Dear Visitor:
As Principal of PS 163, I welcome you to our website. The information
we present reflects a collaborative effort among the members of the
school teaching staff and administration, our students, and parent
members of our community. During your visit to our website, you will
learn about our school’s mission, programs, and activities.
Before you begin, permit me to tell you a bit about our community. It
is our goal to provide an instructional program that will help each PS
163 student meet or exceed City and State standards. Our instructional
staff offers a rich and rigorous program. Our teachers work diligently
not only to help the students meet and exceed instructional goals but
also to celebrate our students’ accomplishments. We offer strong
literacy and math programs. While test scores are only a partial
indicator of success, the scores of PS 163 students on Statewide tests
demonstrate the commitment we have to our strong core program. At PS
163, learning is fun. Our students receive a foundation of basic skills
that help them become critical thinkers.
Several
of our programs contribute to set PS 163 apart from other schools. We
provide our students with a very strong foundation in science.
Throughout their school experience, our students receive science
instruction both in their classroom and through our science cluster
staff. In grades K through 2, a science specialist provides specific
classroom lessons that our grade teachers coordinate with other
classroom instruction. In the upper grades, a science specialist offers
instruction in PS 163’s beautiful science laboratory. We employ an
inquiry-based program that encourages our students to observe, discuss,
draw conclusions, and write about their science experiments. We
coordinate student science work with shared and independent classroom
readings on various topics that are the subject of student
investigation with our science specialists. At the same time, we assure
that our units of study follow the Department of Education’s science
curriculum.
Another
significant aspect of our program can be found in our deep commitment
to the arts. Throughout the grades, our students receive music
instruction, visual art instruction, and dance/movement training.
Please browse through our web site where you can view samples of our
student art projects.
The PS 163 music program offers
instruction using Orff instruments, and provides vocal and choral
instruction. Our students learn to read music and develop a meaningful
understanding of rhythm. Movement instruction begins in kindergarten,
and continues through fifth grade. Fourth grade students enjoy an
outstanding dance experience offered through collaboration with The
National Dance Institute. During weekly dance sessions our students
find themselves transformed into a dance corp. whose performances
“bring down the house” at an end of the year program attended by the
entire school community.
We believe our students bring
often times hidden gifts, talents, and interests to school. That is why
in the third through fifth grade we give our students a chance to
explore such interests in the context of what we call enrichment
clusters. Our children receive an opportunity to choose from a menu of
activities, and to explore their interests in small groups. We change
our program offerings twice each year. Our students may, for example,
participate in a tropical fish club, learn flamenco dance, create
through Lego robotics, study data patterns by drawing upon school
attendance data, or make a short movie. The students’ interests lead
the way during clusters.
I hope you enjoy your visit to
the web site. We take great pride in our school and trust that your
visit to our website will demonstrate why we feel the way that we do
about PS 163.
Sincerely,
Virginia Pepe. Ed.D.
Principal
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