Many of you have asked for insights into the transition out of Montessori.  You can find one student's perspective here.

The Board continues to shape the list of initiatives as articulated by all community stakeholders, through a series of surveys disseminated over the past 2010-2011 academic school year.  At the beginning of the 2011 school year, the Board met off-site.  The list of initiatives was divided and Members of the Board formed three, 2 - 3 person breakout groups.  During the September meeting, the Board utilized a structured thought process identifying specific measurements of success for each initiative.  
 
The next step is to plan for a community wide Strategic Initiatives engagement session on Thursday, 10/13, 6:30 PM, at City Garden.  The goal at that meeting will be to determine if there are any suggestions for areas that should be addressed and brainstorming for other success measures and strategies to reach them.    From that point an assessment will be made as to what we tackle first as a community.  On behalf of the Board, we hope that you will attend.  Your input will be needed as we begin to move toward developing all of this good input into a workable plan.  Child care and light snacks will be provided 
 
We ask and encourage all members of the City Garden Montessori Family to please RSVP for attendance and childcare to LaDonna@citygardenschool.org at your earliest convenience!

Click 'view newsletter' below to see applicable document for event.

View Newsletter

City Garden Parents and Guardians,
 
The leadership team of the Parent Advisory Committee (PAC) would like to invite you to the first PAC meeting of this school year. 
As parents and guardians we are all members of the PAC.  City Gardens strength and achievements can be measured by the level of participation of the parents and the community at large.
Join us as we introduce ourselves and key players in the City Garden community.  Meet school administrators, board members and other City Garden families. 
Topics to be discussed will include but will not be limited to the following:
·         Introductions
o   PAC
o   Administration
o   School Board
o   Committees
·         Overview of school structure and how the PAC fits in
·         New Facility Update
·         Fundraising
o    Trivia Night
·         Community Outreach
o   Shaw Art Fair
 
Date:  Wednesday, September 28th
Time: 6:30 PM
Place:  City Garden Montessori Charter School
Childcare will be provided for those who RSVP**
 
**If childcare is needed parents or guardians must RSVP with LaDonna Henderson at ladonna@citygardenschool.org or 664-7646
 
We look forward to seeing you,
 
Chris Granger
PAC Chairperson

South City Rides!

Shaw/Southwest Garden Neighborhood Bike Ride for CommUNITY!

Saturday, Sept. 17, 2011

Meet at the WEST end of Tower Grove Park

Face painting! Bike Rodeo! Bike Demos! Meet neighbors! Community
Pride! Show off your bike! Decorate your bike! Brainstorm with
neighbors! Have fun! Get fit! Make a friend! Short ride! Family
friendly! Bring a friend! Stand for bikes!

Say “yes” to Peace!

SouthCityRi...@gmail.com or call Andy at (314) 270-2276 for info. Also
on
facebook!http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=130940650336815#!/event.p
hp?eid...

9:45am: Gathering @ Tower Grove Park
10-11am: Quick community Program followed immediately by bike ride!
11am-12pm: Bike Rodeo, face painting, community idea tree, basic bike
maintenance class, bike demos @ The Word at Shaw Church (Tower Grove
& Shaw)

Hello Parents,

Many dates and some changes to the school calendar have been made on the website. I will keep this calendar as current as possible and use it as a repository for information related to the happenings at City Garden.

Friday, September 16 there will be early dismissal at 1pm for professional development. The work the teachers and I will be undertaking will be related to our standardized test information, both from NWEA and the MAP, and outlining a plan for the year for the school, each classroom and individual students.

This data is used to monitor progress at all levels and as part of our accountability to the state and to our charter sponsor, Saint Louis University. It is also used at this time of the year to validate what we are seeing in the classroom and to put another quantitative measure on what each student is demonstrating academically. One goal for us as a staff is to see the importance of this information and be able to put into the context of a well-running classroom. There are many qualitative measures which are even more telling in regards to a students success.

Children will rarely be pulled out to do ‘MAP prep’. Certain testing strategies and the need to build test endurance for the April test will occur after the first of the year and do take time for the children. These are also skills that will be valuable for students throughout their entire educational career.

Mark your calendars!  Saturday, Sept. 17th, at 3:00pm is the City Garden Family Picnic at Tower Grove Park.  We will gather at the Gus Fogt Picnic Site (just north across the street from where we gathered last year).  Please bring lawn chairs or blankets as well as soft drinks for your family.  We'd also be grateful if you brought chips, a salad, or a dessert to share with all (enough to serve ~25 people).  We are looking for a group of parent volunteers to help with this event.  Please contact Kristina Mavers-Vogel, family support coordinator, at kristina@citygardenschool.org or 314-664-7646 if you would like to volunteer.  Hope to see you there!
 
The Parent Education Night has been moved to October 6, 2011 at 6:30pm due to scheduling conflicts. I look forward to seeing you all there to talk Montessori and share ideas about your children.  Childcare is available if you RSVP to LaDonna at 314-664-7646 or LaDonna@citygardenschool.org.

And now for something goofy, need a smile?

http://2uv.us/

Regards,
Jami

SEPTEMBER 3, 2011

Head Case: Jonah Lehrer

Learning How to Focus on Focus

In an age of information overload, simply paying attention is the hardest thing.

For most of human history, the progress of knowledge was constrained by a shortage of information. Books were expensive and rare, libraries were reserved for elite scholars and communication was extremely slow. Mail moved at the speed of horses. Now, of course, we live in the age of Google and Amazon Prime, a time when nearly everything ever written can be accessed within seconds or delivered within days. Facts are cheap and easy; the cellphone has become an infinite library. So what's holding us back? Why does this surfeit of information so often feel overwhelming instead of enlightening? The answer returns us to the stubborn limitations of the human mind, especially when it comes to the ability to focus properly. As the psychologist Herbert Simon famously declared, "A wealth of information creates a poverty of attention." But it doesn't have to be this way; the mind isn't quite as constrained as we've assumed. Though our attention will always be a scare resource, easily steamrolled by the world's abundant distractions, it's possible to improve our focus, to become better at dealing with the excess of information. The key is strengthening what psychologists call "executive function," a collection of cognitive skills that allow us to exert control over our thoughts and impulses. When we resist the allure of a sweet treat, or do homework instead of watch television, or concentrate for hours on a difficult problem, we are relying on these lofty mental talents. What we want to do in the moment, and what we want to want, are often very different things. Executive function helps to narrow the gap. Researchers have found that varying personal levels of executive function have a profound impact on nearly every aspect of life. Consider a recent study led by Avshalom Caspi and Terrie Moffit of Duke University that tracked 1,037 children born in Dunedin, New Zealand. The researchers gave the kids a barrage of mental tests and then kept meticulous records of their behavior as they matured into teenagers and adults. Children who could better regulate their impulses and attention were four times less likely to have a criminal record, three times less likely to be addicted to drugs and half as likely to become single parents. In many instances, the ability to utilize executive control was more predictive of adult outcomes than either IQ scores or socioeconomic status. But here's the good news: Executive function can be significantly improved, especially if interventions begin at an early age. In the current issue of Science, Adele Diamond, a neuroscientist at the University of British Columbia, reviews the activities that can reliably boost these essential mental skills. The list is surprisingly varied, revolving around activities that are both engaging and challenging, such as computer exercises involving short-term memory, tae-kwon-do, yoga and difficult board games. Dr. Diamond also notes that certain school curricula, such as Montessori and Tools for the Mind, have also been shown to consistently increase executive function. Yet, despite this impressive evidence, most schools do virtually nothing to develop executive function. Even worse, education departments are slashing the very activities, such as physical exercise and the arts, that boost executive function among the broadest range of students. We've also failed to develop metrics that can assess these skills. Though in kindergarten we often attempt to track aspects of executive function—the report card of a 5-year-old is filled with ratings about the ability to focus and stay on task—these categories vanish for the rest of a student's academic career, replaced by an obsession with academic subject matter. We worry about the periodic table instead of persistence, spelling instead of self-control. That's almost certainly a mistake. Given the age in which we live, it makes no sense to obsess over the memorization of facts that can be looked up on a smartphone. It's not enough to drill kids in arithmetic and hope that they develop delayed gratification by accident. We need to teach the skills of executive function directly and creatively. If we want our children to succeed in the age of information, we need to give them the mental tools that matter. The world has changed. The mind can't stay the same.

Dear Parents,

I would like you to formally introduce LaDonna Henderson to the City Garden world.  Her skills include more than ten years of administrative and clerical experience.  LaDonna also has extensive experience with state recording and database development and maintenance.  She will be the shining face that greets you in the office and the voice you will hear on the phone when calling in to the school.  Please stop by the office and introduce yourself to LaDonna and make her feel welcome.

Regards,

Jami  

Dear Parents,

Congratulations! If you’re reading this, you’ve successfully navigated to our new location for any and all school information.  I encourage you to get in the habit of checking the “news” and “today at school” sections of the website for the latest updates. 

Monday is a Labor Day holiday and we do not have school.  I hope you enjoy your long weekend.  Sarah, Ira, and I will be heading to our homeland of Kansas for the first time since Memorial Day. We cherish this annual time for family reconnection.

Mark your calendars!  Saturday, Sept. 17^th at 3:00pm is the City Garden Family Picnic at Tower Grove Park.  We will gather at the Gus Fogt Site (just north across the street from where we gathered last year).  We are looking for a group of parent volunteers to help with this event.  Please contact Kristina Mavers-Vogel, family support coordinator, at Kristina@citygardenschool.org or 314-664-7646 if you would like to volunteer.  More details are on the way about this fun event! 

If you have a second or third grade boy interested in playing soccer, please e-mail Bridget Rush bannerush@yahoo.com for details.

I have attached two abstracts of articles relating to some current research in Science magazine about executive functioning in the brain.  These articles tie in nicely with what we are doing at City Garden with Montessori education, and stimulate thoughtful insights into what types of extracurricular activities are most beneficial for youth. 

Regards,

Jami Sweeney

Head of School