5-5-15 Important Dates to Remember: ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● 5/8 Fun Fair 5/12 Community Financial Credit Union Deposit Day 5/20 Skating Party 5/21 PTO Meeting 7:00 pm 5/26 Community Financial Credit Union Deposit Day 6/3 Field Day 6/5 Fifth Grade Movie Night 6/9 Fifth Grade Breakfast Look How Bird Character is Making a Difference! ● Bird Students raised $965.32 for Pennies for Patients Leukemia and Lymphoma Foundation! ● Bird School had over 100 participants for the SJ5K May 3! Thanks for joining us. What a touching way to show your support for the families in our community. Butterfly Breeding Project We are in the middle of a very exciting project where each classroom is breeding Monarch butterflies! Students are using the scientific process of observing, making predictions, recording data as they watch and learn about the lifecycle, and how they interact with the plants in their environment. Students are directly observing the survival of the fittest as some of the small larva are competing for food and eating and growing much quicker than others. We will be having a school wide release before the end of the school year; stay tuned for details. NWEA and M-STEP NWEA and MSTEP assessments continue this month. Teachers look forward to seeing the growth students have made in reading and math through this year. Each standard is measured through the NWEA test which also helps inform teaching practice. These results are shared with students so that they may reflect on their own learning goals as well as shared with parents with year end report cards. We are able to use the results to prepare and plan for our instruction to support students next year too. Schedule may be found on the Bird School website. Fun Fair May 8 Please plan on joining us for our annual Fun Fair on May 8 from 6:00-8:30. Families can enjoy burger spot for dinner, bouncers, pony rides, petting zoo, raffle baskets, teachers in dunk tank, and so much more! Tickets may be pre-purchased and parent volunteers are needed. Please see the PTO website for more details at http://birdpto.my-pto.org . Girls on the Run Community Service Project Join the Girls on the Run and donate items for Ele’s Place a center for grieving children and teens. They will be collecting items from April 27 May 6. Suggested items include: craft supplies, copy paper, red felt by the yard, paper plates, napkins, cups (no styrofoam please). Scholarships Bird School is proud to announce our scholarship winners this year. We are carrying on the tradition of the Bird School Scholarship which is merit based and awarded to former Bird students. Our first recipient is Rachel Light who carries a 3.93 GPA and plans on attending Michigan State University with a major in business. Rachels remembers Bird School fondly with memories of her girl scout troops, playing soccer at recess, and music with Dr. Jackman. In high school she played soccer, was a member of NHS, and completed a number of community service projects. Our second recipient is Kelly Erickson who carries a 3.95 GPA and plans on attending the University of Toledo with a major in nursing. Kelly remembers Bird School fondly with memories of hands on projects such as Mr. Modrzejewski’s bug project. In high school she was on the swim team, and received the Michigan Athletic Scholar Athlete award. Kelly was also a member of NHS and involved with numerous community service projects. We have also started a new scholarship titled the Kim Petras Scholarship named after one of our teachers who past away from cancer last year. This scholarship is not merit based, but rather is meant to honor students who have overcome a hardship in their life (learning disability, personal or family illness, death of a family member). We are pleased to award this scholarship to Brianna Mallia who has overcome the difficulty of losing her brother at a very young age. In addition to this hardship Brianna also had to overcome a bully in elementary school. It is said that trials and tribulations makes us stronger and who we are today; Brianna has shown determination and perseverance as she overcame these obstacles and has become a leader in high school helping other students who are atrisk. Brianna will be attending Grand Valley State University where she will major in elementary education.