SOS Peer Leaders and Adult Advisors along with all Col E Brooke Lee staff created a welcome party for everyone as they entered the building on Monday morning. We know Mondays are tough - especially after being up late for the Super Bowl (Go Broncos!)! So we wanted to make it a little lighter, a little more fun, and take the opportunity to connect with students and staff. We had a variety of noise makers and clappers with upbeat music from 7:30 until 8:05. Staff and students cheered and gave out high fives to everyone as they arrived at school. Haaaaaaappy Monday!
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Our SOS group worked on a variety of skills in the last month!
In SOS, we often focus on 8 specific strength areas - positive friends, family support, mentors, healthy activities, spirituality, medical access, generosity, and mental health. In January, students reflected on one area of strength in their life that is currently strong and one area of strength where they want to grow this year. It's a great conversation to continue with your students. We all have strengths, but we all also have areas where we can grow. We also asked students to think about how they would achieve their goals of growing in this strength area. Our next meeting was postponed due to a surprise winter break! As a SOS group, we used this break to teach a positive strategy that we will continue throughout the year. We asked students to work together to make a list of EVERYTHING positive that they could think of that happened during their surprise time off school. So often, we think about the negative things that happen. We can easily list off being bored, being stuck inside, shoveling for hours, having extra chores, etc., but we forget about all the good things that happen like having a snowball fight, sleeping in, spending quality time with our family, baking, and helping our neighbors! While it's an easy skill to practice with something like a surprise winter break, we are challenging students to use this strategy themselves or to teach a friend when they have a bad day. We promise, in every bad day, there are hundreds of good things happening. You just have to train your brain to look for them! Lastly, we had students review a list of all the fantastic Col E Brooke Lee students and staff. Students were asked to mark how well they knew each person, and then we had a discussion after students looked at their own results. Many observations were shared. We talked about how we may know a lot of students in our own grade, but we are less familiar with people in other grades. We also noted that we may know a core group of friends within our grade, but we don't know many people across our grade. Often, when we are having difficulties with our friend group, we forget that there are LOTS of other people who we might be friends with! We also know that there are many awesome people who might not feel connected to others at school. So SOS members - staff and students alike - were challenged to try to increase the number of connections they have in the building. We talked about talking to new people in class, sitting with new people at lunch, how to introduce yourself to someone on the bus, at a school dance, or at a sporting event. We can help others and help ourselves by becoming a more connected school community! SOS Students and Peer Leaders! Remember that we will be meeting on Monday morning for our campaign! Please arrive as soon as possible!
We hope everyone is enjoying their time off in the snow! We're going to reschedule our meeting once again.
We will have a brief lunch meeting on Monday February 1st as was regularly scheduled. However, we're going to reschedule our January after school meeting to Wednesday February 3rd. We have a lot of campaigns planned for the rest of the year, and we've got to make up for lost time! We hope to see everyone there! Hi Everyone!
This week is the end of quarter exams for students. It's also a transitional week as staff close out the quarterly grades. Therefore, there are no after school activity buses. Because our SOS students rely on the activity buses to get home, we are re-scheduling our January meeting to NEXT Wednesday - January 27th! We also have a fair amount of snow headed our way this weekend if the weather reports are accurate. We hope to have school next Wednesday to meet, but if not, we will reschedule our meeting for February 3rd. As we kick off the new year, we focused on two goals - expanding our own set of strengths and building connections between peer and adults.
During our lunch meeting, we first reviewed all 8 areas of strength promoted as part of the SOS program - positive friendships, healthy activities, family support, mentoring, mental health, medical access, spirituality, and generosity. Then, students paired up with new peer and adult partners to build new connections. The partners introduced themselves and then interviewed each other to learn about an area of strength that was currently strong. Next, the students explored what area of strength they want to grow in during the new year and discussed how they are going to accomplish that growth. The pairs presented the strengths and action plans to the group as a whole, and we will be posting our goals in the school to inspire others! In December, students worked on their campaigns. We set a goal to have one campaign completed per month! It's ambitious, but fingers crossed we can pull this off! :) Finally, our next meeting is after school on Wednesday, January 20th! We will be continuing our focus on building connections throughout the school - and perhaps even partnering with a local high school to build connections within the community! Stay tuned! On the half day before the Thanksgiving holiday, SOS Peer Leaders worked with school leadership to host a fun-filled pep rally! Students signed up to participate during the lunch periods the week before. Activities in the gym included M&M Searching in a Whipped Cream Pie, Group Charades, Turkey Waddle Racing, Scooter Racing, 4x4 Basketball, Group Rock, Paper, Scissors, Walk Around Cool, and more! In classrooms, students were offered opportunities to create murals/collages about what they are thankful for, write letters of thank you to people in their lives, and engage in community building games and discussions. The pep rally was a great way to build positive community, connect students to each other and staff, engage in healthy activities, and de-stress during the busy holiday season. For our SOS Peer Leaders, it was also a great opportunity to build their leadership skills. Four SOS Peer Leaders created the proposal for the pep rally, and then all SOS Peer Leaders were able to work collaboratively to plan and execute the pep rally activities! More pictures coming soon! During our monthly after school meeting, we played games that emphasized team building, communication, and problem solving. We then had a dialogue circle about supporting peers by helping others problem solve but also helping connect others to adult supports. Lastly, we planned our campaigns that are focusing on positive friendships, healthy activities, generosity, and positive mental health! As you arrived for EXPO Night or school of Friday morning, we hope you enjoyed the extensive positive chalk messages the SOS team created in front of the school. Check out our pictures below! Join us Thursday for EXPO Night at Lee! We will have a table with lots of activities to highlight SOS, including group games, informational discussions, and art projects! EXPO Night begins at 6:00 and runs until 7:30. See you there! |
AdministratorsPrincipal:
Kimberly Hayden Williams Assistant Principal: Shauna-Kay Jorandby Assistant Principal: Rodrick Hobbs Counselors6th Grade:
Terrence Purdie 7th Grade: Amy Scribner-Lilly 8th Grade: Robyn Hart SOS FacilitatorsSpecial Education Teacher: James Frazier Archives
June 2016
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