Table of Contents MAY 2018

Transcription

1 MAY 2018 We Learn in the light of Christ Aprendemos en la luz de Cristo- La lumière du Christ dirige notre apprentissage École/Escuela Father Leo Green is a Christ centered community that provides a Catholic learning environment celebrating the French and Spanish languages and their cultures. Guided by the teachings of Christ, the staff and students strive for high academic standards where all members are encouraged to develop 21st century learning skills and opportunities in order to become adaptable, global citizens who aspire to a life of faith filled service to others. We, the Catholic school community of École/Escuela Father Leo Green, will ensure that all members are treated with dignity and respect as we learn together in the light of Christ. Table of Contents ADMINISTRATORS MESSAGE... 2 CELEBRATION OF THE ARTS... 2 STUDENT TRANSPORTATION REGISTRATIONS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE NEWS RECESS/BREAKS TIMES... 4 PROVINCIAL ACHIEVEMENT TESTS (PATs)... 4 ST DOMINIC SAVIO PARISH NEWS..5 TRANSPORTATION INFORMATION FOR SEPTEMBER SAC NEWS... 6 SUPERINTENDENT ITEMS AND NEWS FROM THE DISTRICT... 7

2 ADMINISTRATORS MESSAGE It s hard to believe that May is already here! During May, we honour Mary, the Mother of God. Also, during May, we would like to wish each of our Father Leo Green mothers a very happy Mother s Day! With longer daylight hours and later sunsets, soccer and other sport commitments, and extended time in the playground, children are often later getting to bed and later getting up. With two more months of school left, and instructional material yet to be covered, parents are encouraged to assist their children in understanding the importance of proper rest, and regular and punctual attendance at school. As always, we are mindful of the many blessings that we enjoy as a community of parents and staff, celebrating our faith and working together to create wonderful learning experiences for children. May and June are filled with many significant events and activities. Please check our website and the Weekly Communication Logs sent by your children s teachers for dates which are important over the next two months. Guitta Kodershah Principal Alexandra Scarpelli-Mannarino Assistant Principal CELEBRATION OF THE ARTS Each year Edmonton Catholic Schools showcase and celebrate Fine Arts Education and the gifts and talents of our students and staff through the annual Celebration of the Arts Concert. Our FLG Choir members were exceptional ambassadors of our school at this year's 29th Anniversary Celebration of the Arts which was held on Wednesday, May 2 nd at the Jubilee Auditorium. Thank you to our choir Co-directors Mme Andrews and Srta Tar for leading this event. STUDENT TRANSPORTATION The Edmonton Catholic School District has been working to find cost efficiencies for student transportation for the 2018/19 school year. A strategic plan has been developed to address this issue. A letter detailing the plan and the changes for September 2018 was sent to parents and is posted on the school website. To allow for the school transportation changes, the start and dismissal times for our school will be adjusted as follows:

3 AM Kindergarten PM Kindergarten Grades 1-6 First Bell: 8:35 Instructional Time: 8:35 Dismissal Time: 11:36 Instructional Time: 12:14 Dismissal Time: 3:14 First Bell: 8:35 Instructional Time: 8:40 Dismissal Time: 3:15 Thursday Dismissal: 12:01 Thursday morning Kindergarten will no longer be offered at Father Leo Green School starting September 2018 Kindergarten hours will also be coordinated to accommodate shared Kindergarten noon hour bussing with St. Philip School. REGISTRATIONS FOR We are still accepting registrations for the French Immersion and Spanish Bilingual Kindergarten & Grade 1. Registration forms are available in the school office. Please note, to be eligible for Kindergarten, your child must be 5 years old by March 1st, Please tell others about our school word of mouth is our best advertiser! Thank you for spreading the good news about Father Leo Green. SOCIAL JUSTICE NEWS The Grade 6 Leadership Students would like to say a huge thank you to all the students who purchased some treats at the Bake Sale on April 20th! The students raised a total of $465 during the Bake Sale which will go towards the purchase of Water Kiosk in Haiti. Thank you to all the families who baked the treats that were sold and a huge thank you goes out to Sra Liliana for her help setting up and running the bake sale.

4 RECESS/BREAKS TIMES We are excited to share with you a proposal to alter the break/recess times and format at École/Escuela Father Leo Green starting in September A letter explaining the changes and the rationale behind them was sent to our parent community. We welcome your feedback on the following. Change There will be a 7-minute-long break in the AM, where students will remain inside with their teacher. During this break students will have the time to eat a snack and go to the washroom. The class will also have a short movement activity lead by the teacher. Classes will also have scheduled 20 to 30- minute-long Daily Physical Activities (DPA) in the AM. These DPA sessions are led and supervised by the teachers and can take place in the gymnasium or outside. Rationale Research has shown that the majority of elementary students are more alert in the morning and ready to learn. This proposed change will reduce the time of interruption to the learning sequence, as instruction is quickly resumed after the break. It will also reduce the behavior incidents that occur at recess. Lunch break will be 46-minute-long divided in two parts: a 26 minute outside recess and a 20-minute lunch. This 46-minute lunch break will provide students sufficient time to get ready for outdoor recess, engage in free play with their peers outside, and eat lunch before resuming the afternoon instructional block. This extended lunch break will also provide sufficient time to offer intramural activities and sport clubs for students who choose to participate in them. PROVINCIAL ACHIEVEMENT TESTS (PATs) The Grades six students will be writing Provincial Achievement Tests (PATs) during May and June. Please ensure your child is ready through proper preparation, study and sufficient rest. Students do better on tests when they are well-rested and have a nutritious breakfast before writing exams. These dates are on the website calendar: - Tuesday, May 8, French Language Arts (Part A) French Immersion ONLY - Thursday, May 10, English Language Arts (Part A) all grade 6 students* - Friday, June 15, French Language Arts (Part B) - French Immersion ONLY

5 - Monday, June 18, English Language Arts (Part B) all grade 6 students* - Tuesday, June 19, Mathematics all grade 6 students* - Wednesday, June 20, Social Studies - all grade 6 students* - Friday, June 20, Science - all grade 6 students* *for these exams, French Immersion exams are in French and Spanish Bilingual exams are in English SAINT DOMINIC SAVIO PARISH NEWS 1. Saturday, May 05, from 10:00-4:00 p.m- Confirmation Retreat. 2. Saturday, May 12 th -The Sacrament of Confirmation during the 5:00 pm Mass. 3. Sunday, May 06- Our Parish family will be celebrating the Feast of Saint Dominic Savio. Everyone is welcome to come for cake and coffee after all Masses. TRANSPORTATION INFORMATION FOR SEPTEMBER 2018 Transportation Services: Hours: Mon - Fri 7:15 AM 5:00 PM Thursday 7:15-4:00 PM Phone: transportationservices@ecsd.net Deadline The deadline for Transportation Applications is Friday May 25, Applications received after May 25th will not be set up for the first day of school. How will I be notified if I am not eligible for transportation? Your school shall contact you. Going into grade 1 September If your child is currently in half day kindergarten and you are eligible for transportation in grade 1 parents must complete and submit a Transportation Application by May 25th to ensure that bussing is in place for the first day of school. Address or contact changes. Use the Transportation Change Form for changes (cancellation, change in address {if eligible} or contact information). This form is available at your child s school and/or the District website at Cancelling Transportation transportationservices@ecsd.net to cancel bussing if you no longer need transportation for September. When do changes/starts begin?

6 Changes always begin on Wednesdays. The first route changes will be for Wed September 12th. How will I be notified about transportation? An automated call/ will go out in late August with information about your child s bus route. Please contact your school to obtain your login and password to your Parent Portal to obtain your child s bussing information. Curb Service Transportation If your child is currently attending or will be attending a specific program in the district, where Curb Service transportation is provided; a Curb Service Transportation form must be completed and signed by the Consultant, Principal and Parent. Please contact your school. SAC NEWS May Hot Lunch ORDER DEADLINE IS MAY 11th SAC May 2018 News Friday, May 18 Will be our Booster Juice Hot Lunch. Order online through the HEALTHY HUNGER website. Booster Juice offers ham or turkey wraps and 4 different smoothies. The Info button beside each item shows their ingredients. We usually have some children expecting a lunch from us, but no order has been placed. PLEASE make sure you have ordered lunch on the healthy hunger website before the deadline! Otherwise you must pack or bring a lunch for your child! If you are available on May 18th to volunteer to distribute the hot lunch items, or if you have questions on Healthy Hunger or anything hot lunch related Lizet can be reached at flgsac@gmail.com. Spring Art Cards The deadline for ordering Art Cards is May 4th, so send in your order form and money to school as soon as possible to get those amazing Art Cards to call your own and share with others!!! If you have any questions, please contact Cindy Tomat at flgsac@gmail.com.

7 SAC Information As we have mentioned before, there are some key members of our SAC who are moving away from the school next year. We need some new parents or guardians to step forward to fill some vacant positions we ll have for the next school year ( ). Please consider volunteering for the following coordinator positions: Vice Chair Family Dance Coordinator and team members Art Cards helper (we have a coordinator but need another person to help) Shrove Tuesday Fun Fest Lunch Coordinator Without people like you to help with these positions we will have to eliminate some of the events and programs SAC currently provides. You are more than welcome to bring a friend that you d like to work with and work on an event together or come coordinate a new event that you think we have been missing!! This is Your school, Your Council, Your Society!! If you re interested and would like more information, please contact Barb Kreller at flgsac@gmail.com. As we have mentioned in a few newsletters, we are in the process of updating our Society information such as our name and bylaws. Our name will be changed at the end of this school year to Father Leo Green School Fundraising Society. We will be briefly discussing the bylaws at the next meeting on April 30th before we vote them in at the AGM June 11th. Please join us on Monday as we work towards the end of the year. Please Join us for the Annual General Meeting taking place in the Library of the School on June 11th at 6:30 PM. SUPERINTENDENT ITEMS AND NEWS FROM THE DISTRICT

8 May 2018 Hail, holy Queen, mother of mercy, our life, our sweetness, and our hope. ~ The Hail Holy Queen In the month of May, when our thoughts turn towards paying special honor to our mothers and the women in our lives who fill that maternal role, we also turn our hearts toward our Mother, Mary. She is our model of saying yes to the call of our God, and she is also our model of grace, compassion, love, and tenderness. As we pray the rosary, we pray with hope to our holy Mother to intercede on our behalf so that we may feel God s abundant mercy. The week of May 6-11 is Catholic Education Week and May 10 is World Catholic Education Day. It is a time when we will ask our staff and our students to focus on the gifts that are to be found in an education that is grounded in our Catholic faith. Our work will be centred on empowering our community to articulate the many valuable aspects of attending Catholic schools. This, in turn, will also enable people to advocate for the need for ongoing and meaningful support of Catholic education in our province. It is important that we all speak up for Catholic education with a strong voice! Edmonton Catholic Schools has many partners who help us provide exceptional learning opportunities and supports for our students. One of our excellent partners is the City of Edmonton. They provide support for many of our programs and events. One such example is our upcoming 37 th Annual Ben Calf Robe Traditional Pow Wow. This amazing experience of Indigenous culture will take place from 1-10 pm on May 12 at the Commonwealth Community Recreation Centre. Admission is free, and it is a great family event! To learn more about Our Partnerships, visit our public website at and look under About Us. Our District Budget, will be presented at the May 29 Public Meeting of the Board. Thank you to all our stakeholders who took the time to complete our Budget Survey. Your voice was so important in helping us to set our priorities for this budget. I leave you with words of thanks from Pope Francis to all the women who fill the role of Mother in our world: Mothers are the strongest antidote to the spread of self-centred individualism It is they who testify to the beauty of life. Certainly, a society without mothers would be dehumanized, for mothers are always, even in the worst of times, witnesses to tenderness, dedication and moral strength. Mothers often communicate the deepest meaning of religious practice in the first prayers and acts of devotion that their children learn Without mothers, not only would there be no new faithful, but the faith itself would lose a good part of its simple and profound warmth Dear mothers: thank you! Thank you for what you are in your family and for what you give to the Church and the world. (Pope Francis, Amoris Laetitia, 174) Have a wonderful month of May! Sincerely, Joan Carr Superintendent Edmonton Catholic School District

9 Parent Newsletters May 2018 Mothers and Myrrh-bearing Women Soon after Jesus resurrection, the word of God continued to spread and the number of faithful greatly increased so much so that the twelve disciples had difficulty in continuing to care for the widows and the daily distribution of food. To help in these important tasks, the disciples chose seven men from among their midst, including Stephen, who would become the first-martyr for the faith (see Acts 6:1-7). Yet, men were not the only ones who followed Jesus and supported his ministry, both in his life, and at his death. So, as we celebrate Mother s Day, let us recall the myrrh-bearing women, who ran to the tomb on that first Easter morning. The myrrh-bearing women are the eyewitnesses of Jesus death and the place of his burial. They are also the witnesses of his resurrection. And they are the ones who receive the glorious news from the angel, who tells them, Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you. As we read in Father Thomas Rosica s book, Stay with Us, Encounters with the Risen Lord: These women represented countless nameless yet devoted women who were part of the crowds Jesus addressed and in the homes he frequented. They were the courageous ones who reached out fearlessly to touch the fringe of his cloak. They shouted after him; they entered his hosts houses uninvited; they poured expensive perfumed nard over his feet. They knew the promise made to them, they welcomed him, they knew from Jesus own treatment of them the strength of their own testimony to him, and they were unafraid to show him great love. In the end, they stood beneath his dying body, while the men were hiding for fear of the authorities. It was the women who grounds spices for his burial and calculated how to roll back the stone from his tomb. They attended firmly to the business of his living and dying.

10 [And] they were rewarded for their fidelity by being the first recipients of the Good News of the Resurrection (pp ). My late mother, Olga God bless her soul, was also a myrrh-bearing woman in her own right. As I ve shared before, she taught me as a young boy about God, about love, and the importance of family and friends. She taught me about caring for neighbours. She taught me my daily prayers the Our Father, the Hail Mary, how to make the sign of the Cross, and the Ten Commandments in Ukrainian I might add, and even before I ever attended summer Catechism with the Sisters Servants of Mary Immaculate at the age of 5 (mom didn't want the Sisters to think that she neglected her duty as a mother in passing down the faith to her children!). Like my mother, your mother, all mothers are myrrh-bearing women. They received the Good News of the Resurrection of Our Lord that very first Easter morning. They received the great command to go tell others of the joy of the Gospel message, of God s love and mercy in the world. This Mother s Day, let us offer a word of prayer and thanksgiving to God for all moms who have showed us love and raised us to be who we are today, truly children of God. Happy Mother s Day to all moms! And to my mom, may God grant you eternal rest! I love you! Bishop David

11 Mother s Day Honoring Our Mothers The practice of celebrating Mother s Day comes from Civil War times. Mrs. Ann Reeves Jarvis wanted to organize a special day for mothers who had sons fighting on opposing sides in the Civil War. Ann Jarvis was a peace activist who cared for wounded soldiers on both sides of the American Civil War, and created Mother's Day Work Clubs to address public health issues. Jarvis s daughter, Anna, wanted to honor her mother by continuing the work she started and, in 1907, began a movement to make Mother s Day a national event. Anna wanted to set aside a day to honor all mothers because she believed a mother is the person who has done more for you than anyone in the world. Finally, in 1914, President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed the second Sunday of May as Mother s Day. Mothers teach love. And they teach it by doing loving things for their children and for other people. Mothers, like Jesus, become the measurement of how we are to love. Jesus said, I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. (John 13:34) So every mother silently says the same. Watch me and you will learn how to love. Let me move you from self-centeredness to sharing and concern for others. Watch me and I will show you how to do it. This way, every mother furthers the good news of Christ. Out of French Revolution came the story of a mother who had wandered through the woods for three days with her two children, trying to survive on roots and leaves. On the third day, she heard some soldiers approaching and quickly hid herself and the children behind some bushes. The sergeant in charge prodded the bushes to see what was stirring behind them. When he saw the starving woman and children he immediately gave them a loaf of bread. The mother took it eagerly, broke it into two pieces, and gave one piece to each of the children. She has kept none for herself, the sergeant said. Because she is not hungry? a soldier asked. Because she is a mother, the sergeant replied. Love is taught by loving actions. Our first experience of love in this life comes from our mothers. We recognize that instinctively. We need to acknowledge also that the love of God is taught by lots of moms and dads even the ones that are childless or single. And so Mother s Day and Father s Day really celebrate all those people who have mothered and fathered us, and taught us how to love. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. (John 13:34) This is the perfect verse and message for Mother s Day. Why? Because love is what mothers do best. Happy Mother s Day! Fr. Julian Bilyj District Chaplain Resources: A World of Stories for Preachers and Teachers by Fr. William J. Bausch. Twenty-Third Publications, Mystic, CT, 2004.