Dear Families,
At Open House tonight, please look for the table by the entrance with information about the Groton Dunstable Education Foundation (GDEF). GDEF raises money from the community to give back to our schools in the form of grants for materials or teacher training. The grants they provide to our school directly impact the education of all our students.
Thus far this year, GDEF has awarded 2 grants that directly impact our Middle School Community.
A Major Grant (more than $1,000): Magnetic Whiteboards and Magnetic Panels by Ms. Perrault and Ms. Witt. In 7th-grade math classes, magnetic whiteboards have been purchased to be utilized around the classroom. The goal of this grant is to support a mathematics classroom model that promotes collaborative problem solving and improves mathematical communication. By creating a vertical workspace, students will be working in groups to make sense of problems, persevere in solving them, construct viable arguments, and critique the reasoning of others.
A Mini Grant (less than $1,000) was awarded in collaboration with the Special Education Parent Advisory Council (SEPAC) to invite Janell Burley Hofmann to host a webinar Thursday, Sep. 23 on helping families maintain healthy boundaries around technology use and how to keep their tech savvy kids safe online. Janell Burley Hofmann is the author of iRules and the founder of the Slow Tech movement (www.janellburleyhofmann.com). Her presentation is "The Way Forward: Raising Tech Healthy Families Together."