Principal's Message

Happy Spring, Thomas Kelly families!  Spring Break is Monday, April 15 through Friday, April 19.  

We are approaching Open House where we can celebrate all the hard work of our students and teachers.  We have Open House on April 11.  Our Student Art Show will be from 5:30 to 6:00 p.m.  Classrooms will be open from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m.  Please come to see the powerful learning that is occurring in your child’s classroom and throughout the school.  Come check out the Fifth Grade Exhibitions.  This is a culminating activity for our IB PYP fifth grade and involves students identifying a problem in their community.  The students researched the problem, worked with a mentor, and then came up with solutions to the problem.  Please come see their displays.  Book Fair starts on Friday, April 5 and goes through Friday, April 12. The Book Fair will be open during Open House as well.  Just a reminder, April 11 is a minimum day, and students are dismissed at 12:55 p.m.

Spread across April and May, students in grades three through five will take the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP).  These are the Smarter Balanced Assessments in English Language Arts and Mathematics.  In addition, students in grade five will also take the California Standards Test (CAST) in science.  The testing window is longer because the tests are taken on computer and classes share the computers with multiple grade levels.  If you’re curious about the test, you can go to www.sanjuan.edu/testing, which takes you to CAASPP Information for Families.  It actually has sample questions for each grade level so you can see what the test looks like at your child’s grade level.

There are several ways that parents can help your child be more successful with taking the CAASPP test and actually being more successful at school every day:

* By making sure your child gets a good night’s sleep 

* By making sure your child has a healthy breakfast 

* By seeing that your child leaves your home feeling positive and anticipating a good day at school  

* By encouraging your child to do his or her best. 

Early dismissal:  Please try to avoid picking your child up from school early.  Your child misses valuable instruction, and it is a disruption to all the other students in the class when one of their classmates packs up for the day when the others are still trying to learn.

Student safety is always a priority.  Please do not drop off your child before 8:20 a.m.  There is no supervision at school until 8:20.  Also please follow the parking lot safety rules.  If you must get out of your car, please park in a legal parking space.  Please do not encourage your child to dart between cars to get to your car.  We want every child and adult to be safe at Thomas Kelly.

Happy Spring,

Josh Costa

Thomas Kelly Principal