Category Archives: Community News

New Kindergarten Students Information Night: March 10

To all families with an incoming kindergartner, we’d like to say welcome to the Kindergarten Class of 2021!  In order to join the kindergarten class in September 2021, your child must turn five years old prior to September 1, 2021.

To assist us with planning educational programs for the coming year, we are asking you to complete a short on-line survey to let us know your plans for your child’s school registration: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScjoOme2-O3vhS3NKVWrcp5yVSpxpOZiGpdLO84NY5q9jAdPg/viewform

This year, there will be a New Kindergarten Parent/Guardian Information Night virtual webinar
for those parents enrolling a student for the first time in the Newton Public Schools on Wednesday, March 10, at 7:00 pm.  The session will include a general overview of the kindergarten registration and screening process as well as other important topics that may be useful to new parents.  Links to the webinar will be posted on the NPS kindergarten registration page at the beginning of March 2021.

The online registration system will be open for kindergarten registration beginning March 11, 2021.  While there is no deadline for registration of students in the Newton Public Schools, we are asking if you would register your kindergarten-age child by March 31, 2021 so that school staff can prepare for class placement.

In the spring, individual schools will also host a gathering for parents and children to meet the school principal, teachers and have an opportunity to get to know each other.  Information on kindergarten orientation will be sent directly from Lincoln-Eliot at a later date.

If you have any questions, please feel free to email staff at registration@newton.k12.ma.us.

Science Fair Committee

We are looking for people to help plan a virtual Science Fair event this spring, to replace our usual Family Science Night.  If you’re interested in joining the Science Fair committee, or if you have any connections to cool science-related activities, please reach out to us at secretary@lepto.org — we’d really appreciate your help to make this as creative and fun for the kids as possible!

 

 

Principal / PTO Update 1.17.21

Dear families,

A reminder that there will be no school tomorrow, Monday, January 18th, in honor of Martin Luther King Day.

I also wanted to share with you some resources regarding the inauguration on Wednesday, to support conversations families may have with their children.  These links have been shared with the staff as well.

For older students:

Bill of Rights Institute:  Peaceful Transitions
https://billofrightsinstitute.org/playlists/peacefultransitions

Generation Citizen:  Teacher Resource Guide
https://docs.google.com/document/d/18fgIgjgBBekoqmz5R78Z27OiZFsYtNQWrVqgYLDcXjM/edit?ts=5ff87c67

National Constitution Center: Nothing less than a miracle: The Constitutional transition of power
https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/nothing-less-than-a-miracle-the-constitution-and-the-peaceful-transition-of

 

For younger kids:  (parents can sign-in with access codes on their school’s library site)

PebbleGo Next:  Electoral College
https://site.pebblego.com/modules/11/categories/8853/articles/11333

Understanding Check and Balance
https://site.pebblego.com/modules/11/categories/8854/articles/8782

https://www.apa.org/topics/talking-children

https://www.commonsensemedia.org/blog/how-to-talk-to-kids-about-difficult-subjects

 

Also on Wednesday at 7:30pm is the Supporting Your Child in the 2020-21 School Year forum.  Please register in advance for this forum via this Google Form.  You can also use the form to submit questions to be answered during the presentation or the Q&A session.

And on Friday, Jan. 22nd, at 7pm, we’ll be having our PTO Online Trivia Night — please see below for details and to sign up!  We’d love to see you there!

Have a great week!

Principal Morrissey & the PTO

Virtual Trivia Night THIS FRIDAY, Jan. 22!

Our Lincoln-Eliot Virtual Trivia Night is this Friday, January 22, at 7pm, and we’d love to see you there!

Make sure you RSVP here so you can be emailed the Zoom link before the event:

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSf3fkue7WLxA_d-WQ5BfKTBaVEaNjjxtMGHKAzHeU8dwRPYkQ/viewform?gxids=7628

The format will be Stump! Trivia (https://www.sporcle.com/blog/2020/05/what-is-stump-trivia).  Families will be put onto teams and will be able to discuss questions with their team in breakout rooms.  Children are welcome to join in (and teachers, you’re invited, too!).  It should be a fun way for us to connect — we hope you can join us!

 

January 2021 PTO Meeting Recap

Thank you so much to everyone who joined us for our PTO meeting via Zoom on Tuesday, January 12th!  If you missed the meeting, you can review the minutes and slideshow at these links:

January 2021 PTO Meeting Minutes

January 2021 PTO Meeting Slideshow

We are always open to ideas to help build connections throughout our community, especially between our hybrid and DLA kids, so please reach out anytime to president@lepto.org or secretary@lepto.org with suggestions or any questions!

Our next PTO meeting will be in March; we look forward to seeing you then!

PTO Meeting: Tuesday January 12th at 6:30pm

Please join us over Zoom for our first PTO meeting of 2021 this Tuesday, January 12th, at 6:30pm.  A Zoom link will be sent out via email on Monday or Tuesday, so please look for it in your inboxes (or email secretary@lepto.org if you don’t receive it!).

We will be providing an update on our fall events and talking about more community-building activities for the rest of the year.

If you cannot attend the meeting but have a question or a suggestion for us, please submit it to us using this form or email it to president@lepto.org.  We will post the minutes from the meeting in our next newsletter.

Thanks very much, and we hope to see you there!

Wednesday Lunch Bunch / Zoom Socials for January

It was really great to see all the kids who joined us for our book fair storytime socials, and we’d love to keep that going with lunch bunch / social snacktimes to connect our DLA and hybrid kids!  Based on the survey that went out, the best time for most people is Wednesday lunch, so we’re going to set up some Zooms for 1pm on Wednesdays in January and February, and see how they go!

In order to run any of these, though, we need at least one parent chaperone — so if you’re available and willing to volunteer, we’d appreciate it so much!  Please visit our SignUp Genius to choose a grade & time slot:

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0E44ABA72EA2FD0-lincolneliot3

We’ll provide a Zoom link from our PTO account, so you just have to sign in and keep an eye on the kids.  You can decide the length — the slots are an hour long, but if you’d like to make it a half-hour chat, or whatever amount of time works for you, that’s OK, too!  If you’d like to read to them or organize a game, that would be great — but it’s also fine to sit nearby and let them chat; we just need to make sure there’s an adult presence.

Please email Elizabeth or Tui at secretary@lepto.org anytime with any questions, and thank you so much for your help!

Donate to NPS Young Reader Bags Program

Looking for a way to spread some book love, help out kids in need, and support a local business?  Our wonderful local indie bookstore, Newtonville Books, has set up an initiative to give bundles of books to kids in the Newton Public Schools Title I program.

About 65 have been purchased so far, and the goal is 110, so they’re more than halfway there and would love to make sure all the kids get books!

Click on the link to find out more and donate!:

https://newtonvillebooks.square.site/product/donation-young-reader-bags-for-newton-public-schools-families-in-need/1719?cs=true

FORJ: “21 Days of Diversity” Challenge

Coming up in January 2021, check out Dr. Eddie Moore Jr’s “21 Day Racial Equity Habit Building Challenge”©: https://www.eddiemoorejr.com/21daychallenge/#act

As families, we are often working on doing for our kids or others. This challenge is a chance to center ourselves in the work, learning and action against racism. 

FORJ (Families Organizing for Racial Justice) is a coalition of school-aged families in Newton coming together to teach our children – and ourselves – how to stand up for racial equality.  Our Lincoln-Eliot FORJ contact is parent Lanni Isenberg, lanni_harris@yahoo.com