Did you know:

Multicultural Celebrations
We will be celebrating the richness of the diversity in our school community on January 26 and 27. I hope you will plan to join the staff and PTA for an evening of performances, exhibits and socializing on the 26th. Each Oak Hill student will have the opportunity to share his or her cultural background through the display of a personal paper doll. Please be sure to collaborate with your child on this. We look forward to representing all of our families.

Chinese New Year
Oak Hill will have a visit from the Amazing Chinese Acrobats on Monday, January 23. This spectacular event will kick off a week of Chinese New Year recognition in conjunction with the multicultural celebrations.

school improvement Plan
I encourage you to take some time to read the Oak Hill school improvement plan which is now posted on our website. This plan captures the goals and strategies that our staff focuses on to ensure outstanding student achievement. I am so proud of the collaborative work that has gone into our plan and our clear focus on continuous improvement! Feel free to contact me with questions

-A.G.

Did you know?

• Oak Hill Sixth Grade Chorus students sang beautifully at Reston Town Center on Friday, December 9 to a HUGE crowd of shoppers, family and OH staff.  The performance was a follow-up to the fifth and sixth grade choral concert presented at school the night before.  It was spectacular and a glorious way to showcase the talent and joy of the students from our school.  Thanks to Cristen Dimas, Wendy Peterson, and Brianna Calhoun, as well as all parents for making this fantastic event happen!
• Our First Lego League teams represented Oak Hill exceptionally well in recent competitions including the state tournament!  We shared their successes on WOAK for all of the students to hear about and help celebrate.  Thanks to all of the parent coaches who really made a difference for our students.
• Mrs. McHale’s first graders will be participating in a service learning project to celebrate the holiday season this year in lieu of giving gifts.  In collaboration with her room parents, Mrs. McHale has adopted a family that the first graders will support in having a happy holiday with gifts and food.  Mrs. McHale shared with me that she started this tradition several years ago when a family in her class was impacted by a house fire a few days  before Christmas.  She has partnered with community organizations to adopt a family each year ever since and encourages her students to participate.  I am so proud of our children’s involvement in this project in addition to our Kids Helping Kids backpack meal outreach program!  Way to go!!!
• Mrs. Noble-Ginty, orchestra director, and the advanced strings ensemble will not only present their winter concert at school this week, but will also showcase their learning at Dominion VA Power on Wednesday, December 14 from 11-12 PM.  The group has been invited to share some holiday cheer with our community partner.  I look forward to attending as well.
• Family Math Night for grades 3-6 is this Thursday, December 15 from 6:30-7:45 PM.  Bring you family and come and see the amazing things that our students are learning in math!  I am looking forward to joining my third grader and hope to see you.

Have a wonderful week!

-A.G.

I am so grateful for the support that the community provides for our special programs at Oak Hill.  Recent wonderful happenings include:

• Kids Helping Kids in Grade 5:  This service learning program led by Karen Tinker, PTA Community Outreach Chair, helps provide food for students in need in neighboring communities.  During the last week I read the book Boxes for Katje to Mr. Sonoskey’s and Ms. Toprani’s fifth graders and talked with them about giving, generosity, and helping others.  It has been heartwarming to talk with them and see how they truly understand the need for serving others.
• First Lego League:  FLL teams have been busy meeting, creating, programming and competing.  Oak Hill’s FLL teams have had a tremendous showing in the last two competitions.  Not only do we have a state championship qualifying team, and other recognitions, but two outstanding teams were awarded the “Gracious Professionalism” award.  This award recognizes sportsmanship and team work.  I know the parent coaches share in my pride know that all of our students conduct themselves in an exemplary manner outside of school, even in a highly competitive environment!  Wow!!!
• Girls on the Run:  Oak Hill’s GOTR team ran the fall 5K over the weekend.  Supported by many staff members including teachers Kelly Herring, Cristen Dimas, Jess Dowd and Brianna Calhoun.  The dedication of the parents who support their girls’ personal advocacy and fitness goals, as well as the extra time given by our staff is appreciated!!!
• Kindergarten Friendship Feast:  What could be better than sharing finger food with 75 Kindergarten students in celebration of Thanksgiving!  It was a joy to see the smiles and sharing that happened today as the students, their teachers and parent volunteers shared in the delicious food.  I really enjoyed it too!

I hope you have a chance to visit Oak Hill very soon.  I wish you and your family a wonderful Thanksgiving!

-A.G.

This week I had the opportunity to experience so many exciting learning moments including:

• The Schlembach family harvested the last of the summer vegetables from the Teaching Garden including many, many pounds of carrots, cherry and plum tomatoes and sweet potatoes!  Students were able to enjoy the carrots and tomatoes on salads our cafeteria and the staff enjoyed roasted sweet potatoes Tuesday afternoon thanks to the cafeteria staff.  Yum!!!  I can’t wait to see how our garden develops throughout the year.
• Thank you to the classroom teachers and PTA for helping to support field trips over the last two weeks for grades 3, 4, and 6.  Third graders enjoyed an exciting trip to the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia.  Fourth grade attended the Fairfax Symphony at GMU and sixth grade has recently visited the Woodson HS Planetarium.  It is wonderful to extend the learning to venues outside of our classrooms and allow students to experience what they have read about!
• Did you ever wonder what teachers do to stay current with best practices and make sure they understand how their students learn best?  This week a group of teachers led by Ms. Wright, fifth grade Oak Hill teacher, conducted a lesson study with fifth graders.  The group of teachers constructed a lesson together, observed it in action with Ms. Wright’s students, talked to the students about their thinking, and then reflected as a team on how they could revise the lesson.  I had the privilege of sitting in on the discussion and observing part of the lesson.  It is amazing to listen to student verbalize their thinking as well as to observe teachers as they thoughtfully collaborate about teaching and learning!
• The Chantilly Pyramid Choral Concert that was held last night was a phenomenal occasion.  Thanks to Brianna Calhoun and Cristen Dimas, music teachers, for preparing our sixth grade choral students to perform so brilliantly at the concert.  If you haven’t had the chance to attend this event, I encourage you to do so next year.  Choral groups from all six feeder elementary schools, Franklin and Rocky Run Middle schools, and Chantilly High Schools perform.  It is a great way to support the fine arts and encourage students to continue their pursuit of music knowledge throughout their school years.

I hope to share with you on a regular basis what I notice as I visit classrooms and interact with students, staff and families at Oak Hill community events.  If you ever want to know more about something I have written about, feel free to email me at atgoodloe@fcps.edu.

Happy Weekend!

-A.G.

So many great things have been happening at Oak Hill during the last month.  Here are a few of the highlights:

• Principals’ Coffee for New Families
• PTA meetings and new family receptions that had a HUGE turnout!
• Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival
• Fabulous Field Days the encouraged teamwork and classbuilding (Thank you P.E. and parent volunteers)
• Sixth Grade Field Trip to “The Edge”.  The students were remarkable and represented Oak Hill very well.  We are so proud of them.

As I have been visiting classrooms on a daily basis I have noted how well the students have settled into school routines and how highly engaged they are in their learning.  Today I saw fantastic multiplication practice happening in Mrs. Cosgrove’s third grade and a variety of geography activities including painting pumpkin globes and creating classroom maps in Mrs. Levy’s third grade.

Ms. Michele Giardina, Oak Hill’s full-time Advanced Academic Resource Teacher presented a comprehensive overview of the FCPS advanced academic programs and Level IV (center) screening process last evening.  She shared the instructional models that she uses to reach ALL Oak Hill students including teaching lessons in all classrooms twice per month as well as collaborating with teachers to plan higher level thinking lessons and also running small enrichment groups for students in grades 3-6.  Today I saw her facilitating a lesson with Mrs. Herring’s fourth graders integrating technology.  Each student created a self-portrait on the computer that will be used as the cover of their 4th grade “yearbook” – an electronic advanced academics portfolio.  The students were enthralled with the work!

I encourage you to regularly check both the classroom teachers’ and specialists (Reading, Counseling, Music, Art, PE, Chinese, AART) Blackboard sites.  There are wonderful resources and activities for students to engage in outside of school, as well as peeks at the curriculum!  You can even hear the Chinese vocabulary and concepts being taught with a voiceover from Mrs. Uang!  Wow!.

Enjoy the gorgeous fall weather and I hope to see you at Oak Hill very soon!

-A.G.

9:30-10:15:  Kindergarten

10:00-10:45:  Grades 1-6

Don’t miss it!

-A.G.

Many of our staff members are here well before their contracts start busily preparing the building and their classrooms for the students’ arrival.  We have collaborated all summer long to review student data, plan for classes, and allocate resources to be sure each and every student can reach his or her potential this year!

Please remember that class placements will be mailed out on Monday August 29 and our Open House is on Friday, September 2 in the morning.  Students and parents can also log in to existing Blackboard 24-7 Learning accounts starting on Monday the 29th to see teacher assignments.  

We hope you know that we work very hard to match each and every child with the right teacher as well as to balance instructional groupings in each classroom.   Changes to class placements will not be made once the letters have been sent.  Thank you for understanding and supporting your child in having a great year with our wonderful teachers!

Looking forward to seeing you next week!

-A.G.

I am very proud to share the most recent assessment results and VDOE school report card for Oak Hill ES.  Be sure to take a look at the following link to see the past three years of student achievement performance bands.  You can see that our scores continued to follow an upward trend!!!  Please stay tuned for more information regarding student achievement from grades K-6 at Oak Hill as we open the 2011-12 school year.  SOL Perfomance Bands

Oakie’s Summer Enrichment

Approximately 30 Oak Hill students in grades 1-6 began their second week of a summer jump start program designed to help them achieve and exceed grade level benchmarks in reading, writing and math today.  This intense eight day program is being taught be six Oak Hill staff members with the goal being to help students to be prepared to have a very successful 2011-12 school year in the core areas of Language Arts or Mathematics.   We will be celebrating the students’ accomplishments at the end of the second week of instruction this Thursday, August 18.  Way to go!!!

Wedding Bells

Congratulations to Oak Hill staff members Ernie Herring (P.E.) and Kelly Lewis (4th grade) who tied the knot in South Carolina over the weekend.  Ernie and Kelly met here at Oak Hill ES and we are thrilled for them!!!  Our good friend Oakie even made an appearance at their celebration!  We wish the new Mr. and Mrs. Herring much happiness and look forward to having them back to open the school year. 

Please keep checking the Oak Hill ES website:  www.fcps.edu/OakHillES as well as the PTA website: www.OakHillPTA.org for important school updates and reminders.

Enjoy the summer!

I am back in the Oak Hill office, along with Mrs. Evans and we are busily preparing for the 2011-12 school year.  My family and I greatly appreciated all of your support during our daughter’s surgery and hospitalization during the month of June.  I am thrilled to report that she returned home after very successful open heart surgery and is doing very well. 

I am back at work and looking forward to meeting new families over the summer, collaborating with the staff and preparing to welcome all of our students back in August.  Please be sure to check the Oak Hill website often for updates and here too!  I will be sharing happenings throughout the summer here on my blog.

-A.G.

Students throughout our building have been engaged in end of the year assessments during the last two weeks and we couldn’t be prouder of their performance.  If you hear the alphabet soup talk of DRA, SOL, MRA, eCART, don’t be alarmed.  Our students are well-prepared and focused on achieving high standards!  Thank you for supporting their learning and making sure they are well rested and ready for school each day.

Ms. Sledge and I hope that you and your family enjoy what promises to be a sunny and HOT summer kick-off weekend.  School will close two hours early on May 27 and the Oak Hill office will close at 2 PM.    When the students return Tuesday we will be looking forward to a little over three weeks of learning fun in June before summer really begins.

Also be on the lookout for a summer learning opportunity for selected students to receive extra practice with reading or math coming soon!

-A.G.