Lower School Division News: Oct. 3, 2024

By Dr. Debra Sass, Lower School Division Head

Dear parents,

October is the month designated for raising learning disability awareness.  If you have a child with a learning difference, you may have experienced the frustrations of watching your bright and talented child struggle with everyday tasks like finishing homework or following instructions at school.  There is an emerging consensus among researchers that many disabilities are fundamentally a disorder of executive skills.  Chief among these are response inhibition, sustained attention, working memory, time management, task initiation, and goal-directed persistence.  Executive skills are increasingly critical for success in a complex world. 

Winston teachers support the development of executive skills by creating whole-class routines that help students develop skills such as organization, planning, working memory, and time management.  They also embed instruction in executive skills into subject matter teaching.  They teach children how to break down long-term assignments into subtasks and develop timelines for subtask completion.  They build in homework routines to ensure that students remember to hand in their homework and end-of-day routines to help children remember to check their assignment books and put everything they need for homework in their backpacks. They develop classroom rules for behavior that help children control their impulses and manage their emotions.  They review the rules regularly and at opportune times.  Winston teachers are dedicated to teaching kids to be self-sufficient, responsible, and proud.

You can reinforce what’s happening in the classroom by teaching your children  "self-reminding" skills and holding them accountable for using these skills.  Helping children learn these skills gives them valuable tools that will empower them to realize their full potential. In addition to ongoing instruction at home, I think it’s important to celebrate each success.  For example, designate a “Wall of Wins” in your house.  It’s really simple – just write down wins/achievements on sticky notes.  The idea is to fill the designated wall with sticky notes documenting all the cool things that the child has done. 

The Wall of Wins can help you to:

• Talk about successes in or out of school
• Brighten bad days
• Increase motivation
• Build confidence

Write down as many wins as possible, regardless of how small.  For example, record challenges they’ve overcome, times when they’ve improved, nice things people have said to them, things they’ve done to help others, certificates, times they felt really confident and proud, the completion of big assignments or projects, and goals they’ve achieved.  For children with a learning difference, organizing something, or identifying a problem and solving it could even be classified as wins.

Steady wins the race,

Dr. Debra Sass

A LOOK AHEAD 

Wednesday, October 9 - 3rd Grade Fieldtrip: State Fair Livestock, 8:30 a.m. - 2:45 p.m.

Wednesday, October 9 - Fire Emergency Practice, 10:30 a.m.

Friday, October 11 - Early Dismissal (Professional Development)

Our amazing faculty will have the afternoon engaged in professional learning. Please make arrangements for Lower and Middle School students to be picked up at 12 p.m. Upper School students will be dismissed at 12:25 p.m. 

Childcare is available for students in Kindergarten through sixth grade. You can register here to reserve your spot. 

NOTE: There is no childcare/aftercare supervision offered for students in grades 7-12.

Monday, October 14 - Indigenous People’s Day [NO SCHOOL]

Thursday, October 17 - Admission Coffee

If you know someone who is looking for a new school home for their bright student who learns differently, please share our information and encourage them to join us for one of our monthly admission events! Our best referrals come from our current families and we would be honored for you to share your successes and love for Winston! Share our inquiry form with any potential future Eagles!

Friday, October 18 - Fall Conferences [NO SCHOOL], 8 a.m. - 4 p.m.

We look forward to welcoming you to campus to share with you insight into your student’s journey this year at Winston. These conferences are for parents and teachers only.

Tuesday, October 22 - Class of 2025 Pictures and K-11 Retakes

Monday, November 4 - Friday, November 8 - Homecoming Spirit Week

Details coming soon!

Friday, November 22 - Grandparent & Special Friends Day

Lower School: 8:30 - 11:30 a.m.
Middle & Upper School: 12 - 3 p.m.

Friday, November 22 - Lower School Fall Concert, 11 a.m.

GENERAL UPDATES

WINSTON ROCKS THE SECOND STATEWIDE CHALLENGE IN PRODIGY
Prodigy is an adaptive math program that is assistive while providing a gamified math experience incentivized by the self-paced, student-led, and teacher-directed activities aligned with the current classroom curriculum and adapted to students’ math learning levels in real-time. Prodigy hosts a state-wide class challenge every 2 weeks. In the second state-wide challenge of the school year, Winston students hold the lead!

1st place: K-1, 4th, 5th, 6th grades
3rd place: 3rd grade
9th place: 2nd grade