ALS Ice Bucket Challenge!

It was only a matter of time until the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge came to Hixson Middle School. Well, when we do things, we go big! Here are the details.

Monday Memo: Open House, Homework and Gear

Welcome to Week 3 at Hixson. This week have Hixson Open House on Wednesday evening from 6:00-8:15. We hope to see you there!

Harmony Gear orders are due on Thursday, August 28. We will only be ordering one time this year. Homework for Parents, found in an earlier post on this blog, is due on Friday, August 29.

Friday, August 29, is a no-student day. Teachers will be in for professional development and kiddos will have four-day weekend! Lucky them!

Friday, September 12 is Picture Day at Hixson. Many students had their picture taken during Orientation so only kiddos who did NOT have their picture taken during Orientation will have their picture taken on the twelfth. Picture re-takes will occur later in the year.

Please continue to check the Harmony Assignment Calendar to stay up-to-date on assignment due dates. All core class assignments and team events will be on that calendar. The Hixson Calendar will show all school events and important dates.

Monday Memo: Gear, Homework and Calendars!

This week things are really kicking in. Core classes are well underway and some of our team-oriented activities are on deck as well. Here is some important information for the coming week.

Today, kids were given Harmony Gear orders. We have a line of Harmony clothes (t-shirts, hoodies, shorts, flannel pants, cinch sacks, etc.) that kids and their families can purchase if they would like to. Each student was given an order form and the order form is also available for download here: Harmony Gear Order Form.

This week we will be attending Principal Talks. Dr. Roberts, Dr. Miller and Dr. Smith will be talking to the kiddos about expectations this year both academically and behaviorally.

Please fill out the Homework for Parents if you have not done so already. We want to know as much about your kiddos as possible. This confidential information often helps us tailor our instruction and also helps us relate better to the students. Just scroll down this blog to find the entry titled "Homework for Parents". We really appreciate your cooperation and support.

Picture forms will go home this week for the kids who didn't have their pictures taken at Orientation. Please expect them by the end of the week.

You can subscribe to the Harmony Assignment Calendar or just view it on this blog. Across the top of the blog are several page links. Click the one that says "Calendars" and you will be able to see the Harmony Assignment Calendar in addition to the Hixson Calendar. You can also see a short snapshot of the assignment calendar on the right side of this blog. We will be updating the assignment calendar with due dates for all of our core classes and some team information updates.

Subscribe to the Harmony Assignment Calendar

Students and parents can subscribe to the Harmony Assignment Calendar to make it easier to monitor assignment due dates and set reminders.

Subscribing to the Harmony Assignment Calendar is easy. If you have Google Calendars, go to the Video Tutorial link above and watch the video called "Subscribe to Harmony Assignment Calendar". If you don't have Google Calendars, try the directions below.

Here are the directions from the Google Help Page:

To add a calendar using its address, follow these steps:

1. Click the down-arrow next to Other calendars.
2. Select Add by URL from the menu.
3. Find the address of the Google Calendar in iCalendar format, or if you have the iCalendar address of a calendar from a different application (for example, Apple's iCal), you can use this as well.
4. Address of our calendar: https://www.google.com/calendar/ical/wgcloud.org_blt499tkjdojdka5ma2vqbt3r4%40group.calendar.google.com/public/basic.ics 
5. Enter the address in the field provided.
6. Click Add calendar. The calendar will appear in the Other calendars section of the calendar list to the left.

Welcome to Team Harmony!!

We would like to welcome all of you to the Harmony Team for the 2014-15 school year. We are looking forward to meeting all of you and working with your kiddos this year. One of our points of pride is creating a positive, constructive and collaborative climate on team. Since we are a half team, the kids get to know each other pretty well and we become more of a family than a random group of kids. We will work hard to make sure that your kids have everything they need in order to succeed this year at Hixson.

As you may know, we use technology quite a bit on team and see it as a tool to foster learning. We will be introducing a lot of digital tools and showing the kids how to best use their new laptops within the first few weeks of school. The learning curve is steep but within a couple of months, they will be old pros.

Please subscribe to this blog either through e-mail or your RSS feed. We will be updating the blog a couple times per week and we want to make sure you get the updates to stay current on all of the team happenings. Please feel free to e-mail us at any time if you have questions. We are always available to talk about the kiddos. Welcome and let's have a great year!

By the way, please fill out the Homework for Parents when you have time. Thanks!