UNIVERSAL AMERICAN SCHOOL E L E M E N TA RY N E W S L E T T E R - J U N E 2 015
Mr. Eric Webb Universal American School of Dubai Elementary Principal
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PRINCIPAL’S NOTES The last few weeks of the school year at most international schools are emotional times. At UAS the annual “emotional roller coaster” is already rolling. UAS faculty members that came together from all over the world, are, as usual, expecting that part of the faculty will be scattering at the end of the year to posts all over the world. We know we have good teachers hired to take up the mission next August, and we are happy for our colleagues who will be “seeing the world” as they travel to their new assignments, but it is still hard to see our friends and colleagues go.
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Indonesia, Egypt, Japan, Malaysia, USA, Canada, Luxemburg, Pakistan, and The Cayman Islands are some of the places that UAS Elementary Teachers will be headed for the next school year, with our well wishes still ringing in their ears. We wish the very best for Mr. Rush (Mr. Z), Ms. Schuessler, Ms. Rastin, Ms. Kirk, Ms. Dolley, Ms. Shaughnessy, Ms. Dear, Ms. Fincham, Mr. McIsaac, Ms. Greenberg, Ms. Gerlach, Ms. Hawkes, Ms. Dunfee, Ms. Siwiec (Ms. Kim), Ms. Terry, and Mr. Padilla. My wife, Sheri, and I are also departing this year (returning to the USA for family reasons), and learning, as we suspected, that as hard as it is to see others leave, it is even harder to leave ourselves. Watching a dozen friends leave every year has been hard; leaving a UAS Faculty and Staff of over two hundred friends and respected colleagues, a student body of over 800 of the greatest kids in the world, and scores of the most wonderful friends in the parent community is hard…extremely hard. The UAS School Community has been very much “home” for those of us leaving, and we thank the hundreds of colleagues, students, and parents that make it such a welcoming, supportive, and caring home. I always say to others, “Be happy that the departure is hard. That means your heart was touched, your time was good, your desire to stay was strong. Far better that the departure is hard than that the departure was a happy escape! Then your heart was not touched and your time was not good, so you had no desire to stay.” So, I guess, I should be glad that leaving is so hard… Thank you, school community of UAS, and Dubai, for making leaving so hard. Calendar June 17 W 18 Th
Possible first day of Ramadan (Length of school day impacted)
22 M
Noon dismissal Last day of classes for 2014-2015 school year Ramadan hours for school employees Elementary and Secondary 2nd Semester reports posted to Portal
August 31 M
1st day of classes for 2015-2016 school year
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Ms. Stephanie Stone and Miss Kim Universal American School of Dubai Elementary Counselors
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COUNSELOR’S CORNER Positive Parenting Tips for Summer The Elementary Counseling Department wishes you all a relaxing summer filled with positive family time. To help, we are offering some useful positive parenting tips for the summer months and beyond. Sibling conflicts: Stay on the sidelines of sibling arguments (unless it becomes extremely physical) and help your children learn to appropriately express their 3
negative feelings. At school we teach students to use the "magic sentence." The sentence includes phrases such as "I feel" "because" "I want you to" and "I am willing to." Example: "I feel angry because you called me a name and I want you to stop. I am willing to stop calling you names." Using the magic sentence requires practice and parental guidance. It may feel contrived at first, but if your children and you get into the habit of thinking and stating your feelings rather than acting out, you'll find it opens up the lines of communication and decreases outbursts. Encourage your children to listen to the other person’s magic sentence and repeat back what they understand they heard. If they think they heard, "You said you don't want me calling you a frog face -- even though you really are one. And you want me to stop, but I won't until you do" then they may have to listen (or repeat it again) until they get it right. Discipline: Children develop security, increased self-esteem and have fewer behavioral problems when in an environment that provides consistency, rules, consequences, praise and positive acclamations. Consistency means your behavior as a parent is absolutely predictable; this is key. To a child this means, "Every time I throw a fit in the store, Mom or Dad will leave the store." If you give in once, it's like a lottery ticket that pays off. Winning once is addicting. If the ticket never paid, no one would ever put money in. Having rules in print is important. When the child breaks a rule, the parent can point to a printed sheet and ask, "What is the rule?" This takes the heat off the parent as the bad guy and places it on the "rule." Rules must be clearly stated and reasonable for the child's age, developmental level and emotional stability. In some situations, the rules can be created with the child, which creates buy-in. For example: The rule might read: "Johnny’s bed time is 8 p.m." When Johnny tries to negotiate for a later time, the parent asks the child, "What is the rule?" and the answer is clear. Also choose consequences that fit when rules are broken. Coming home late from a friend's house should result in your child not being able to see the friend for a few days. Missing a trip to an amusement park as punishment does not fit this offense. Praise is also important. Look for the good in your child and praise it. Sometimes parents must look hard to find something to praise, but you still should look for it. Also work to build your child's self-esteem through positive acclamations, such as 4
"You know Susie, I love you because you're my daughter, but I really like you because you're kind." Messages like these really help in building self-esteem, especially when they are unearned and spontaneous. Your child will always appreciate them. Parental conflicts: Two wonderful words can be used when your child wants to engage in an unending argument with you or chooses to defy your authority. They are "nevertheless" and "regardless." For example: Parent: Tom, please pick up your room and then feed the dog. Child: But Mom, Nelly never has to do any chores. Parent: Nevertheless, I want you to pick up your room and feed the dog. By using these simple argument deflectors you can avoid the confrontation and negotiation and keep the child's focus on the issue. These deflectors can be used to avoid arguments in almost any situation. In resolving conflicts at home, especially those regarding how thoroughly your children have accomplished their chores, it helps to specify the task while being direct and to the point. In this way, there is no confusion. You will have the greatest success if you keep the statements short and direct, and you child will feel more successful upon completion. As always, don't forget to praise a job well done. Parenting is hard work with no instruction manual. Therefore, we must try new things, hone our skills, learn from and support each other and give ourselves a break when we have rough days. Source: ASCA School Counselor, 7/13/2011, Trish Hatch, Ph.D. Enjoy Your Summer! A final farewell to the students and parents in the UAS community. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank the students and parents throughout the UAS community. It has been an absolute pleasure getting to know you over the last three years. I will be beginning a new chapter in my International counseling career working as a Middle School Counselor at Cayman International School in August. I leave UAS with the fondest memories and am going to miss all of your smiling faces. Have a wonderful, rest-filled summer! You deserve it! Miss Kim
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ANNOUCEMENTS
SUMMER PRACTICE PACKETS! Don’t let summer brain drain happen! Download our grade level Summer Practice Packets off of the Elementary School blog now! Please visit our Summer Practice Packet Site!
As summer vacation approaches, it’s imperative that the adults in the lives of children help provide structures to prevent summer brain drain. Summer brain drain is not a myth and according to a study by Dr. Harris Cooper, professor of psychology at the University of Missouri-Columbia many students return to school after a long summer vacation with a loss of one to three months worth of learning. Universal American School is supporting families by providing optional Summer Practice Packets for the elementary school grade levels. These packets are available on the portal and at the end of this blog post. In addition to the provided practice, UAS teachers and administrators recommend the following tips to ensure children retain educational skills and come back to school in the fall ready to continue their learning: Math: The decline in skills is more detrimental for math than it is for reading. Consistency with short amounts of math practice is more important than sitting a child down for long amounts of time for just a few times over the summer. Children should use the websites provided by UAS teachers and/or use the Summer Math Packets provided by grade levels for 15 minutes a day.
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Reading: Litter your house with books and magazines for your child to devour over the summer. While setting a certain number of minutes to read everyday can be effective, studies show that children excel with reading when an adult models attributes of a good reader. Read to your children or set a family reading time where each of you read together as a group or independently and then talk about what readings. For book suggestions, please visit the UAS Summer Book Drive site. Social/Emotional: Summer is a time for recharging and a time for play. As parents, we want our children to be happy and healthy. Happiness and healthy lifestyles are developed through healthy relationships. Take the time to nurture these relationships and sneak in a little bit of learning consistently along the way. See the article Practical Tips to Prevent “Summer Brain Drain� The UAS faculty and administration wish you a happy and healthy summer! Thank you for letting us be your partner in education and thank you for continuing to support your children in their educational journey. End of PreK Summer Packet End of KG1 Summer Packet End of KG2 Summer Packet End of Grade 1 Summer Packet End of Grade 2 Summer Packet End of Grade 3 Summer Packet End of Grade 4 Summer Packet End of Grade 5 Summer Packet End of Grade 6 Summer Packet
ANNOUCEMENTS
UAS SUMMER READING Summer Reading Program with Universal American School! #uasreads Dear Parents, Summer reading – it’s important! Research shows that kids who read four or more books over the summer are better prepared for the coming school year and do not go down the ‘summer slide’ – the loss of reading skills during the summer break. Reading over the summer months really does make a difference to your child’s learning. Here are four easy ways you can help your child reduce summer reading loss: Make reading important Be a role model for reading! Let your child see you reading throughout the day. Join in our summer reading challenge! Give your child the power of choice The key to helping kids love reading is to let them choose their own reading materials. In fact, 92% of children and teens say they are more motivated to read and more likely to finish a book that they have selected. Use the suggestions below as a starting point for choosing great summer reads!
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Set aside time to read everyday We know that the more kids read, the better they become at reading. During the summer, encourage your child to read for at least 20 minutes a day. Talk it up! Talking about books during and after reading helps with comprehension. Encourage your kids to share their ideas. Talk to them about what you are reading as well! How the UAS Summer Reading Program works: 1. As you read, upload a picture or comment to either Twitter or Instagram using the hashtag #uasreads 2. Remember that students and parents can take part in this challenge and by using the hashtag, we will be able to create a community of summer readers via social media! Imagine checking your Twitter account and seeing that our very own director has hashtagged his reading using #uasreads 3. Note that if your children do not have their own Twitter or Instagram accounts, with your permission, they could use your account to take part. Otherwise, it will be fine for your child to keep a list of what they have read and they can then share it with us when they return from summer. 4. At the end of summer, those who taken part in the summer reading program will be entered into a random draw to win a book voucher! What better prize to continue to encourage reading motivation, hey?! Looking for ideas on what to read? http://www.teach-nology.com/summerreading/ http://childrensbooks.about.com/od/forparents/tp/summer_reading.htm https://www.goodreads.com/list/tag/childrens Happy summer reading! We can’t wait to check #uasreads to see the reading adventures that everyone is having
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SUMMER BOOK DRIVE UAS is hosting a summer book drive! Go to our Summer Book Drive site to find a list of books that are appropriate for your child to read this summer. Have them read it and then donate it to UAS for others to enjoy! Visit: UAS Summer Book Drive
Universal American School is having a book drive! Why? • In order to continue to foster a love of reading and develop reading skills in our students, we are in the process of building our elementary and middle school classroom libraries. • While we have purchased many books for our class libraries (with many more due to arrive for the 2015-16 school year), we will also be VERY grateful for book donations that students, parents and families are able to make. • The better our classroom libraries, the more excited our students are to read, grow and learn.
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What happens? • Upon donation, a “Donated by…” sticker will be placed in the front of the book recognizing the donor. This will be a fun and important way of acknowledging these generous donations. • After returning from summer, there will be a place in the UAS foyer for you to place your book donations. • Once all books are collected, we will then ensure that they find appropriate homes in our classroom libraries, ready for the students to learn from and enjoy.
Wondering what to purchase? • Click on this link to see suggested book titles. If you spot a title you would like to donate, simply enter your name next to the title and submit the form. The list is full of appropriate suggestions but of course, if there are other appropriate books that you would love to donate, then we will gratefully receive it. • Also note that if you wish to buy multiple copies of a book (up to 4) then this means that we will be able to place a copy of that book in each grade level classroom. For example, if you LOVE the book “The Lightening Thief” by Rick Riordan, it would be a fine idea to buy multiple copies of it so they can be placed in multiple classrooms.
Thank you for any donations you can make. Our students will really benefit from each and every contribution!
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C E L E B R AT I O N S
THE UAS SPELLING BEE On Wednesday, June 10th our UAS students held their culminating event for the Spelling Bee! Congratulations spellers!
Leading up the this year’s Spelling Bee, classes held friendly competitions to identify the student who would represent their grade level at the annual UAS Spelling Bee. All did a wonderful job and showed poise under pressure as they spelled their way through the day. Congratulations to the following class spellers and to our grand speller, Joseph Salem from 5N! Winner: Joseph Salem - 5N 2nd Place: Anshuman  Bhattacharyya - 6L 3rd Place: Aditya Sengupta - 3F 4th Place: Rain Goff - 4G 5th Place: Majid Hameed - 4A 6th Place: Ishaq Breiwish - 5G 7th Place: Zuhyr Kabir - 3F 8th Place: Mansur Popal - 6Q
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C E L E B R AT I O N S
TALENT SHOW AND MUSICALS
UAS is proud of our students for exploring their creative side. Grade 1 students performed in their final musical and grade 4 students showed off what they can do in their talent show. Well done students!
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