Middle School 5-7

Mode In-Person

Monday through Thursday

8:30-9:15: English Language Arts or Math

9:20-10:05: English Language Arts or Math

10:05-10:20: Snack/Recess and Transition Time

10:25-11:10: Science or History

11:15-12:00: Science or History

12:00-12:30: Lunch

12:30-1:00: Lunch/Recess

1:00-1:50: Art, Music, or World Language (refer to child's schedule)

1:50-2:10: Recess and Transition Time

2:1`0-3:00: Art, Music, or World Language (refer to child's schedule)

3:00-3:30: Office hours with teachers for extra help, makeup work, etc.

Fridays (online)

8:30-9:15: STEM or Socratic

9:15-9:20: Quick break

9:20-10:05: STEM or Socratic

10:05-10:20: Snack and Transition Time

10:20-11:10: Activity

11:15-11:30: Community Meeting

11:30-1:00: Lunch and Transition Time

1:00-3:00: Office Hours with teachers for extra help, makeup work, Parent meetings, etc.

Things to know and remember:

Remote policies:

We are changing our remote policy for the spring semester. Please review these policies:

Students will not be allowed to learn remotely "at will," The only exceptions are
- they are ill (or a family member is ill)
- they are required to quarantine
- there is a school-wide remote day.
If your child needs to be remote for the day, you must notify the school by 7 am and include the reason for remaining remote. This notification is vitally important so that we know where students are in the event of an emergency. Therefore, if you do not notify us, your child will be marked absent.
Because we value the in-person experience for academic and social and emotional reasons, we strongly urge you to send your child to school in person when they are scheduled to be in school (with exceptions as listed above).
If your child needs to be remote for more than a day, you will need to file a plan of your intentions with the school by logging in and filling out the form on Home Base and provide the reason for remaining remote.

Drop off:

In order to help us keep drop off efficient, please be sure to fill out the Daily Home Health Screening by 7:00am each day. We will be sending text reminders to all parents daily.
We will continue with the same procedure for drop off as we used in the fall.
- Vehicles enter our campus by Noel Street and wait until they receive the OK signal from the adult for students to exit their vehicle.
- Middle School Students will be dropped off near the Middle School entrance on the far right of the building.
- Please make sure your child is ready to exit the vehicle promptly when they receive the signal to do so.
- Vehicles exit via Main Street by Family Dollar.

Attendance:

If your child is ill for any reason, please keep them home and notify the school by 7 am as outlined above.
Please notify us immediately if your child or a family member has symptoms of or contracts Covid, or has been exposed to someone who has contracted Covid. This information is vital to the health and safety of our community and our ability to do contract tracing. You and your child's identifying information will be kept confidential.

Health and Safety:

All students are required to wear masks while on campus unless otherwise directed by an adult.
Gaiters, bandanas and neck coverings are not acceptable.
Masks must cover the nose and mouth at all times.
Masks should be changed and washed daily.
Dress code policies apply to mask design (may not be provocative, offensive, or distracting to others).
Students should bring a backpack or duffle bag large enough to hold their personal items, lunch, clothing and books as locker breaks will be confined to the beginning, end and middle of the day.
Only Sparhawk students and staff are allowed in the building.
Only students whose parents have completed the Daily Home Health Screening that day may enter the building.
The Daily Home Health Screen form has been changed to include a question about travel outside of the state of Massachusetts. We are required to have all students abide the Travel Order of the state of Massachusetts. If students travel, please notify us and follow quarantine requirements.

Failure to follow protocols:

We love your children and do not want anyone to get sick. I'm proud to say that most of our students acclimated to the rules and protocols of mask wearing, hand washing and social distancing and needed few reminders.

In the event that students do not follow social distancing and other protocols (page 8-9), they will be required to learn remotely. In order to keep everyone safe, we have a zero-tolerance policy for lack of adherence to the protocols. The following are the steps that will be taken with students who do not follow the protocols:

1st offense: student will be given a verbal reminder.
2nd offense: student will be required to spend 1-day learning remotely (and parent will be notified).
3rd offense: student will be sent home and required to learn remotely for one week.
4th offense: student will be sent home and required to learn remotely for the rest of the semester.

Lunch

We are now a nut-free and peanut-free school. Please be sure your child's snacks or lunch don't contain tree nuts or peanuts or products that contain these items. Please read the labels to help everyone stay healthy and safe.
Students must bring a snack and lunch to school in a container to keep it warm or cold. They will not have access to refrigerators, microwaves or toaster ovens this year.
Each student will be provided an expanding plastic divider that will be set up at their desk during lunch and snack,

Recess

We will be going out for recess after snack and after lunch daily if weather permits.
Please send your child to school with the appropriate clothes to spend time outside. Boots are required to be in the snow.

Dismissal

All students should be picked up between 3:00 and 3:30pm every day.
The campus will be closed at 3:30 for break down and cleaning.
Students are required to leave campus by 3:30pm every day. We are unable to provide supervision after 3:30pm.
Students who are dismissed early may not re-enter the campus or building until the next school day.

Supplies

The following supply lists are segmented into two groups. The Environmental & Technology list has all of the supplies that your child will need to create a successful distance workspace as well as the technology that will transition to in-person classes. The second is the General List of School Supplies.

Environmental & Technology Supplies

Environmental & Technology Supplies

A sacred study space (take time to watch this short video and create your sacred study space).
Reliable, charged computer, iPad or Chromebook (set up a routine to plug your device in every night or at lunch time) capable of accessing the internet (phones or Apple watches are not adequate).
Reliable internet access (high speed preferred).
Webcam (if you are using a desktop computer).
Headset (or headphones and microphone).
A Google account to access Google Docs, Drive, Meet, Classroom (Google provides ways for you to create a Google account for your child and manage it with them using Family Link).
A comfortable chair / fitball
White board/cork board
Good lighting
Earplugs for when you need fully quiet time to focus
Necessary software or apps (teachers will advise you on this)
Printer (optional)

General School Supplies
Art Supplies

General School Supplies

General school supplies for this year:

A daily school-year student planner for 2020-21
5 or more washable face masks (bandanas are not adequate)
Multiple layers of clothing for comfort in any weather (e.g. light short-sleeve shirts, long sleeve shirts, pants, socks, zippered light and heavier fleece, waterproof/windproof jacket)
Pens and #2 Pencils
Pencil cap erasers and large eraser
Spiral notebooks (one for each class)
A folder for each class or an organizing binder
1 pkg. quadrille square white graph paper (8 ½ x 11) 80 sheets (pad or spiral bound)
24-pack colored pencils
Highlighters
A ruler
Pencil sharpener
Calculator
Sketchbook, glue stick, scissors for art classes
Backpack to store all your supplies

Art Supplies

To eliminate risks associated with sharing supplies, we are asking students to have some of their own art supplies. Students should also have a container in which to store tools and supplies so they can bring them to school or home as needed. They do not need to have the supplies until classes beginning the week of September 14th.

The art supplies can be purchased at Amazon, Michaels or Dick Blick. Student grade is fine, but higher quality usually lasts longer. When purchasing sets of color media, 18-48 color best, but purchase according to your budget.

ART SUPPLIES

Sketchbook with min 50 sheets, aprox size 5x7, thicker/heavier weight paper is best
Sharpie Markers - 1 set FINE point Color burst (24)
1 Set watercolor paints (minimum 16 color-36 colors) (from Michaels: 36 color Yasutomo is best)
Any set inexpensive watercolor brushes (variety of sizes, at least 3)
1 set Prismacolor colored pencils (min 24 colors)
1 set craft acrylics (2 oz bottles, min 18 colors)
Any set acrylic brushes (variety of sizes)
1 pack colored paper (min 24 color variety)
cardstock from Michaels is best, 200 sheets “brights”

TOOLS from home:

Cell phone camera - students need access to a cell phone camera as work will need to be submitted for grading via visual format).The first several weeks will be spent on students gaining expertise on how to best utilize their cameras, the variety of applications and how they work.
1 pair scissors
1 X-acto knife
1 ruler (min 12 inches) and or yard stick
1 roll masking tape
1 roll scotch tape

Any and all “arts and crafts” items you have such as:

Scrapbook papers
Decorative hole punches and scissors
Glitter
Decorative tape
Wallpaper scraps buttons/beads/sequins
Misc markers (metallics)
Any acrylic paints (including misc old house paints from your basement!)
Paintbrushes
Old tarps or sheets

OTHER ITEMS FOUND AROUND THE HOUSE:

Postage stamps: a few postcard and/or letter stamps the more interesting the better.

Recycling (to cut up and use for collage)

Cereal, pasta and cracker style boxes can be folded down flat and stored in a grocery bag
Flyers of any kind on cardstock (postcard weight)
Old postcards and photos
Old magazines
Plastic trays (meat trays), washed thoroughly (to be used for painting palettes)
Plastic bottle caps (can be stored in old coffee or oatmeal cans)
A few corrugated cardboard boxes (amazon), shoe boxes, etc. To be used for supply storage

Communication

We have streamlined our communication systems. Parents, students and teachers will now access their portal from the Sparhawk Home Base Login. When you login, you can access all pertinent school information from there.

Your portal will include:

a feed of the latest emails sent to parents
pertinent forms
the school calendar
link to the PlusPortals for assignments and grades
link to Google Classroom

Class Meetings

Meetings will take place via Google Meet. Students are expected to follow rules of Netiquette and the Sparhawk Credo.