Kettle Falls School District

Kettle Falls High School has partnered with GEAR Up to offer some great experiences and opportunities to visit postsecondary campuses to learn about admissions, academic programs, and financial aid options, attend student workshops, and participate in summer campus experiences. Our students have recently been on several campus tours to learn what it takes to be a college student and explore each school’s campus and culture. KFHS students have recently traveled to the University of Idaho, Washington State University, Eastern Washington University, The Paul Mitchell Institute, and Spokane Community College.

4th Graders have been researching animals common to Washington state. They were fortunate enough to have some experts from the Department of Fish and Wildlife come to give more information about white-tail deer, bald eagles, cougars, and grey wolves. The students learned more about the animal’s habitats, how they protect themselves, and their life stages.

Mr. Hansen’s Opps Electives Podcasting class is busy taping interviews and creating quarterly school broadcast updates. This quarter they have focused on Character Strong, Spring Sports, Build A Better World Day and our new School Security Officer. The students are responsible for the entire broadcast from designing the questions to taping and completing the interview. This quarter of broadcasts will be posted on our website this spring. Stay tuned.

Students in Mrs. Tetrick’s textiles class have been busy creating dresses for girls around the world. In partnership with “Dress a Girl Around the World”Kettle Falls students create dresses for girls in third world countries. Dress a Girl is a campaign under Hope 4 Women International which brings dignity to women worldwide and has been doing so since 2006. This is an excellent service learning opportunity. According to Dress a Girl, “We dream of a world in which every girl has at least one new dress. We want girls to know that they are worthy of respect, and that they are loved.” Excellent job students!

You are never to old to celebrate Dr. Seuss’s birthday! Some lucky students in Mrs. St. Clair's class enjoyed listening to a Dr. Seuss book and eating some green egg and ham! Other classrooms spent some time reading Dr. Seuss books and participating in “Read Across America Day.” This day was launched in 1998 and is the nation’s largest celebration of reading. “Sometimes you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.”- Dr. Seuss

Kindergarten students have been learning about the art of paper collage. During expedition labs, they are creating leaf artwork to decorate our classroom. This ties together with our module about trees and how animals and people depend on trees! They also celebrated the 100th day of school in style by making crowns and participating in STEM activities. Students collaborated to build creations using 100 legos, brain flakes, plates, and cups.

The FFA trapshooting team did GREAT at the shoot in Tonasket. Aiden Fowler placed 1st for the boys and Bailee Heater placed 1st for the girls. The team placed 1st overall out of 13 teams!

The elementary school celebrated Valentine’s Day with the traditional extravaganza of parties and activities. Such a sweet opportunity to practice building a community of inclusion and kindness within every classroom!

Building ONE TEAM! Thank you to the high school cheerleaders for coming to the middle school to teach our students some new cheers. With your help we are building some great school spirit. Our students are doing a great job cheering at the basketball games. Also, thank you to our new school security officer, Matt Stevens, for helping with our class competition during the assembly. Welcome to our school, we are happy to have you working in our school district.

What’s Up in the Sky Our 1st Grade students are starting a new Expedition called “What’s Up in the Sky: A Study of the Sun, Moon, and Stars. Students are building their literacy and science skills as they engage in a study of the what is in our sky. They will be learning about the patterns we can observe in the sky as well as how different authors have used their knowledge and observations of the sky to write stories. To begin this new study 1st Grade students are making observations and connections to different pictures of the sky and what they notice and wonder about each of the different pictures. Soon these students will be engaged in lab activities where they will be able to create, explore, imagine and research with their classmates.

1st Graders are hard at work on math and their new expedition Sun, Moon, and Stars. For expedition they are watercolor painting to match photographs, later they will paint pictures to match self written poems. For math they are working as partners to add numbers with unifix cubes.

2nd Graders are being paleontologists. Practicing their fossil digging skills on chocolate chip cookies, and then moving on to digging dinosaur bones from fossil kits and recording their findings just like real scientists. This week they also got to create air dry clay dinosaurs.

Learning through play At the Early Learning Center we believe children learn best through play. We are all about paint, glue, color, and imagination. Play is central to a child’s learning and development. It also helps your child to build confidence, feel loved, happy, and safe. Through play other important skills are addressed, such as fine motor skills, cognitive development, social skills, math, and language skills. Forms of play can occur in many different areas of an early childhood setting such as block area, sensory stations, or a specific area set up for dramatic play. When your child plays it gives them many different ways and times to learn.

SMALL ENGINES Students in Kettle Falls have access to courses that teach students real life skills, and one such example is Mr. Gary Axtell’s small engines course. Each year community members volunteer small, broken down engines, such as lawn mowers and chainsaws for students at KFHS to rebuild. Students work in teams to refurbish the engines. Advanced students in small engines work on special projects that may be a personal or donated engine. One such example is the Honda 70CC motorcycle that Kettle Falls High School counselor Paula Gormon brought in for student Bryce McMillian to rebuild. It is a 1970 Honda motorcycle. Bryce is working diligently to get the bike on the road again.

FCCLA Students participating in Family, Career and Community Leaders of America (FCCLA) at Kettle Falls High School met shortly before Christmas break to celebrate their accomplishments as a team. Students in FCCLA engage in many community service events ranging from the Trunk or Treat event at the high school on Halloween, to blood drives and food drives for the community. During the party, students ate and exchanged gifts in an unusual fashion. With dice and presents moving from student to student! We are so proud of these students and the service they give to our community.