Clinton Township Newsletter

I N OUR S S C H O O LS: Spruce Run School Kindergarten Round-Up! Kindergarten Round-Up is now occurring at Spruce Run School. A child must be 5 years of age on or before October 1, 2013 to be eligible for kindergarten during the 2013-2014 school year. If you have a child who will be eligible for kindergarten next year, please notify our school as soon as possible by visiting our website to download and return the Kindergarten Round-Up Survey. In addition to the survey, completed kindergarten registration packets are due by March 28, 2013–visit our school website to download the registration packet. After your child is registered for kindergarten, Kindergarten Screenings will be held by appointment during the week of April 29 – May 3, 2013. We'd like to invite parents of incoming kindergarten students to our Kindergarten Information Night on March 7 at 7:00 pm at Spruce Run School. Do you have questions about the kindergarten registration process? Please email Mrs. Redmond at kredmond@ ctsd.k12.nj.us or 908-735-7916 ext 208. Thank you! C T S D M i ss i o n S t a t e m e n t : The Clinton Township School District, in partnership with the community, achieves excellence for each child by ensuring a meaningful and challenging educational experience in a supportive environment, developing life-long learners who are responsible and productive citizens. Child Assault Prevention Program: The Clinton Township School District has once again received a grant from the NJ Child Assault Prevention Program to present workshops for our parents, children and teachers in grades K, 5 and 6. The CAP Project is a comprehensive primary prevention program. CAP utilizes a three-pronged approach to community prevention education: training of staff, parents and children. CAP strategies include self assertion, peer support, effective communication and reporting skills. CAP programs are presented with a view of assault as a violation of the basic human rights to be 'Safe, Strong and Free'. During the week of February 4 at SRS and RVS, students in kindergarten, fifth and sixth grades will be participating in the Child Assault Prevention (CAP) Project. We are all concerned about the safety of our children. We hope that you, as parents, will join us in learning about and supporting this fine prevention program. P at r i c k M c g a h e r a n S c h o o l PMG Has Talent! The Annual PMG Talent Show was held on January 18. Organized and run by the PTA, the show was a huge success! This year there were over 40 acts! Mr. Verderamo, one of PMG's second grade teachers, was the emcee. Teachers performed the "Bones" dance. Student acts included dance, gymnastics, instrumental performances and singing. A great time was had by all! Reading at PMG: Second and third grade students at PMGS are developing their comprehension, fluency, vocabulary, and love of reading. Comprehension, understanding and interpreting what is read, is the ultimate goal of reading. Children need instruction in comprehension to become more proficient readers. Comprehension develops through reading and listening to texts being read aloud. Parents can enhance their child's comprehension skills by reading text to them that they would not Round Valley School On Friday, January 4, RVS had its Annual Geography Bee. All students participate in Round I of the Geography Bee. Round II was held right before the Winter Break to establish our ten finalists. The month of December is Geography Month where each day the students are presented a question of the day.  Students can research the answer in their homeroom and verify if they are correct the following day. On the 4th, the ten finalists competed in an oral competition in front of the school–it was be able to read themselves. When reading with your child or grandchild, stop periodically and say, "Let's see if we remember what I just read. Think about who the story was about and what happened." Do this 3 or 4 times throughout the story. Fluency is vital to comprehension and it is one of the most common reading problems. According to the National Reading Panel, 2000, fluency is reading "... with speed, accuracy, and proper expression. We tell our students that, "good reading sounds like talking". Paired reading, (Topping, 1987) is a procedure that has been shown to increase fluency with the help of parents at home. Paired reading sessions begin with the adult reading a chosen passage to the child. Next, the two read the passage several times in unison. The child uses a prearranged signal when he or she wants to take over the reading and read alone. As the child reads, the adult may correct errors in word recognition by saying the word, having the child repeat the sentence in which the word a real nail biter. We had two championship tie breakers to establish our Geography Bee winner. Congratulations to Sam Weiss for first place. Sam advances to the next stage by taking a written test. During February, Round Valley's fifth and sixth grade students will participate in the Child Assault Prevention (CAP) Project. The CAP project aims to prevent child assault by teaching children to recognize and deal with potentially dangerous situations, and by training teachers and parents to help prevent the victimization ADULT CAP programs preceded the children's programming and covered the prevention and empowerment strategies used in the children's workshops. Suggestions were provided for the most effective ways to support those strategies at home, school and in the community. Teachers participated in a training session led by the CAP Coordinator prior to the workshops for children, and parents were invited and encouraged to attend our Parent/Guardian CAP training in January. KINDERGARTEN CAP workshops are designed for children ages 5 to 6. Classroom workshops consist of one-hour sessions, presented on two consecutive days by three CAP facilitators. Time is included for individual review of the program following the workshop, within the classroom. Children's rights and personal safety issues are taught through the use of pictures, dolls, songs and role plays. The classroom workshop trains children to recognize potentially dangerous situations, and to make effective use of the options available to them. n appears, and then continuing to read. Paired Reading is an excellent strategy to help your child become more fluent on challenging text. We're thrilled! This spring students at PMGS will be participating in a Student Publishing center. Thanks to a grant from the Clinton Township Foundation for Excellence, each student will select one piece of writing to transform into a published book. Teachers will encourage students to write, revise, and edit their writing and then submit it to the publishing center. Once the student's writing is received, it will be bound into a book. We applaud the young writers at PMG and are excited that they will have this opportunity. If you're looking to recycle hard cover books, consider donating them to PMGS. We'll be cutting off the covers to use them for our Student Publishing Centers. The pages will be recycled. You may drop off books in the main office addressed to Roberta Grambor. n of children. The program has three components: a parent program, a teacher/staff in service, and individual classroom workshops for children. Adult CAP programs precede the children's programming and cover the prevention and empowerment strategies used in the children's workshops.  Suggestions were provided for the most effective ways to support those strategies at home, school and in the community.  Teachers participated in a training session led by the CAP Coordinator prior to the workshops for children, and parents were invited to attend a Parent/Guardian CAP training. n C l i n to n T ow n s h i p M i d d l e S c h o o l It is Relay season, and the CTMS American Cancer Society Relay for Life is in full swing! Mark your calendars for Friday, February 22 from 6:00-9:00. There's still time to join a team, start a team, or donate to your favorite relay member at http://relay.acsevents. org/site/TR?fr_id=53399&pg=entry. Community groups and businesses are welcome to start a team of your own or advertise at our event. Contact Ms. Cormican dcormican@ctsd.k12.nj.us if you have any questions or would like to help with the relay! F Our National Geographic Geography (in January) had 18 finalists competing. In third place we had Siddharth Datar and Urszula Wisniewska. Michael Jinks came in second. It was a grueling competition, and Kyle Piekarski walked away with the school medal for his fourth win in a row! Kyle will now take the qualifying test for the NJ State competition. Congratulations! The CTMS Law Adventure classes submitted three original case briefs to the NJ Bar Foundation. The competition is for 7th and 8th graders all around the state, and our students won first place last year. This e b r u a r y 2 0 1 3 year we submitted 2 motor vehicle cases and one social networking/slander case. We'll find out if any of our entries have won in March. The CTMS Ski Club had a very successful, fun and memorable ski season at Shawnee Mountain! One hundred thirty students and 10 teachers traveled to Shawnee each week, and the students received group instruction. This was a great opportunity for the kids to learn a life long skill and sport, and have lots of fun, too! A big thank you to the NHHS Band and Chorus for putting on a fantastic show for CTMS students and staff on January 22! n 11

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