As we settle into the third week of school and I spend time popping into classrooms, I am excited to see students highly engaged in hands on activities and challenging discussions. It is obvious that teachers have been busy planning over the summer. Many of our students attended lessons in the Hatch Patch and participated in harvesting this week, and our 5th graders worked with our kindergarten students to make prints of vegetables from this year’s harvest! Many thanks to our parent volunteers for their hard work in making this experience possible!
Thank you to those of you who are already signing in at the main office when entering the building. We love having such a strong parent presence in our school! As we work together to ensure everyone’s safety, please try to remember that all visitors must enter through the main office and get a visitor’s badge. This small step in our procedures is important in emergency situations to make sure every person in the building is accounted for. We appreciate your cooperation as we work together to keep our children safe!
Please join us for the Hatch Curriculum Night on Wednesday, September 13th from 6:00-7:30pm. During our Curriculum Night you will have the opportunity to meet your child’s teacher and hear about the various learning experiences we have planned this year. There will be two sessions so that families with more than one child can attend each classroom presentation. Session A will run from 6:00-6:45 and Session B will run from 6:45-7:30. If you do not need to attend two classroom sessions, I highly recommend you visit our Library, Music, Art, PE, and Spanish teachers. We have an amazing fine arts team that would love to share their curriculum and programing information with you. We will also have our support staff available in the foyer by the main entrance to answer questions and provide information on the many resources we offer our students.
We are currently looking for parent volunteers who are available to run a weekly lunch club. Some ideas for lunch clubs include lego club, science, crafts, walking, spoken word, or running club. If you are interested in running a club, please contact Ms. Mura at [email protected] to get started.
Oak Park Public Library Cards
All Hatch students should have an Oak Park Public Library Card as they will need it this year to access the databases as well as ebooks from school. All 3rd - 5th graders must have their library card with them in library during the week of September 11th. If your student doesn't want to bring their library card to school as they might lose it, they can take a picture of their card on their iPad so they have their library card number at easy access. If your student does not have a library card they can get one at any of the Oak Park Public Library branches. If you have any questions please reach out to Mrs. Howe at [email protected].
Birthday Books for the Hatch Library
Once again the PTO will be sponsoring the Hatch Birthday Book Program. All students will receive a book for their birthday that will be donated to the Hatch Library. On the student's birthday, they get to come to the library and pick out a brand new library book. The student is the first student to check it out! When they are done reading their birthday book they return it to the library for other Hatch students to enjoy! Once again we are asking for a donation of $20 per child to help offset the cost of this great program. For an order form, please go here and remember your donation can be claimed on your taxes! Be sure to check out the great books that students picked out for their birthday books last year here.
It was brought to our attention that some of our parents were unable to access the PDF of the district's Detailed Assessment Schedule for 2017-18 in Google Drive. Please try this Assessment Calendar link instead.
PTO Reminders:
Taste of Hatch Patch Annual Harvest Dinner – Get your Tickets and a Call for Volunteers – Join fellow Hatch parents, teachers and community members for a delicious taste showcasing the produce harvested from the school's vegetable garden and orchard, now in its 11th year! The event will feature main courses and desserts crafted by local restaurants and volunteers, music by a New Orleans brass band and a raffle. Purchase your dinner and raffle tickets here. The Taste of Hatch Patch Committee is looking for volunteers to assist with preparation, serving and cleanup for the event. Sign up to volunteer here. Event is September 19, 2017 from 6:00 to 8:00 at the Hatch playground.
Hatch Patch
Thank you to all our parents who helped classes harvest in the Hatch Patch. We are looking forward to Taste of Hatch Patch! Our amazing Hatch Patch needs 3 parents to help out our existing volunteer team. We’re looking for three parent coordinators. Creative and educational efforts to engage our students with the garden, curriculum opportunities/events with the garden, or - for garden lovers or garden wannabees- upkeep of our school PTO garden. Contact [email protected] to apply.
Join the Girl Scouts or Cub Scouts
- 5th grade Girl Scouts: Is your daughter interested in having fun, learning about the outdoors, and helping in our community? We'd love to have her in our troop. Contact Allison Baxter at [email protected]. Our first field trip is to try geocaching. We meet once a month, sometimes at Hatch but usually in the community for a field trip.
- Hatch’s 2nd grade Girl Scout troop meets 4th Tuesdays of the month 4:30-5:30pm. More details here.
- Join the Cub Scouts with other Hatch students. Cub Scout Joining Night is at Mann Elementary School, pod gym, Thursday September 14, 2017 6:30 – 8:30 pm. More details here.
- There’s still time to sign up for Green Team. See attached or email [email protected]
World Language Enrichment Classes
Registration deadline is October 10. Please look for a paper registration form coming home with your child or find it in the digital backpack. Questions? Contact [email protected].