KEYS Academy - Augusta

The first half of the 2022-2023 school year have come to an end. I don’t know about you, but I feel as though it went by fast. Our students, staff and families continue to help KEYS Academy Augusta grow. We can’t say thank you enough for all your support.

During Social Thinking as a whole group, we the students and staff focused on being good friends and Who Matters. Some of the activities included life rings, characteristics of being a good friend and using kind words. As the nine weeks progressed, we began to work on Safety Dignity and Opportunity. These activities included treating people the way you would want to be treated. During this nine-week period we tied a lot of our KEYS and Social Thinking together. For example, we did a week telling the truth and the importance of telling the truth, which ties back to our Safety, Dignity and Opportunity KEY as well as our Who Matters KEY. We worked on the Big Life book to complete the What’s in the Way power tool. To end the nine weeks, we put our focus back on to being kind to each other. We discussed bullying and how bullying can affect those around us. The students were presented with ways to respond to bullying.

Students are adjusting well to new changes to the high school classroom. Ms. Kenyetta has adjusted to KEYS Academy and has started building positive and meaningful relationships with all her students. For the first nine weeks of school, we focused on establishing expectations, routines, and goals. We introduced students to the people of the classroom, school community, school environment, and to the expectations we hold about learning. We also introduced and established expectations for behavior, the limits we will set, and the ways we will enforce those limits. We introduced the routines that help students learn while taking care of each other and the environment. We laid the foundation for a productive and cooperative year of learning. We are learning to work in an atmosphere of support and collaboration.

The middle school classroom has been rocking out hard this quarter. They do daily journal writings to help them develop strong writing skills. During math time, the 7th graders have been learning how to simplify, multiply and add fractions. Our 6th graders reviewed multiplication, long division and working on positive and negative numbers. All of the students have been enjoying science class. A large part of the nine weeks was focused on energy. The students can identify potential and kinetic energy. Each student enjoys Friday experiments.

Ms. Latoya has enjoyed teaching the elementary class. She continues to build relationships with her students as well as the students and staff throughout the building. Throughout the quarter the elementary staff and students have focused on introducing and building relationships with new staff. They have also placed emphasis on setting expectations and routines. Academically and socially the elementary class held a class store that served all of our students. During this time, they worked on social skills as well as math skills (counting money).

We hope to continue building a village that is safe, nurturing, and always in the motion of progress.

Warmest Regards,

Brandy L. Wright, Director