January 2020

My wife is currently in Southern California with our daughter, son-in-law and their three children for a long-anticipated trip to Disneyland. Today was supposed to be their first day in the “Happiest Place on Earth”, but my wife will be staying in the hotel room with our 6-year-old grandson who started vomiting at 2:00 am this morning. Life never goes as planned, as we saw yesterday with the tragic passing of NBA legend, Kobe Bryant, his daughter, and seven other individuals.

This is Missoula Children’s Theater performance week. The students who will be participating in Jack in the Beanstalk have already been notified and will be rehearsing in our gym after school Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, with a rehearsal at Timberline on Thursday. The students will perform at Timberline Middle School at 7:00 pm on Friday night and 11:00 am on Saturday.

We appreciate all of the parents who attended our Chinese New Year and Lantern Festival celebration on January 23. Special thanks to Suzanne Campbell and other PTA volunteers who helped organize the lantern festival. Our Chinese Immersion program gives Alpine Elementary a culturally rich international learning experience, both for students and parents.

We had a large turnout at our January 22 Parent Informational Meeting for parents interested in applying for admission for first graders into our Chinese Immersion Program. Please remember that the online application will open on February 1 and close on February 28. Parents will be notified by March 13 if their student has been accepted into the program.

 https://docs.google.com/document/d/1GtkNH7mEB8e_XO02XlnP1DFVRi0zJOGQZUBF4Ve5fFY/edit

Registration for the Alpine Elementary Inclusion Preschool for next year will open January 28 at 10:00 am  alpineschools.org/preschool/.

Hopefully, you have heard from your student about our Million Minute Reading Marathon. The goal is for our students to accumulated a million minutes of reading time. We need every parent to enter each student’s weekly reading minutes. The link provided is four simple questions. Please determine with you student(s) how many personal minutes read, listen to, or on any reading apps. Fill out the form for each student.  Also determine how many minutes your family read and listened to and enter them only one time per week. You will want to divide among siblings the family minutes. If you would like a paper tracker they will be in the library. Thank you we know this might take a few minutes of your time to add up minutes and enter minutes, but it will be amazing when meet our goal of 1 million minutes!

The following students were nominated by their teachers and recognized the week prior to the Holiday Break for consistently demonstrating the character traits of the Alpine Big 3: Responsibility, Respect and Readiness to Learn.

Sage Bolen–1st Grade, Mrs. Faux

Clara Domike–1st Grade, Mrs. Liston

Nikki Hughes–1st Grade, Mrs. Faux

Brooklyn Jones–6th Grade, Mrs. Reyes

Tom Lacey–1st Grade, Mrs. Liston

Ella Locke–2nd Grade, Mrs. Wallace

Berkley Nelson–1st Grade, Mrs. Liston

Eleanor Oldroyd–1st Grade, Ms. Johnson

Brooklyn Proctor–6th Grade, Mrs. Kuo

Eva Rawlings–5th Grade, Mrs. Weakley

Avery Spigarelli–5th Grade, Mrs. Hill

Avery Taylor–5th Grade, Mrs. Padgett

Vienna Wickens–6th Grade, Mrs. Reyes

Brynlee Wood–5th Grade, Mr. Horan

Vincent Xanthos–1st Grade, Mrs. Faux

Have a great week, and as always, remember that it is a great day to be an Eagle!

On a recent bike ride up the Provo Canyon, I quickly learned that that clip-in bike shoes are designed for one purpose only, and are not functional when walking on snow or ice. Because I have made the mistake in the past of trying to ride my road bike over small patches of ice, with less than positive consequences, I dismounted and was walking my bike across some icy snow up near Bridal Veil Falls. My clip-in bike shoes slipped on the ice causing me to topple to the ground with my bike, and one of the pedals lodged into my side just below my ribcage as I fell to the ground. The pain I’ve been dealing with in recent days is a natural consequence of not being smart enough to simply turn around when encountering ice on a winter bike ride.

Best of luck to our K – 3 grade students as they take the Acadience (formerly known as DIBELS) middle-of-the-year assessment on Tuesday.

There will be an informational meeting on Wednesday, 6:00 pm in our library for all parents interested in making application to our first grade Chinese Immersion Program for the 2020 – 2021 school year. You do not need to attend this meeting to apply for admission into our Dual Language Immersion program. Online applications will be accepted beginning February 1 on the Alpine School District DLI website. Applications will be accepted through the month of February and parents will be notified by March 13 if their student has been accepted into the program.

 https://docs.google.com/document/d/1GtkNH7mEB8e_XO02XlnP1DFVRi0zJOGQZUBF4Ve5fFY/edit

Registration for the Alpine Elementary Inclusion Preschool for next year will open January 28 at 10:00 am  alpineschools.org/preschool/.

A reminder that this Thursday is our first-ever Chinese Lantern Festival at 5:30 pm! Students should be making lanterns at home and bringing them back to their home-room teachers by Thursday. Remember, the class that turns in the most lanterns will win a free pizza party! Again, here is the schedule for Thursday evening:

5:30 – Chinese immersion students asked to arrive to prepare for Chinese New Year concert.

5:45 – 6:30 – Chinese New Year concert.

6:30 – 7:30 – Chinese Lantern walk and Chinese cultural activities and games.

 In December, our 3^rd – 6^th grade Chinese Immersion classes took the Chinese Assessment of Performance toward Proficiency in Languages (AAPPL). I have attached the past three years of AAPPL results. Be sure to scroll down to see the results in the speaking, reading, listening and writing portions of the assessment. You will be able to see that our Chinese Immersion students compare quite favorably with the other Chinese Immersion students in the Alpine School District. Congratulations to all of our 1^st – 6^th Chinese teachers and our Immersion students for the outstanding assessment results!

The following students were nominated by their teachers and recognized the week prior to the Holiday Break for consistently demonstrating the character traits of the Alpine Big 3: Responsibility, Respect and Readiness to Learn.

Brigham Adams–2nd Grade, Mrs. Wallace

Kate Edwards–5th Grade, Mr. Horan

Jonothon Fong–1st Grade, Mrs. Liston

Kimberly Hanes–4th Grade, Mrs. Keller

Ari Ingo–4th Grade, Ms. Moore

Reagan Johnson–5th Grade, Mrs. Hill

Tate Johnson–5th Grade, Mrs. Weakley

Tyce Kirkham–2nd Grade, Mrs. Andersen

Jack Lind–6th Grade, Ms. Kuo

Eliza Lynch–6th Grade, Mrs. Monson

Ethan Passey–5th Grade, Mrs. Padgett

Tyke Sisouphanh–1st Grade, Mrs. Faux

Logan Sterzer–4th Grade, Mrs. Vipperman

Kyrie VanVactor–4th Grade, Mrs. Vipperman

Georgia Walker–3rd Grade, Ms. Elder

Have a great week, and as always, remember that it is a great day to be an Eagle!

I assume many of you, like me, woke up on Sunday with snow that needed to be removed from driveways and sidewalks. Though I shovel or snowblow most of the snow at our house, my sweet wife is always the first to shovel snow from the handicapped access sidewalk and home entry for a wheelchair bound couple that live across the street. For forty years, I have never had to look very far to see and feel what selfless service looks and feels like.

The Alpine Elementary School Community Council will be meeting 9:30 – 10:30 am, Thursday, January 16 in our Conference Room. All parents are welcome to attend. The agenda is attached.

We’re so excited to be partnering with Missoula Children’s Theatre for a fifth year! This year’s musical is Jack and the Beanstalk. Rehearsals will be happening Jan. 27th – Jan. 31st, with performances on January 31st & Feb. 1st. If your child would like to participate, an application needs to be turned in by Friday, January 17. Use this online form. Any questions can be directed to Bianca Collings [email protected], or Erin Stanley: [email protected].

We are so excited to be hosting our first-ever Chinese Lantern Festival on Thursday, Jan. 23rd, to welcome in the Chinese New Year! For the Festival, students throughout the school (not just Chinese immersion students) will be asked to make a Chinese lantern. In fact, students should be taking home instructions for the lanterns today, and will be asked to turn them into their teachers by the morning of the event. The class that turns in the most lanterns will win a pizza party! In case you’d like to look at some examples of lanterns, here are links to a few (example 1, example 2, example 3, example 4). We hope your child gets creative and has fun with this!

Here is a schedule of the Chinese Lantern Festival for Jan. 23rd:

5:30 – Chinese immersion students asked to arrive to prepare for Chinese New Year concert.

5:45 – 6:30 – Chinese New Year concert.

6:30 – 7:30 – Chinese Lantern walk and Chinese cultural activities and games.

The BOX TOPS contest for December is over, and the winning class for December is Ms. Vipperman’s class with a total of 129 box tops.  Our total for the month was $52.00, bringing our grand total to $521.40! January’s contest has already begun!  Please turn in your box tops by January 31st, before 230pm as they will be collected at that time. Thanks Daylight Donuts in Alpine for generously donating treats again this year!  Check out their online store for fun products, too:  https://www.shop.daylightdonuts.com/main.sc  65 years of yumminess.

The following students were nominated by their teachers and recognized the week prior to the Holiday Break for consistently demonstrating the character traits of the Alpine Big 3: Responsibility, Respect and Readiness to Learn.

Caleb Ashton–5th Grade, Mrs. Hill

Boston Belnap–3rd Grade, Ms. Moore

Decker Berglund–Kindergarten, Mrs. Aitchison

Avri Davidson–5th Grade, Mr. Horan

Jack Gifford–Kindergarten, Mrs. Aitchison

Lucy Hadlock–2nd Grade, Mrs. Wallace

Ezme Hoard–Kindergarten, Mrs. Aichison

Mackenzie Jones–1st Grade, Ms. Johnson

Cache Larsen–3rd Grade, Ms. Elder

Jared Olsen–3rd Grade, Mrs. Chen

Saylor Reeve–4th Grade, Ms. Moore

Danie Reynolds–6th Grade, Mrs. Monson

Milo Thompson–1st Grade, Ms. Johnson

Lindsey Tomkinson–1st Grade, Mrs. Bailey

Charley Watts–3rd Grade, Mrs. Elder

Have a great week, and as always, remember that it is a great day to be an Eagle!