Oakhurst Weekly

The Georgia Kindergarten Inventory of Developing Skills 2.0 (GKIDS 2.0) is a yearlong, progression-based formative assessment. GKIDS 2.0 is aligned to Georgia's state content standards for kindergarten and is organized around big ideas and learning progressions.

The GKIDS 2.0 Individual Student Report (ISR) provides information on your child’s overall performance in kindergarten. An ISR detailing your child’s midyear progress was sent home in today’s communication folder.

Please note that data is not available for the English Language Arts section of the report because the Georgia State Board of Education exempts all kindergarten students who take a universal reading or dyslexia screener as specified from the requirement of taking the ELA domain of GKIDS. The STAR assessment satisfies this requirement. There is no exemption from the other required GKIDS domains (Mathematics, Approaches to Learning, Personal and Social Development).

Please contact your child’s teacher with questions about their progress. For additional information about GKIDS 2.0, please see this parent flyer.

Arlethea Williams

awilliams@csdecatur.net

CLICK IMAGE TO PREORDER YOUR CLASS PHOTO.

Wellness is an active process of making choices that lead to a healthy and fulfilling life. Every day, people make choices about how they spend their time, what they eat, and who they spend time with. These decisions create a healthy lifestyle.

This week as a family walk and talk or have a conversation at dinner about the following:

Mental/emotional wellness refers to liking and accepting yourself, expressing and processing emotions, coping with the demands of daily life, and managing stress. What mental/emotional wellness habits does your family already have? Name a mental/emotional wellness habit your family would like to start or continue doing? (ie. naming emotions, pause and breath breaks, having only one after school activity during the week.)

As of last Friday, our Owls have completed 1567 laps. That equals 261 miles.

Join the Decatur community on March 15th at the Decatur Education Foundation Tour Decatur fun run. (www.tourdecatur.com)

Feel free to contact Stacie Kenner with questions regarding iRUN or Tour Decatur scholarships at skenner@csdecatur.net

Have you heard of Read Across America? Each year, this day is set aside for children to find joy in reading, to build community, and to ultimately improve literacy. Cultural awareness and reading in all forms is encouraged. This year, it fell on March 2nd, and although we weren’t in school on that day, we can still take the time to enjoy reading in all its forms. Check out some of the ideas below:

• Join a Book Club

• Check out the Decatur Library. There are book clubs and activities for children of different ages.

• Start a Family Book Club! It’s a fantastic way to spend time together and do something that is screen-free. https://demmelearning.com/blog/family-book-club-ideas/

• Help your child start a book club with friends. It’s a positive way for them to interact with their peers and allows them to appreciate different perspectives on things they have read. https://imaginationsoup.net/ultimate-guide-book-clubs-kids/

• Virtual Book Shelves
• Virtual Libraries are a great way to enjoy a variety of titles that the library may not have. Check out the links below to find some awesome new books! St. Patrick's Day, International Women's Day, Math/Pi Day
• Little Free Library

• Take a family field trip to find Little Free Libraries around Decatur, Atlanta, and beyond! You can swap out books you no longer want or need with some new ones. Many have books for the whole family, too! Visit this site and explore the map for your next book adventure. https://littlefreelibrary.org/map/

Our 3rd Annual Bookmark Design Contest is in full swing! All entries must be submitted by Friday, March 14th.

We've been talking about poetry in the library a lot this year, and now we get to write our own! If your Oakhurst student would like to submit poetry for consideration in this year's Young American Poetry Digest, please scan the code or click the image below to watch a video with all of the details and helpful information for poetry writing!

Submissions for the digest are due to Ms. G by March 21st.

(Even if your students doesn't want to submit poetry for the digest, the link will take you to great K-2 poetry resources you can access and use as family literacy activities!)

Oakhurst families, please complete and submit this food insecurity request form if your student is experiencing food insecurity within the home and is in need of some supplemental weekend snacks.

The Decatur Education Foundation supplies Oakhurst with snack bags for any student in need. This request form will go directly to our school counselor, Ms. King, and she will send home a snack bag with your student every Friday. Please go through each week's snack bag to remove any snack you may not want your child to have due to allergy concerns, etc.

The 2025-2026 CSD enrollment opens on Monday, March 3, for rising Kindergarten students or students new to CSD. Registration may be completed entirely online. Find more registration information here.

New Families: See CSD's Key Contacts & Resources for Families, available in multiple languages.

REMINDER: If your currently enrolled student has a sibling who will be new to CSD for the 2025-2026 school year, you must register this new sibling via the Parent Portal.

1. Select "More" from the menu in the Parent Portal.

2. Select "Annual Data Update."

3. Select "2025-2026 New Student Registration."

As part of the enrollment process, you will also need to email residency documentation to CSD's district enrollment specialist, Patrice Moore, at pmoore@csdecatur.net, as the Parent Portal will not allow you to change or upload this field. Information about required residency proof documents is available on the CSD website. Please contact pmoore@csdecatur.net or 404-371-3601 x1063 for assistance.

To help prevent the spread of COVID-19, support strong school attendance, and encourage safe in-person learning, the U.S. Department of Education, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, is offering free, rapid, at-home COVID-19 tests to school districts for distribution to students, staff, and families. Starting this week, free COVID-19 test kits will be available in school clinics for pickup from the school nurse.

To maintain the health and wellness of school-aged children and adolescents, the state of Georgia requires that students receive vaccinations for vaccine-preventable diseases before and while attending school.

The CSD School Health Team continuously assesses the immunization status of all CSD students. Parents/guardians of students with expired immunization certificates, Form #3231, or invalid immunization documentation will receive a notification from the school clinic team requesting that the student obtain the required vaccinations for school attendance. A medical exemption on Form #3231 with a current expiration date should be noted, if applicable. See the Georgia Department of Health's child and adolescent vaccination schedule.

According to the Georgia Department of Public Health, a valid immunization certificate, Form #3231, or a notarized Affidavit of Religious Exemption, Form 2208, is required for school attendance. If a certificate marked with a "Date of Expiration" expires on the date indicated, a current certificate must be submitted within 30 days of expiration.

Adherence to this guidance is crucial. Being adequately vaccinated safeguards the health and well-being of individual students and contributes to the school community's overall safety and vitality. Additionally, ensuring students are immunized creates a protective barrier that minimizes the risks of outbreaks within the school population. Please contact your child’s school clinic team with any questions.

• You can check out multiple books from the DEI Book Cart at once.

• Return books at the next DEI Book Cart event in the coming weeks.

• Watch for an automatic due date reminder via email from the new Libib system, used by both the DEI Book Cart and Game Center.

The City of Decatur offers the Animal Crackers program at all K-2 school sites and the Whiz Kids program at all 3-5 school sites. Enrollment for incoming students is done through a lottery process, which opened on February 20 and closes on April 18, 2025. The lottery spin will be April 25, 2025. Full details on registering for the afterschool lottery are on the City of Decatur website at How to Register for 25-26 Lottery on the Forms and Documents page. Contact the Out-of-School Time Division for more information at dprd@decaturga.com or 404-377-0494.

Families can find various afterschool options for students for the 2025-26 school year on the CSD website.