Cold Weather
Even though we are in the midst of fall weather, cold temperatures are most certainly upon us. Please make sure your child arrives to school with proper clothing regarding coats and other outdoor garments. We want to make sure all students are properly clothed when going outside for recess. If students do not have an appropriate coat during cold temps we will ask them to stay inside during recess for their safety. If your child is in need of receiving a donated coat or other outdoor garments, please reach out to your child's teacher or the school office. We appreciate your help and understanding.
Book Blast
Be on the lookout for a separate announcement regarding our Book Blast drive which kicks off on Monday, November 4th! This event is focused on expanding home libraries for all of our students.
Veterans Day Program Reminder
McKinley will be having a Veterans Day Program on Friday, November 8th at 9:00 a.m. and would like to invite veterans who are related to our students. Please call the school office (815) 433-1907 by Wednesday, November 6th and give us the name of the veteran attending, the branch of the military he/she served in, and the name(s) of the students at McKinley they are related to. Veterans should plan on arriving at 8:40 a.m. to check in at the office and have their driver’s license scanned. Due to limited space, we can only invite veterans to attend this assembly as we honor and thank them for their service. All students are invited to wear red, white and blue on Friday, November 8th to show their support.
Parent-Teacher Conferences
Parent-Teacher Conferences will be held on Monday, November 25th from 11:00 a.m. - 6:15 p.m. Included below is the conference sign-up link that is now live and will close on Friday, November 15th. Conferences will be held in-person or via google meet. If you would like to meet with your child's teacher via google meet you can request this under the "special request" portion of the sign-up process. Teachers will then send you a google meet link once the conference date gets closer. Please sign up for a time to meet with your child's classroom teacher and if you have any questions feel free to reach out to your child's teacher or contact the school office.
https://www.ptcfast.com/schools/McKinley_Elementary_School
Freezin' for a Reezin'
OES will once again be participating in Freezin' for a Reezin'. We will be collecting monetary donations for the event through Thursday, November 21st. If families would like to participate, cash or checks made payable to: Freezin' for a Reezin' or Ottawa Food Basket will be accepted. The winning class will have the opportunity to sing downtown with WCMY on Friday, December 6th at 1:00 p.m.
Buffalo Wild Wings Fundraiser
If you like Buffalo Wild Wings this is the fundraiser for you! If you visit the Buffalo Wild Wings in Peru on Saturday, December 7th anytime from 11:00 a.m. - 10:00 p.m. a portion of the proceeds will donated back to McKinley. This fundraiser applies to both dine-in and carry-out orders, however online order or deliveries will not be honored. We appreciate your support!
Calendar Dates
November 4 - Book Blast begins
November 5 - No School (Election Day - Illinois schools are mandated to close)
November 6 - Culver's Night (5:00-8:00 p.m.)
November 8 - End of Trimester 1, Veterans Day Program (9:00 a.m.)
November 13 - PTO Meeting (5:30 p.m.)
November 15 - Report cards distributed to students, Parent-Teacher Conference link closes
November 19 - OES Board Meeting at Central School (6:00 p.m.)
November 21 - Freezin' for a Reezin' donations due
November 22 - Half Day Dismissal (11:30 a.m.)
November 25 - No School (Parent-Teacher Conferences 11:00 a.m. - 6:15 p.m.)
November 26-November 29 - No School (Thanksgiving Break)
December 2 - School Resumes
December 6 - Freezin' for a Reezin' winning class performs downtown (1:00 p.m.)
December 7 - Buffalo Wild Wings Fundraiser (11:00 a.m. - 10:00 p.m.)
PTO
Happy November!
We hope everyone had a fun Halloween!
The 5B’s BBQ fundraiser was a great success! Thank you to everyone who sold and purchased tickets!
This month we are quite busy! We have our first Culver’s night of the year on Wednesday November 6th from 5-8. 10% of the total sales from those hours will come back to our PTO. Save yourself the work and have someone else cook for you 🍔🍟🍦
Our Tis the Season tickets will be coming home towards the end of the month. We have bigger prizes this year which is really exciting! All of the kids will come home with 10 tickets and they’ll be sold for $5 each. There will be a limited number of tickets so when you return your 10 you can request more from the office.
We will be getting started on our Holiday shop purchases this month. More information will come home about that in December!
Our next PTO meeting will be held on Wednesday November 13th at 5:30 in the gym! Anyone is welcome to attend.
We hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving!
If you have any questions you can reach out to any of our board members or send us a message to the McKinley PTO Facebook page
Amanda Waddell- President
Darlene Hess- Vice President
Casey Clemens- Treasurer
Amy Anderson- Secretary
DON’T FORGET…
-Like our Facebook page McKinley School PTO
-Save your Handy Foods receipts and send them into school. We can redeem these for gift cards to use for school events
-Join Kroger Community Rewards if you haven’t already. Select McKinley school as your organization to support and you can help our school just by grocery shopping!
Champion of The Charter
Congratulations to our October Champion of the Charter students! You have all done an awesome job following the school Charter and being smart with your emotions. Your positivity and kindness do not go unnoticed and you lead by example. All of our Champions are invited to attend the November board meeting to be recognized.
Kindergarten
Lincoln C., Jude J., Evan D.
1st Grade
Lainey L., Logan R., James P.
2nd Grade
Harlow O., Everly P., Avery W.
3rd Grade
Raelynn H., Leo S., Paul P.
4th Grade
Emma P., Grant C., Brynn R.
Life Skills
Vincent T., Ladanniale R.
Kindergarten
This month in Kindergarten we learned about bats, spiders, and pumpkins. Everyone enjoyed learning about these fun topics and participating in some Science and Math activities.
In Math we worked on comparing and writing numbers that were less than/greater than/equal to each other. We also practiced our graphing skills, and learned some of our ordinal numbers.
The firefighters were here to observe our October fire drill and also to give a fire prevention presentation, and we got to visit the fire station. We learned a lot about staying safe around fire and about what to do in the case of a house fire.
-Kindergarten Team
1st Grade
It has been a busy month of learning in 1st Grade again. Students learned about the basic needs of plants, animals, and humans in our living things science unit. We enjoyed providing those basic needs and watching our “Grass Heads” grow in the classroom. Students learned about the differences between living and nonliving things by observing gummy worms and earthworms. Addition and subtraction math facts have improved a lot this month. Students have studied the relationship between addition and subtraction. Writing is coming to life in our narrative writing unit. Students are writing ‘small moment’ stories about things that have happened to them. Many of our 1st grade families were able to attend Family Literacy Night and celebrate reading. Way to go 1st grade!
-1st Grade Team
2nd Grade
2nd Grade has had a busy October. Classes went to the YMCA for four different swim lessons and learned about water safety. We also visited the Little Red Schoolhouse where the kids went back and learned what school was like in 1885. They loved this experience and realized just how much times have changed.
In the classroom, students have been working on two-digit place value, reading to understand information, writing detailed sentences, putting ideas into words that make complete sense, and the importance of producers and consumers in social studies.
We held our second, 2nd Grade Friendship Friday on October 25th. The classes were broken into three different groups and rotated to different activities, discussing ways to spread kindness, cheer people on, and being respectful. It was such a fun day!
We wrapped up October with a variety of pumpkin activities, including pumpkin launchers!
-2nd Grade Team
3rd Grade
3rd grade has been working hard this month. In reading, we spent time practicing our comprehension strategies; compare and contrast, cause and effect, and theme. In writing, we continued to work on our small-moment story. Our stories are coming along really well.
In science, we learned what causes leaves to change color. We also wrapped up our first Earth Science unit, where we learned how the sun, Earth, and Moon are all connected. In this unit, we also learned about the moon's various phases and did an activity where we recreated the phases on Oreos. We also took a trip to the little red schoolhouse to learn more about what school was like in a one-room schoolhouse. Overall, we've had a busy but productive month.
-3rd Grade Team
4th Grade
We had such an amazing month of learning in October and are looking forward to all of the knowledge that November has to bring us in 4th grade! We will begin the month with a focus on human body systems in science. For reading, we will be using informational texts to learn about text structure and identifying author's reasoning and evidence. We will continue switching classrooms for math, as we focus on multiplication. Opinion essays will be the writing focus of the month.
We all had the best time, stepping into history, at the Little Red Schoolhouse!
-4th Grade Team
Life Skills
The month of October was full of pumpkins in both classrooms. We enjoyed the beautiful weather and spent lots of time playing on the wonderful new playground. We continue to enjoy cooking, art projects and learning new things.
-Life Skills Team
D/HH
October has been a great month in the Deaf and Hard of Hearing class. We have been preparing for our concert at Epworth Village. We have also been creating our own pumpkin patches. We have had a lot of fun.
-D/HH Team
STEM
Kindergarten:
Within STEM, kindergarten students have been learning about how to build an outdoor pet house. Kindergarteners have been practicing our taping skills by using masking tape to support to pieces of cardboard
1st Grade:
WIthin STEM, 1st Grade students have been practicing making model rockets based on the book Penguinaut.
2nd Grade:
Within STEM, 2nd Grade students have been working on freezing and melting activities. Students have worked previously with the crayons for melting. Recently, students have worked with making “popsicle soup” for our melting experiments. Students will next work on making homemade ice cream.
3rd Grade:
Within STEM, 3rd Grade students have been working incredibly hard with their learning of hurricanes, and the effects that they place upon coastal communities. Students will be working on building a model levee to save their town from becoming part of the Gulf of Mexico.
4th Grade:
Within STEM, 4th Grade students have previously observed the effects of erosion and weathering on soil, sand, gravel and water. Mrs. Vincent’s class will be working on building simple machines with LEGO Education projects, Mr. Jett’s class will be building model Mini-Golf courses and Mrs. Johnson’s class will be learning about the properties of rocks, as well as creating their own pet rock.
DHH/LIFE SKILLS:
Students in DHH classroom and Life Skills class have worked on painting pumpkins within STEM
-Mr. Grommon