Notes from Eddy

Hello Eddy Families,

Thanksgiving is upon us, and I thank you all for your continued partnership supporting our students and their learning each and every day. I am thankful to be a part of our wonderful Brewster and Nauset communities. My family will be heading to Walpole for Thanksgiving Day, and then return to the Cape to continue the holiday season, which has been exploding all over our home for about two weeks already! I hope that you have an opportunity to see your loved ones, reflect about the things that are meaningful in our lives, and get in some R&R for your student and family.

Nauset Superintendent Glenn Brand has asked for your input as parents/caregivers and as staff: Dr. Brand Entry Plan/District Priorities Input. This brief survey only takes a few minutes, and Dr. Brand would appreciate any input as he continues to understand our Brewster and Nauset communities as part of his entry plan. Dr. Brand is also holding open community meetings, for anyone to drop in and share thoughts and feedback on our school system. Both Superintendent Brand and Assistant Superintendent Vicky Saldana will be present to speak with visitors, and all are welcome:

• Thursday, December 4 @ 4:30-5:45pm: Nauset Regional Middle School (Nauset Room)
• Thursday, December 11 @ 4:30-5:45pm: Brewster Town Hall
• Tuesday, December 16 @ 3:30-4:45pm: Eastham Town Hall

Thank you for making sure your student is dressed for the cold weather during recess. We will hold outdoor recess when it is dry outside and the windchill is 20°F or above. We will use WeatherBug to measure temperature and windchill here, as the gauge is on the roof of Stony Brook so we know it is accurate to Brewster. If your student is in need of winter layers (jackets, hats, gloves), please reach out to our School Adjustment Counselor, Sonja Bono, who can help: bonos@nausetschools.org.

When we return from Thanksgiving Break, it will be December! It will be a busy month: there is an early release for professional development for staff on Friday, 12/5 @ 11am; report cards go home on Wednesday, 12/10; our holiday music concert (4th and 5th graders in chorus, band, and orchestra) is Thursday, 12/18 @ 9am; our last day of school before the holiday break is Tuesday, 12/23 @ 11am.

I wish you and yours a restful and happy Thanksgiving holiday!

Respectfully,

Steve Guditus

Principal and Lead Learner, Eddy Elementary School

The fifth grade class has a goal of being able to take a class trip to Boston this year! The cost of a trip for students has dramatically gone up in recent years, primarily because of the cost of transportation. We are unable to use school buses for this trip, because there are not drivers or bus availability, and therefore the only way we can travel to and from Boston, leaving before the school day and returning after the school day, is to take coach buses. We hope that you will consider helping us fundraise by purchasing items you may already need for the holiday season, through Charleston Wrap. This fundraising company has a variety of items for sale: candles, soaps, holiday and home decor, gourmet candies, wrapping paper, handbags, personalized gift items, and more! A flyer went home on Friday, and you may either create an account with organization 30870, or you may go directly to (and share) this website: http://bit.ly/EddyTrip2025, and simply purchase items; a percentage of each sale goes directly back to our school to help us raise money for our field trip. All items are shipped directly to your home; there is no pickup time/date. The sale lasts through December 8, 2025. You may also scan the QR code with your phone to go directly to the purchasing website. Thank you for your consideration!

Danny The Dog works every day at Eddy Elementary School as a school assistance dog. This is his third year working daily at Eddy, where he interacts with all students and staff on a daily basis. Danny joins students for recess, helps students get into the building who need some reassurance, listens to students read, joins teachers and students for morning meeting or even math, and has a calming and positive impact in our school for all students and all staff.

Danny was trained by NEADS World Class, and was specifically trained and partnered to work with students in a school. Danny spends his day working at Eddy, and then after work day is over, he goes home to be an off-duty family pet with Ms. Williams, our school psychologist. NEADS provides assistance dog free of charge, but they also do require several thousand dollars of donations to make this service free for those in need.

From the NEADS website: NEADS® Assistance Dogs are partnered with teachers...working alongside their human partner, Assistance Dogs interact with many people. The presence of these steady, well-trained dogs can humanize a stressful situation, have a calming effect, and help build trust.

If you or your student has been positively impacted by Danny, you are invited to donate to help cover the cost of his service dog training. The service dog training process is exclusively funded by donations. If you are interested, you may donate at any time, but in particular, donations will be matched on Giving Tuesday, December 2, 2025, starting at 8am - so the earlier the better!

https://support.neads.org/fundraiser/1927243

Did you know? The Brewster PTO has a new website! Check it out: https://brewsterpto.com/. The next meeting is on January 14 at 7pm at Eddy Elementary. The Brewster PTO is also hosting a Thanksgiving Bingo. If you'd like to participate, please return the Bingo card to your homeroom teacher by Wednesday, December 3 to receive a prize from the PTO! You can download a copy here, or paper copies are being sent home with your student this week before the Thanksigiving break.

Thanks to Mrs. Lister and Mrs. Meyer, Eddy Elementary is collaborating with the Brewster Book Store! The Brewster Book Store is welcoming author Peter H. Reynold's on December 7 to talk about his new book Gift of Words (see below for more details).

A reminder that Trimester 1 report cards come home on Wednesday, December 10 with students in their backpacks.

Families whose students have an IEP: Special education progress reports will be mailed home via USPS one week later, if your child is on an IEP, as we have done in the past. If you have any questions about this, please contact our School Psychologist and Team Chair, Jennie Williams at williamsj@nausetschools.org.

Did you know? Mrs. Lister offers morning library time to check out books, return books, or just have some quiet reading time in the library before school starts. If your student would like to participate in this, they may get a pass at the entrace when the get off the bus, or enter the building at car dropoff in the front of the building. We also offer free breakfast for all until 8am each morning, so students may leave the library when the first bell rings at 7:40am, grab breakfast to go, and finish eating in their classroom until 8am. If you have any questions, please contact Nikki Lister, library and reading teacher, at listern@nausetschools.org.

As we grow our Farm to School programming and initiatives, if you are interested in assisting in some way, please fill out this Farm to School (FTS) Volunteer Interest Form here. If you have any questions, please contact our Nauset Farm to School Coordinator, Natasha Iannuzzi at iannuzzin@nausetschools.org. This past week, we held a staff meeting where we dug in more deeply to our hydroponic garden, coordianted by Nurse Miller, our new outdoor garden with FTS Coordinator Natasha Iannuzzi, and discussed possible curriculum connections in the classroom. As the weather gets warmer in the spring, we will reach out for assistance planting our spring crops!

We welcomed back students with a week of many green cards earned by students for demonstrating our core values of Respect, Empathy, Accountability, Determination, and Your Best. Congratulations to Camille, Adalyn, and Dylan for being our green card winners the last two weeks! We are proud of you for embodying our school's core values! Students select a prize from our bucket of prizes, may choose extra recess for their class, or lunch bunch with Mrs. Bono, and their picture is proudly displayed in the front lobby on the TV screen to celebrate being Eddy READY!

We are asking for your help! If you drop off or pick up your student by car in the front circle, please know that this front circle is also shared with the specialized buses. When a bus has their red lights on and the stop sign out, please be sure to stop your car and treat this as you would a red light. During these times, students are actively boarding or disembarking the bus, so all vehicular traffic must stop for student safety. We understand that drop off and pick up is a busy time, and appreciate your alertness to stop your car when the bus red lights are on and the stop sign is out; this only occurs when active boarding/disembarking is occurring. If you have any questions about this, please be sure to let Principal Guditus know.

So far this school year, the Brewster PTO has earned $48.50 through folks scanning their receipts after grocery shopping, and we are asking for your help to earn more! You can learn more by clicking here: Supporting Brewster Elementary Schools with Boxtops.

You can download the free Boxtops app here!

This recent article from NPR references numerous research studies about the impact of screen time on children, and also discusses the importance of modeling responsible screen time as adults with our children. The article's main takeaways were:

• Ask yourself if the response can wait.
• If you have to "phub" your child, explain why. ("Phubbing" is a term that means snubbing another person using your phone to do so.)
• Make sure the time you're spending on your device is actually useful.
• Keep devices outside the bedroom.
• Create device-free zones in your home and schedule.
• Be kind to yourself.

It's a quick read and has some interesting points about what we can do to build healthy habits and model them with our kids. To read the entire article, go to: https://www.npr.org/2025/11/07/nx-s1-5564069/healthier-screen-time-habits-parents-adults

Barnstable County’s Cape Cod Cooperative Extension has information to help provide food- access support. Visit “SNAP on Cape Cod: Find Food Assistance, Learn How You Can Help” for updates on SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) and HIP (Healthy Incentives Program), resources and ways to stay connected to food access programs across the Cape.

Thank you to all who donated to the Hurricane Melissa Relief Drive. We collected far over 500 items, helping many families who are in need of assistance in Jamaica due to the devastation from Hurricane Melissa. The Cape Cod Chronicle even picked up our story to showcase the generosity our students, families, and staff are showing to others in need! https://www.capecodchronicle.com/articles/3685/view/brewster-shows-up-in-wake-of-hurricane-melissa-and-federal-snap-cuts

We will again partner with the Brewster DPW to hold a snowplow naming contest! This will occur at school in classrooms. See below for more details.