HERE is the link to the Wonder Advisory…this is the anchor lesson that I provided. Teachers have several other activities to do with students…some are writing, others are discussion. Much of what happens depends on the students and how they want to explore the themes and ideas presented in the movie.

I would like to thank all of our students, teachers, staff, and admin team for planning and orchestrating such an amazing school wide field trip to see Wonder at the Stonefield Regal this morning.

Interestingly, a woman stopped me outside the theater as we were loading the buses and asked, “Are you with the school group?” To which I responded, “Yes, we watched Wonder.” 

“Oh, that makes so much sense!” She replied. “Did you have a good time?”

We had an amazing experience, one that we think contributes exponentially to our school goal of building a community where all students are visible. So much has been written recently about the importance of social/emotional learning and I am proud to be in a school where the parents, teachers, and students believe in the importance of developing these skills in all of our students and creating a safe learning environment where all students have an adult connection.

We have planned a movie debrief for tomorrow, 11/21, that will give us a lot of insight about how students perceive the importance of the movie’s themes #ChooseKind and #KindnessIsContagious, but more importantly than recognizing the importance is understanding how each one of our students contributes to the creation of a community where kindness is the norm. Stay tuned!

Dear Henley Families,

Tomorrow is our school wide field trip to see Wonder!  We have over 820 of 860 students attending, and I know that number also factors our families who have already started their holiday traveling.

A couple of informational items:

• Tomorrow, we will leave at 9:15 in the morning and stagger our arrival at Stonefield Theaters. 8^th grade will leave and return first. We will have all students returned to school by around 12:30. Classes for the day, after lunch and recess, begin at 1:20.
• Tuesday’s schedule is altered for an extended Advisory. We will be exploring the themes of the movie (#Choose Kind, #KindnessIsContagious, Diversity) and debriefing our experience. We also have our November Activity Period in the afternoon.
• During the week of 11/27, we will be asking students to give us feedback about our school climate goal #2: All students will be visible and have an adult connection in the building. Students will report feeling safe at school. We will administer a short survey during advisory and share the results with you by the end of that week.
• We will also be sending parents a survey about some of our school goals around climate, communication, topics for exploration, and our modernization plans. Please participate. I value your feedback and we can only improve if we are in this together!
• Are you aware that Henley will be undergoing a security addition and other modernization improvements? Would you like to tour other schools that have had similar improvements and talk about the opportunities for our Henley students? Part of the survey sent next week will ask for an RSVP to do either a day or evening bus tour of Jouett, AHS, Walton, and WAHS.

I hope you have the most amazing Thanksgiving Break! Find time for family, fun, and the activities that make you the happiest. We value your partnership in your child’s education and we appreciate you being a part of our team.

Best,

Beth Costa, principal