Monday, August 26, 2019

Back to School

Back to School time already?  Where did the summer go?

We hope our students enjoyed a summer full of amazing memories, continued learning, and relaxing fun!  North Valley Academy is working diligently to prepare for the upcoming year and welcome students back.

Back to School Night -  Thursday, August 29th from 4:00-7:00p.m.  
Come bring your school supplies, meet your teacher, and 
get ready for an incredible new year!

The NVA staff kept our feet to the fire all summer with loads of great professional development and new happenings!  Some of the highlights…

PBIS (positive behavior intervention systems) - showing now at N.V.A.
Featuring...Our new PBIS team:
Mr. Klamm, Mrs. Stephenson, Mrs. King, Mrs. Rogers, and Mrs. Klamm   

Our team spent many, many hours training and working this summer to bring 
PBIS to NVA - wait until you see what’s coming, you’re gonna LOVE IT!  

School-wide PBIS is a systems approach for establishing the social culture and behavioral supports needed for schools to be effective learning environments for all students.  Our goal is to create educated and patriotic leaders, promote academic achievement, and encourage students to be responsible citizens.  Our school culture should reflect a safe and engaging environment for growth.  Great Expectations provides our foundational model, PBIS paves the way!  To achieve this, we are implementing The NVA Way, focused, school-wide expectations, and positive recognition for students who exemplify The NVA Way!




Summer school - yay!

NVA was able to offer summer school to help bolster academics success rates for some of our students.  A HUGE thank you to Mrs. Rogers, Mrs. King, Mrs. Bolish, and Mrs. Childs and Mrs. Smith for spending a month of their summer helping kids!

Professional development - getting our training on!

North Valley Academy elementary staff attended the SDE Conference in Las Vegas, Nevada again this summer - WOW - did we learn a lot!!  New staff also attended Great Expectations training in Texas.  But...we had some fun with our families too!  Check out these teacher highlights from the summer!

Mrs. Perreira’s summer  brought some changes as her family moved into a new house.

I am so thankful that we were able to go to the Las Vegas SDE conference again
this year (Thank you, Mr. Klamm for making it happen again)!  I have learned so
much this year as well as last year.  The most important aspect I take away from
 every session is to build a relationship with every student!  That is the first step
in helping students have a successful year.  This year I am excited to add more
STEM projects for my first graders to combine literacy with science!

Dr. Ferens’ summer involved working on his mobile home renovation and discovering the true meaning of the term "crawl space." 
It was a crash course in spelunking...would not make it, if my waistline was an inch or
two bigger!  My cat was okay living in Moscow, Idaho for 6 weeks and she even
tolerated travel fairly well.  
Except, he says, that his cat was attacked and received several puncture bites from a bully while visiting there.  We are so sorry, Dr. Ferens - we know BULLYING IS NEVER OKAY!  Dr. Ferens is excited about the possibility of taking students on field trips with our new Blue Bus. 

Mr. Williams went to both the SDE Conference and Great Expectations and loved them!  He is excited about building a zoo in the classroom, engaging children in a super fun activity.  There will be a new poetry section in his class and earwigs...EWW...for a Halloween science project! 
While visiting Great Expectations in Houston, Texas, he attended his first ever baseball game with Mr. Klamm, Mr. Sanders,  and Mr. Freeman - Take me Out to the Ballgame, unless it is in a high grass field in Texas with snakes in the area…

                                                                           YIKES 
Watch out Mr. Williams!
 Mr. Williams also bought a new book that he is super excited about - he’s going to learn to teach like his hair is on fire - watch out neighboring classrooms.
  


Mrs. Stephenson was sooooo sad not to be able to go to the SDE conference this year; but, Mr. Klamm brought back some great books about poetry and writing for her - she gets REALLY excited about new books!!  She has added tons of books to her classroom library, because who doesn’t need a lot of great books to read? 
I did get to participate in the team training for PBIS and my big take-away was 
finding your “WHY” both as an individual and an organization.  I love teaching at NVA!  Why, you ask?  Well, the students are totally awesome and I’m excited to make a positive difference in their lives, the AMAZING staff really cares about kids, and the administration is supportive and open to new ideas.  I love that NVA has an American Heritage focus and is dedicated to developing student character along with academics.  So, if your kids aren’t at NVA my only question is…..WHY?

Mrs. Anderson is working on something called Calendar Math - I have no idea what that is, but in about two weeks, your students will!!

New teachers!

Mr. Richard Freeman - High School History, geography, and government 
Mr. Freeman was born and raised in Jerome, Idaho.  After high school, he joined the United States Marine Corps and served at Camp Pendleton, California for four years.  He traveled around for a while, and in 2011 returned to school.  He studied at the College of Southern Idaho and University of Idaho, along with two years at Mississippi State University.  He is a Nineteenth Century U.S. historian with emphasis on The Civil War and Reconstruction.  Welcome to NVA, Mr. Freeman!

Mr. Jeffrey Sanders - 4th, 5th, & 6th grade social studies/science
Mr. Sanders is excited to be new to North Valley Academy this year!  Welcome to NVA, Mr. Sanders!