Attendance Procedures

THEISS TALK

October 2012

Theiss Mission Statement Theiss Elementary will provide a safe and collaborative learning environment for all students. We will challenge students to reach their highest potential while closing the achievement gap for all learners.

Theiss Calendar of Events for October 2 - Spring Creek BBQ Night! 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. Come out and support Theiss and see your teacher serve the rolls. 12 - Moms and Muffins 7:30 to 8:15 a.m. 12 - PTO meeting 2:00 in the library 16- Klein Classic Golf Tournament 16 - Teacher Lunch provided by 5th grade parents 16-18 Fall Book Fair 17- Parent Shopping Night for Book Fair 17- Key Communicator Meeting at Central Office 18- Forum for Candidates running for Board Positions/ KFHS 7:00 pm 19- Watt Watcher Kick Off – Bring a flashlight to school! **** 22-26- Red Ribbon Week 24 - Tutti Frutti Sprirt Night 25- No Place for Hate Meeting

Attendance Procedures When your child is absent from school, a note must be turned in to the front office. If your child is absent for medical reasons, a doctor/dentist note should be turned in to the front office. A parent note is required for all other illnesses and must be submitted within 5 school days. Attendance is taken at 9:45 each morning and students not present at this time will be counted absent. We are participating in the Stay in School program which is part of the Harris Country District’s Attorneys’ efforts to promote good attendance.

Tardies Students arriving late to school must come to the Attendance Office accompanied by a parent/guardian or with a note stating the reason for their tardy. All tardies accompanied by a doctor/dentist note will be excused. Remember – Tardy students walking into class impact the learning environment for everyone. Please be on time.

Early Release If you need to pick your student up from school before the end of the school day, please send a note to the office before school on that morning. In the note, specifying the time you will pick your 2 THEISS TALK child up, so that we can have them in the office waiting for you. If you determine during the day that you will need to pick up your child early, please call the front office as soon as possible. This will prevent delays for you and will help us to minimize interruptions to the classroom learning environment. All students must be signed out in the office before departing early. If you have an emergency and need to change how your child will go home, do not send a message by e-mail to the teachers. The teachers are busy with instruction and may not see it until after school. Call the front office and they will deliver the message to the students. Teachers check e- mail and phone messages during their conference period, before and after school. Please allow 24 hours for a reply. Drop Off and Pick Up For the safety of all students, please follow these procedures. Parking and getting out of your car is not allowed in the bus circle, or the flag pole area as this would pose problems for the KISD bus drivers and the car riders. Always stay in your car when loading and unloading students. The building opens at 7:50 and students may enter the cafeteria at that time. Children may not be dropped off before 7:45. Please make babysitting arrangements for your child if you must be at work earlier than this time.

To pick up students in the carpool area you must have a carpool sign in your windshield/ rear view mirror. Please pull your car up to the designated area so that other cars can move safely out of the street. Students must be picked up by 3:20 p.m. If you arrive after 3:20 p.m. your child will be in the front office. You will need to park, come inside and present your ID, prior to signing your child out in the late sign-out log. We ask that all drivers follow the designated carpool route, for the safety of our children and faculty. Again, please do not get out of your car or drive in the areas designated as an exit as this poses a danger for others and slows down the entire carpool system. Children will not be released to the clubhouse area for pick up. If you choose to pick your child up by the crosswalk on Hidden Trail, please keep them by you and out of the trees. The area is not a safe place for children to play tag, ride their bikes or other games as our crosswalk lady is charged with the safety of walking students across the street. These distractions interfere with the safety of all of our children. A few extra minutes in the carpool line or supervising your child that is a walker/ bike rider is a wonderful preventive measure. We treasure our little tigers and we do not want to see any child injured. Thank you for helping us keeps our students safe.

Catch a Wave Each Friday students and faculty members are encouraged to wear their Theiss spirit shirts. This is an excellent way for all of us to share our pride in our school. Go Tigers!!! Planners Students in grades 2-5 will have a planner. Please check this daily for homework and upcoming academic activities. We still have these available in the school store. The cost is $4.00 plus tax. Wednesday Folder You can expect your child to bring a folder home every Wednesday. Please take this opportunity to go over the papers together before you sign and return the folder on the following day. Teacher Conferences To schedule a conference with your child’s teacher, you may call, e-mail or send a note. Please keep in mind that phones are not on during instructional time so please leave a message and the teacher will respond in 24 hours or less. This is the same procedure for e-mail. If you have an emergency,

New Phone # 832-484-5900 Fax 832-484-7886 Web Site: www.kleinisd.net. 3 THEISS TALK please call the front office. Teachers are unable to conference outside the classrooms while school is in session.

Messages Only messages of an emergency nature can be relayed to students. Please be sure that your child knows what to do in unusual circumstances or rainy weather. Make sure that your child has the necessary items when leaving home each morning. Student Cell Phones Possession of cell phones is only allowed if they are turned off at all times and not visibly or physically present during regular school hours, including riding the school bus to and from school. If a cell phone is collected from a student, the parent will be notified by the administrator to pick up the device at his/her school during school hours after the payment of a $15 fee has been collected. Visitors To ensure safety for our students, all visitors must sign in at the front office and wear a visible ID while on campus. Be prepared to show an ID which will be scanned through v-soft. Faculty and staff have been instructed to request persons without an ID to return to the front office to obtain one. Please remember that these procedures are in place for the safety of our students and staff. Parents will not be allowed to enter the building through the cafeteria in the morning. Thank you in advance for supporting our efforts in keeping Theiss safe. Our school newsletter, Tiger Tales and PTO flyers will be on the website. Check it out! The Theiss website is: http://classroom.kleinisd.net/webs/theiss Birthday Treats This year we want to make birthdays fun for all students. Instead of sending cupcakes or cookies that students with diabetes or food allergies won’t be able to participate, send a super beach treat. These items can be purchased in sets of 24 from the school store. This is easy for you and fun for all of the children. We have a special bulletin board outside the cafeteria listing all the items that can be purchased for your child’s birthday. Choose your favorite birthday celebration item so all students can participate in the fun!

Destination Imagination Destination ImagiNation is an enrichment program designed to increase creative problem solving for selected 4th and 5th grade students. The DI program is a problem solving competition in which students form teams to solve two kinds of challenges: a team challenge and an instant challenge. A big shout out to our two DI coaches, Mr. Leith and Mr. Pluckhahn. Thank you coaches for making great things happen for our students.

Bearkat Bash-#1 Place for the 2 nd Year! Theiss Elementary won the 1st place trophy for the Bearkat Bash Fun Run. Huge thanks goes to Coach Nissen for her outstanding job kicking off our fitness program. Her enthusiasm has encouraged all of us to focus on a healthier lifestyle through good nutrition and exercise. Both Coach Wheeler and Coach Froebel assistanted in our school wide success. Thank you for making fitness #1 in your child’s life! Bearkat Bash winners for 2012-2013- Theiss Elementary!

Dinner with the Superintendent Parents of Klein ISD students are invited to attend a community dinner hosted by Superintendent Jim Cain. A pizza and salad dinner will be provided free to parents scheduled for October 4, 2012,

New Phone # 832-484-5900 Fax 832-484-7886 Web Site: www.kleinisd.net. 4 THEISS TALK at Wunderlich Intermediate, 11800 Misty Valley beginning at 6:30-8:00 pm. A district informational update and a question and answer session will follow.

EXXONMOBIL Volunteer Involvement Attention All School Volunteers! If you volunteer at the school and are an ExxonMobil employee, spouse, child or annuitant, you can participate in the ExxonMobil Volunteer Involvement Program (VIP). For every 20 hours of volunteer activities you do at the school, ExxonMobil will award a $500 grant to the school for much-needed equipment, supplies and educational opportunities. Each employee social security number is eligible for four grants per year, and each school can receive up to $5000 annually in these grants. If you qualify and would like forms or information about the program, please contact Rong Li at 281-654-5745 or [email protected] .

Club Meeting Dates Several of the extra-curricular activities at Theiss are off and running. All participants must have a permission form on file in the front office before they can attend. Look for the form in the Wednesday folder. Most of the clubs are scheduled after school from 3:15-4:00 or 4:15 pm.

Easytech Our teachers are using EasyTech a program fully aligned with national technology standards. There are more than 75 lessons and many integration and extension activities that address a variety of topics, from understanding the parts of a computer to building graphs in spreadsheets and writing basic HTML code. EasyTech is composed of Web based interactive lessons, complete with animation and sound. It is delivered via the Internet; the system can be accessed from virtually any Internet-ready computer. This technology curriculum reinforces learning in Language Arts and Math, and meets the technology literacy standards set by ISTE (International Society for Technology in Educations). Visual and verbal instructions guide the students to prevent them from getting lost as they might in an actual application. EasyTech tracks student progress and provides real time assessment of student performance, giving students achievement certificates upon successful completion of a lesson. Every K-8 student in Klein ISD has an account with EasyTech for the 2012-2013 school year. Parents may access the site: http://www.learning.com User name: kleinparent Password: klein.

Library News Through the years, many Theiss students have celebrated their birthdays in a very special way...by joining the Theiss Birthday Book Club. By choosing a book from our special shelf of new library books, a student can have his/her own "birthday book" in the Theiss library. The cost is $12.00 and the book will have a special nameplate in the front with the child's name and date of birth on it. Your child will also receive a pencil and a bookmark and will be recognized during our morning announcements. We started our Bluebonnet Award reading program and an informational letter went home in Wednesday folders. Third, fourth, and fifth grade students are encouraged to participate. The Texas Library Association chooses 20 new books each year to put on the list, and students who read at least five by mid-January will be able to attend our Bluebonnet party and vote for their favorite Bluebonnet book. We have multiple copies of the books in the library, they can also be

New Phone # 832-484-5900 Fax 832-484-7886 Web Site: www.kleinisd.net. 5 THEISS TALK found at the public library and in bookstores. We should have several of the titles available at our upcoming Book Fair. To learn more about the program, you can go to the following website: http://www.txla.org/groups/tba/index.html. On October 16-18 the Theiss Library will sponsor a Scholastic Book Fair. Students will be able to visit the book fair during regular school hours. The book fair will be opened during the evening of Wednesday, October 17th until 6:30 PM for additional shopping time. Students my purchase books on October 16-18 during normal school hours. Watch for additional information in your child’s Wednesday folder. We launched our Star Reader program during an assembly in September. Many Theiss Tigers have already met their goals and earned their star reader t-shirts. In addition to the informational letter that came home, you may access information about our program at home by going to: http://classroom.kleinisd.net/webs/theiss/ Click “Library” (at the top of the page) Click on “Star Reader” Information on the left. Click on the Renaissance Learning link & search by title or an advanced search. Team Theiss T-Shirts Students and faculty members are encouraged to wear their Theiss t-shirts every Friday. We have a new T-Shirt design for the 2012-2013 school year. If you haven’t gotten yours yet, stop by the school store for your new Theiss Spirit T-Shirt! The school store is open for business Tuesday and Thursday mornings from 7:45 to 8:00.

Volunteer Program We love our Tigerrific Theiss Volunteers! Thanks to all of you who returned your volunteer sign- up forms or came to the Volunteer Coffee! We’ve had a great response from all of you and look forward to a Tigerrific new school year. For those of you who provided your email address, we will update you throughout the school year of various volunteer opportunities! If you weren’t able to come to the coffee or haven’t signed up and would like to, just contact Cheryl Riley at 832-559- 3870 or any of our coordinators. Thanks again for the Fin-tastic start to the school year. Message from the Principal: Our parent participation for Curriculum Night was amazing! Thank you for your support in the education of your child. We are very fortunate to have such spectacular parents supporting both character education and academics. Our P.T.O. is to be commended for their strong communication with our community. They have worked so hard and we appreciate their continued support. We are so thankful to all of our carpool riders, walkers and bike riders and their parents for working with us in our transition to a more safe and efficient afternoon dismissal. The cooperation from our parents has ensured a safer dismissal for all of the students. We have the best children in Klein and that is because we have the very best parents! Check out the Theiss website: http://classroom.kleinisd.net/webs/theiss/

Our nurse, Deb Baylor will be leaving us on Monday, October 8th. Her husband has retired and they are moving back home to Virginia to be with her family. Mrs. Baylor is the most amazing nurse and friend to all of us at Theiss Elementary. Her genuine kindness and expertise will be greatly missed. Please join us in wishing her the very best of luck as she starts a new chapter in her life.

Ride the wave of success at Theiss Elementary! Jo Ann Keenan Shelley Robinson Principal Assistant Principal New Phone # 832-484-5900 Fax 832-484-7886 Web Site: www.kleinisd.net. 6 THEISS TALK Go Tigers!

New Phone # 832-484-5900 Fax 832-484-7886 Web Site: www.kleinisd.net.