The Board of Education will discuss later school start times at its meeting on Tuesday, and workshops for parents will take place this month, one on early literacy for elementary school students, and others on improving communication with children.
Superintendent Alan Addley briefly described each of the developments in his newsletter, sent Friday afternoon, Oct. 13, to parents and staff.
Here’s the full text:
Dear Families & Staff
Just a short Friday email on a few upcoming events:
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In the educational field, even prior to the pandemic, there was a growing interest and body of research regarding school start times. At Tuesday’s Board of Education Meeting, the Board communicated its intention to add this topic as an agenda item for preliminary discussion at one of the Board of Education Meetings in the spring.
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Information pertaining to the purpose, privacy policy, opt out options and administration of the K-8 DESSA (Devereux Student Strengths Assessment) will be mailed home to elementary and middle school parents on Monday.
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The District will host an Early Literacy Workshop for parents of elementary students on Tuesday, October 24 @ 9:30 a.m-10:30 a.m. in the Darien Library Community Room. A recording of the meeting will be made available after the meeting.
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Next Saturday, October 22nd, students, staff and members of the community will participate in the Fairfield County Out of the Darkness Walk in Westport. This event is open to the public and you can register here.
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Commencing this month, Dr. Alycia Dadd (Director of Mental Health) will be facilitating a series of four parent workshops over the course of the school year at each school. Session one is Building your Toolkit for Parenting in the 21st Century: Strategies for Having Challenging Conversations with Your Child. This workshop provides parents with strategies to increase effective communication with their children on a variety of topics, such as setting boundaries around technology use, addressing sensitive news topics, and helping your child(ren) navigate peer relationships. A prerequisite to successful family conversations includes being able to regulate our own emotions in challenging situations. The workshop will also include each school’s use of RULER and its relevance to parents. Specific dates and times for these workshops will be shared by each school principal.