AMS Prince | October 2021
A Message from Principal Lomeland
September certainly did fly quickly by! Your children and their teachers have been very busy setting the stage for a rich year of learning. By now, building and classroom procedures are well-ingrained, and students are deep into the literacy, math, science, and social studies content they will learn this year.

October is Bullying Prevention Month!
Initiated by PACER in 2006, this is a great time for schools, organizations and individuals to raise awareness about bullying and the role we play in making a difference. Everyday thousands of young people experience bullying from their peers while at school, after school in their neighborhoods, and even when they are at home, through social media and texts. There are many ways to support bullying prevention as an individual or with friends and family, and within your school or community. Please join AMS students and staff by wearing orange on October 20, Unity Day. Students will also be designing posters to help spread the message of kindness, acceptance, and inclusion.

AMS Parent Booster Club
We would like to extend an invitation to all parents to join our parent booster club. The parent booster club has been instrumental in helping to plan school events. We are looking forward to bringing back past annual events such as Trunk or Treat and the Spring Fling event. We need the support of parents to make this happen. If you are interested in participating, please email Ms. Lomeland, Mr. Roddy, and Ms. Hubele.

Attendance Policy
One of the key factors for students to perform well academically is daily school attendance. It is very important for every student to be on time and in school every day. Students need to be seated in class by 7:55 am. Students not in class by 7:55 need to report to the office to be signed in by the parent/guardian and given a pass to be able to enter the classroom. Students are considered tardy when they are not in the proper class with all materials necessary for that class period when the bell rings.
At AMS we believe that only working together can we ensure the success of our students

A Message from Mr. Chayka
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2021-2022 Student Dress Code
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Greetings, AMS families,
 
In an effort to raise funds for our annual 8th grade trip to the Catalina Island Marine Institute (CIMI) in California, we are selling a variety of delicious pastas! This is a COVID-friendly fundraiser, as no money changes hands and students are not required to deliver orders. Our overall goal for this event is $3,500, and we are confident that with your support, we are stroganoff to pasta-tively crush this number!
 
To get your carbo load on, please visit the link below and mac a purchase today!
 
Help our 8th graders have an unspaghettable experience by spending a penne or two.

Grade Level Updates
It’s been a busy September in Kindergarten! We are working very hard in Math class to memorize our doubles math facts and have started working on our plus one math facts as well. We’ve also learned to write number sentences, complete patterns, and how we can use a scale to measure light and heavy objects. We really love to use the pattern blocks to create pictures and patterns. In Science, we studied the Five Senses and the importance of each sense organ. We learned about our body and healthy habits, as well as the four food groups. We also completed a short unit on Apples. We talked about the life cycle of an apple tree, the different kind of apples, and various ways apples can be used. It was fun to learn about Johnny Appleseed. We liked that he was kind to animals and people and found it very funny that he wore a pot on his head! Our Social Studies unit this month was all about Citizenship and how to be a good citizen at school. We also learned about our United States Constitution for Constitution Day on September 17. Kindergarteners continue to work on letters and their sounds, rhyming words, and have learned many sight words during Reading. We are working on comprehension skills such as making predictions, sequencing events, and how things that happen in books can be just like things that happen to us. We are also learning about various types of books and genres such as; informational text, poetry, fairy tales, and narratives.
The fall is such a fun time in First Grade! In science, first grade is learning about plant life cycles and pumpkins. First graders will be planting their own seeds and observing their progress as they grow. 
In math, we are adding new sets of addition facts each week! Students will soon progress to 100 addition facts and will learn subtraction facts soon. We are now working with counting mixed coin groupings, measuring to the nearest inch, double digit addition without regrouping, and polygons. 
Each first grade class has been diving into the curriculum. In reading, students are practicing with sight words and working on reading fluency. We are working on improving reading fluency with a goal of being able to read at least 25 words per minute. Practice makes great readers! 
Hello families! Second grade is excited with the learning progress we are making. We have been doing our phonics lesson in class and have seen great improvement in reading fluency. Those who turn in their reading logs each week are making the most progress. In math we are starting to tell time to the 5 minutes, and we are working on elapsed time with half hours. We are also working on dividing by 2 and have almost finished our review of addition. Soon we will start reviewing subtraction. In science we finished learning about air and water. Remember by the end of the year we will be dividing and doing 4-part problems so please help your child if they are struggling. We also learned how air and water can change the surface of the land. This month in science we are learning about different types of rocks and outer space. The students love learning how rock formation is related to volcanic activity. 

3rd Grade Parents,

Hello, our amazing parents. We are having an amazing year. We are teaching our scholars many things this year.
Mrs. Holbert’s class is learning and doing so well that by the end of the year she plans to have the scholars write a book. Mrs. Holbert will keep you updated with this amazing project. We have been making posters on different reading strategies in class. This week Mrs. Holbert’s class is reading “The Prairie Fire” and they are learning comprehension. Language, they will cover Singular and Plurals nouns, and Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics: Quotation Marks, Commas, Capitalization.
Ms. Bonillas would like to give her entire class a shoutout for how amazing they have been with the transition from one teacher to another. They have really taken to Ms. Bonillas and have shown her how our Centaurs are. Karen and Alma have done such a great job at keeping on task. They are going above and beyond in class and showing the true Centaur way.
Mrs. Shepard’s class is working on learning the difference between inches, centimeters, and meters. They are also learning about perfect squares and square roots. The scholars were so excited to learn this concept and be able to understand what they were learning. Mrs. Shepard has been giving her scholars some hands-on experiments with color and sound. They have used prisms and flashlights to see how white light is actually the colors of a rainbow when separated. They have learned about reflection, refraction, and opaque, translucent, and transparent materials.

We would like to remind you wonderful parents to make sure your scholars are reading for 20-30 minutes a night and completing their workbook pages as assigned for English Language Arts. Also, please make sure their math homework is also getting done every night. This will help them improve on their math skills to be more successful on their tests. If you are able please have your scholar work on I-Ready reading and math from their MyPath. This will help close the gap that the online learning gave them. They can access this by going to Clever.com and logging in with their Google account information and scrolling down to find I-Ready. We all appreciate how supportive and understanding you have been this year.
We have completed our first quarter of 4th grade! We have been learning about lots of interesting topics so far. In science we are gearing up to start our science fair experiments. Keep an eye out for letters and dojo messages with more information. For math, depending on the class, we are either using Saxon intermediate 4 or 5 textbook. Students will complete the written practice (30 problems) for homework Monday through Thursday. In ELA, we are glad to see students taking home spelling lists and reading logs as part of their homework. This hard work at home shows during our weekly tests every Friday. We are exploring different genres of writing such as: poems, biographies, and non-fiction stories. Our social studies unit begins with our current event summaries. These are an essential step to encourage our students to engage with their community. If your student is going to be absent, please let us know to put work together.
 
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Hello Dear Parents and Students,

It is exciting that we are almost at the second quarter. It is awesome to see students growing in many areas.

Lately, 6B class have learned using interior angle sum of triangles and angle relationships to solve for missing measures within a triangle, labeling data and setting up proportions from ratios comparing the same categories of information with equations and in ratio tables, identifying given information on plots and graphs to interpret data organized and represented in different graphs, calculating and "creating" the formula for area of a triangle using rectangles and parallelograms, setting up ratio and identifying total possibilities/sample space and organizing that information using ratio tables, adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing using decimal numbers using the standard algorithm, organizing decimal numbers with a number line and creating scale using number lines and place value.


My students are receiving a Dojo point for each passed I ready score at school. Please encourage them to spend time doing I-ready Math at home. Students are so happy to show me their passing scores. You may also think to give them rewards at home for the lessons that they have completed at home.
If you still don’t have a dojo account, please call office to get more info. It is the fastest way to communicate.

Have a great rest of the year!
Greetings, AMS families,

As we wrap up the first quarter of our year in English class, students are also rounding out the first unit of the Collections curriculum. After completing the unit assessment, we will be pausing from our reading to step into our first unit of writing, which features students working to assemble five-paragraph fictional narratives. We have many creative voices across 7th and 8th grade, so I’m eager to see what colorful plotlines are constructed.
Please feel free to check the progress of the drafting process by asking to see your learner’s writing packet; the packet is designed to move them from the pre-writing steps all the way through making revisions and edits and each packet includes detailed rubrics used for grading rough drafts and final drafts. In an effort to sharpen students’ typing abilities, final drafts will be written up using Chromebooks.
As always, thank you for your continued support, and don’t hesitate to reach out via ClassDojo or email with any questions you may have.

Warmly,
Mr. Faraday


Hello Dear Parents and Students,

It is exciting that we are almost at the second quarter. It is awesome to see students growing in many areas.


7A class have learned to solve absolute value equations and inequalities, to graph absolute Value Functions, to graph piecewise-defined functions, arithmetic sequences defined explicitly, arithmetic sequences defined recursively, scatter plots, correlation, and fitted lines.

8B class have learned calculating area of a circle using the standard formula; correctly identifying the parts of the circle that are used, calculating circumference of a circle using the standard formula; identifying Pi as a ratio, correctly identifying the parts of the circle that are used, the Golden Rule of Algebra and equations as balance to solve for a variable using properties of equality, using area formula from familiar polygons to decompose combined figures and calculate area, perimeter, Identifying the rules for multiplying and dividing with integers; applying the rules to algebraic terms and using the definitions of similar and congruent to define the relationship between polygons.
All students are working hard at school to complete I ready lessons. According to the last week’s data 95% of the students in 6B spend at least 50 min, 90% of the students in 7A spend at least 50 min, in I ready, 95% of the students in 8B spend at least 50 min in I ready. Students can also work on my Path assignments at home as well as at school.

My students are receiving a Dojo point for each passed I ready score at school. Please encourage them to spend time doing I-ready Math at home. Students are so happy to show me their passing scores. You may also think to give them rewards at home for the lessons that they have completed at home.
If you still don’t have a dojo account, please call office to get more info. It is the fastest way to communicate.

Have a great rest of the year!
Greetings, AMS families,

As we wrap up the first quarter of our year in English class, students are also rounding out the first unit of the Collections curriculum. After completing the unit assessment, we will be pausing from our reading to step into our first unit of writing, which features students working to assemble five-paragraph fictional narratives. We have many creative voices across 7th and 8th grade, so I’m eager to see what colorful plotlines are constructed.
Please feel free to check the progress of the drafting process by asking to see your learner’s writing packet; the packet is designed to move them from the pre-writing steps all the way through making revisions and edits and each packet includes detailed rubrics used for grading rough drafts and final drafts. In an effort to sharpen students’ typing abilities, final drafts will be written up using Chromebooks.
As always, thank you for your continued support, and don’t hesitate to reach out via ClassDojo or email with any questions you may have.

Warmly,
Mr. Faraday


Hello Dear Parents and Students,

It is exciting that we are almost at the second quarter. It is awesome to see students growing in many areas.

7A class have learned to solve absolute value equations and inequalities, to graph absolute Value Functions, to graph piecewise-defined functions, arithmetic sequences defined explicitly, arithmetic sequences defined recursively, scatter plots, correlation, and fitted lines.
8B class have learned calculating area of a circle using the standard formula; correctly identifying the parts of the circle that are used, calculating circumference of a circle using the standard formula; identifying Pi as a ratio, correctly identifying the parts of the circle that are used, the Golden Rule of Algebra and equations as balance to solve for a variable using properties of equality, using area formula from familiar polygons to decompose combined figures and calculate area, perimeter, Identifying the rules for multiplying and dividing with integers; applying the rules to algebraic terms and using the definitions of similar and congruent to define the relationship between polygons.
All students are working hard at school to complete I ready lessons. According to the last week’s data 95% of the students in 6B spend at least 50 min, 90% of the students in 7A spend at least 50 min, in I ready, 95% of the students in 8B spend at least 50 min in I ready. Students can also work on my Path assignments at home as well as at school.

My students are receiving a Dojo point for each passed I ready score at school. Please encourage them to spend time doing I-ready Math at home. Students are so happy to show me their passing scores. You may also think to give them rewards at home for the lessons that they have completed at home.
If you still don’t have a dojo account, please call office to get more info. It is the fastest way to communicate.

Have a great rest of the year!
Specials
Piano- Mrs. Kashtelyan
Guitar- Mr. Nigro
From the Music Department,

The students are excited about performing for the Winter Recital. We are still trying to decide if this event will be held virtually or live. We will have all safety measures in place. Students will have to wear masks. The students will be performing on guitar and piano all our favorite holiday music. In other news, Rock Band Club is beginning this Monday, October 4th. The club will meet on Mondays and Wednesdays. In this club, students will learn how to play electric guitar, electric bass, drums, and keyboard.

Warmest Regards,
Mr. Nigro & Mrs. K
Computer Technology- Mrs. Noriega
Hello Centaurs!

In technology class our K-2 grades have been learning the parts of the computer (inside and outside). We have also been learning programming vocabulary words by using Kodable; and of course, learning the keyboard and practicing typing correctly.

3-5 grades have been working with Google slides. They’ve learned how to create slides, insert Add-ons, such as a variety of fonts and special effects. We have been practicing our presenters’ tones and body language and we must not forget typing; practicing typing is an essential skill that will be utilized throughout their entire lives.

6-8 grades are on a role learning the correct terminology for JavaScript programming, types of networks, and practicing typing. Our sixth graders are working on creating heir own websites using Google Sites. This allows them to express their creativity but understanding that creating a website consists of a uniformed flow, it must look professional and of course it should be easy to navigate.

Keep up the good work Centaurs! I love to see your brain gears working.

Best regards,
Mrs. Noriega
Techies Of The Month
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K-2
3-4
5-8
P.E.- Coach Langlais
From the P.E. Department

Welcome to October! We are now in the second quarter of the school year, and we have begun working on skills and drills in VOLLEYBALL. We are starting with the basic skills, such as tossing, passing, and catching. We will have a TEST during the week of October 11th. Then, there is Fall Break. Please reference the “Yearly Calendar” using the link below to help your scholar stay on track:
As the weather is changing, please ensure that your scholars are dressed appropriately, wearing athletic shoes, and bringing their water bottles. It is so nice to be able to enjoy the nice weather, and I am excited to see the scholars’ progress with their volleyball skills. If you have any questions about the assignments, please contact me directly via email slanglais@amstucson.org or through Class Dojo. We can always set up a Zoom meeting to assist your scholar. Stay healthy, stay safe.

--Coach Langlais
Art- Mrs. Baluja
Happy Fall Centaurs!

We have been creating so many wonderful projects throughout all grade levels in the art studio. Students have been learning blending techniques from colored pencils to pastels. Grades 1st to 4th participated in a collaborative mural for Dot Day. "The Dot" is a sweet story about creativity, and it all starts with a dot. The possibilities are endless! Middle school students are enjoying creating their chalk pastel masterpieces and are excited to move onto oil pastels shortly. 

Coming up: All students will be creating fun fall themed crafts! We will be using construction paper, tissue paper, markers, pastels, recycled materials, and yarn. Be on the lookout for some beautiful artwork from your student coming home soon.

Mrs. Baluja
School Calendar & Jo's Corner
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2021-22 Calendar:
Oct 18-22 Fall Break NO SCHOOL
Oct 25- Teacher Workday NO SCHOOL
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Connect with the AMS Prince Office Team
520-293-2676

Office Manager: Ms. JoAnn
jbelvedere@amstucson.org
Front Office: Ms. Jean
jmbelvedere@amstucson.org
Registrar: Ms. Emma
efelix@amstucson.org

Connect with Principal Lomeland
slomeland@amstucson.org
520-293-2676