No School: Friday, January 13 & Monday, January 16
Friday, January 13 is a professional learning day for our staff, and Monday, January, 16 is Martin Luther King Jr. Day. We hope everyone enjoys the extra long weekend and we will see students back in the building on January 17!
Kindergarten Parents: Save the Date!
Onsite Kindergarten Parent Meeting • Thursday, January 26 at 6:30 p.m.
Purpose: Visit your child’s home building before registration opens. Learn about the kindergarten experience within Ankeny Community School District, turn in the Kindergarten Information Form, learn more about Jumpstart, utilize the Address Look-Up Tool and ask questions.
Attendance counts!
We would like to emphasize the value of being in school, and as much as possible to avoid taking children out of school for multiple-day vacations. Making up the schoolwork is great, but it is not the same as being there. The experiences at school during this time are lost opportunities. We just hope that you do your best to protect our students’ learning time. In the same light, we would like to remind parents that doctor appointments and any other special appointments need to be made on late arrival days or after school. Again, we know this isn’t always possible, but working toward this would be appreciated.
We also want to emphasize how important it is to be at school ON TIME. Again, this correlates with school success and later job success. If we notice problems with absences and tardies of any of our students, we will be contacting their families to share our concern and offer assistance.
Cold Weather Guidelines
Children need time to expend energy and soak up fresh air and sunshine. For these reasons, we ask that all our students go outside. If your child is recovering from sickness, we request a note from you indicating your desire for them to stay in from recess. For one day, a note from parents will do. After the first day, a note from a doctor is required to stay in. Otherwise, we plan that a part of every child’s school day will be spent in the fresh air.
The students will not go outside for recess when the temperature and/or wind chill is at 0 degrees or below. These are maximum wind chill guidelines. If at any time the recess supervisor(s) believes it is too cold, they will bring students inside regardless of time or temperature.
The children however, need to dress accordingly for outside activities. It is important that they have caps, mittens or gloves, and boots for snow play. We also ask that children in kindergarten through 5th grade have snowpants if they choose to play in the snow. Children without boots will be asked to stay on the blacktop. It would also be helpful if you would consider sending extra socks and sweat pants for your child/children. We don’t have a big enough supply of clothing at school to accommodate everyone who gets wet at recess and we don’t want the children to spend the school day in wet clothing. This might also save you a trip to school with replacements.
Please label their coats, boots, snowpants, and other clothing items. It is quite common for children to have the same type of clothing. If your child loses an item, please check the “lost and found” box located outside of the lunchroom. Most items eventually show up there.