100's Day Celebrations

Thank you to all of our families for helping your child celebrate the 100th day of school! We loved your creativity in designing t shirts. The kids wore these creations proudly! We also want to offer our sincerest thanks for donating 100 non-perishable food items! Your generosity is a testament to your love of neighbour.

Parent-Teacher Interviews

Parent-Teacher interviews will be held this Monday and Thursday. We still have openings and if you haven't signed up yet, please forward your preferred time by completing the interview request form, or send us a note on Remind. If these dates do not work for you and you would like to speak to us about your child's progress, please contact us and we will do our best to schedule an alternate meeting time or date.

Space Inquiry

Our little ones are loving our space inquiry. They are learning about our solar system and terminology such as orbit. This week we will be making rocket ships. Please send in small boxes, paper towel rolls. foil and wrap. Glue sticks would also be appreciated!

Litterless Lunches and Recycling

Two of our Catholic Graduate Expectations are "Caring Family Member" and"Responsible Citizen." Caring for the God's creation and the wider social community are values we hope to instill in our students.

Thank you to all who send in litterless lunches and snacks. We appreciate your using reusable containers!  Of course, from time to time, children bring in items that are pre-packaged. And, our milk program makes use of paperboard cartons and straws.

Since school has started, we have been working with our students on sorting refuse into the garbage bin, the blue recycling bin and the green composting bin. You may support your child's learning by having them help you sort your own litter at home.

Lenten Promise

The beginning of Lent (Ash Wednesday on March 6) is fast approaching! During the 40 days before Easter we will focus on preparing our hearts for Jesus' Resurrection. This can be accomplished through the three pillars of Lenten observance: prayer, fasting and almsgiving. Your child will be encouraged to make a Lenten promise about how they will show God's love.

*** Shrove Tuesday will be celebrated on Tuesday, March 5. Students will receive nut-free pancakes as a special treat that day. 

100s Day Celebrations

We will be celebrating 100 days at school on Tuesday, February 19. Your child is encouraged to wear a celebratory Tshirt with 100 items on it. 

We also hope to demonstrate God's love for our neighbour by making a donation to the local foodbank.  Our class goal is to collect 100 food items. Please send in non-perishable food items on Tuesday morning!

We will also be focusing our math and literacy activities around this special number. Follow us on Instagram to see your child's learning in action.

Parent-Teacher Interviews

As you know, Room 103’s Initial Observations Parent-Teacher Interviews originally scheduled for November 2018 were cancelled.

We are pleased to offer you the opportunity to discuss your child’s progress and their Term 1 Communication of Learning this month on Monday, February 25, and Thursday, February 28.

Interviews will be 10 minutes in length and take place between 3:45 and 6:00 pm on Monday, and between 3:45 and 8:00 pm on Thursday. The interview location will be in St. Andrew’s Conference Room, within the Main Office area.

On Tuesday, February 19 an Interview Request Form will be sent home.Please take time to consider your availability those days. Completed interview forms are due back to school on Wednesday, February 20.

Every effort  will be made to accommodate your requests. A confirmation notice will be sent home with your child’s zippy bag by Friday.

If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact us via telephone, Remind or a written note in your child’s zippy bag.

We look forward to meeting with you,

💕Valentine's Day💕

We will celebrate Valentine's Day on Thursday, February 14th! If you are planning to send Valentine's cards to school, please ensure that all students are included. We have 29 students in our class. Kindly label them "To my friend" and have your child sign their name! (This is excellent writing practice.) Please do not send in candy, chocolate or food. We have students with allergies and we are not permitted to distribute food. Any food items will be returned. Thank you for your co-operation.

PAT Time

Before children learn to read print, they need to become aware of how the sounds in words work. They must understand that words are made up of speech sounds or phonemes. A child's skill in phonemic awareness is a good predictor of later reading success or difficulty.

Phonemic Awareness is the ability to notice, think about, and work with the individual sounds in spoken words. Manipulating the sounds in words includes blending, stretching or otherwise chaning words. Children can demonstrate phonemic awareness in several ways, including:

• recognizing which words in a set of words begin with the same sound (Bell, bike and boy all have b at the beginning)
• isolating and saying the first or last sound in a word (The beginning sound of dog is d. The ending sound is g.
• combining or blending separate sounds in a word to say the word (d/o/g - dog)
• breaking, or segmenting a word into its separate sounds (dog- d/o/g)

Phonemic awareness and phonics are not the same thing. Phonemic awareness is the understanding that the sounds of spoken language work together to make words. Phonics is the understanding that there is a relationship between letters and sounds through written language. Children who cannot hear and work with the phonemes of spoken words will have a difficult time learning how to relate these phonemes to letters when they see them written in words.

Source: http://www.readingrockets.org

Please review our classroom PAT schedule below. It is helpful to prepare your child each week for their presentation. Together choose a fun object of interest to your child that begins with the letter of the week. Have your child practice their presentation, focusing on breaking up the sounds in the word. For example, "My name is .... I brought in dog. Dog starts with the letter d and makes the duh sound. Dog. Duh-awe-g. Dog." And don't worry if your child hesitates or is shy, we will guide them through their presentation if necessary.

PAT Schedule

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Alexandria	Jessica	Luca	Morakinyo	River
Anastasia	Joseph	Lukas	Nolan	Oliver
James	Callum	Matheya	Mason K.	Sarai
Aaliyah	Davi	Mason L.	Lami	Shelby
Aria	Jojo	Kiran	Nina	Sebastian
Bjorn	Lara	Leo	Khrystyna	Alyssa

Please note that if your child is scheduled for PAT Time on a Friday PA Day, please allow them to bring in their object on a Thursday. If your child is scheduled for PAT Time on a Monday PA Day, please allow them to bring in their object on a Tuesday. If your child is absent on their scheduled PAT day, they may bring in their object upon their return to school.

Have a Blast at Mass!

Starting on Feb.17, Mary Mother of God Parish will start a three week initiative to invite young families to try Children Liturgy of the Word called “Have a Blast at Mass”. Each week they will have special activities for the children and families. Please consider giving  Children’s Liturgy a try on Feb 17, Feb 24 or March 3rd.

Children’s Liturgy of the Word (CLW) is an age-appropriate program offered to children ages 3 to 7 at the 9:00 am and 11:00 am Masses. No pre-registration is necessary. All children are welcome and encouraged to attend.

Just before the readings begin during Mass, these children are invited to go with the weekly leaders from the church to the Annunciation Room just outside of the sanctuary. During this special time, the volunteer teacher leads the children through prayers, songs, and activities that are simplified and appropriate for their age group.

The children learn about the same Scripture readings that you are hearing during Mass. They are taught a simplified main message of the readings and are encouraged to share that message with their parents after Mass.

After the homily, the leaders will lead the children back into the church to rejoin their families for the remainder of the Mass. CLW allows you to give your full attention to the readings and homily during the Mass, while letting your children hear the Word of God in a way that is meaningful to them. It is not a child care program, but a rich experience of God’s Word with prayers and activities designed to help reinforce the message of the Sunday readings.

FAQ’s

• Each session has one adult volunteer teacher and two teen helpers to facilitate. The average number of kids who attend each week is between 25 and 30.
• You should arrive at Mass and sit in a pew as a family for the beginning of Mass. When CLW is about to begin, the presider will call the children to the front of the church and offer them a blessing before they are led to their classroom by their leaders.
• Parents are welcome to quietly observe from the back of the room the first few times your child attends.
• If your child is crying or asking for you, one of the helpers will walk them back to you in the church.
• Children who attend are expected to be potty trained and able to sit and listen for several minutes during the readings.
• If your child needs any aids to self regulate ( a fidget toy, stress ball, etc.) please speak to the leader after Mass and we’ll do our best to accommodate them.
• CLW runs each Sunday from September to May and is paused during Christmas and March Breaks.

Children's Liturgy of the Word CLW Mary Mother of God Parish MMOG

Dear Parents/Guardians:

PAT Time (very similar to Show and Tell) will begin on Monday, November 12^th. PAT Time is a time where we work on developing phonemic awareness. This involves children being able to listen for sounds in words.

For instance, on Mrs. Cuggy-Murphy’s PAT Day she brings a snake or a picture of a snake when our focus letter is “s”. She will present it in this way: “My name is Mrs. Cuggy-Murphy. I brought a snake. Snake starts with the letter ‘S’. The letter ‘S’ makes the sound sssss.” Then together we will make a fist, say the word snake and release one finger for each sound that we hear (four fingers for the four sounds that we hear in snake). Phonemic awareness is known to be the best predictor of reading and writing success. This is an easy and fun way to gain that awareness.

During this time, students will also be invited to ask an informative question where the reply will be more than just a yes/no answer. Students will be encouraged to begin a question using “who, what, where, when, why and how”. This is a great way to promote inquiry-based learning.

Please check the schedule below to see which day of the week your child needs to bring in his/her item. For example, the week of November 12^th students will be asked to bring in an object that begins with the letter “Ss”. Please check our classroom blog for the weekly letters and help your child to choose his/her PAT item. Your child should bring in only one item each week. Students should be prepared to present the item to the class.

Thank you for your co-operation,

Mrs. Cuggy-Murphy and Mrs. Nisbet

PAT Schedule

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Alexandria	Jessica	Luca	Morakinyo	River
Audrey	Joseph	Lukas	Nolan	Oliver
James	Callum	Matheya	Mason K.	Sarai
Aaliyah	Davi	Mason L.	Lami	Shelby
Aria	Jojo	Kiran	Nina	Sebastian
Bjorn	Lara	Leo

Please note that if your child is scheduled for PAT Time on a Friday PA Day, please allow them to bring in their object on a Thursday. If your child is scheduled for PAT Time on a Monday PA Day, please allow them to bring in their object on a Tuesday. If your child is absent on their scheduled PAT day, they may bring in their object upon their return to school.

Happy Halloween!

So much fun at during the days leading up to our Boogie-A-Thon!

Thank you to all who donated to our school fund-raiser!

Countdown to Halloween

The focus of our kinders this week has been the upcoming excitement of Halloween.

Through journal writing, read-alouds, STEM and art activities, we have been exploring various aspects of this holiday. 

Pumpkin Painting 

On Wednesday we painted a variety of pumpkin shapes in different shades of orange, using paintbrushes, cotton balls and forks. The goal was to explore a variety of painting tools and to create a variety of textures with paint. On Thursday, we added faces to these pumpkins using wax crayons!  What a great way to draw shapes (triangles, squares and rectangles) and make spooky faces that scared the teachers!

Emerging Writers

As students become interested in writing, they enjoy making a variety of marks on the page. To an adult this may look like scribbles, but it is a first step in writing words. Drawing pictures is also a way students create written stories. Encourage your child to write and draw at every opportunity.
This little one brought in a small notepad from home and spent the day making notes. Well done!

STEM Challenge

This week, we received some new toys in Room 103. These magnetic shapes were a hit! Children built a variety of structures, including castles, barns and rocket ships. They even created two dimensional pictures.



Collaboration

A key aspect of the Kindergarten program is collaboration during play. The outdoor playground provides children with many opportunities to co-operate and collaborate when building, playing games or engaging in imaginative play.  When we all work together we stay in the green zone and have a great time!

The Great Big Crunch      

An initiative of Halton Food for Thought, the Great Big Crunch is a school-wide activity. The entire school assembled in the gym. Students participated in an apple trivia game, learning about apples and their nutritive value. After a countdown, we all bit into our apples. Mmm, it was good!!!

Room 103 is now on Instagram!

For visual updates on learning throughout the day, please request to follow Kindergarten_103 .

Boogie-A-Thon Fundraiser

St, Andrew is already half way to our target of raising $20,000 to support learning at our school. Al funds raised will be used to purchase activities for our students that will enhance their experiences at St. Andrew School. We appreciate any financial support you can give us.

There are several ways to donate.

1. If you would like to donate via cheque, you can follow the instructions on the on-line pledge form.

2. You can make a donation through the board's Make a Donation Button. 

     a. Gift information - select an amount

     b. Select Destination - Andrew

     c. Tribute Information - Not a tribute gift

     d. Message to School Board - Student name, specify amount donated per child.

     e. Click add to cart

3. You can make a donation through School Cash Online.

Our Boogie-A-Thon will take place on WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 31. The Kindergarten classes will be dancing in the gym between 9:30 and 10:05 am. Please feel free to join us for the fun. Please note that Halloween costumes should NOT include weapons, masks, complete body suits with covered faces, or inflatable costumes. All costumes should be appropriate to the values we hold as a Catholic school.

Upcoming Dates

Wednesday, October 31 - Boogie-A-Thon Fundraiser - 9:30 to 10:05 am

Wednesday, November 7 - Firefighter Visit

Friday, November 9 - Pizza Lunch

Friday, November 16 - Pizza Lunch

Songs, Poems and Chants

One Little Skeleton

One little skeleton hopping up and down,

hopping up and down,

hopping up and down.

One little skeleton hopping up and down,

for this is Halloween!

Two little witches flying through the air ...

Three little pumpkins rolling down the hill ...

Four little goblins skipping down the street ...

Five little children saying "Trick or Treat" ...

A busy week in Room 103!!!

Two fire drills, library, gym, STEM activities, music, reading, art and math! On Friday our playground was closed while workers planted new trees and built new features. We can't wait to see what's new next week!

Screen Time in Kindergarten

From time to time, our kinders watch videos in class. Screen time is always purposeful and connected to learning and the Kindergarten Program curriculum expectations.

Inquiry

When questions come up about wildlife, the natural environment or how things are made., we will seek answers through a variety of means: books, websites and videos. Children are learning to thoughtfully ask questions and seek answers. The Magic School Bus, Wild Kratts and How Things are Made are excellent educational and engaging programs.

The Kindergarten Program Expectations: 
1.8 ask questions for a variety of purposes, (e.g. for direction, for assistance, to innovate on an idea, to obtain information, for clarification, for help in understanding something, out of curiosity about something, to make meaning of a new situation) and in different contexts (e.g. during discussions and conversations with peers and adults, before, during, and after read-aloud and shared reading experiences, while exploring the schoolyard or local park, in small groups, in learning areas)
13.3. select and use materials to carry out their own explorations

Read Alouds

We are sure you are aware that many of your child's favourite books can be found read-aloud on YouTube. In our classroom, we also access the Halton Catholic District School Board's license for Tumblebooks. Children are often engaged by having a "new voice" reading new and familiar stories to them.

The Kindergarten Program Expectations: 
11.1 demonstrate an interest in reading (e.g. expect to find meaning in pictures and text; choose to look at reading materials; respond to texts read by the educator team; reread familiar texts; confidently make attempts at reading)

Understanding of Media Texts 

We have watched The Berenstain Bears at arrival on rainy mornings. Children arrive at different times and take varying amounts of time going through arrival routines (taking off coats, handing in their zippy bags, etc.) This program explores, in a subtly Christian context, many social issues such as making friends, bullying and sportsmanship.

The Kindergarten Program Expectations: 
3.3 demonstrate an awareness of making and keeping friends (e.g. sharing, listening, talking, helping, entering into play or joining a group with guidance from educators)
12.1 respond critically to animated works (e.g. cartoons in which animals talk, movies in which animals go to school)
12.2 communicate their ideas verbally and non-verbally, about a variety of media materials (e.g. describe their feelings in response to an seeing a DVD or a video, dramatize messages from a safety video or poster, paint pictures in response to an advertisement or CD)

Daily Physical Activity

During long rainy days, our kids need to both burn off excess energy and calm their bodies. The internet has a wide range of enjoyable resources such as Pop See Ko, Just Dance Kids, Go Noodle and Cosmic Yoga. Together we learn how our bodies can move quickly and slowly.

The Kindergarten Program Expectations: 
7.1 participate in creative movement and other daily physical activities (e.g. dance, games, outdoor play, fitness breaks)

Songs, Poems and Chants

The Spooky Wheels on the Bus

by J. Elizabeth Mills

Tune: The Wheels on the Bus

One spooky bus goes RATTLE and SHAKE,

RATTLE and SHAKE, RATTLE and SHAKE.

One spooky bus goes RATTLE and SHAKE,

All through the town.

Two white wipers go CREAK, CREAK, CREAK,

CREAK, CREAK, CREAK, CREAK, CREAK, CREAK.

Two white wipers go CREAK, CREAK, CREAK,

All through the town.

Three noisy cats go MEOW, HISS, HISS,

MEOW, HISS, HISS, MEOW, HISS, HISS.

Three noisy cats go MEOW, HISS, HISS,

All through the town.

Four glowing wheels roll ROUND and ROUND,

ROUND and ROUND, ROUND and ROUND.

Four glowing wheels roll ROUND and ROUND,

All through the town.

Five big spiders SPIN THEIR WEBS,

SPIN THEIR WEBS, SPIN THEIR WEBS.

Five big spiders SPIN THEIR WEBS,

All through the town.

Six singing mummies HUM, HUM, HUM,

HUM, HUM, HUM, HUM, HUM, HUM.

Six singing mummies HUM, HUM, HUM,

All through the town.

Seven silly monsters WIGGLE and WAGGLE,

WIGGLE and WAGGLE, WIGGLE and WAGGLE.

Seven silly monsters WIGGLE and WAGGLE,

All through the town.

Eight wacky witches CACKLE and HOWL,

CACKLE and HOWL, CACKLE and HOWL.

Eight wacky witches CACKLE and HOWL,

All through the town.

Nine magic brooms go SWISH, SWOOSH, SWISH,

SWISH, SWOOSH, SWISH, SWISH, SWOOSH, SWISH.

Nine magic brooms go SWISH, SWOOSH, SWISH,

All through the town.

Ten goofy ghosts say BOO-OO-OO,

BOO-OO-OO, BOO-OO,OO.

Ten goofy ghosts say BOO-OO-OO,

All through the town.

One spooky bus goes RATTLE and SHAKE,

RATTLE and SHAKE, RATTLE and SHAKE.

One spooky bus goes RATTLE and SHAKE,

On HALLOWEEN night!