Wild About Learning!

Welcome Back to School!

First Day of School - September 6th

Dear Parents and Students,

Welcome to the 2011-2012 school year!  I hope that you have had a great summer.  This school year promises to be an exciting one.  It is my priority to ensure students have a safe and positive environment and to make sure the quality of instruction is the best possible.  I look forward to meeting and getting to know all of our new students and families, as well as welcoming back our current students and families.  Our staff will continue to participate in ongoing professional growth and deliver the most current and relevant curriculum and instruction to students.  We will work diligently to meet the individual needs of all students’ academic learning styles and achievement levels.  I am confident that as we work together in our educational community, our students will experience tremendous growth and success.  On behalf of the Rose Drive staff, welcome back! 

The first day of school for students is Tuesday, September 6^th.   Preliminary class lists will be posted after 5:00 pm on Thursday, September 1^st.  All class placements are tentative for the first two weeks of school due to changing enrollment during this time.  We cannot honor requests for changes in class placements, until the enrollment stabilizes, which will be after the first two weeks of school.

School hours for grades 1-5 are 7:50 a.m. with line up at 7:45 a.m.  Dismissal for grades 1-5 is 2:15 p.m.  We have early release days each Wednesday for students in grades 1-5.  Dismissal is at 1:15 each Wednesday for grades 1-5 and all Kindergarten Late Birds.  General Ed. Kindergarten Early Birds begin at 7:50 a.m. (also lining up at 7:45) and dismiss at 11:10 a.m., while Late Birds begin at 9:30 a.m. and dismiss at 1:40 p.m.  This year our General Ed. kindergarten Late Birds will be eating lunch at school.  SDC Kindergarten Early Birds will begin at 7:50 a.m. and dismiss at 11:50 p.m.  SDC Late Birds begin at 9:30 and dismiss at 1:32 p.m.  Please note on the first day of school ALL kindergarten students will be on the Early Bird schedule (General Ed - 7:50 a.m. to 11:10 a.m. and SDC 7:50 to 11:50 a.m.)  School office hours are:  7:15 a.m. to 4:15 p.m.   Childcare is available on site both before and after school.  Please call 714 993-1665 for information or registration.

New student registration may be completed, beginning August 18^th, when the school office opens.  If you know of new students in your neighborhood that will be attending school this year, please encourage them to stop by the office and pick up a registration packet as soon as possible, as it is preferable to register before the first day of school.

School lunches cost $2.50.  Milk may be purchased for $.50 and juice for $.75. It is our recommendation that you pre pay lunches.  Checks should be made payable to PYLUSD Food Services and may be dropped off in the front office.  Please be sure to write your child’s first & last name on the memo part of the check. You can find updated information regarding lunch menu and prices on the district website at www.pylusd.org.  You may pay for lunches through our on-line payment program.

Parking Lot:  Please make safety and courtesy your guidelines for behavior in the parking lot.  Follow the signs, painted curbs, and directions of our valet team to ensure the safety of the children.  All students are required to exit automobiles from the passenger side only.  Please remember to only allow students to get in and out of cars in our marked valet section of the parking lot, which begins after the parking lot crosswalk.  NEVER attempt to cross Rose Drive unless you are using the crosswalk. Cars must not be left unattended in the drive-through lane.

Rules and Procedures:  Our Parent-Student Handbook and school calendar are now on-line.  Please visit our school’s website, www.rosedrive.pylusd.org/  and review the handbook carefully with your child.  If you do not have access to the Internet, you may pick up a copy from the office. We are going “green” this year and will be posting almost everything on-line.  I encourage you to check our website weekly for new updates. 

Important Upcoming Dates:

PTA Parent Welcome – Tuesday, September 6^th @ 8:00 am in the multipurpose room.  Please come and meet the new PTA Board for this year and enjoy some light refreshments. 

Back to School Night – Thursday, September 15^th  @ 7:00 pm.  This is when you will meet your child’s teacher and learn about their academic program for the year.  A PTA meeting will be held prior to Back to School Night in our Multi-Purpose Room at 6:30 p.m.

We are continuing our “Wild About Learning!”  theme this year, and our entire staff is looking forward to an exciting and successful year!   

Sincerely,

Liana Neuland, Principal

PYLUSD Enrichment Summer School

The PYLUSD Enrichment Summer School program is an exciting opportunity for students from Kindergarten through 7th grade to take fun, exploratory classes during the summer. Classes begin June 27 and run for 19 days, Monday through Thursday, excluding Fourth of July. Enrichment Summer School is a four-hour program beginning at 8:15am at Brookhaven and 8:00am at Tuffree. Classes for 2010-2011 Kindergarten – 3rd graders will be at Brookhaven Elementary School. Classes for 2010-2011 4th-7th graders will be at Tuffree Middle School. Log onto the website www.pylusd.org and click the Summer School link on the right hand side of the webpage.  The total cost for the Enrichment Summer Session is $280.  Confirmation of your child’s final Enrichment Summer School schedule will be mailed during the week of June 20, 2011.

FULL CLASS LISTINGS AND CLASS DESCRIPTIONS AVAILABLE ONLINE AT WWW.PYLUSD.ORG

REGISTRATION BEGINS: FRIDAY, MAY 20, 2011

Summer Reading List

The district has compiled a suggested list of books for summer reading.  All of the books on the list are from the California Department of Education Adopted Literature List.  If you would to view the list, please   the district website. 

PYLUSD Recommended Summer Reading List

Suggested Supply Lists 2011-12

K-3 suggested supplies

4-5 suggested supplies

Student Dress Code Guidelines

Now that we are experiencing warmer weather, please take the time to review some of our dress code standards from our Parent Handbook.

·          Students may wear sun protective clothing outdoors. 

·          Sunglasses may only be worn for medical or prescriptive reasons.

·          Students may wear headwear for sun protection purposes only. Baseball caps with bills with appropriate logos or sayings on them are permitted for sun protection.

·          Students may not wear flip flops, sandals, open-toed or backless shoes.

·          Students may not wear short shorts, tops with spaghetti-straps or tops that expose the midriff area. 

·          Students may not wear extreme or unusual hairstyles (i.e. Mohawks, hair coloring)

Rose Drive Parent Tech Night

     We were so excited to hold our first Parent Tech Night at Rose Drive!  District tech experts David Watts and Eddie Tabata  presented Digital Photography:  How to Organize and Share Photos Using Picasa.  Parents learned the basic tools available in Picasa, such as how to locate and organize all the photos on their computer, how to edit and add effects to their photos with a few simple clicks and how to share their photos with others through emails, prints and on the web.

Parent Involvement

We know that children perform better in school when their parents are actively involved in the learning process.  We are so fortunate at Rose Drive to have such a high level of parent involvement. 

With the New Year upon us it might be helpful to review the Ten Ways to Help Your Child Do Well in School

• Show you care. Your child needs hugs and words of support. Ask your child about their day.

• Read, read, read with your child. Make it fun and talk about what you are reading.

• Make home a place for learning. Help your child practice reading, math, and writing.

• Promote healthy habits. Make sure your child gets plenty of rest, exercise and balanced meals.

• Be a role model. Your child learns from you. Be positive about education and show joy for learning.

• Encourage independence. Allow your child to make mistakes and learn to accept consequences.

• Give your child responsibilities and household chores.

• Create a study routine. Set a time and quiet place for your child to work every day. Go over homework.

• Get involved. Meet with your child’s teacher, attend school events, and help out at school.

• Build success. Help raise your child’s self-esteem by setting reachable goals and praising your child’s efforts.

• Make school important. Insist on good attendance and punctuality.

The entire Rose Drive staff is wishing  all of our families a happy, healthy, and productive 2011!

Liana Neuland, Principal

Routines can help your child build responsibility.

As routines become habits, children are calmer and things run more smoothly.  You child will also learn to be responsible for doing his/her part to keep the routines on track.

It is a good idea to create a routine for:

Mornings – Follow a regular schedule for everything your child needs to do, from getting up, making the bed, eating breakfast, and walking out the door.

Homework – Set a consistent time and place for homework. 

Reading – Choose a regular time for reading.  You can read aloud as a family or have your child read quietly

on his/her own.

Bedtime – Did you know that the recommended average amount of sleep for school age children, ages 5 to 12, is 10 to 11 hours a night? The National Sleep Foundation claims the #1 tip for good sleeping habits in children is to follow a nightly routine.

Rose Drive Parking Lot and Rose Drive Safety

     Student safety and the safety of others is, of course, a primary concern of all of ours.  A huge thank you to all of our parents for driving slowly and safely through our valet parking with the extra attention, caution, and patience needed for the safety of our students.  Please remember to only allow students to get in and out of cars in our marked valet sections of the parking lot.  NEVER attempt to cross Rose Drive unless you are using the crosswalk.

Rose Drive Elementary School

4700 Rose Drive

Yorba Linda CA 92886

714-986-7250

Office Hours 7:15 am - 4:15 pm

Important Calendar Dates 2011-2012

(see the calendar link on the left for more information)

Aug 18  - Office Opens

Sept 6 - First Day of School

Nov. 11 - Veterans Day

Nov 23 - Non-Instructional Day

Nov 24-25 Thanksgiving Holiday

 API rankings were announced last week and Rose Drive received the highest scores possible 10/10.  The first measure is a composite score of standardized test scores and other measures used by the state to evaluate student achievement.  A second measure is a similar schools measure, where each school is measured against 100 similar schools.  Schools were judged on a scale of 1 to 10 on two measures, and Rose Drive received a 10 in both!  Just twenty-two schools county wide earned a 10 in both the statewide and similar schools categories.  

STAR Test Results  - Rose Drive Scores 923!

Rose Drive’s API score continues to increase.  It is estimated that our API score will be 923, which is an increase of 21 points from 2009 scores.   I am so proud of our staff and students!  We are part of an elite group of schools to score above the 900 mark. 

State Budget Crisis Information

To learn more about the budget crisis facing our schools go to our district website.

5th Grade

Walk Through the American Revolution

Our 5th grade student did a wonderful job on their Walk Through the American Revolution.  This is a 2 1/2 hour interactive study of the events and driving forces that were at the core of the founding of our country.  All students were assigned parts that they presented.

Preppy K Coming to PYLUSD!

The Kindergarten Readiness Act, a historic reform to kindergarten education, gives Placentia- Yorba Linda Unified School District (PYLUSD) an opportunity to ensure that more children each year are better prepared to succeed in kindergarten and beyond. PYLUSD believes that school readiness is more than just reading, writing, and mathematics. This legislation enables PYLUSD to create a Developmental Kindergarten program, "Preppy K", to support the development and achievement of our youngest learners. View Flyer (English)    (Spanish)

Online Resources

Ticket to Read is a powerful resource for your students.  It is available at school and at home.  Students will be guided through appropriate grade level reading lessons while they gather tickets to build their clubhouse.  Ticket to Read is matched to grade level skills and sends feedback to your child's teacher about their progress.

Home Connect Rose Drive students now have additional resources to promote independent reading and master math facts!  Students Access your MathFacts in a Flash and Accelerated Reader progress from home.  Student will use their regular school username and password. MathFacts in a Flash combines practice, intervention, and progress monitoring of fundamental math skills into a variety of easy-to-use tools, helping you make sure students have committed their math facts to memory.  Students will use their regular school username and password.

AR BookFinder will give you access to titles in your reading range.  Search by title, author, reading level and more. No password needed. Accelerated Reader Parent's Guide is available to view online or print as a PDF file.

Math and Reading Series Look for our Houghton Mifflin Math series the year.  There will be many online resources available at www.eduplace.com/eservices for both students and parents by grade level in addition to our new textbooks.  Student ID and passwords are as follows.  grade level + pylusd for the ID and grade level and student for the password.  For example a 5th grade student would login using 5pylusd and 5 student.

ST Math  www.stmath.com  If this is the first time logging in at home, students will be asked to enter the homework activation code:ROS760-HZS-ZE-YRY

Dear PYLUSD Families:

Welcome back families!  I am pleased to start the year by sharing that State and federal accountability measures were released in mid-September and our district once again posted record gains. 

The PYLUSD’s Academic Performance Index jumped from 836 to 848, a 12-point one-year gain and another all-time high for the school district.  The district already surpasses the State’s goal of 800 for all California schools.   Individual school scores tell the same story with 25 schools above 800 and nine of those above 900.  An additional eight PYLUSD schools have APIs above 700.  The PYLUSD is also higher than the Orange County API average of 826 and California’s average of 767.

View the Complete Newsletter from Dr. Smith

Placentia-Yorba Linda USD Students Continue Steady Gains in Academic Achievement

     Placentia-Yorba Linda USD students continue to demonstrate steady gains in already high test scores, according to recently released test data. 

     Results from the California Standards Test given this past spring showed that the percent of students scoring at the advanced or proficient levels is at an all-time high. The results helped bolster the district’s Academic Performance Index to 838—an impressive 15-point gain in one year.  The API is the state’s measurement of year-to-year academic growth.  The scale ranges from 200 to 1,000 with a statewide target of 800.  Since 2004, the district’s API has steadily increased by 59 points.

     “It is wonderful to report growth every year in the most important area—student achievement,” said Superintendent Dennis Smith.  “Our students

already have strong scores which surpass both state and national averages; yet their academic performance keeps getting better and better.  Students are to be congratulated for their hard work and staffs are to be commended for their dedication to student academic success.”

     On the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) federal measurement, called the Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), which measures the progress of 38 various subgroup breakdowns (i.e. English learners, special education students, and socio-economically disadvantaged), the PYLUSD surpassed goals in 35 of the 38 categories.  This was accomplished even though the federal NCLB target increases significantly each year.

     By the year 2014, NCLB legislation stipulates that 100 percent of all students across the nation must be at proficient or advanced in English Language Arts and Math, the only two areas that NCLB measures. 

     For more information and to view the district’s test scores, visit the district’s website at www.pylusd.org.