This week, we are celebrating 7th grader Da'Traevius for excellence in ELA!

Seventh grade has recently read the novel A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park and the article "The Lost Girls of Sudan" by Ishbel Matheson. Both describe the experiences of children in South Sudan.

The teacher asked scholars to write about a common theme between the two texts. In response, Da'Traevius wrote about an implied theme. That kind of thinking shows excellent comprehension, strong analytical thinking, and confidence in his thoughts and interpretation! Well done!

REMINDER: Attendance is key! Scholars who miss days of school miss out on important learning and fun in-class activities.

Send your scholars to school every day to help them recover from the academic, social, and emotional effects of the pandemic!

REMINDER: Your scholar should be coming to school in uniform every day. Being in uniform is part of the culture because it sets the tone for academic and personal excellence!

February was full of fun events for scholars and families alike! Throughout the month, we celebrated Black History Month with lessons and hallway displays of Black heroes. When you visit campus, you may see a periodic table of Black excellence and a tribute to Ruby Bridges. Our emphasis on Black history and excellence shows that identity is valued here.

We ended Black History Month at Brilliance with a Wax Museum. Each of the participating scholars picked a famous Black historical figure to study. On the day of the event, each one dressed as their historical figure and prepared a speech to share with visitors. Featured figures included Muhammad Ali, Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, Kamala Harris, Shirley Chisholm, LeBron James, and Barack and Michelle Obama.

At the beginning of March, we hosted awards assemblies for all grades! We celebrated all kinds of scholar success, including:

Families joined the celebration virtually to cheer on our scholars from home!

Has scholar child told you about the amazing food we've been serving at lunch lately? We're so excited to introduce Mrs. Ronda, the mastermind behind Flava Catering! Mrs. Ronda's mission is to make sure that every child gets a healthy lunch every day. In fact, that's how she got into catering. A friend who owned a daycare asked Mrs. Ronda to provide meals, and she's been working with schools and daycares ever since!

"Seeing the joy on the kids' faces is priceless," Mrs. Ronda and her husband Tim agree. In addition to making kids happy, Mrs. Ronda loves her work because it allows her to serve others and contribute to her community. Plus, we're especially happy to support her because Flava Catering is one of the few African-American caterers licensed in the state of Ohio! Thank you so much to Mrs. Ronda and her family for the amazing food and caring energy you bring to Brilliance every single day!

There are lots of ways to approach a single topic! This week, pick something your scholar is interested in, like dinosaurs, figure skating, or digital music production. Find 2-3 different texts about that topic, such as:

A group of several written works about a topic is called a "text set." Research shows that text sets increase depth of understanding, reading comprehension, and the ability to interpret new texts on the same topic. Plus, encountering the same vocabulary words in several different contexts helps scholars define and recall them!