P is for Pride of a job well done

E is for Energy to keep on going

R is for Respecting and believing in yourself

S is for Sticking to it and carrying on

E is for Effort to stay motivated

V is for Vowing to hang in there

E is for expecting to get to your goal

R is for reaching beyond and taking risks

A is for Appreciating our hard work

N is for Never giving up, never quitting

C is for Commitment to the task

E is for Endurance to the end!

Other buddies wore signs with words that mean perseverance like “Grits and guts,” “Spunk,” “Pursue your goal,” “Be determined,” etc. Pictures of the Perseverance Cougars are on the bulletin board outside the office and their designed posters of the PERSEVERANCE letters are hanging in the MPR.  Photos of our Perseverance Cougars are on the photo gallery page.   Thank you PERSEVERANCE Crocker Cougars.

Do you have some burning questions that you have been dying to ask me?  Are you wondering about the state of the school, what we are doing and where we are going?  Well, we have a “Coffee with the Principal” on Friday morning at 8:45 a.m. in the Art Room.  Stop on by and bring your questions…or just come on by to listen and hear what the hot topics might be!  (Well, maybe lukewarm topics…)

Beth Rhine

Dear Crocker Community,

As many of you know, recently there have been many discussions regarding the expanded boundaries and the impact on enrollment at Crocker Highlands Elementary. We were able to add an additional kindergarten class this year to accommodate all our neighborhood families but that is a short-term solution.

We are having a meeting with David Montes de Oca, Executive Director, Quality Community Schools Development of the Oakland Unified School District, to address the long-term enrollment capacity of the school on Wednesday, June 6, from 6:30 – 8:00 p.m. at Crocker Highlands Library. Everyone is invited.

Beth Rhine

For the last months of school, the Cougar word will be FRIENDSHIP.  Friendship reflects ALL the Cougar words:  respect, compassion, self-discipline, cooperation, acceptance, responsibility and perseverance.   For example, when talking with your child about how friends treat each other you can point out that good friends listen to each other (respect, self-discipline).   Good friends try to understand each other’s feelings and moods (acceptance, compassion).  Good friends help each other solve problems (responsibility).  Good friends don’t give up on each other after a disagreement (perseverance).

Here are some things you can do to encourage your child to develop positive and healthy friendships.

• Encourage your child to talk with you about his or her friendships—use the Cougar words if you can (respect, compassion, self-discipline, cooperation, acceptance, responsibility and perseverance).
• Discuss how to have good friends you must be a good friend.
• If your child shows signs of feeling rejected or left out talk with him or her about it. Share a time when you felt the same way.
• Be sensitive to friendships that may involve negative activities or put-downs of other kids. Discuss it with your child and let him or her know how you feel about it.
• Encourage your child to show appreciation when a friend does something thoughtful or helpful.
• Remind your child that it’s never too late to make a new friend—even at the end of the school year.

On Friday, April 6^th, we held the sixth of our eight assemblies celebrating the Crocker Cougar Word of the Month, Responsibility.  Ms. Keller’s 2^nd grade class read journal entries sharing examples of responsibility, and Ms. Spees’ 5^th grade class performed skits showing what responsibility means to them, with a 5^th grade twist! The Cougar Celebration board has a display with pictures of the buddies in these classes. Thanks also to all the other teachers and students who learned about and discussed responsibility this month. And don’t forget about Compassion, Self-Discipline, Acceptance, Cooperation and Respect.

In April, the Crocker Cougar word of the month is PERSEVERANCE, which means to keep on trying in spite of difficulties.  Perseverance looks like practicing a new skill, or pushing harder to do something, like running.  Perseverance sounds like “I can almost do it,” or “We’re almost at the of the mountain.”  Perseverance feels like success or confidence.  For families, teaching your children perseverance will help them overcome many of the challenges they face each day.  Whether learning to tie shoes or finishing that hard problem in homework, perseverance in the face of hardship is vital to success.  Here are some suggestions to foster this important trait: Model perseverance.  It helps your children to see you going after goals you set for yourself and sticking with a job until it is completed—even if you are frustrated.  Talk with your children about how some of the difficulties you encountered and how good it felt to finally accomplish your task.  Notice and praise your children when they persevere.  Help they see the value of completing activities they may not always enjoy.  Refer back to time spent doing homework when they bring home a good grade.  And if they haven’t done well despite studying, emphasize that their continued hard work will eventually pay off.   Remind your children that things don’t always come easily.  Explain that success is not always immediate and victory is often how they perceive it.  Even the smallest steps or most gradual improvements can bring a strong sense of accomplishment.  Remind your children that even famous people have to work hard and persevere to succeed.  Sport stars like Michael Jordan and writers like J.K. Rowling are just a few examples.  Look to the past.  Talk about the accomplishment of Albert Einstein, Rosa Parks or Anne Franks.  Contribute stories about your ancestors.

Please stop by the Bulletin Board by the office. Talk with your child about what he or she sees about Perseverance. Any questions on Crocker Cougar’s Word of the Month Program, please contact Liz O’Brien at lizobrien@pacbell.net.

On Friday, March 2nd, we held the fifth of our 8 assemblies celebrating the Crocker Cougar “word of the month.” The Cougar word for February was “Compassion.” Ms. Shannon’s kindergarten and Mr. Donahue’s 3rd grade buddy classes were our “ Compassion Cougars”. At the assembly, these Compassion Cougars performed 5 skits written by the 3rd graders about showing compassion: compassion for someone being teased, compassion for those who are hungry, compassion for someone in trouble, compassion for someone new at school and compassion for someone who was hurt. Thank you for showing us compassion. Pictures of our “ Compassion ” Cougars will be posted on our website. In addition, the Cougar Celebration board has a display with pictures of the buddies in these classes. Thanks also to all the other teachers and students who learned about Compassion this month. Let’s keep that compassion going: Let’s continue to show we care: here at school, at home, and in the community. And don’t forget about Self-Discipline, Acceptance, Cooperation and Respect, our Cougar words for January, December.

Any questions on Crocker Cougar’s Word of the Month Program, please contact Liz O’Brien at lizobrien@pacbell.net.

The following notes were taken from the “Coffee Talk” with Beth Rhine, which is an informal chat with parents/guardians that occurred on Feb. 17th at school. The following is a summary, not a transcript.

Parent Question: Update on new students joining from closed schools?

Beth: Word is there are 7 students. Most students from the closed schools are gravitating toward other schools (not Crocker) where the teachers are going.

Parent Question: Any thought about moving classes around to more appropriate sized rooms?

Beth: There are not larger rooms available. 4 and 5th have the larger rooms. The 3rd grade classes already have the next largest rooms.

Parent Question: How are things going on the playground, especially in regard to the student conflict manager program?

Beth: Many of the conflicts do happen on the playground. We will be looking to how we can improve the conflict manager program next year. Seems to be most effective for K-1, but then those older students are out of class. Looks like we will still have 15 classes next year, and I am looking at how we could adjust the schedule. Also looking at a program that would facilitate structured games on the playground (which could help reduce conflicts).

Parent Comment: Structured games would help kids feel like they are not left out.

Beth: Agreed. If parents that are on the yard could help facilitate more games, that would be great.

Beth: Budget for the school looks pretty good. District gets a certain amount of money per child per student (CA is low, nationally). Portion of that goes to school sites, and the district is saying a larger portion will go to schools next year. Maybe some of the surplus could be used for playground supervision/programs.

Beth: The new family tours were very popular this year. So there may be a larger influx of new families than we know about right now. No official word yet. Crocker has been up to 525 students in the past (when it went up to 6th grade, and had 30 students per class), but hopefully the parents will help push back if they try to increase the enrollment too far. Worst case may be that we have to limit enrollment and not all neighborhood families get in.

Current student caps per class:
K – 27 students
1-3 grades – 30 students
4-5 grades – 31 students

Also possible there will be “combination” classes, for example a mixed 2nd – 3rd grade class. This has not happened for a long time, but is a possibility for next year.

Beth: Since we will have over 400 next year, the district requires an attendance clerk (part time). So that may provide more help in the office next year.

Parent Comment: There are a lot of 5th grade families going to Brewer next year.

Beth: There were also a lot of private school applications that were processed as well, but perhaps many of them are deciding to go the public option.

Parent Question: How are new teachers and programs going?

Beth: New Spanish program is going very well. Our teaching staff is very cohesive, including our new 2nd grade teacher. Everyone is pretty exhausted right now, but things are going smoothly.

Parent Question about enrollment numbers and projections.

Beth: We are at 400 right now, and projected to be at 410 next year.

Parent Question: What are the 3 biggest things that are on your plate (in the context of “what do you need help with”)?

Beth: At School Site Council this week a parent asked that. 1) Social/emotional care for students. 2) We could use more help dealing with bullying. Structured games at recess would help. 3) How can we continue to improve professional practice? E.g. use of new technology. Teachers are currently so strapped for time, and they need time together to plan. The classes have been becoming more collaborative over the years, but they need more help and structure to do that.

Parent Comment: It feels to me that the teachers are overloaded, and they don’t have time to address social/emotional areas.

Beth: We have some new systems in place to be able to look at that. I have been sitting down with students directly, and have had very productive discussions. Having more supervision and structure would help. It is a challenge to investigate conflicts (very time consuming to get all sides of every problem).

Parent Comment: There are also cliques forming that may not be “bullying” but are still causing issues, as early as 2nd grade. It would be great if there were more “tools” to offer students to understand and deal with this behavior.

Parent Comment: Nice if the word of the month was further practiced and reinforced with students and families.

Beth: We have classroom buddies and word of the month. Now we need to create time for the students to explore these topics. Given the other academic demands of the classroom, there is not time.

Parent Comment: Maybe the reason why bullying is coming up more, is that kids are feeling more empowered.

Beth: Hard to find the line between teasing and bullying. I try to make a good call on when the line is being crossed, but again it is hard to balance this against all my other responsibilities. Having a safe environment at school is my #1 priority. It is great to have parent help, but too much makes the teachers feel like the parents are driving things. So there needs to be a proper balance.

Beth: We are seeing that students that enter the school in middle grades (e.g. 3rd) have a more difficult time breaking into the social structure.

Parent Comments: We need to find a way to encourage parents to be more proactive around discipline, and find a more positive way to reinforce good behavior.

Beth: My approach is to find a balance where the children maintain their dignity.

(There was an extended discussion about student discipline, from the parents and school staff, and how we need to work together to reinforce good behavior.)

Beth: There is a lot of positive praise for good behavior. Other times there needs to be firm verbal discipline. Sometime we have to reinforce to kids– your job here is to learn, and if you disrupt the opportunity for others to learn, there are consequences. Sometimes the kids bring stuff from home that we have to deal with. Yes, sometimes they are read the riot act, but I also help them maintain their dignity. Parents need to trust the school staff, and the staff needs to trust the parents.

Parent Comment: Parents can easily reinforce and praise good behavior, for example, on the playground in the morning. An example was shared that was very productive.

Parent Comment: There has been improvement on the playground in terms of physical altercations.

Parent Comment: Thank you to Beth for the session with the 5th grade boys. It was very helpful for the boys. (Beth explained they had a circle discussion about experiences with bullying.)

Parent Comment: Hillcrest has a school psychologist to work with the general student population.

Beth: We have a school psychologist one day a week, mostly for IEP. We would have to hire her and pay if we wanted to expand her role.

Beth: Sometimes I will sit in a classroom and do my work, and that helps with observations and maintaining discipline in the classroom.

Beth: My priority is to find help that benefits the students and staff.

In March, the Crocker Cougar word of the month is RESPONSIBILITY.  Here are some things you can do to support the idea that being a responsible person makes us feel good about ourselves and makes other people respect and appreciate us.

·      Talk with your children about responsibility. Tell them that responsibility isn’t just doing chores, it’s following through on commitments, answering for their own actions, being reliable and trustworthy, using good judgment, taking care of their own affairs, and not procrastinating. Let them know that these are signs they are growing up and can be trusted with greater freedom.

·      “Catch” your children making a responsible choice or behaving in a responsible manner. Tell them how much that means to you.

·      Try to “forget” past failures at being responsible.

·      Have a discussion about responsibility in the family. What are your responsibilities (other than chores), and what are your parents’ responsibilities? Make a chart of these responsibilities and put it up on your bedroom wall (or, perhaps, the refrigerator door). What happens if you are irresponsible? What if your parents are irresponsible? What are the rewards for being responsible?

·      Talk with your family about what things you can do together to take responsibility for the environment (recycling, using less water and energy, buying non-polluting products, etc.). Make a plan and do it.

·      For one week keep a daily record of all your responsibilities. Include social commitments, homework, household chores, everything. At the end of the week give yourself a grade on how well you did in carrying out your responsibilities.

·      Stop by the Bulletin Board by the office. Talk with your child about what he or she sees.

Responsibility also means having integrity and doing the right thing. Here are some things you can do to encourage your child to always try to do what’s right.

·      Start with your own example. If you always base your own decisions on what you believe is right, that will mean more to your child than hours of lecturing.  This can mean following the rules—such as not parking in the “no parking” zone around the school.

·      Take time to talk about issues of right and wrong with your child.

·      When you watch TV or movies with your child, look critically at the way the characters behave and have a discussion about it.

·      Be sensitive to what your child says about decisions involving right or wrong. Don’t hesitate to correct statements like, “It doesn’t matter—nobody will ever find out” or “Everybody does it.”

·      Encourage your child to think about whether something is right or wrong before acting.

For more information check out http://www.teachkidshow.com/teach-your-child-to-do-the-right-thing/

Any questions on Crocker Cougar’s Word of the Month Program, please contact Liz O’Brien at lizobrien@pacbell.net.