Westside Elementary

Human Rights Day on December 10 remembers the day the General Assembly of the UN adopted and proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. It is the most translated document around the world and is available in over 500 languages. It has inspired countries and people alike to start treating every person with the right to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. On Human Rights Day we acknowledge the importance of this document and the importance of human rights. HISTORY OF HUMAN RIGHTS DAY Human Rights Day is the anniversary of the day in 1948 when the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The day’s popularity is perhaps best demonstrated by the commemorative stamp that was issued by the United Nations Postal Administration in 1952, which received over 200,000 advanced orders. The aim of the Declaration of Human Rights is to establish a common standard of living for all people across the planet that everyone is entitled to, and to in turn encourage all UN member states to strive towards the said standard of living for the people in their nation. Although the rights are seen as more declarative than legally binding, they are commonly acknowledged to have had an impact on how human rights are perceived and to be a force for good. Nowadays a different theme is selected for Human Rights Day each year. In 2014 the theme was “Every Day is Human Rights Day” and in 2016 it was “Stand up for someone’s rights today.” We should remember our human rights every day, but on December 10 we should remember them just a little bit more and embrace everyone around us as equals.

This is the time of year where we are aware that everyone needs grace. It should be something given year round, especially this year. Covid has people stressed, worried, and tired, if not sick. It's nice to see that Westside Teachers truly understand this and show their students daily how much they understand this. Sometimes we all need a deep breath, a second to ourselves, to count back. Children need those things too. Here's to all those little ones struggling with worries and frustrations, and adults too! We're all in this together! And here's to hoping that 2021 brings better health and mental health for all! ❄💗❄

Introducing... Mrs. Darsea Sanders First Grade Teacher Thank you for your dedication to Westside! ____________________________________________________ I have taught first grade for 20 years, 17 of those at Westside Elementary. I have been married to my husband Troy Sanders for 23 years. We have three kids; Jay 21, Shayna 17 and Preston, 12. I am blessed to do what I love every day with a fabulous first grade team. I enjoy reading, listening to music, and spending time with my family.

The OSDH & OSDE have collaborated to offer the following FAQs regarding new guidelines involving quarantine, isolation and related matters. You can find them here - https://5il.co/noem #CPSZEBRAPRIDE

Oh, Christmas Tree! Oh, Christmas Tree! Look all these lovely trees! Oh, Christmas Tree! Oh, Christmas Tree! Can you find your teacher's tree? Did you sing it? Did you just now go back and sing it? 😍🎄 Westside Teachers are getting in the Christmas spirit! Can you find your teacher's tree in all these pictures?

CPS #TechTipTuesday - Touchpads Has your touchpad mouse ever stopped working? In this week’s #TechTipTuesday, we will show users how to enable and disable their touchpad on the Zebra HP Laptop. YouTube: https://youtu.be/K-ZGM2Fpo5c #CPSZEBRAPRIDE

Introducing... Mrs. Mistey Book First Grade Teacher Thank you for your dedication to Westside! _______________________________________________ This is my 29th year of teaching. I have taught for 21 years here at Westside and taught in Tulsa for 8 years. I truly love my job and I love teaching kids how to read! I grew up in Claremore and graduated from Claremore High School. I attended NSU where I received my degree in elementary education. I am married to David, we have one daughter and a son-in-law. I enjoy working and living in Claremore. Guided Reading and Writer's Workshop are two of the most powerful components in first grade. The more you write, the better you'll read. The more you read, the better you'll write! In reading, we have guided reading groups most days. We work on reading strategies like looking at the picture and getting our mouth ready with the first sound. In writing, first grade encourages invented spelling and writing complete sentences.

National Pearl Harbor Day of Remembrance A day of infamy, the day Japan attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor, is commemorated with the National Pearl Harbor Day of Remembrance each year on December 7. On that day in 1941, more than 2,400 people died in Japan’s attack on the Hawaiian base of America’s Pacific Fleet. Hundreds of aircraft were destroyed or damaged, as were most of the ships in the harbor, and thousands of service men and women were killed or injured. It was an unprecedented surprise attack that precipitated the United States entry into WW II as we sided with the Allies and declared war on Japan. HOW TO OBSERVE NATIONAL PEARL HARBOR DAY OF REMEMBRANCE 1. Send a care package to a member of the Armed Forces overseas Find a local organization sending care packages—there should be one in your community. Basic grooming needs, phone cards, canned treats, even just a kind note of appreciation are all simple expressions of concern that mean so much to soldiers thousands of miles from home. Get your church or civic organization to help and your impact will be so much greater. 2. Loved ones staying at home need comfort too. The families left behind often struggle with expenses and loneliness while their husbands and wives are overseas. Adopt a family in your community and be there to offer help. It could be as simple as attending the kid’s games, dropping off some food, or giving a gas card. Small acts of kindness can help keep a family together even when they are apart. 3. Treat yourself well, too The life you are living today would be impossible without the sacrifices of December 7 and of all the wars this country has been in. Honor the memory of those lost by living the best life you can, and work to make life better for those coming after you.

What do great teachers do that have to teach from home? They teach virtually! Mrs. Stone is in a precautionary quarantine and teaching her class from home! Reading books and doing assignments with her class from home, makes having to be apart a little more bearable. Westside students love their teachers, especially Mrs. Stone's students!

Introducing... Mrs. Nicole Woods Kindergarten Teacher Thank you for your dedication to Westside!

Back in 2003, Ninja Burger created National Ninja Day on December 5 as a way to celebrate the Ninja “speed” with which their burgers are delivered. Aside from that, ninjas are awesome. We all love them and secretly wish we were one. On this day, wearing black is 100 percent acceptable. Stuck at home during quarantine? Dress like a ninja at your house and run wild down the hallway! Think Parkour but quieter with more pauses between jumps. HISTORY OF NATIONAL NINJA DAY It’s said that December 5 was chosen for the first National Ninja Day because the Tom Cruise movie “The Last Samurai,” which featured a ninja-vs-samurai battle, was released on that day. In the years since the celebration has grown and gained press in stages, its creators playing on the fascination Americans have always had for the black-clad warriors, from the original issues of “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles,” back through swordplay-focused games like the old table-top “Dungeons and Dragons,” not to mention a slew of Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris films from the 60s and 70s. But the satirical website and its creators’ motivations are secondary to the intention: December 5 is the one day a year where you won’t catch strange looks for saying “Haiii-yah!” as you swoop in and grab a donut out of the box in the meeting room, being stealth-like silent in the hallways, and turning in your paper like it's a chinese star (actually let's not try this one), On Day of the Ninja, you hold the key to the mystical power, so make it the best day yet, young grasshoppers! On Facebook, show us your best ninja moves and comment with your picture! Legend has it that Westside used to even have a BoxTop Ninja who would come cartwheeling into classrooms and drop of a note with ninja like speed and reflexes!

Ali Robinson is celebrating National Cookie Day! National Cookie Day is December 4 so get ready to refill your cookie jar. Maybe you prefer your cookies to have a crunchy snap, or maybe you’d rather bite into soft and chewy sugary heaven. Either way, eating cookies brings us happiness, and we should all do it more often. Just don’t tell your doctor. HISTORY OF NATIONAL COOKIE DAY In America, a cookie is described as a thin, sweet, small cake. By definition, a cookie can be a variety of hand-held, flour-based sweet cakes, either crisp or soft. Each country has its own word for “cookie”. In England and Australia they’re referred to as biscuits. In Spain they’re galletas. Germans call them keks and in Italy they have several names to identify the various forms of cookie. In America, the Dutch word “koekje” was Anglicized to “cookie”. The sweet treat came to America through the Dutch in New Amsterdam in the late 1620s. The earliest reference to cookies in America is in 1703, when the Dutch in New York provided 800 cookies for a funeral. Hard cookie-like wafers have existed for as long (and maybe even longer) as baking has been documented. However, they were not sweet enough to be considered cookies by modern standards. They appear to have some origins in 7th century CE Persia, shortly after the use of sugar became relatively common in the region. They spread to Europe through the Muslim conquest of Spain. By the 14 century, they were common in all levels of society throughout Europe, from royal cuisine to street vendors. With global travel becoming widespread at that time, cookies made a natural travel snack, a modernized equivalent of the travel cakes consumed throughout history. One of the most popular early cookies, which traveled especially well and became known on every continent by similar names, was the jumble: a relatively hard cookie made largely from nuts, sweetener, and water. Whatever cookie it is that you prefer, enjoy it today in honor of the cookie!

𝗗𝗜𝗦𝗧𝗥𝗜𝗖𝗧 𝗖𝗔𝗟𝗘𝗡𝗗𝗔𝗥 𝗖𝗛𝗔𝗡𝗚𝗘 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗗𝗲𝗰𝗲𝗺𝗯𝗲𝗿 𝟭𝟴𝘁𝗵. Claremore Public School will not have classes on December 18, 2020. This includes distance learning and in-person classes. Winter Break for students will begin 12/18/2020. The previous Distance Learning Day will now be a Professional Development Day for teachers. #CPSZEBRAPRIDE

The Elks Shoot Out Contest will be this Saturday, Dec 5 at the Verdigris JH gym. 8-9 year age group: 9:00 10-11 year age group: 10:00 12-13 year age group: 11:00 Lyric Watkins: 8-9 boys Kinley Williams: 8-9 girls Kannon Kinnard: 10-11 age Ella Hardage: 10-11 age Trenton Corbitt: age 12-13 Let's wish the guys and gals GOOD LUCK! Come out and support them Saturday at the Verdigris Jr. High Gymnasium!

National Disability Day on December 3 is a day to help everyone become more compassionate and understanding of the challenges faced by people with disabilities. The day doesn’t discriminate between mental and physical disabilities, and the spirit of the day is to ensure that all people in the world have equal opportunities for work, play, health, and success. People with disabilities can be and very often are contributing and valued members of society, and today is all about appreciating them. HOW TO OBSERVE NATIONAL DISABILITY DAY Become an advocate for the disabled Look around your community and the places you frequent. If accommodations for the disabled are not in place, ask the shop owner, mall manager and/or your elected officials to install them. It’s the law. Lend a helping hand Inquire at your local senior center or residence, or of the nurses at an outpatient clinic, if they know of someone who needs assistance. Offer to help. Sometimes just delivering a medication, dropping off the mail, or picking up a few things at the grocery —simple tasks for you—would make the world of difference to someone with a disability. Show some compassion When you’re tired, hurried, and in a rush, you know you can sometimes be irritable. Don’t snap at someone who’s slowing you down, or take your frustrations out on them. They may be disabled. If so, their lives are always like that, while your problems are probably fleeting. Likewise, don’t let any bad humor they exhibit ruin your day. This is when a smile can smooth everything over. WHY NATIONAL DISABILITY DAY IS IMPORTANT It builds awareness of people with disabilities. Disabled people sometimes feel invisible in our society. People rush around them in their daily routines, barely noticing them. Today, try to make eye contact and smile (that’s good advice with everyone you see every day, not just the disabled) and be available to help should they seem to be having difficulties. We better understand the difficulties disabled people have The treasured parking space right in front of the pharmacy, the sloped curbs at intersections with the textured mats in place so the vision impaired folks can feel the curb end, the buttons to open doors automatically, even elevators on the Subway —are all in place to make a difficult life a little easier for a disabled person. Notice these accommodations today, and then notice how few of them there are. It’s more than a day —it’s the law The Americans with Disabilities Act was created to define the rights of disabled people and the design standards which businesses and municipalities must incorporate to comply with the law. Called the ADA, it is quite explicit in the standards required, and a familiarity with it could be most helpful to anyone in. **Disclaimer these are stock photos, not actual children at Claremore Public Schools, (CPS). They do not have masks on because these pictures were not taken at CPS.

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT Rogers Co Health Dept. is now testing without appointments. Drive-through testing is available Monday through Thursday from 3 - 4 PM and Friday mornings from 8:30 - 9:30 AM. No cost and no insurance needed. Must wear a mask and stay in the car. Renetta Harrison, MHR, CEP-Health Educator Rogers County Health Department 2664 N Hwy 88 918-341-3166- office CPS #WellnessWednesday

Ms. Alex Edinger First Grade Teacher Thank you for your dedication!

Has your child lost a jacket? gloves? lunch pail? back pack? Tell them to check the Lost and Found! It is located between the office and the PE classroom! There are hooks on the wall, and all of the items are hung up on the hooks. If it's yours please take it home BEFORE Christmas Break!

It's #TechTipTuesday Claremore is a Google School, and the Google Workspaces Suite offers many useful tools to complete homework assignments and teach students. One of the most useful options is the Google Chrome Sync feature which keeps all bookmarks, links, and a user’s account information synced across all the devices. This week’s #TechTipTuesday will show users how to turn on Chrome Sync, so everything follows the user across all devices! Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ClaremorePublicSchools/videos/682043512514530 YouTube: https://youtu.be/QPRTYhLI31g #CPSZEBRAPRIDE

Jens Jenson has a message for everyone! Mask up! Even Monkeys need to mask up! Every day when you come to school, please make sure your child has a clean mask! Cloth masks do need to be washed! Don't forget your bottled water and your device too! Remember those big 3 (Mask, Water bottle, and device) every day!