Dear Lacamas Families, Can you believe our weather! Spring has sprung early with trees budding, flowers blooming, sun shining and everything growing. As we witness the new growth in nature, we are moving into our time for measuring our students’ growth with our new assessment system. Starting this school year, our state’s learning standards are now aligned to the Common Core State Standards in math and English language arts. New state standards mean new state tests. Washington is participating in the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium, along with 23 other states. It is a state-led consortium working to develop next-generation assessments that accurately measure student progress toward college and career readiness. This spring our 3rd-5th graders will take the new Smarter Balanced Assessments (SBA) in math and English language arts. These new tests will replace the Measurements of Student Progress (MSP) in math, writing and reading, with 5th graders still taking the MSP for science.

The new learning standards are more challenging than the standards they replaced. Some students who were considered proficient using the old standards will have a more difficult time reaching proficiency using the new standards. The results from these new tests provide information about each student’s reading and math skills and help set our new baseline, providing an accurate picture of whether students are meeting standards and help guide our next steps to support our students. For the Smarter Balanced Assessment, all 3rd-5th grade students will take their tests online. This consists of a Computer Adaptive Test (CAT), Performance Task (PT) and Class Activity for both English language arts (ELA) and math. Each test is untimed providing students all the time they need to do their best. Below is our school’s testing schedule:

As a family, you can support your child by making attendance during their testing days a priority. You can also support by practicing their basic math facts, reviewing skills, and using our ACTIVE reading strategies. During your child’s testing window make sure they get plenty of rest, eat a good breakfast, snack, and lunch, and that you offer lots of encouragement. All Make-Up Tests will take place soon after a student returns to complete any missed assessments as close to their regular scheduled time as possible.

For more information about the Smarter Balanced tests and to try out a practice test yourself, please visit www.k12.wa.us/smarter and http://k12.wa.us/resources/. More information about the Common Core may be found at www.k12.wa.us/corestandards.

Thank you for continuing to work with us to make sure our children are successful. We want all our students to leave us with a solid

foundation of skills and a future full of opportunities.

Julie Mueller Principal

LACAMAS HEIGHTS ELEMENTARY

Leopard Tracks

ELA Math MSP Science

3rd Grade March 23-26 May 11-15 NA

4th Grade April 20-24 May 18-22 NA

5th Grade April 27-May 1 May 4-8 May 12

http://www.k12.wa.us/smarterhttp://k12.wa.us/resources/http://www.k12.wa.us/corestandards

Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri 2

3 4

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16

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A/R Store Lunch Recess

18

Burgerville/Zoo Snooze Fundraiser

4:00-8:00 pm (Camas Burgerville)

19

PALS General Meeting 6:00 pm (Library)

20

23

3rd Grade ELA Smarter Balanced

Testing Week

24

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Report Cards Come Home

27

5th Grade Human

Development Video

30 31 April 1

Squeeze and Grind Zoo Snooze Fundraiser

1:00-6:00 pm

2

3

6 7 8 9 10

2015

Jungle Week in the gym...Eat lunch in class rooms

Week

Spring Break...No School

Dr Suess Dance

Around the School

Movie Night - Big Hero 6

February Character Education Awards

Congratulations to the following students who were given Character Education Awards at the assembly on March 4th. The character education trait for the month of February was "Honesty".

Kindergarten Kaden Philpot Lucas Astanin Anthony Andrews Vincent Enos First Grade Kiran Giles Payton Radke Nevaeh Villa-Hernandez Lily Creamer Nathan Hoff

Second Grade Wyatt Compher Lilly Langer Hiro Andersen Owen Buell Ezra Gonzalez Third Grade Shane Farra Camillia Pelyukhno Lucas Vaneekhoven Diego Lopez Lucas Bingaman Anika Kerls Jaden Ruff

Fourth Grade Tyler Samson Bradley Prouse Amelia Merritt Chase Reid

Lilly Compton

Devon Myers

Fifth Grade Jasra Vandekrol

Karyssa Burrus

Andrew Caroussos

Emma Coates

Keston Sauer

Volunteer of the Month

Each month PALS will be selecting a volunteer of the month to thank with a Starbucks gift card for their dedication to Lacamas Heights.

For February we would like to recognize and thank:

Leanne Williams

Thank you to all who volunteer time and energy to help make Lacamas a wonderful place for our

children to grow and learn!

...by shopping on Amazon you can

help earn funds for our school?

Since the beginning of the school year PALS has earned

$500.85 just by Lacamas families using the Amazon link

on our PALS website!

This is an EASY way to support our school by shopping

online at Amazon. All you have to do is use the Amazon

link on the PALS website to begin each shopping session

then at the end of each month, Amazon will pay PALS

up to 10% of the total online purchases. Thank you!!!

Lacamas Heights PTO would love to have you be a

Parent Volunteer next school year!

There are many opportunities for you to choose from

to enrich your child's education.

If you are interested in getting more involved in school activities,

now is the opportunity to consider joining the PALS Board or one of

our committees for next school year. Volunteering doesn’t mean a

huge time commitment, we have jobs to fit your schedule and

interests.

To learn more, attend the PALS General Membership Meeting this

Thursday, March 19th at 6:00 pm in the Library or contact

DeeDee Radke, PALS President, at Deedeeradke@comcast.net.

Support our first grade “Zoo Snooze”

You can help our first graders raise money for their field trip with two different dine out events.

The first one takes place THIS Wednesday, March 18th at Burgerville in Camas. All you

need to do is plan to dine out there between the hours of 4:00-8:00 pm and Burgerville

will donate up to 10% of profits to our Lacamas first graders. As a bonus, the first grade

teachers will be on hand delivering orders and blowing up balloons!

The second event takes place on Wednesday, April 1st from 1:00-6:00 pm at Squeeze

and Grind. Visit this Camas coffee/smoothie shop and let them know you are with

Lacamas Heights and they will donate a percentage of your purchase to the Zoo Snooze

fundraiser.

Thank you for your support!!!

Stay Connected!

http://schools.camas.wednet.edu/lacamasheights/http://lacamaspals.weebly.com/index.htmlhttps://www.facebook.com/LacamasHeightsPALS

Jungle Arrives at Lacamas!

Lacamas students did a great job collecting Box Tops and Labels for Education for

the class competition last month. Our school goal of $1,500 in total earnings for this

school year was met by $6.00!

Mrs. Norgard’s 2nd grade class raised the most Box Tops and will receive a prize!

Keep saving those labels for the rest of the school year!

2015SCHOOL BUS SAFETYPOSTER CONTEST

ENTER TODAYENTRIES DUE TOYOUR SCHOOLOFFICE

MAY 20, 2015

For details, visit: http://goo.gl/4MPnVh

-Posters Judged May 28-Root Beer FloatCelebration June 8-Regional Poster JudgingJune 11

Lacamas NewsletterMarch2015.pdf (p.1-7)School Bus Safety Poster 2015 2_opt.pdf (p.8)http://goo.gl/4MPn