and stability of familiar surrounding and staff for an eight or nine-year period. 

10- to 14-Year-Olds are Children

v  Forces in today’s society are pushing 10- to 14-year old children to grow up fast.  Because they have fewer children in that age group, K-8 schools are in a better position to remind children, parents and the entire community, that these are still children and should be treated as such.

 

v  The configuration of grades 6-8 actually works against the needs of young adolescents.  Ten-year old children are at their most vulnerable when moved from the stable school environment they are accustomed to and asked to navigate a new school and a new succession of adults while they are still learning to negotiate with each other. 


Greater Parent Involvement, Leadership Skills and Higher Self Esteem in K-8

v  Parents are more inclined to stay connected to and involved in K-8 schools than in middle schools—a factor that correlates highly with student success in school.  Too frequently, parents disconnect when a child graduates from a K-6. 

v  K-8 settings provide the ideal environment to begin fostering leadership in young adolescents.  Older children serve in many capacities and undertake service projects, while younger students have someone to look up to. 

v  Students in the K-8 school show a higher self-esteem and confidence and a healthier adolescent development.

Sources:  American Association of School Administrators (AASA); National School Boards Association (NSBA); Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory (NWREL);  Deseret News (Marjorie Cortez); Philadelphia Education Fund (Keith Look)

Wednesday, October 8, 2014

Trinity 5th Graders Celebrate Winn-Dixie

The fifth grade students read Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo. To celebrate the themes and ideas from the book, we had a party. The party included food items from the book, like egg salad, punch, and even Littmus Lozenges! The students brought in pictures of their pets and we celebrated their pets by creating decorations with their pictures. The students concluded the celebration by watching the movie Because of Winn-Dixie. They will be writing an essay comparing the book and movie in L.A.. It was a wonderful day with lots of amazing food!