MIDDLE SCHOOL

Dear DAA Middle School Families,

With three of the four MAP tests complete, a couple of EXPO field trips, fantastic learning opportunities in our classrooms, and a long weekend, we are drawing near to the end of October!  I am so proud of the activities and challenges that are taking place in the middle school.  

Our grade 6 Global Outcomes teachers took their class to visit the Center of Excellence to pique their interest in an ongoing activity.  Students explored Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality to get an idea of how they might be able to represent their chosen moment in history!

Professional learning days at DAA are sacred.  We appreciate your understanding that this time is very productive for our staff and enables them to enhance the learning experiences your children have each day. This past week, our teachers focused on what individualized, inspired, and interconnected assessments look like in DAA by digging into their standards, rubrics, and moderating those assessments with their colleagues.  I am so proud of the teacher leaders who helped to facilitate the learning for their colleagues.  The workshops were meaningful and teachers are able to take what they’ve learned and implement it in the classrooms.

Upcoming Dates

• October 19-20- Professional Learning  Days (No school for students)

• October 21- Prophet Mohammed’s Birthday (PBUH)

• Oct 31- Nov 4 Middle School Spirit Week! Sunday- Halloween, Monday - Thursday will be voted on by students

• November 03- UAE Flag Day

• November 04- Diwali (Noon Dismissal)

• November 16-18- Parent Teacher Conferences (No School)

• November 25- Thanksgiving Holiday (No School)

For all events, click here for the K-12 Academic Calendar.

Slices Catering

All students should now have their DAA ID cards and should take them to Slices to make purchases.  It is much faster to use the card than cash, so please top up your child’s Slices account to help with the efficiency of purchases at lunch. If you have any questions, please contact Mikhail at mikhail@slices.ae.

While all of our teams scored very well in the competition, in the final standings two of our teams placed 3rd and 4th place.  So I am very happy to see that one of our teams will be taking a place in the world finals being hosted by Singapore later this year – more details will follow soon from the organizers.

I would like you to join me in congratulating our young innovative leaders on this journey and share in their tremendous success.

We are almost at the end of our MAPS journey for the fall session. We have now completed Math, Science and Language Usage and are doing very well with catching students up with completion. Next week we will be starting Reading during Social Studies lessons. We do very much appreciate your support from home and reinforcing that these tests are important although they don’t show up in their reports. So far Middle School is off to a great start with improved results from last year!

As you may be aware, the Dubai Fitness Challenge will be taking off soon.  There are a couple of ideas below to help your family participate in some healthy habits!

Dubai Fitness Challenge

Mark your calendars as the Dubai Fitness Challenge will return for the 2021 edition. The event will run October 29-November 27, 2021. More information can be found online:  https://www.dubaifitnesschallenge.com/ 

More information will follow in the coming weeks.

Would you like to contact a middle school teacher or staff member?  Please see the list of email addresses here.

If you are still having technical troubles, please make sure to raise a ticket if the teacher is unable to help your child with a fix.  Send an email to studenthelpdesk@gemsdaa.net and they will help resolve the issue.