Spring 2020 Volume 3, Issue 3

INSIDE THIS ISSUE

Lake Hiawatha, Parsippany Hills .. 2

Intervale, Knollwood .................... 3

Lake Parsippany ........................... 4

Littleton ....................................... 5

Northvail ...................................... 6

Mt. Tabor, Troy Hills .................... 7

Eastlake, Brooklawn ..................... 8

Rockaway Meadow ....................... 9

Parsippany High, Central ............. 10

ESL Virtual Summer School ......... 11

Members of the

Board of Education

Mr. Frank Neglia

President

Mrs. Alison Cogan

Vice-President

Mr. Tim Berrios

Mr. Andrew Choffo

Mr. Matthew DeVitto

Mrs. Susy Golderer

Mrs. Judy Mayer

Mrs. Deborah Orme

Mrs. Kendra Von Achen

Education Today, Success Tomorrow

GREETINGS FROM DR. SARGENT…SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS

Dear Parsippany-Troy Hills Families, I hope this newsletter finds you and your families safe and healthy. These are such extraordinary times. Our students have been so diligent in their studies and continue to engage with their teachers through online instruction, as you can see through the images shown in this newsletter. Our teachers, principals, and staff miss the children a great deal and not being able to hold tra-ditional end-of-year celebrations is a tremendous loss for all of us. Our principals are working with their PTA leadership and school staff to recognize students in meaningful and safe ways. We re-joice in the accomplishments of our students and hold them in our thoughts and hearts. We are grateful for the strong home and school partnership in this community. This has been so critical in supporting students’ con-tinued learning and we acknowledge the hard work, perseverance, and patience required to make this work. Thank you! Best wishes to you, and enjoy these remaining weeks of school.

Hope and Strength from our teacher community!!

Video 1 Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wuw2MxoRVcQ&t=31s

Video 2 Link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5bhXYTQ1bc&t=2s

And our Board of Education!!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1HveGKvXc00qaPo_tkU9cML_DNUwkxGDC/view?usp=sharing

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LAKE HIAWATHA SCHOOL

It’s hard to imagine that we’ve been apart from our students for over a month! As we continue to be together at home, LHS has been keeping busy both inside and outside of the virtual class-room! Together In Spirit Video Our staff wanted to remind our school community how much they are missed, while having a little fun, too! Please click below to view a short video we put together to spread some positive vibes!

Operation Shout Out To The Helpers As Mr. Rogers’ mom once said, it’s important to “always look for the helpers.” Now more than ever, our gratitude to the “helpers” of the world - from medical staff to police and fire personnel, delivery workers, and so many more - is something we should be sharing at every opportunity. LHS’ K-Kids organized Operation Shout Out To The Helpers!, inspired by NPR’s podcast Two Whats?! and a Wow! Students created videos to thank these helpers for doing all they can to make our lives safer.

Our 4th grader, Justin Godoy, created this inspirational message to share his appreciation! All of us at LHS share his sentiment and are thankful for everyone who is working so hard to sup-port us during this time!

PASIPPANY HILLS HIGH SCHOOL

As soon as the pandemic hit and we found out about virtual learning, the Student Council decid-ed to have a meeting brainstorming what could be done to keep morale up and boost everyone's spirits. That is when this idea was born: "What if we make a video of all the teachers giving in-spirational messages, and send it out to the student body?" Other schools were doing the same thing, but we wanted to make sure it was a Viking production! We divided all of the tasks and requested pictures and videos from all of the staff. In a short amount of time, we received over 30 pictures and videos of teachers, their families, and their pets all spreading love and positivity and most importantly reminding everyone that we are #Viking Strong! We sent the final video to the entire student body and staff, showing everyone that their teachers are thinking about them and that we are all in this together.

Click Link:

https://youtu.be/WuyErPf_vw4

Click Link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XoAT0WCKIo

Click Link:

https://youtu.be/ryrtlMsYv3g

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KNOLLWOOD SCHOOL

During Spring Break, Knollwood School took virtual spirit weeks to a whole new level with the Princi-pal's Tech-Free Spring Break challenge! Many students participated in tech-free activities including drawing, helping around the home, reading books in a creative spot, family game time, and self-care activities. It was wonderful to see students engaging in these unique opportunities while enjoying Spring Break safely at home with their families. While Mrs. Rosa was unable to officially reward the students just yet, she promised a big reward upon the return to school.

Our Intervale Eagles had a very busy winter in PE! We participated in a jump rope unit to prepare for the Kids Heart Challenge event. The students learned the importance of heart health and how to raise money to help kids with special hearts. Intervale held a really fun Kids Heart Challenge day where the students got to show off their individual jump rope skills and long rope skills. This is a great way for students to exercise and learn how to stay heart healthy! Our students raised over $5,000 for the American Heart Association; great job everyone! Thank you for all of the donations!

INTERVALE SCHOOL

LAKE PARSIPPANY SCHOOL

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Virtual Spirit Week: Lake Parsippany School was proud to sport their very first Virtual Spirit Week. There was no better time for a Spirit Week as Distance Learning is up and running. It has been incredible to engage in the collaboration and communication between our parents, students, and staff members. Our recent spirit week provided an opportunity to highlight and celebrate our united spirit as daily positive messages and efforts were going strong. It was great to see the family and community spirit that was demonstrated, as always. We thank everyone for their participation and willingness to share their awesome displays of teamwork! Keep it going!

LITTLETON SCHOOL

Distance Learning on Earth Day at Littleton School! The Littleton students were involved with various virtual and recycling activities which included interactive writing, virtual field trips, nature walks, rubbish mon-ster challenges, selfie slides about Earth Day and singing together ‘Big Beautiful Planet,’ by Raffi in music.

“There's a big beautiful planet in the sky It's my home, it's where I live

You and many others live here too The earth is our home it's where we live”

Environmental Education empowers our students and is an opportunity for inte-grated learning experiences in a variety of subject areas including science, geogra-phy, mathematics, and art!

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The Northvail Staff has done a superb job preparing and implementing distance learning. Staff

worked together to compile resources, conducted platform “tests” with parents and have been culti-

vating their online instruction since the middle of March. With staff and parents working together,

the results are the continued implementation of the school curricula as well as caring for the emo-

tional well-being of the children. Whole group and small group lessons are conducted online to help

keep the sense of a class community alive during this time of social distancing.

What do students think about distance learning? Mr. Breiten, Northvail’s guidance counselor,

polled 5th graders to determine their “Top 10 Likes and Dislikes of Distance learning.”

Top 10 things I LIKE about Distant Learning

1. I don’t have to get out of bed to do my work

2. I get to wear pajamas all day long

3. I take a break anytime I want

4. If I’m hungry, I can have a snack

5. I can complete an assignment anytime during the day

6. If I finish school early, the teachers don’t give me extra work

7. My parents can help me with my work

8. I have more free time for hobbies

9. I can play with my dog more

10. I go for walks with my family

Top 10 Things I DISLIKE about Social Learning

1. I miss seeing my friends and teachers

2. It’s harder to learn at home than at school

3. I don’t get to do partner work with my friends

4. My parents don’t know as much as my teachers do

5. There are no fun projects

6. There’s no recess at home

7. I can’t ask my friends for help

8. If you have a question, you can’t ask the teacher immediately. You have to send an email and wait for them to re-

spond

9. You don’t get to go to Art, Music, Gym or Media

10. It’s easy to get distracted at home with the TV and video games

NORTHVAIL SCHOOL

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Click link:

https://youtu.be/GxNimDSGKqU

We are only a few weeks away from the end of this academic school

year and we are having a great time doing it through our Distance

Learning. We all know this is not the ideal situation, but it is defi-

nitely helping us maintain the educational standards during these

difficult times. It is also a way to keep connected with our students

and families and to support each other while staying away from our

usual social setting.

Now more than ever it is important to reflect on our blessings and to stay connected. Our faculty is

working diligently to create innovative lessons that engage our students not only academically but al-

so socially and emotionally as well. Activities such as classroom talent shows, family scavenger hunts,

show and tell and Mother’s Day Tea are giving students an opportunity to interact with their peers

and parents to join in the fun. Our school-wide virtual field day is just around the corner. Mrs.

Billman will be sharing details about the event shortly. Stay tuned.

Throughout the past several weeks our Timberwolves have also participated in a number of virtual

spirt days such as super hero day to honor our health care workers and personnel on the front lines.

It has been wonderful to see them show their Mt. Tabor spirit and see their smiling faces during their

zoom and google meets. During Staff Appreciation Week our PTA with the assistance of our parent

community made a video in which our students conveyed special messages to our staff and it truly

warmed our hearts. Our staff created a video to motivate and encourage our students, as well as let

them know they are also missed.

We look forward to making additional memories and staying connected to one another as we finish the year Mt. Tabor Strong!

Mt. TABOR Staying Connected During Distant Learning

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Our Student Council has been utilizing Flipgrid to host virtual spirit days each week! Some of the recent spirit days included a Troy Hills Day, a virtual talent show, and Earth Day. Next week will be our Rainbow Week, with the color each day corresponding to a character education topic. We hope that these fun and festive days help our students feel closer together during our time apart. Last month, our wonderful staff shared their positivity and messages of hope with

our community through a video slideshow. If you'd like to watch it for the first time, or experi-

ence it again, click on the link below! Stay strong, stay brave, and stay well - we miss you all so

much!

TROY HILLS SCHOOL

Click link below:

https://youtu.be/rsfPRRBbIQI

EASTLAKE SCHOOL—Adjusts To Distance Learning

The Eastlake School and Community has successfully adjusted to the new necessary distance learning that has been in place since March 18th. Through collaboration and cooperation be-tween the teachers, students, and families, Eastlake School is now in a consistent routine that is offering its students a rewarding education from home.

Eastlake salutes its teachers for adjusting so quickly, its parents for showing themselves to be quality educational tools and its students for working so efficiently with both their teachers and parents. Although we can't wait to be learning inside Eastlake School again, we are happy to be “seeing” each other through digital means for now!

BROOKLAWN MIDDLE SCHOOL Love, Love, Love, #BMStrongerTogether

BMS staff members on Team 6-1 spent Friday, April 3rd inviting students to participate in a ‘Feel Good Friday’ team activity dedicated to catching up on any work from the week for any of our students academic classes, and secondly doing something that supports growth mindset, civic duty, or community support by creating a poster to hang in their windows at home. Stu-dents needed to decide on their target audience including: walkers in the community, first re-sponders, law enforcement, postal workers, delivery men and women, neighbors and more. Next, students decided on a positive message. The purpose and goal was simple: “Spread some love and positivity during our Social Distancing! Let others know you are thinking of them and/or that you appreciate their commitment to the community and the world. Be the reason someone smiles- especially in these uncertain times where much of the world is facing adversity.” Over 75 students on the team posted a message of hope, love and thank you spreading more love throughout our Parsippany community! Below are several highlights of this team building activity. Go Knights!!! The entire slide show can be found on our BMS Twitter page on our school webpage.

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ROCKAWAY MEADOW SCHOOL Rockaway Meadow School overall family/student engagement in distance learning has been con-sistently high at Rockaway Meadow School since it began in Mid-March. The parents are providing the needed support at home to help their children complete the activities that are assigned. Teach-ers have created Google Classrooms that serve as a HUB for the information that parents and stu-dents need to access. Whole group, small group, and individualized live sessions have been sched-uled and are held regularly at every grade level. In addition, pre-recorded read alouds and instruc-tional sessions (including some on YouTube) are also accessible to students. Thank you to the entire Rockaway Meadow School Community for your efforts to make the learning purposeful and meaningful during this time. Below are some of the highlights from March and April at Rockaway Meadow School.

Virtual Spirit Day - 1st Graders Showing Their Rockaway Meadow School Pride

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Par High is so proud of all of our parents and alumni who are on the front lines serving the commu-

nity and fighting against covid-19. Your bravery and sacrifice are appreciated by all of us. Stay safe!

Congratulations and great work to editor and CMS English teacher, Mr. Winick, and the whole CMS Newspaper Club for publishing “The Cougar Chronicle - Special Pandemic Edi-tion 2020.”

The original publication features four sections including a “Note from the Editor, Student Quarantine Stories, Poems and Odes and Pandemic Graphics, and Comics.” CMS is proud of our students and inspired by the positive attitude they have shown during these unprecedented times. The stu-dents wanted the stories to be inspiring and to show that we are going through the experience together. We believe it is a mission accomplished. Please take a moment to visit the CMS website and check out this outstanding work.

Click Link:

http://parsippanycms.ss9.sharpschool.com/

PARSIPPANY HIGH SCHOOL

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CENTRAL MIDDLE SCHOOL

ESL Summer Program

Grade 1 –8

ESL Summer Program registration

This year our PTHSD ESL Summer Program will be virtual! From July 6th to July 23rd, your child will be able to participate in a fun, interactive, and educational program that will continue to promote English language acquisition during summer vacation right in your own home. Students will be able to choose from a variety of classes on Mondays to Thursdays, from 9:00 am to 1:30 pm. We encourage you to include your child in our pro-gram which is free of charge for Parsippany-Troy Hills School District ESL students who will be entering grades 2-9 in September 2020.

If you wish to have your child attend the summer program online, please complete this form and return (see link below). If you have already signed your student up from the email that was sent on Monday, there is no need to fill out the form again.

We look forward to seeing your child online for the ESL Virtual Summer

Program!

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