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HomeMy WebLinkAboutTimes-Advocate, 1999-03-31, Page 18Wednesday, March 31, 1999 Exeter Times—Advocate 17 EWS FROM OUR SCHOOLS Schools are a very integral part of our community the news from our local schools. Watch for this page. The children in these schools are our future leaders. the fast week of every month. The Times Advocate would like to share with you MCCURDY SCHOOL NEWS Congratulations! Your extra effort to keep us informed about absence or lateness of oar children is helping to make our Safe Arrival program very successful. Continue to make use of the answering machine that Is available throughout the evening and early morning for four messages. On Monday, March 29, students from all South Region schools participated in three activities with staff and students from South Huron District High School to 'celebrate' a variety of Arts activities. I'm sure you've seen the slogan "Huron Shines in '99"... well... in September of 1999 Huron County is hosting the International Plowing Match right in our own backyard just outside Dashwood. As part of that celebration our students too will have an opportunity to shine as they participate in a variety of ways. We will be sending artwork,. displays, audio and video tapes... and our students too will experience first hand the agricultural heritage we have so close at hand. Report cards for the second term were sent. home on Monday Manch 8. Please take the opportunity to review this report with your child(ren) and complete page three of the report. Select some goals and return page three to your children's teachers as soon as possible. Congratulations to all students who were success- ful in classroom Storytelling and Speech competi- tions held this past month at McCurdy. Special con- gratulations to the three winners from our school who went on to represent McCurdy at the Exeter Legion Speech Coihpetition... Parker Reed who placed third in Storytelling: Justin Knee who received honourable mention in the Junior Division and Ryan Knee who also received honourable men- tion in the Intermediate Division. • Last year it was called "Kids Kitchen Table"... this q4 year, built on the success of last year it'will be called= the "Earth Friendly Garden." Students in Grade 2/3 will be involved in a variety of curricular activities to continue working with the garden here at McCurdy. Following weeks of practice and lots of noontime efforts to slam dunk, students from Grade 5-8 repre- sented McCurdy at the February 6 Free Throw Competitions in Exeter. Sponsored by the Knights of Columbus, this very popular annual event allows stu- dents an opportunity to show their basketball skills. Though generally known by our students for the Crediton dances they put on, the Crediton and Area Optimist Club is sponsoring a Spelling Bee for three area schools; McCurdy, Mt. Carmel and Stephen Central. Students in Grades 5-8 will participate in classroom competitions prior to March 26 and then a school wide competition, for three winners at each grade level, on March 30. On April 1, the winners will travel to Mt. Carmel to participate in the Inter - School competition. ZURICH COUGAR NEWS Mrs. Weigand's Early Years class has been learn- ing about magnets. The children have also been selling magazines for the school fundraiser. In February, we celebrated 50 days of school and made a book called "Fifty and Fifty make a Hundred". The Early YearsBear Class had a great time acting out The Three Billy Goats Gruff and making bridges for the troll to live under. Our focus in math this month is numbers. Peter Rabbit is making a visit to our class this week., He will visit each child's home. We are learning all about him and the mischief he gets into. Both classes are looking for signs of spring to make a class book together. Happy Easter! The grade ones had a safe and restful March Break and returned to find new centres and seating arrangement in their classroom. They have been busy welcoming spring with new word lists. They have also been having fun making decorative kites and working on Easter activities. This week's "Cougar Of the Week" from the grade 2/3 class is Ryan MacBean. The kids all agreed that Ryan has good manners. We. are currently immersed in a fascinating unit on volume, mass and area. We will soon be continuing a look at the differ- ent cultures of the world. The grade 3/4 class is excited about receiving their first letter from their new penpals in Edgewater, BC. We are ready to start our research project on the pioneers. Mr. Brock's grade 5/6 class has successfully fin- ished an interesting novel study of "Bridge to Terabithia", with excellent results on the final test. We have just begun to read "The Magician's Nephew" by C.S. Lewis, and learned about the author and his other stories. We are looking for,- ward or-ward to working with Mrs. Putherbough on our Earth Friendly Garden. We will be constructing, planning, planting and tending our garden from now until the contents are ready for us to use. Grade 7's are busy getting ready for the musical, , "Groovy". , We have created posters, that will soon be displayed around town, advertising the upcoming production. In preparation, we have been learning about societal and political issues of importance dur- ing the 60's era. It is too bad that we didn't have our grad photos taken on March 11. Our parents would have been proud because we put on quite a show for "Wacky Hair Day". A lot of the grade 8 students have been quite busy since March Break running our major fundraising project for the year, magazine sales. We all entered the Hay Township Flag Contest for the plowing match and are quite proud to announce that Teala Macl3ean had her artwork chosen. You will be able to see her flag when you visit the International Plowing Match this fall. All of the grade 7 and 8 students are quite busy with our musical this year which is set in the "psychedelic six- ties". There are a lot of musical pieces to learn, lines to memorize, and dance routines to practice. The theme has carried over to our other subjects as well. We are learning about Vietnam today and trying to understand the major events of that decade (civil rights, protests, the Vietnam War, hippies, drug use and the changes that resulted in North American society). Our School Council conducted a very successful Skate-a-Thon in their effort to continue to raise money for new playground equipment. Many thanks to: our students who did a fantastic job of getting sponsors to pledge them money, to Michele Haberer, our School Council chair, for providing us with hot chocolate and popcorn; and. to our volunteers, Mary Haggitt and Emmy Zandwyk. Ll CENTRAL NEWS l For the past two years Usborne Central has been a host site for TVOntario's Virtual Classroom. The Virtual Classroom is an interactive learning experi- ence for students and teachers. This month we have many projects underway in the Virtual classroom. Grade 3 and 4 enrichment students from McCurdy, Stephen Central, Hensall, Zurich, Huron Centennial, Exeter and Usborne are involved in Pirate University. Throughout this series students will be participating in story telling projects; designing and building structures and mechanisms for a pirate ship and mapmaking. Our grade 5/6 class at Usborne has recently partic- ipated in Media Communications, a 3 session pro- gram that focuses on oral and visual communication skills. Students were taught how to pose interview questions and survey questions. They were given the chance to ask their questions to students from another school in the Toronto area who appeared on air for the production. Usborne's grade 7 students are looking forward to engaging in a series of programs that will help them to create math projects. This three week program will cover a variety of math expectations, by the end of the series students will be required to create a project based on the concepts covered during the Virtual Classroom sessions. Grade 8 students from Usborne and Exeter are participating in Exploring Emerging Careers. This program will outline career options that students may not have considered: Students will have the opportunity to observe seg- ments of various careers through videos and be able to speak to Mr. Williams (a career consultant) about emerging career options. The Virtual classroom also offers professional development programs for teachers and principals. Since January many principals from the Avon Maitland District School Board have been involved in Conflict Resolution Programs. This series includes the theory, of disputeresolution, and focuses on prac- tical skills and applications as they relate to the day to day role of school administrator s and others involved in the running of a school. Many teachers from the Avon Maitland School Board are involved in the Assessment Video Program series. The Ministry of Education and Training has collaborated with TVOntario on the production of a series of five videos dealing with classroom assessment and evaluation. The series is designed for use by boards and schools to assist elementary and secondary teacher in developing an understanding of assessment, eval- uation, reporting and related classroom skills. All this falls within the context of the new provin- cial report card and -policies for assessment and cur- riculum. Our French teachers are participating in a pro- gram that provides some strategies for their core French classes. These programs are created to help them implement the requirements of the neve Ontario Core French Curriculum Policy document. The Virtual Classroom offers many programs for everyone inthe school system. The variety of pro- gramming is excellent and continues to change throughout the year.. Students enjoy picking up the telephone and sharing their ideas with students from other schools outside the Avon Maitland District School Board. The hands - on interactive teaching style of the Virtual Classroom gives students at Usborne a leading edge to the twenty-first century. Written by: Brenda Martin; TeacherNirtual Classroom Facilitor STEPHEN CENTRAL NEWS From Room 9 The Grade one class has been busy reading at home and have read over 2000 books already. They also tested the March winds with the kites they made. There were happy to report that their amaryl- lis had seven blooms. From Room 12 During March, the Grade one and two class have been studying maps. For a special project the chil- dren are going to create a community out of boxes. From Room 2 Grades seven and eight have started a new English contract. They are reading novels and working in groups to explore the answers to questions and learn new vocabulary. The science fair went very well with grades 7 and 8 students presenting many types of experiments and inventions. Aerobic exercises have started in each of the gym classes, followed by bad- minton skills. The classes have been studying eco- nomics in Geography, learning how Japan's indus- tries and Canada's differ. From Room 7 Grades two and three have looked at objects with form and discussed how tall they were, how wide they were .and thickness from front to back. They collected all sorts of boxes and created a model building. These were too big to paint so we made a silhouette of each building. From Room 4 Grade 6 students have been studying rate, ratio, percent and integers in math. In science, they will be doing many experiments with the properties of air and flight. The. 'Chicken Soup' stories have almost all been published using the computer and soon the stu- dents will be able to check out the classroom book to read at home. From Room 8 Competition was fierce for the three top places in the Grade 5 spelling bee. All participants did very well in class, and in the gym. Two finalists have been chosen for the next competition on April 1 in. Mt. Carmel. The class is preparing for the Celebration of the Arts, as well as a Slice of Huron next month. The group will look at Early Civilizations in South America in Social Studies. From Room 6 Room six just completed a unit on fractions in Math. Students learned to identify common fractions as a part of a whole and part of a set. Drawings and concrete materials were used to develop concepts. From Room 3 Grade 7 students have finished their studies-oi Antarctica in Geography. The teachers and students are proud of Meghan O'Rourke and Stacey Bartlett for presenting their speeches in the gym. There will be two visits to Tech 21 in March. From Room -S The Grade 4 class has been preparing for their trip to Seaforth for "Slice of Huron", a look at Agriculture in Huron County. The Grade 4 class is currently studying instruments of the orchestra. From the Resource Centre Here's a site with lots of great Easter activities' 'httpi/www.happy-easter.com. Don't forget to visit the school website with links to the school newsletter hnd monthly calender! httpi/'www.avonmaitland.on.ca/StephenCentralPS.