Rickard Elementary School

Hello Rickard families! I want to say a big thank you to everyone who participated in our Kids Heart Challenge fundraiser! Our school goal was set at $4,000 and we raised $8,728.98! I am so proud of our students and parents for helping make all of this possible and such a success. Since we went way above our goal, instead of receiving $800 worth of new PE equipment we will now get $1,300! The American Heart Association will be sending this in the form of a gift card to U.S. Games. I'm excited that we'll be able to add this to our PE department here at Rickard and that our students will benefit also! If you still have money that you would like to donate, we are keeping the window open until tomorrow, February 4th. You can donate online or your student can bring me the money. I am ordering the larger gifts that the students earned on Friday after school so that's why we need to wrap everything up. The gifts could take 4-6 weeks to arrive but as soon as I get them, I will deliver them to your child. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me. Thank you again! -Mrs. Bauska

Kindergarten Roundup for the 2022-2023 school year will be on Feb. 8th & 10th from 8:00 am - 4:00 pm at the District Office Board Room. Be sure to go into Door K on the backside of the building. **Students MUST be 5 years old on or before July 31, 2022 to enroll** *Update - Upper Missouri District Health Unit will be available during the event to give immunizations or to print off immunization records for families. For any questions, please contact enrollment@willistonschools.org, (701)572-1580, or visit www.willistonschools.org/page/enrollment.

Sgt. Tom Rich will be here on Thursday, February 10th, at Williston High School at 7pm for a Workshop on Cyber Safety and Security. At this high energy, fast paced presentation you will learn about every app, how to monitor your child’s activity and see real time how to navigate the most popular social media apps. Sgt. Rich has spoken to over 1 million people worldwide and has been featured on NBC, FOX, CNN and Good Morning America! For more info, check out www.AlwaysConnected.org

On Friday, February 4, 2022, all of our phone lines will be down intermittently beginning at 10:00 a.m. At this time, we do not have an estimate of how long the phone lines will be down. We appreciate your patience during this. If you need to reach someone during this time, please email your school secretary. You can find a list of staff members and their email addresses by clicking on the “Staff” link on your school’s website.

February's SEL word is Acceptance.

Mrs. Larson's 2nd graders celebrated the 100th day of school on Monday by imagining how they will look and what they will be doing when they turn 100 years old!

Our Battle of the Books school competition has officially ended! Four teams will represent Rickard in our District battle and will compete against other 3rd/4th grade teams around our District 7. Congratulations to all the teams for participating and competing. We are so proud of everybody for reading and battling it out with their team members. We can not wait to see how our four teams do at Districts! Battle on! 4th Grade Winners: The Three Amigos and Bob's Chicken Wings Returns 3rd Grade Winners: Toon Squad and The Shooting Stars

It was also a long day for the students in Ms. Beck's 4th grade classroom on Tuesday as their chairs decided to go on strike, too. The same reasons were given, and it seems that the chairs were tired of their working conditions and demanded this to change, as well. Students then had to write persuasive paragraphs to the chairs to try and convince them to come back.

It was a long day for the students in Mrs. Carnes' 4th grade classroom on Tuesday as their chairs decided to go on strike. Many reasons were given, but it seems that the chairs were tired of their working conditions and demanded this to change. Students then had to write persuasive paragraphs to the chairs to try and convince them to come back.

Kindergarten Roundup for the 2022-2023 school year will be on Feb. 8th & 10th from 8:00 am - 4:00 pm at the District Office Board Room. Be sure to go into Door K on the backside of the building. **Students MUST be 5 years old on or before July 31, 2022 to enroll** For any questions, please contact enrollment@willistonschools.org, (701)572-1580, or visit www.willistonschools.org/page/enrollment.

Our winners from the second day of Battle of the Books are The Shooting Stars and Toon Squad from the 3rd grade and The Three Amigos, Bob's Chicken Wings Returns, and The Pineapples from the 4th grade. These teams will face off on Friday against yesterday's winners to have the chance to compete at the District competition in February! The top two teams on Friday from each grade will move on! Friday's Finals include: 3rd Grade- The Falcons, The Crew, The Shooting Stars, and Toon Squad. 4th Grade- Super Chicken Nuggets, Stellar Stars, The Three Amigos, Bob's Chicken Wings Returns, and The Pineapples.

Mrs. Lippert's 4th grade class also spent a day last week at the James Art Exhibit!

We just wanted to update you all on where we are at and some exciting news that we received this morning from the Kids Heart Challenge rep. Our school goal was set at $4,000 and we are currently at $5,216.30! The students have done an incredible job and they have until this Friday, January 28th to fundraise. Here's the exciting news. Since we have exceeded our goal, the rep told me that if we can get to $5,608 by Friday, our school will be gifted with $800 worth of NEW PE equipment! This would be such an amazing addition to our PE program and our Rickard school. Any support would be greatly appreciated! Thank you!

Our winners from the first day of Battle of the Books are The Falcons and The Crew from the 3rd grade and the Super Chicken Nuggets and Stellar Stars from the 4th grade. These teams will face off on Friday against tomorrow's winners to have the chance to compete at the District competition in February! Thursday's Semi-Finals- 3rd Grade: Shooting Stars and Toon Squad. 4th Grade: The Pineapples, The Three Amigos, Bob's Chicken Wings Returns, The Fighting Children, and The Wolf Pack. The top two from 3rd grade and the top three from 4th grade on Thursday will move onto the Finals on Friday to go against the winners from today!

Mrs. Norby's 1st grade class was learning about silent e's last week and completed a project to show their learning!

Ms. Beck's 4th Grade class took a field trip to the James Art Exhibit last week and spent the day looking at ND kids art.

Due to icy road conditions, all WBSD7 schools will start 2 hours later than normal on Monday, January 24, 2022. Schools will begin 2 hours after their normal start time, and buses will run 2 hours later than normal for pick up in the morning. School will dismiss at its normal time. Thank you, WBSD7

After reassessing the road conditions, we have decided we will not be running our school buses today for morning or afternoon routes.

You know your principal is the best when he's willing to help out whenever and wherever he can in order to help our Rickard family succeed!

Our Rickard library was busy yesterday with the students learning about Ozobots. Ozobots are student-friendly robots that teach coding and programming. With a built-in sensor on the bottom, an Ozobot is programmed to do certain tasks when it moves on certain colored lines. Yesterday, our K-4 classes were able to practice making codes and paths for their Ozobots to follow. Some of the favorite codes used were Nitro Boost and Tornado!