Principal's Message 4.20.12

Highlight of the Week
Popcorn Party!!! The Student Council conducted our reward popcorn party on Tuesday for 3rd - 5th graders and on Thursday for 1st and 2nd graders.  If you remember, the Student Council conducted a coin drive for the Leukemia Society where our students raised over $1,300 dollars. It was really fun to have the popcorn machine up and running in the lunchroom with the aroma of freshly popped corn in the air. Everyone really enjoyed this special treat. Thank you to Mr. Nagle for your patient popcorn popping and the Student Council students who helped with the popcorn bags.

Welcome Incoming First Grade Families

The spring general PTO meeting will be held on Wednesday, April 25th at 7pm in Room 19.  It is at this meeting that the PTO and I enjoy welcoming our incoming 1st grade parents.  At the conclusion of this meeting, please join me for a tour of Prairie School during which time I can answer any questions you may have.  The meeting and tour is an adult evening as our incoming first graders will have a tour during the school day at the end of May.

Board of Education and Staffing News in District 96

In open session on Tues., Apr. 17, the District 96 Board of Education regretfully accepted the resignation of Board member Don Shannon. During Mr. Shannon's more than 14 years of service, the District improved in overall rank from 55th to 8th in the state and has received the highest Financial Recognition Status from the Illinois State Board of Education for the past 8 years. READ MORE about Mr. Shannon's devoted service to District 96 students, staff, and community.

The Board of Education is now accepting applications to fill the vacancy created by Mr. Shannon's resignation. Applications are due Apr. 27, 2012, by 4:30 p.m. READ DETAILS / DOWNLOAD APPLICATION FORM

Also, at their meeting on Apr. 17, Supt. Julie Schmidt recommended and the Board approved the appointment of Twin Groves Assistant Principal Andrew Fenton, effective Aug. 1, 2012. Mr. Fenton succeeds Mrs. Amy Gluck in this role, as Mrs. Gluck will assume the responsibilities of Ivy Hall principal on August 1. READ MORE

Principal Coffee and Parent Technology Training

During the next Principal's Coffee, you will experience first-hand, the technology and applications your child uses at Prairie School. Please complete this survey to give us an idea of what technology you would like to learn more about so you can support and understand what your child is doing at school. The results of this survey will be used to determine the focus for parent training. Thanks!

Girls on the Run

Do you have a daughter that will be in 3rd, 4th or 5th grade next year? 

Do you want her to learn to have a healthy self-image, increase self-esteem, and be a role-model for other girls?

Do you want to see her beaming when she crosses the finish line and conquers a 5K run? 

If so, she might be just right for Girls on the Run!  Girls on the Run is an international organization (check it out at www.girlsontherun.org) that promotes healthy-living and healthy self-esteem for girls.  The program is 12 weeks long and culminates with a 5K fun run.  Erin Sauer and Nicole Nielsen brought Girls on the Run to Prairie for its inaugural season this spring, and on June 9th 14 girls from 3rd, 4th and 5th grade will run their first ever 5K downtown Chicago around Soldier Field with 6500 other girls and 1100 coaches in Chicagoland.

We are looking to see the interest for next year so we can prepare for coaching. The organization has very specific guidelines on the coach to girl ratio.  Here are some things to consider: Practices will be TWO times per week (Probably Wednesday and Thursday) from 3:15-4:30. Girls can not leave early, so we ask you to please carefully consider other commitments (lessons, practices, vacations) prior to committing to Girls on the Run. Additionally, it is highly advised that girls do not miss any practices other than for illness because each lesson builds on the other. 

If you are interested in your girl being a part of Girls on the Run, please contact Erin Sauer atesauer@kcsd96.org.  

Teacher Appreciation Week... A Message from the PTO
Staff Appreciation Week is May 7-11.  Please help the Staff Appreciation Committee thank our wonderful Prairie teachers and staff by participating in Flower Day on Tuesday, May 8^th, and donating gift cards for game prizes by Tuesday, May 1^st.  Click here for all the details.

Lawn Treatment Application Notice
District 96 uses Integrated Pest Management--a program that combines
preventive techniques, non-chemical methods (such as bait traps), and
the appropriate use of pesticides (with a preference for products
least harmful to human health and the environment).

On the weekend of My 5 & 6, 2012, the District 96 lawn treatment
provider, Zenith Landscaping will treat grassy areas adjacent to all
District buildings. Signs will be posted to indicate that the
treatments have been applied. In the event of rain, the applications
will occur on the following weekend, May 12 & 13, 2012.


From Superintendent Schmidt

Please share your feedback on the new report card format: CLICK HERE AND COMPLETE THIS BRIEF SURVEY.  Be sure to click the SUBMIT button when you finish, to send your responses.

The survey will be available through 4:00 p.m. on Mon., Apr. 23.
Thank you–we do appreciate your time and responses.

Second Grade Dental Exams

Please remember that second grade students are required by Illinois state law to have a dental exam.  If you are unsure if you have completed this requirement, please call Mrs. Evans, School Nurse.  The required dental form can be found on the District 96 Student Health Forms link.

Upcoming Dates

• 4/20 Art Auction, TONIGHT, at 7pm at The Cedar Grill, 330 Old McHenry Rd., Long Grove
• 4/25 PTO General Meeting & 1st grade parent welcome and building tour, 7pm
• 5/3 Spring Rhythm Band Concert, 7pm
• 5/9 Prairie Celebrates Learning (formerly Portfolio Night), 6:30 - 7:30pm
• 5/23 PTO General Meeting and Board Elections, 9:30am
• 5/24 5th grade transition day, 9am
• 5/24 5th grade beginning band concert at TG at 7pm
• 5/25 Half Day of School, 11:45am dismissal
• 5/28 No School - Memorial Day
• 5/31 Talent Show at 7pm
• 6/1 Field Day
• 6/4 Field Day Rain Date
• 6/5 5th Grade Party

Principal's Message 4.13.12

Highlight of the Week
Rockin' USA was one of our highlights this week presented by our singing and dancing 4th graders. The concert featured facts and songs about many of our United States highlighted by a video montage of student artwork and American photographs. Congratulations to the prelude soloist performers Lucas B., Drew S., Atharv K., and Michael B. A huge thank you to Mr. Nagle for his dedication and creativity in directing this concert.


Our second highlight of this week was our Positively Prairie assembly which featured our Positively Prairie Student Leadership Team's videotaped newscast of students being kind, respectful, responsible, and ready at school. All students who have received a WOW slip this year were honored as well. Keep up the great work kids!!

Principal Coffee and Parent Technology Training

During the next Principal's Coffee, you will experience first-hand, the technology and applications your child uses at Prairie School. Please complete this survey to give us an idea of what technology you would like to learn more about so you can support and understand what your child is doing at school. The results of this survey will be used to determine the focus for parent training. Thanks!

Buffalo Grove Bike Rodeo

The 2012 Bike Rodeo will take place at the Mike Rylko Park (Skate Park), 1000 N. Buffalo Grove Road, on May 19, from 11:00am to 3:00pm. We will be raffling off 2 bikes and numerous bike accessories. The raffle will be at 3:30pm and you do not need to be present to win. The rodeo is for kids 5-12 years old. Bikes with training wheels are allowed. Kids should wear a helmet if possible. 

Welcome Incoming First Grade Families

The spring general PTO meeting will be held on Wednesday, April 25th at 7pm in Room 19.  It is at this meeting that the PTO and I enjoy welcoming our incoming 1st grade families.  At the conclusion of this meeting, please join me for a tour of Prairie School during which time I can answer any questions you may have.  

Book Drive
The Helping Others Together (H.O.T.) club is excited to be conducting our final community service project of the school year, a book drive to bring books to children in needy areas around Chicagoland.  So far, the students of Prairie have collected over 2,000 books!! We're just over halfway to reaching our goal of collecting 4,000! Keep up the great work!

We will be collecting books until Monday, April 23, so please send any books your children have outgrown, that are a 6th grade level or lower, in to school! Thank you so much for your support of this wonderful cause!

Social Emotional Learning Podcast
Are you interested in learning more about the social-emotional learning standards? If so, please click here... SOCIAL & EMOTIONAL LEARNING PODCAST

PTO News

Next Friday, April 20th is the PTO Art Auction. Please don't miss out on this chance to own awesome student artwork. Check out this week's PTO Newsletter for details.

Placement Requests for the 2012 - 2013 School Year
The Prairie staff welcomes any insight you wish to share about your child’s strengths, needs, and learning style. We will take into consideration pertinent information about your child’s learning style and needs, received on or before Friday, April 27, 2012. While we welcome your input, specific teacher requests will not be honored.  Please put your thoughts in writing and address them to me at cpfaff@kcsd96.org. 

Upcoming Dates

• 4/20 Art Auction at 7pm at The Cedar Grill, 330 Old McHenry Rd., Long Grove
• 4/25 PTO General Meeting & 1st grade parent welcome and building tour, 7pm
• 5/3 Spring Rhythm Band Concert, 7pm
• 5/9 Prairie Celebrates Learning (formerly Portfolio Night), 6:30 - 7:30pm
• 5/23 PTO General Meeting and Board Elections, 9:30am
• 5/24 5th grade transition day, 9am
• 5/24 5th grade beginning band concert at TG at 7pm
• 5/25 Half Day of School, 11:45am dismissal
• 5/28 No School - Memorial Day
• 5/31 Talent Show at 7pm
• 6/1 Field Day
• 6/4 Field Day Rain Date
• 6/5 5th Grade Party

Principal's Message 4.6.12

Highlight of the Week
WOW!  Prairie students exceeded their Fill the Bucket goal and earned 1,085 WOW slips for the second trimester.  You remember that WOW slips are those pink slips that come home every now and then.  Achieving this Positively Prairie challenge, which was created by our Positively Prairie Student Leadership Team (PPSLT), led to our fun "Buddy Reading" reward.  The PPSLT combined efforts with our Helping Others Together (H.O.T.) club and kicked off our afternoon with an assembly focused on a book drive community service project.  After the assembly, students met with their reading buddy, big kids with younger kids, and enjoyed an afternoon of reading in a location of their choice.  To have a peek at the fun, visit our Reading Buddy Day photos.  In that students exceeded the Fill the Bucket goal, a snack was earned as well.  We are so proud of the students at Prairie!  They really know how to be Kind, Responsible, Respectful and Ready!  


6th Grade Orientation Night at Twin Groves
5th grade parents and students, please don't miss out on the great opportunity to attend 6th Grade Orientation next week on April 10th at 7:00pm.  This is a wonderful evening to learn more about 6th grade and get a feel for the Twin Groves campus.


Welcome Incoming First Grade Families
The spring general PTO meeting will be held on Wednesday, April 25th at 7pm.  It is at this meeting that the PTO and I enjoy welcoming our incoming 1st grade families.  At the conclusion of this meeting, please join me for a tour of Prairie School during which time I can answer any questions you may have.     


Growing Your Child as a Reader
Are you looking to help your child become a better reader?  The BUILDING READERS NEWSLETTER is full of wonderful ideas.


Lockdown Drill
On Tuesday we conducted our second lockdown drill of the school year with the assistance of Office Staci Kupsak from the Buffalo Grove Police Department.  This drill was conducted during the 3rd grade recess period to provide students the opportunity to practice getting to safety while outside.  The third graders did a great job of moving into the prairie area located adjacent to the playground.  All other students were in the building in their respective classrooms and did a great job as well of remaining quiet and out-of-sight.  Students and staff are to be complimented for the serious manner in which these drills are discussed and practiced.       


Book Drive
The Helping Others Together (H.O.T.) club is excited to be conducting their final community service project of the school year, a book drive to bring books to children in needy areas.  Did you know that in communities such as ours, there is a ratio of 13 books per child.  In low income areas, the ratio is 1 book for every 300 children.  That's outrageous!  


From April 5th - April 19th, H.O.T. will be collecting any gently used or new books to donate to Bernie's Book Bank.  The books can range from the beginning reader to 6th grade level, however; please no text books or workbooks.  Our school goal is to collect 4,000 books.  Please find some time in the upcoming week to go through your book shelves, look under beds, or wherever else books in need of a home may be.  Thank you for your support!

PTO News

Did you have a chance to see the AWESOME student artwork on display during parent-teacher conferences?  Don't miss out on the chance to own one of these terrific pieces.  Be sure to get your registration in to the PTO for the Friday, April 20th event.  To learn more about location and cost, please visit the PTO Newsletter. We hope to see you there!    

Placement Requests for the 2012 - 2013 School Year

It’s time to start thinking ahead to the 2012-2013 school year.  Creating balanced class lists that meet the needs of all students is a tremendously difficult job that takes many hours of thoughtful dialogue between classroom teachers, administrators, and other staff members.  We at Prairie take student classroom placement very seriously.  The process for class list creation is as follows:

·      First, teachers think about the social and academic needs of each of their current students, recording pertinent information to assist in the decision making process.

·      Next, teachers meet together as grade level teams to form class lists that are balanced in terms of academic, social, and emotional needs as well as considering friendships and other areas.  This is no easy task and often takes several meetings.  Teachers consider each child’s personality, academic needs, friendship patterns, and so on as they make a match for each individual child.  Specialists, the specials team, and I collaborate with the teams as needed during this process as well.

·      Each grade level team types a draft set of class lists that are then submitted to me.  One at a time, I will consider each student and his/her placement.  At this time, parent input is also considered.  Any changes in the draft lists are reviewed by the classroom teachers to ensure balance. 

·      Final class lists are then created with summer changes for move ins/outs reflected.

This same process happens at first grade.  Willow Grove creates the class lists for our incoming kindergartners enrolled there and I will add in students who attend private kindergartens.  Our goal is to create balanced class lists that promote the success of each child.  The process benefits all students.  Because of the input and thought given by teachers, parents, and administrators, we are very reluctant to make changes once this process occurs, as removing or moving one child can disrupt the balance of a class, impacting all students. 

The Prairie staff welcomes any insight you wish to share about your child’s strengths, needs, and learning style. We will take into consideration pertinent information about your child’s learning style and needs, received on or before Friday, April 27, 2012. While we welcome your input, specific teacher requests will not be honored.  Please put your thoughts in writing and address them to me at cpfaff@kcsd96.org. 

Principal's Message 3.23.12

Highlight of the Week

On Thursday, we hosted our 2nd Principal Coffee of the school year.  Our topic this week was "Technology at Prairie."  Mrs. Linda Litvan, Prairie's Technology Instructional Coach, reviewed for parents the many various types of technology and web-based applications our students use on a daily basis.  Parents were very excited to learn about all the ways their children are using technology at Prairie.  On our technology tour, parents were able to see the technology in action and watch students using iTouches, MacBooks, and the interactive white board in Mrs. Spivack's class.  We stopped by Miss Cotter's classroom as well and the students walked our parent visitors through their class blog.  Parents were also able to see the new ByteSpeed laptop computers that will be going into our classrooms after spring break.  This generous technology donation from our PTO, 60 ByteSpeed computers in all, brings each classroom set of computers up to six laptops.  

A huge thank you goes out to Mrs. Litvan for her excellent presentation.  Her knowledge and expertise in the area of technology education for parents, staff, and students is truly appreciated.       

Teacher Institute Day

Teachers throughout the District worked extremely hard at the Institute Day on Tuesday.  The focus of the day was on reviewing our new reading targets that were implemented this year.  As you may recall, these new learning targets originated from the Common Core, which is a set of proposed national targets developed by experts in the field of education.  On Tuesday teachers had the opportunity to share how they instructed and assessed these targets this year.  Grade level teams revised the targets to make them clearer and in certain instances they increased the rigor or altered when they would be taught next school year.  The collaboration that occurred on Tuesday was truly exceptional!  It was certainly a day well spent. 

PTO Highlight

The Art Auction will be held on Friday, April 20th.  To learn more, please visit the

PTO Newsletter. We hope to see you there!

Spring Conferences

Parent/teacher conferences are an important opportunity for educators to share your child’s progress with you.  It is also a time for you to ask questions and plan additional ways to support your child with the classroom teacher.  Just a reminder that spring parent teacher conferences will be held on Wednesday, April 4, from 5:00-7:00 PM and Thursday, April 5,^th from 2:00-7:00 PM.  Students will be dismissed on Wednesday at 2:00 PM.  Students will also not have school on Thursday and Friday to accommodate for conferences.  We look forward to meeting with you then.

Incoming 6^th Grade Students

• Click here for information regarding the 6^th grade placement criteria for the 2012-2013 school year.
• Incoming 6^th Grade Parent Evening * April 10^th * Twin Groves Cafeteria * 7:00

Placement Requests for the 2012 - 2013 School Year

It’s time to start thinking ahead to the 2012-2013 school year.  Creating balanced class lists that meet the needs of all students is a tremendously difficult job that takes many hours of thoughtful dialogue between classroom teachers, administrators, and other staff members.  We at Prairie take student classroom placement very seriously.  The process for class list creation is as follows:

·      First, teachers think about the social and academic needs of each of their current students, recording pertinent information to assist in the decision making process.

·      Next, teachers meet together as grade level teams to form class lists that are balanced in terms of academic, social, and emotional needs as well as considering friendships and other areas.  This is no easy task and often takes several meetings.  Teachers consider each child’s personality, academic needs, friendship patterns, and so on as they make a match for each individual child.  Specialists, the specials team, and I collaborate with the teams as needed during this process as well.

·      Each grade level team types a draft set of class lists that are then submitted to me.  One at a time, I will consider each student and his/her placement.  At this time, parent input is also considered.  Any changes in the draft lists are reviewed by the classroom teachers to ensure balance. 

·      Final class lists are then created with summer changes for move ins/outs reflected.

This same process happens at first grade.  Willow Grove creates the class lists for our incoming kindergartners enrolled there and I will add in students who attend private kindergartens.  Our goal is to create balanced class lists that promote the success of each child.  The process benefits all students.  Because of the input and thought given by teachers, parents, and administrators, we are very reluctant to make changes once this process occurs, as removing or moving one child can disrupt the balance of a class, impacting all students. 

The Prairie staff welcomes any insight you wish to share about your child’s strengths, needs, and learning style. We will take into consideration pertinent information about your child’s learning style and needs, received on or before Friday, April 27, 2012. While we welcome your input, specific teacher requests will not be honored.  Please put your thoughts in writing and address them to me at cpfaff@kcsd96.org. 

Principal's Message 3.16.12

Highlight of the Week
On Tuesday, Mrs. Kim Dahlem, Director of Student Services, and Mrs. Kim Lechner, Assistant Director of Student Services, presented Social and Emotional Learning at Ivy Hall School.  This excellent presentation focused upon the five social emotional learning (SEL) competencies:  self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision making.  As SEL committee representatives, Mrs. Dahlem and Mrs. Lechner, were excited to share the District's work thus far along with sharing resources for raising caring, confident, and capable children.  For more information about social and emotional learning, please visit The Illinois Children's Mental Health Partnership at www.icmhp.org and The Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning at www.casel.org.

New Laptop Computers
A HUGE thank you goes out to the Prairie PTO for purchasing for our Prairie students 60!!! ByteSpeed laptop computers.  The teachers and students are so excited about this new purchase.  Currently, each grade level homeroom has three laptop computers.  These additional computers will give each class a total of six or seven laptops.  As technology use increases daily in all of our classrooms, this wonderful purchase could not have come at a better time.  Staff training for the new computers will occur after spring break and then the computers will be in the hands of our kids.  Again, THANK YOU to our wonderful PTO.    

Principal Coffee:  Technology at Prairie School

Interactive whiteboards, iPods, document cameras and laptops!   These are a few of the 21st century tools your students are using in their classrooms.  We are very fortunate at Prairie to have so many great technologies to engage our students in learning.  Please join us on Thursday, March 22nd at 9am to take a look at the programs, applications and various technology we use in our school. We will have a presentation and tour of how technology rolls at Prairie School!

PTO Highlight

Learn about the exciting new location for our upcoming Art Auction in Long Grove.

Please go to the  PTO Newsletter to learn more.

Babysitting for Parent Teacher Conferences

Once again, Prairie School's 5th Grade Girl Scout Troop 41416 will be providing babysitting services during the upcoming Parent-Teacher Conferences.  Please help Troop 41416 feed the hungry by utilizing their services. For 1 hour of baby sitting Troop 41416 kindly requests one non-perishable food item or $2 donation per child (for children over one year of age only, please).  All donations, monetary and food items, will be given to the Vernon Township food pantry.  Your support helps the girls of Troop 41416 earn their Silver Award.  This award is the highest Girl Scout service award for Junior Girl Scouts. Locations are as follows:

Wednesday, April 4: 4:45 - 6pm in room 19

Wednesday, April 4: 6 - 7:15pm in the gym

Thursday, April 5: 1:45 - 7:15pm in the gym

Children should be older than one year (we will not be changing diapers), parents cannot leave the school and must provide a cell phone number and a conference room number.

Principal's Message 3.9.12

Highlight of the Week
We had our 2nd and final Professional Learning Community visit this Wednesday. Our visitors were a 6th grade team from Rock River Intermediate School in the Waupun Area School District in Wisconsin. They were excited about all the learning they gained when they were here. Several visitors shared that they could learn so much at Prairie and wished they could spend more time with us. Some other comments were:

• "Hearing the staff talk here, I want to stay and learn more."
• "Your knowledge base was outstanding."
• "I would love to spend a trimester here to truly learn your ways."
• "I am energized to try a few of your ideas."
• "You gave us lots of things to think about."

We thank the Rock River team for coming to Prairie as we learned so much from you as well.

Principal Coffee:  Technology at Prairie School

Interactive whiteboards, iPods, document cameras and laptops!   These are a few of the 21st century tools your students are using in their classrooms.  We are very fortunate at Prairie to have so many great technologies to engage our students in learning.  Please join us on Thursday, March 22nd at 9am to take a look at the programs, applications and various technology we use in our school. We will have a presentation and tour of how technology rolls at Prairie School!


Social Emotional Learning Community Event
Kildeer Countryside School District 96 welcomes you to a community event designed to increase awareness of social and emotional learning.  This event will take place Tuesday, March 13th at 7pm at Ivy Hall School in the MAT Room, which is located on the lower level of the building.  We hope to see you there.   

PTO Highlight

The Art Auction is quickly approaching.  Don't miss this great opportunity to get your hands on our wonderful Prairie students' artwork.  Please go to the  PTO Newsletter to learn more about this exciting adult evening out event.

Candace Fleming, Children's Author, Visiting Soon... Candace Fleming will be visiting Prairie on Thursday, April 26th. She is an Illinois children's author who has written picture and non-fiction books. She worked for several years writing and trying to get her work published. After three years of rejection letters, she found success in getting published. To learn more about Mrs. Fleming and her books, please visit her website.


Mrs. Fleming will be giving presentations to all our students. If you are interested in ordering any of her books, the can be purchased prior to her visit by completing and returning this order form. If you have any questions, please contact our librarian, Mr. Tim Vanderwerff.


Reading Resource for Parents
Building Readers, a resource that helps parents help their child become a better reader, will be available online. To read this valuable resource go to BUILDING READERS March 2012 Newsletter.


Girls on the Run
This Spring, Prairie is home to a program called "Girls on the Run". This international program combines social-emotional learning and physical fitness to help girls in grades 3rd-5th to believe in the power of themselves by belonging to a team. This program currently has 1100 coaches throughout Chicagoland, and nearly 6500 participants!! Two of our staff members, Nicole Nielsen and Erin Sauer, brought the program to Prairie and are working hard and having lots of fun with fourteen girls to prepare for the end-of-season 5K (that's 3.1 miles!) on June 9th.  The girls do lessons, workouts, and team building activities two days each week for 12 weeks.   We would LOVE to expand this program next year to include more girls. If you are interested in having your 3rd, 4th or 5th grade girl participate next year, check out www.girlsontherun.org to learn about the program or e-mail Erin Sauer at esauer@kcsd96.org.  

Positively Prairie
Thank you for your feedback on our recent Positively Prairie survey. The feedback was very positive and also had very good suggestions for consideration. The Positively Prairie Committee will continue to review the data, along with teacher and student input, as we plan our next steps for the upcoming school year. One immediate change that we will implement to keep parents more informed about the Positively Prairie Program, is our new monthly "Positively Prairie" segment in the Principal's Message.


We recently updated the look of our WOW slips. In an effort to save paper and storage space, we have reduced the size of the WOW slip to a quarter page. We we thrilled to learn through the survey results that WOW slips find a prominent place on the refrigerator. We couldn't think of a better place for displaying them at home!  


The Positively Prairie Student Leadership Team (PPSLT) has put into place a "Fill the Bucket" reward program. If you've been at school lately you may have seen this on display in the multi-purpose room. The PPSLT created the idea of the student body earning a reward based upon the number of school-wide WOW slips received. Once the number hits the "meets" level, all Prairie students earn a reward. We have nearly 900 WOW slips earned building-wide and do have a fun reward activity planned for April. More information to come on that soon.  


Finally, we will be having a PP all-school assembly on April 13th. The PPSLT is working hard on planning and preparing for this assembly. We look forward to sharing more about this after the event.

Principal's Message 3.2.12

Highlight of the Week

Fourth grader Drew S. from Mrs. Saltzberg's classroom was surprised on Tuesday by the District 96 Foundation Prize Patrol.  Drew submitted a grant application to the District 96 Foundation KIDS Mini-Grant Program for four flip cameras.  During his acceptance speech, Drew shared that he wants to use the cameras for video projects and the blog that he would like create for teachers to post assignments.  Drew is looking forward to working with his teachers to get this up and running.

Prairie Receives Academic Excellence Award ~ 2011 Honor Roll
Congratulations Prairie students, parents, and teachers! We have once again received the Illinois State Board of Education Academic Excellence Award.  Only 438 schools across Illinois earned this award for 2011.  To earn the award, elementary schools must meet the following criteria:

• Attain Annual Yearly Progress in 2010 and 2011
• 90% of students must meet or exceed state standards in both reading and math for the three most recent school years

To learn more information about the Academic Excellence Award, please visit the Illinois Honor Roll website.
6th Grade Placement Information

Please click here for information about 6th grade placement for the 2012-2013 school year. Please remember to attend Twin Groves night on April 10th.

PTO Highlight

The Art Auction will be coming up quickly on April 20th.  Should you have an opportunity to stop by the school office, please check out the beautiful Art Auction items that are on display.  Please go to the  PTO Newsletter to learn more about this exciting adult evening out event.

ISAT Testing will Start on Wednesday, March 7th
It is always important for our students to have ample rest and healthy nutrition. With ISAT testing starting next Wednesday, the importance of these two healthy life style choices cannot be overstated. ISAT testing can be demanding for students so giving them a head start on the day feeling well rested and energized with a healthy breakfast will certainly put them in the right frame of mind. As always, if you have any questions about ISAT testing, please contact your child's teacher.