A Note from Our PrincipalWe are starting the 2nd semester. I can't believe how fast this school year is going! Time sure flies when you are having fun. Winter is upon us and with that is cold weather and snow. Please make sure that you are sending your child to school with the appropriate winter gear to be outside for recess (jacket, hat, gloves, snow pants & boots). It is also helpful if you label your child's gear with their name on it. This way if the item(s) get lost we can get it back to the right child. Important Upcoming Dates: February 9th: Noon - 4pm WAWM PTA Council Founder's Day Carnival https://wawmptacouncil.org/council-carnival.php February 11th: 6pm Walker PTA Meeting February 17th & 18th: No School for Students February 19th: 5:30 - 7 Family Engagement Night - Learn About Social Emotional Learning (Part 2) Please see the attached flyer below with information on Adult English classes being offered by the school district.
News from Our TeamsTeam Persistence: Team Persistence kicked off their Fairy Tales unit with a fairy tale dress-up day! Students selected a favorite fairy tale character and then dressed up! When they arrived to the room after specials, they found that Nibbles the Book Monster had visited the classroom. Sadly, they tried to find him in the school, but he left before he could be captured. He took a little nibble of a fairy tale book and left some coloring pages to remember him by. Students have been continuing to look for clues for Nibbles return! Team Respect: January has been a month of reflection and feedback! We were so excited with the success of our first Student Exhibition! We know that reflecting on the work we did and how we worked together will help us as we begin our next project adventure! The students in Team Respect have begun reflecting weekly on Flipgrid. This is a tool we use on their ipads that allows everyone to take a short video of themselves . After posting their own reflection on their work that week, students are encouraged to watch other's videos and reply. We are loving Flipgrid!! Team Respect has also been learning and practicing giving and receiving good feedback. We use a protocol that includes Praise, a Question, and a Polish. We have been fortunate enough to connect with a classroom from Franklin Elementary. We skyped with them to give them feedback on narrative writing. It was such a great experience for everyone that we have decided to become "sister classrooms" and connect on a regular basis. This photo is of them skyping with us! Team Integrity: Team Integrity would like to send a HUGE shout out to our amazing families for their contributions and generosity in making our Little Library dream turn into reality. We appreciate those who have and will offered up their time, expertise, or financial backing (our Read-A-Thon was a success) to make it happen. The Gravelle's are about to begin building 10 LITTLE LIBRARIES that will be painted and have the finishing touches added on here at Walker by the kids. If you or anyone you know is interested in hosting one of our Little Libraries in their yard, please contact Team Integrity via [email protected]. Team Diversity: This month was very exciting as we explored scientific principles about interactions and changes in matter. How transformations happen? What causes transformations? What is the result of a transformation? We also explored how we can transform one structure into another using the same amount of blocks. We applied scientific ideas about magnets to study the cause and effect of magnetic interactions. We had fun using the scientific method to predict the outcome of using a magnet(s) to move a paperclip submerged in water, oil or corn syrup. Team Excellence East: In Excellence East this month, we are proud to say four of our passion projects came to fruition. First, six of our students walked to the Retirement Home in our neighborhood to socialize with some of the residents there. We painted nails, played games, and had conversations about the residents' families and life. They want us to come back as soon as we can! Secondly, five of us went out to put up signs to offer up help to anyone in the neighborhood that may have lost a pet and would like assistance finding them. The group will create signs for lost pets and be on the lookout! Next, five more our students chose to sponsor a Walker School clothes drive, and many of the residents in the neighborhood (thanks to one of the participants moms) donated over 15 bags of clothes to donate to the Purple Heart organization. Finally, a group of six boys who are passionate about helping sick dogs held a "hot dog" fundraiser, knowing the Humane Society puts medicine in the hot dogs to feed to sick pets. We collected hundreds of hot dogs to donate to the Humane Society! We can't wait for the coming months to carry out the rest of the projects we've planned- stay tuned! Team Excellence West: Excellence West students and teachers are very proud of the hard work and effort that went in to making our first Learning Exhibition night a success! Students invited district and school board members along with individuals from the community as a way to receive authentic feedback on their plans. Our students presented their new learning as experts on the topic. Walker Elementary is working hard to empower students to be leaders in their community today and in the future. It is amazing to see the changes we can make with our own two hands! Team Endurance: Our class wrapped up their Winter MAPS testing. MAPs test asks students to demonstrate and apply their knowledge and skills in areas of Math and Reading. Our classroom as a whole showed growth! Good job Team Endurance! We are beginning on our next Project Based Learning unit it is about Habitats around the world. For this project students will pick a specific habitat that they would like to learn more about. It can be anywhere in the world (and there are many choices). When their research is complete, they will create an animal that showcases all they have learned. As the creator and designer of the animal, they decide what their animal needs to survive and where their animal with thrive. This Month in Specials and Clubs..SEL - The past 4 weeks we have been working on our Second Step Child Protection Unit. Students are doing a great job learning different ways to Recognize (tell if something is safe or unsafe), Refuse (use words that mean no), and Report (tell an adult) within different safety scenarios and are learning a variety of safety rules. Second Step has a great online portal that provides Family Access that allows you to view what your child is learning about and resources called 'Home Links' to practice safety skills at home with your child. To access the online materials simply go to secondstep.org and use the application code listed below that applies to your child's grade level. Team Persistence and Team Respect Activation Code: CPUK FAMI LYGK Team Diversity, Team Integrity, and Team Endurance: CPUK FAMI LYG2 Team Excellence East and Excellence West: CPUK FAMI LYG4 (*Activation codes need to follow the letter capitalization and spacing to activate correctly.) GCT - There are many exciting things happening with the Walker GCT! First off, chess club in is full swing. Chess club is open to any student who would like to play/learn how to play. Students participate in chess club on Mondays during the lunch hour. Focusing on sportsmanship, strategy building and patience, students who participate in chess club cultivate skills that apply not only to the game, but to the rest of their academic world as well! With roughly 25 students in attendance each week, this has been a great way for students to connect and grow! If your student expresses interest in joining, it is not too late! Have your child talk to their classroom teacher and their teacher will let me know they want to join in on this challenging fun. I would also like to extend congratulations to the Walker Spelling Bee winners! First place finisher Tanner Proeber, second place finisher Masyn Brown and third place finisher Coleton Cohen will head to the district level bee on January 30th at Central High School to participate as first and second place spellers, and third place speller alternate. This is an amazing accomplishment I wish them well as they represent Walker! As always, please check out our weekly blog to find out about the great day to day things happening at each school that I support. https://robertsonk43.wixsite.com/website ~Ms. Robertson~ Student Council -
Walker Student Council has partnered up with the Hope Closet located in West Allis. We are collecting new pajamas for children and young adults. We are a little over half way to our goal!!! Please continue to help us serve others in our community by donating new pajamas sizes 2T- young adults. Thank you for your support! |