Letter from the MC Principal
Hello MC families,
When our counselor Ms. Lee made our last drop off to the APS Food Hub our contact Ms. Floyd expressed immense gratitude. At the APS Food Hub families are able to sign up for appointments and shop like they would in a grocery store, allowing them to acquire food for their families with dignity. According to Ms. Lee:
[Ms. Floyd] explained that as a result of the food our school donated, she has stocked the shelves of the Food Hub and she has enough remaining food that she can now use her grant money to stock the fridges and freezers with meat, eggs, milk and fresh fruit. She is also able to offer more appointments each week. Our food drive has made a real impact in supporting families in APS. Thank you all for your support of the drive!”
Thank you school family for your generosity. Additionally, given that these can be difficult times, if anyone is in need of resources please reach out to our counselor Ms. Lee (klee@atlncs.org) and she can coordinate.
During Morning Meeting on Monday students learned about the various holidays that are being celebrated in this season including Hanukkah, Las Posadas, Winter Solstice Yule, Soyal, Christmas, Kwanzaa, and Three Kings Day. I’m grateful for the opportunity that our students have to celebrate and learn about the various cultural celebrations that occur at this time of year.
The Spelling Bee will take place after school today – best of luck to all of the participants!
This week please remind your student to take a look for items they’ve left behind in the lost and found. There are lots of hoodies, jackets, sweatshirts, lunch boxes, tupperware, and water bottles in the lost and found. If something is missing at home, it’s probably at school. We will donate everything at the end of this week.
Please remember that on Friday, December 19th, dismissal is at noon (12:00pm) and all students must be picked up at that time. There is NO After Care at the Middle Campus that day, but the Boys and Girls Club is open. If your student needs a sack lunch that afternoon, they should let their Advisor know by Wednesday so that the Nutrition Staff can plan accordingly.
As you know, Toddle is our new grade reporting and class communication website. Teachers are recording formative data and summative feedback on this platform. Math teachers (and those in some other subject areas where applicable) are reporting on homework completion. Teachers will wrap up end of semester grading and narrative report writing by the week after the Winter Break ends, and those reports will go out in Toddle in mid-January.
You can also find information about what your students are currently learning in class by way of the “Bi-Weekly Messages” that are posted and by way of the “Units” link on your student’s profile. I encourage you to login to Toddle and take a look at the various information that is available about your student’s classes and pertaining to your student’s performance on assessments. This video walks you through ways to find and interpret some of this information. FYI MAP scores can be found on Toddle as well. After logging in, click on your student’s name in the top right of the screen (there will be a little down arrow next to your student’s name) and select “My Profile.” Once you click on that, click on the link that says “Student Files” under your student’s name and email (top left of the Profile page).
Reviewing grades and working on summatives as we close out the semester can be a source of stress for students. As students are working through each semester please encourage your students to take breaks and take time to do the things that help them calm and decompress. More importantly, it’s very important that we are all promoting a growth mindset for our children.
Fixed Mindset: “In a fixed mindset, people believe their basic qualities, like their intelligence or talent, are simply fixed traits. They spend their time documenting their intelligence or talent instead of developing them. They also believe that talent alone creates success—without effort.” (Dweck, 2015)
Growth Mindset: “In a growth mindset, people believe that their most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work—brains and talent are just the starting point. This view creates a love of learning and a resilience that is essential for great accomplishment.” (Dweck, 2015)
Chasing grades and test scores increases stress levels for students. At school we emphasize growth in alignment with the work of Carol Dweck, and we encourage you to do the same. Promoting a growth mindset helps all students know that they can be successful. It helps students recognize that we all have strengths and areas of growth that may look different across subject areas and that’s okay. It’s important for students and families to have healthy mindsets around school work in order to help our children navigate challenges, build resiliency, and lower stress and anxiety. Our children are learning and growing everyday and it’s important that we are supporting them through the ups and downs while helping them build lifelong skills.
Thank you for your support as we close out a great first semester. We hope that you have a peaceful and restorative break. I am looking forward to spending time with family, watching sports, binge watching a few shows, and generally relaxing. Happy Holidays, and we will see you in January!
Kind regards,
Mark
Mark Sanders
Mark Sanders began teaching at ANCS in 2011. Before coming to the school, Mr. Sanders worked in New York City. He spent three years teaching 7th and 8th grade mathematics at Middle School 50 in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and two years at Harlem Village Academies teaching Geometry and Algebra 2/Trigonometry. He taught 8th grade Math/Science/Technology at ANCS for five years.
