December Newsletter
Dear Dutch Creek Community,
It is with great joy that I say Happy Holidays! I hope this letter finds you and your family enjoying everything the season has to offer. We have been very busy here at Dutch Creek and I am grateful to get to share some of the excitement with you all.
First of all, I am thankful for a very successful Veteran’s Day Assembly and Thanksgiving Meal Support Event. These are two traditions that we hold dear to our hearts in the month of November. I am beyond grateful for the volunteers and donations that contributed to the success of these two events. Thank you to everyone who helped out!
I’d also like to recognize our 4th-grade CREW this month! Ms. Uhrenbacher, Ms. Kirwin, Mrs. Chance, and Mrs. Rauh partnered with experts from the Clyfford Still Museum in Downtown Denver to “expeditionize” their poetry unit. “Expeditionizing” is when we take the final task in a literacy unit and grow it into something amazing. We ensure that students produce high-quality work that is beautiful, complex, and creative. In this amazing project, students studied poetry alongside abstract expression. In our partnership with the Clyfford Still Museum, students studied Still’s artwork while learning to create abstract expressions that matched their poems. They went on field trips to the museum, welcomed art experts to Dutch Creek, and ultimately presented their work at a night event at the Clyfford Still Museum.
This meaningful and authentic project is something that our students will forever remember. A special shout-out to Ms. Uhrenbacher, Ms. Kirwin, Mrs. Chance, and Mrs. Rauh for all of the heart that went into this project!
Another exciting event to share with you all is the EL National Conference. This annual conference hosts over 1,500 educators from all over the world who share a vision of what is possible for our students. The 3-day conference has a variety of sessions, activities, and speakers. This year, the conference was held in Denver and Dutch Creek got to participate in a large way! We had over 30 Student Ambassadors representing Dutch Creek in the massive opening and closing CREW ceremonies. Students escorted guests, answered questions, and shared their experiences at Dutch Creek. Since the conference was local this year, we were also able to send 9 staff members, two of whom were presenters of a Master Class. To say the least, I am sure proud of our CREW and was excited to brag about the wonderful work happening at Dutch Creek to this large audience. I’ll be sure to include pictures in the next Principal’s Pen.
May the holiday season bring you warmth, love, and joy. We look forward to enjoying our much-deserved Winter Break before welcoming everyone back after the new year. As it always does, time is flying by, so please take time to slow down and enjoy your little ones before we zoom into the second half of the school year.
Warm Regards,
Sara Oliver