Principal's Corner

Greetings, Kindi Families!

I would like to wish you all a Happy New Year! May this year be a year of peace, prosperity and happiness for all.  As we move into the second half of the 2018-2019 school year, we ask our families to be mindful of consistently establishing the necessary routines to ensure that your students are in attendance and on-time each morning to get each school day off to a great start. As always, we appreciate your support as our teachers and students strive to maximize their instructional time shared each day.

The New Year is always a time of reflection but also a time for resolutions. Encourage your child to outperform themselves. Teaching them to always have a new personal record (PR) to break. When my son was in track in High school, he had a magnificent and beloved track coach. The coach taught the runners that the only competition he expected of them was to always “compete against your own personal record”. My son and his team were always asked to perform better than they performed in the previous meet. Winning is not about the other competitors rather winning is showing consistent improvement. This means as a runner my son was winning against his own best time in all races. So, in school and in life, we should always tell our children to look to our Personal Records and to always try to top it.

As we continue to focus on proper everyday etiquette and kindness with all of our wonderful students, let us continue to emphasize the importance of saying “thank you”, “excuse me”, and “Please”. These and many more proper ways of speaking with others is a way to create a kind and caring environment. It is also a great way to raise positive and eloquent citizens of the future. Please talk to your children about proper behavior everyday, this is an ongoing Home-School-Community project. .


In closing, we want to thank all of you, our families, for your continuous support for our students and teachers as we look forward to an outstanding New Year here at Kindi!

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Our 3-6 Class Updates!

What a December! On behalf of our entire staff, we would like to thank our families for making our holiday season brighter. Your gifts and your thoughtfulness were much appreciated! Wishing you all a prosperous and Happy New Year!
 
Our children all worked very hard practicing for the Winter Performance. They performed “Winter Wonderland” and “Here Comes the Sun” as well as a Spanish song and an Arabic song.
 
Although we were busy with the Winter Performance, our students were still working very hard. Kindergarten is continuing their research and study on the world.
 
After much observation, Dr. Maria Montessori observed that a child’s mind is like a sponge. Over time, a sponge will dry up, but the child’s mind does not dry up. It incorporates what it soaks up. This is what Dr. Maria Montessori called ‘The Absorbent Mind‘.  Dr. Montessori said, “Our work is not to teach, but to help the absorbent mind in its work of development. How marvelous it would be if by our help, if by an intelligent treatment of the child, if by understanding the needs of his physical life and by feeding his intellect, we could prolong the period of functioning of the absorbent mind!”
 
We would like to invite you to partner with us in prolonging the period of functioning of the absorbent mind.
 
We are looking forward to an even better second half of the year. 

NEWS FROM OUR 6-9 CLASS

         A very Happy New Year to our students and their families. 
We hope everyone had a safe and enjoyable Winter Break.
                                                                             
            We hope everyone enjoyed the Winter Celebration. All of the students worked very hard on their performance in “The Lion King” play. We are glad that all of their hard work paid off.
 
            Our class will begin Junior Achievement for all three grades in the coming weeks. Junior Achievement is a set of free classes offered to students funded by the state and businesses. Its mission is to inspire and prepare young people to succeed in a global economy. We will be asking for parent volunteers in the coming emails.
 
We have entered the second half of the school year and it is going to be one busy rest of the school year. Our First year students in the month of January will be working on:  parts of a reptile, parts of a leaf, landforms, nouns, word study, time, measurement and bead frame addition and subtraction.  
 
The Second year students in the month of January will be working on:   fractions, types of roots and types of leaves, types of verbs, times tables, checkerboard multiplication and planet research: Mars, and Africa- continent study.
 
The Third year students in the month of January will be working on:  measuring angles using a protractor, area and perimeter, adding and subtracting mixed and whole fractions,  abstract long division, plant and animal cells, ancient civilizations, and      Asia- continent study. 
  
            

News from our 4th & 5th Graders

​The Upper Elementary class is finishing up their third round of novels - this time with a fantasy theme.  The class chose between The Phantom Tollbooth, A Wrinkle in Time and Half Magic.  We have had exciting discussions, clarifying the plot and are looking forward to our new round of novels that will begin next week.


The AR Book Contest began in November.  We are tracking the books we are reading in our free time on a monthly basis.  December readers have pushed our totals up!  Prizes will be awarded to top readers.


Fourth grade science students have been exploring the plant kingdom.  We have begun comparing and contrasting plants that flower, plants that produce cones, and the plants that produce spores.  We have placed avocado pits in water and will be tracking what happens next!

Social studies in fourth and fifth grade focused on our presentations for Cultural Day.  We had a great turnout and thoroughly enjoyed sharing our research on India and Pakistan with our families.

News From Our Middle School

All students have been exploring the histories and culture of Ireland and/or Mexico.  Students have researched either food, clothing, architecture, or crafts/entertainment of their countries.  This project is to explore and celebrate different cultures around the world. Some students brought traditional dishes to share such as soda bread and Mexican Mole! Other students dressed up in traditional Irish or Mexican clothing.  6th-8th grade students presented on Dec. 20th to parents, staff, and other students about their country and topic.
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  We have been busy reading, writing and editing in English.  We recently finished Animal Farm, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and The Hobbit.  We interact daily in discussion groups, dissecting themes, language and historical contexts.  Students finished a research paper, and are working on how to properly cite sources and use in-text citations.  The sixth graders will begin a creative road map project for The Hobbit.  
In grammar, we are concluding verbs and learning how to easily navigate the various tenses.  We continue to analyze sentence structures and technically break down parts of speech. We continue with our paragraph edits, readworks to improve our comprehension, and our AR book club.

Above are some pictures captured when our kids were busy in the gym! (Our Upper Elementary & Middle Schoolers)


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Updates from our Science Classroom!

7th and 8th graders helped get the science classroom ready for Cultural Day. We were Méjico! The 5th graders were creating structures to test to see if they would survive an "earthquake" -gelatin trays.

The 5th graders were also learning about volcanoes. They shared what they learned and had fun making their volcanoes "erupt"

​News From Our Arabic Room!

​We were-working hard in the previous month to prepare for our cultural day, about the Arabic countries around the Mediterranean Sea.We learned about the traditional food, cultural clothes and the traditional crafts.
Our students worked hard and did a wonderful job in their presentations.