Correction to Sept. 27th Post ...

Please make your donation online for our Terry Fox Walk. Click here to go to the link:


Please do not send any donations to school.  Sorry for any confusion.

This Coming Week...

As you may already know, Thursday, September 29th is our School Open House & Curriculum Night.  The classrooms will be open from 6:30 to 7:30 pm.  Parents are invited to come with their child(ren) to see what is happening in our Kindergarten room and meet the Teachers.  We hope to see you on Thursday evening!


Terry Fox Walk - Friday, Sept. 30th


Our school will be walking on Friday to raise money for the Terry Fox Foundation. The Kindergarten classes will be walking around the field a few times to show our support for the Terry Fox Foundation. We are encouraging each child's family to make a donation online so that our school can reach our goal to fundraise $1000. 

Friday, Sept. 30th is also 'Orange Shirt Day'.  Orange Shirt Day officially started a few years ago as a way to promote healing and reconciliation for the survivors of Residential Schools.  On Friday, we will give the students in our class an orange ribbon to wear to show our support.  

Here is a link if you would like more information about Orange Shirt Day.




Library Books

The library is ready for us to start signing out books!  Our class will be going to the library on Day 1 of school.  Each child will get to borrow a book of his/her choice and take it home for about a week.  Please help your child take good care of his/her library books and library book bag.  Families will be asked to pay for any lost or damaged books.

Our first library day will be tomorrow: Wed., Sept. 28th (Day 1).  We will send home a schedule indicating the dates of our library days throughout the year later this week.  Please look for it in your child's communication bag.

Our Class Promise & A Few Reminders

We have written our class promise.  In fact, the children came up with 4 promises that they thought would help us achieve a nice class and a clean class.  Here are our promises:

1.    We   promise   to   keep   our   hands   and   feet   to   ourselves;
2.  
   We   promise  to   listen   and  pay  attention;
3.  We promise to solve problems in good ways (e.g., use our W.I.T.S. = Walk Away, Ignore, Talk about it, and/or Seek help); and
4.  We promise to tidy-up.   

    Just a few friendly reminders... 

     Friday, Sept. 23, 2016:  We are going to the Community Safety Village at Bruce's Mill Conservation Centre.  We'll leave in the morning at 9:50 and return by 2:30.  We'll be eating lunch there.  If you have not already done so, please go to 'School Cash Online' in order to give consent for your child to go on the trip and in order to pay for the trip. (We will send a second reminder notice today to any families who have not done so.)  

     Scholastic Book Club Orders:  If you would like to place an order for your child this month, please return the order form(s) by Tuesday, September 27, 2016. 

     Curriculum Night/Meet the Teachers:  We hope you and your child(ren) will be able to come and join us on Thursday, September 29th from 6:30 to 7:30 pm.  Our classroom will be open for you to visit and perhaps you may even want to try an activity with your child.  We look forward to seeing you!

The Adventures of Pete the Cat

  

                                                   

Pete the Cat is ready to start visiting with the children in our class! Starting tomorrow, Monday, Sept. 19th, Pete will be sent home with one of our students in his travel bag.  The 3 books pictured above will also be in his bag along with Pete's scrapbook. Each student will get a turn throughout the year to have Pete at home for a week.

Please help your child take good care of Pete the Cat, the books and bag, and please return everything to school on time so another family may enjoy Pete's company.  Thank you in advance for your cooperation.

International Dot Day

 

Today the Kindergartens celebrated International Dot Day with Mrs. Gordon-Rak.  We read the story, The Dot, by Peter Reynolds and created our own dot pictures to celebrate being an artist.

Rose Gordon-Rak
Nellie McClung P.S.

Mrs. Gordon-Rak is our prep coverage teacher.  She is with our class each day before lunch time.  She teaches drama, dance, music and health.  In addition, she will be taking the class to the library for book exchanges once the library is ready for us.

Room 110 News

We made it through the first week of Kindergarten!  A big thank you to our returning Senior Kindergarten students for being such good helpers with the Junior Kindergarten boys and girls and helping to make them feel comfortable and welcome in our class and school.

We have been working on establishing and following the routines of our classroom.  For example, our entry routines include:  finding our cubby spots; hanging up backpacks; handing in communication bags; locating and handing in our ‘name rocks’; standing for O Canada; and sitting down on the carpet with our legs crossed.  (And that all happens in the first 10 minutes of the morning!)

As our first class inquiry, we posed this question to the class:  How do you want to feel when you are at school? After some thinking and discussion, most children said they wanted to feel happy. After some more discussion, we decided that we also wanted to feel calm, relaxed, safe and excited. 

We then asked, what kind of class do we need to have so we can feel happy, calm, relaxed, safe and excited?  What kind of choices will we make so we can have that kind of class? After some more thinking and discussion, we decided that we want to have a nice class and a clean class. 

We have been reading various books to help us distinguish what kind of choices and behaviours will help us achieve the kind of class we want.  One of our favourite books is I Call My Hand Gentle.  It reminded us that when our hands do things it is a choice that we make.  We can choose to do good things with our hands like play, build and colour.  We can also choose not to make other choices like hit, break or steal.

This coming week, we will use our ideas to write our class promise.  We refer to our class promise, on a daily basis, as a reminder about the kind of choices we should try to make each day.

Pete the Cat

Have you heard about Pete the Cat, yet, from your child?  We have been enjoying reading the various books that feature Pete the Cat.  Pete is a happy, go-lucky character.  He doesn’t get bothered very much when things go wrong.                              “Just keep walking along and singing your song because it’s all good!” says Pete.

Pete the Cat will be visiting each child’s home this year.  Each week, Pete will be sent home with a child.  In Pete’s travel bag, you will also find some books to read together and a scrapbook to record some of Pete’s adventures with your child.  Pete will start visiting the week of September 19^th.

Helper of the Day

Each day, one child from our class is selected to be the ‘Helper of the Day’.  Throughout the year, each child will have about 4 to 5 turns to be the Helper. 

What are the duties of the Helper?  The Helper takes the attendance to the office with 2 buddies.  The Helper gets to be first in line throughout the day, and holds open doors for the class. What are the perks of being the Helper?  The Helper gets to sit on a special chair during carpet time, and he/she takes home the message of the day.  

It's good to be the Helper!

Birthdays

Birthdays are important, and we like to acknowledge everyone’s birthday in our class. We celebrate each child’s birthday by singing ‘Happy Birthday’ to him/her and ‘How Old Are You Now?’.  Each child also gets to choose a small gift from the birthday box. (We also celebrate July & August birthdays. We will celebrate these birthdays near the end of the school year.)  

                                     

Our birthday box

                                                                                            

As you may have already read in previous communication from the school, we are not able to share any food treats (e.g., cake, cookies, etc.) at school. Thank you in advance for your cooperation with this policy.

Reminders & Dates to Remember:

·  Friday, September 23^rd:  Trip to the Community Safety Village at Bruce’s Mill Conservation Centre. Please sign up on ‘School Cash Online’ in order to give consent for your child to go on the trip and to pay for the trip. We welcome parent volunteers to come with us to help supervise the children on trips.  Please remember, in order to volunteer at school/on trips/etc., volunteers need to have a current police check on file at our school.

·      

    If you have not already done so, please send extra clothes and running shoes for your child to keep at school.  Please label all clothing and shoes with your child’s name.

·  Gym Day:  our class will have use of the gym on Day 1 of the school schedule.  Our school operates on a Day 1 to 5 schedule. Here are some of the dates for the upcoming Day 1’s:

 Tuesday, Sept. 13^th …. Day 1

 Tuesday, Sept. 20^th …. Day 1

 Wednesday, Sept. 28^th…. Day 1

·  Monday, September 26^th: PA Day … there is no school for students that day.  We will be in the school if you need to contact us.

·        

   Curriculum Night/Meet the Teachers:  September 29^th.  More information about the evening will be sent home soon from the school soon.

Welcome Back to School!

Just two more big sleeps until we start another school year!  We have been getting the classroom ready for our first day on Tuesday, Sept. 6th, and we can't wait to see our new SK students and meet our new JK students!  

This year, a poster of Pete the Cat will be in our classroom window to let us know where to line up in the mornings.

Pete  the  Cat  says, "Welcome  to  Kindergarten  in  Room  110!"

On Tuesday morning, we will try to touch base with everyone to find out what your child will be doing at dismissal time on September 6th: being picked up, taking the bus or attending Fun on the Run.  In case we don't see you, please send a note with your child or call us and leave a message at (905) 303-1720 ext. 110.

On Tuesday, we will send home various information pages from the school and our classroom.  In addition, you will also find a parent contact page to complete and return to school.

Enjoy the rest of the long weekend, and we look forward to seeing you on Tuesday morning!