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Members with Portfolio
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Class Rep Coordinators
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COUNCIL WEBSITE
| | Check out our Council website for up to date info on school events, news, calendars, fundraising, forms, parent resources and much much more! www.castorvalley.ca |
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PROGRESS REPORTS
| Student Progress Reports will be going out on Thursday, November 10th.
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PHOTO RETAKES
| Retake day is Monday, October 24th.
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CLASS REPS
| Thanks to everyone who volunteered to be a class rep this year! A complete list of class reps and their emails can be found on our Council website here.
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NUT FREE SCHOOL!
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Due to the large number of students that have nut allergies, Castor Valley continues to be a nut free school. We ask families not to include nut items in snacks - this is for the safety of our anaphylactic children. Should you be unsure as to the contents of a food item, please do not send it. If you'd like more information on the government of Ontario's anaphylaxis policy, please click here.
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NEW NUTRITIONAL GUIDELINES
| The Ontario Ministry of Education's new School Food and Beverage Policy came into effect on September 1st, 2011. For information on this new policy, please visit www.ontario.ca/healthyschools and for a great resource for nutritious lunches and snacks, visit www.eatrightontario.ca.
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POP TABS
| We are collecting pop tabs again this year. The tabs are recycled for cash and the proceeds sent to Ontario March of Dimes to provide a wheel chair for someone in need. Please send your tabs in with your child. There is a collection can in each homeroom class.
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Welcome to Fall!
The CVES Council newsletter is sent out mid-month from September to June. If you have any items you would like to have included in our next newsletter, please send them by November 13th to castorvalleycouncil@gmail.com. THANKS! |
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PLAY STRUCTURE UPDATE
| Both play structures are now open for play!
Finally, on September 28th, after several on-site meetings, phone calls, emails, measurements and additional work, the Board gave the go-ahead and the junior/intermediate play structure was opened for use. A huge thank you to the dedication of Natasha Robb-Burrows, Heather Wilson, Marg Clunie, Mr. Jeff and our Principal, Sherri Bonneville, for seeing this project through to completion, and an extra HUGE thank you to Doug Clunie of D&G Landscaping for his tremendous support throughout the project, including the donation of equipment and labour required for the site preparation.
By all reports, the students are loving their new structures, and we hope to mark this milestone with a celebration in the near future! |
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TERRY FOX NATIONAL SCHOOL RUN DAY
|  The school participated in the Terry Fox National School Run Day on September 28th by running a circuit on school grounds.
By bringing in a *Toonie for Terry*, our students raised $903.57! All money was donated to the Terry Fox Foundation to help find a cure for cancer. |
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ENTERTAINMENT BOOK FUNDRAISER
| Thanks to everyone who bought an Entertainment Book! We brought this fundraiser back because it was so popular last year, and we're happy to report we sold 350 books and raised over $5000 this year!
Our top selling class was Mme Rolland's grade 2 class who sold 42 books! Not surprising that our top student seller comes from this class - Josh L's family bought 37 books to give as Christmas presents to employees of his grandparents' business!
A special mention also to Emily C from Mme Labelle's class who sold 21 books for her family to give to business clients!
A BIG thanks to our fundraising coordinator, Marg Clunie, who put many many hours into making this fundraiser a success, and to all the other volunteers who help stuff and process books.
In our June survey, we'll be asking you whether you'd like to see this fundraiser again this year - we have a few ideas for making it more efficient, but we'd love your feedback!
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FALL & ONGOING FUNDRAISERS
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- We are continuing our tradition of selling MacMillan's Gourmet Frozen Food. Forms were already sent home, and are due back on November 7th. Pick up will be November 24th and extra forms can be found in the school office.
- The popular Samko & Miko Toy Sale is coming up on November 4th-11th at Landsdowne Park featuring thousands of discounted brand name toys and books! We will send more details on how this fundraiser works in the upcoming weeks - in the meantime you can check out their website!
- You can now order discounted Ottawa Senators tickets on our Council website! Click here for more information.
- We continue to offer on-line discounts through our website on QSP magazines. A brochure was sent home attached to the MacMillan's form, but it didn't include our school code. When you order your QSP magazines, please make sure you use our code: 10727.
- You can also order your Mabel's Labels through school council. By clicking on the Mabel's Labels widget on our website, we automatically receive a portion of your purchase.
Next up will be the ever popular Christmas Shopping Day!
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VOLUNTEER SURVEY
| As you know, School Council depends on parent volunteers (YOU!) to help make our events, initiatives and fundraisers successful. We sent out a survey last week to help identify who would like to help out (in any way). If you didn't see the email (or forgot!), you can fill it out here. It will take LESS THAN 2 MINUTES - really!!!
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LIBRARY UPDATE!
| Our library is now re-stocked and open for borrowing! With the assistance of the many wonderful parent volunteers who put in 200+ volunteer hours(!) in June (packing) as well as September-October (inventorying, purging and reshelving of approximately 13,000 items), the last books were placed on the shelves on October 4th.
As a result of the purging that was carried out (approx. 2300 books removed from collection), there is now space on the shelves for the approximately 1000 new books (new to CVES), awaiting processing. For those who may be concerned regarding volume of books removed from collection, books were purged based upon following criteria: - have not circulated in 6-10+ years, or; - material was extremely outdated (facts, graphics, format), or; - book was damaged or in very poor condition (falling apart, moldy, etc.), or; - there were more than 2 copies (English), or 3 copies (French), or; - Material was inappropriate for K - 8 students. Check out the new look the next time you visit the school! |
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LUNCH MONITORS NEEDED
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CVES has been funded by the Board to have adult lunch monitors in our classrooms and on the yard for 3 hours a day. This works out to two adult lunch monitors per nutrition and recess break every day of the week. We are currently looking for 2 lunch monitors for each nutrition and recess break on Mondays and Thursdays and 1 additional lunch monitor for each of the nutrition and recess breaks on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays. These are paid positions that require an hour and a half commitment daily, and the school would really love to fill them!
If you are interested or would like more information, please contact Laurie in the Main Office (821-1272). She will be able to provide you with the documentation required by the board. Once an application is submitted to the board with the requisite documentation, each new lunch monitor will be given an Employee Identification Number (EIN), after which their service as a lunch monitor in the school can begin.
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PARENT SUPPORTED LITERACY PROGRAM VOLUNTEERS NEEDED
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Our Parent Supported Literacy Program will be starting in a few weeks. We are looking for volunteers who are available to come into the school during class time to read one-on-one or in small groups with students in grades 1-3 who could benefit from the extra practice. A short training session will be provided. If you are interested, please contact Heather Wyche or call 613-821-4518, and specify your availability (mornings or afternoons, which days of the week), and whether you are able to help with the English reading program or the French reading program.
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A SPECIAL *PARENTS REACHING OUT* PRESENTATION!
| Using our Parents Reaching Out (PRO) Grant, this year our Castor Connections series will be focusing on *Safe Schools*. Our first presentation will be on November 28th, when the School and School Council will jointly host Paul Davis, an Internet safety expert. He will hold 2 presentations for students - one for grades 4/5 and one for grades 6/7/8 during the day, and then will be speaking with parents that evening.
Mr. Davis' talk is entitled: Social Networking Safety 101 for Parents, and has the defining message of *the overall safety of your child online - and the impact on their future on your family and your household*, and includes the topic of cyber bullying.
Our hope is to present more information sessions on a variety of topics, including bullying, throughout the year - stay tuned for more info!
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HEALTH NOTICES!
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Ontario is expanding its free vaccine program and is now offering a second dose of chickenpox vaccine for children 1-11 years of age. More information on this program can be found here (website) and here (brochure).
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In case you missed it, our Principal circulated an Ottawa Public Health Memo on Mumps to CVES parents via Council school-wide email a few weeks ago. For more information on Mumps, click here, and if you have questions or concerns, please phone the Ottawa Public Health Information Line as noted at the bottom of the memo.
To date, no one at Castor Valley has exhibited symptoms, nor has a case of mumps been confirmed at our school.
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CVES EQAO RESULTS AND OUR SCHOOL'S IMPROVEMENT PLAN
| Interested to see how our school rates against other schools in the board and the province? Check out our EQAO (Education Quality & Accountability Office) results from last spring. Our grade 3 and grade 6 students were assessed in Reading, Writing and Math and did very well! Click here to see the first 3 pages of the report - they give you a quick comparison. If you'd like to read the full 37-page report, click here.
Click here to see more info on our school's results and for past year's reports.
You can go to their website: www.eqao.com to learn more about what they're all about!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * This year, as part of CVES' School Improvement Plan, the school is focusing on Math:
Grades 1-3: Number Sense and Numeration (composing and decomposing numbers - understanding of this concepts helps in the acquisition and understanding of basic math facts).
Grades 4-6: NS and N (solving problems using multiplication of whole numbers - application of this concept to effectively solve a problem). We are not asking them to extract the info or choose the most appropriate tool; this is being given to them.
Grades 7&8: NS and N ( use whole numbers and a variety of tools and strategies to effectively solve multi-step problems (being asked to extract info, choose appropriate strategy and apply this to effectively solve the problem).
For more information on the SIP, please contact the school office.
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GRADE 7 & 8 AMBASSADEURS
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It's that time of the year again! The grade 7 & 8 Ambassadeurs are collecting clean and warm snowsuits in support of The Snowsuit Fund. We ask that you drop off gently used snowsuits, sizes ranging from infant to adult, in the school foyer by Friday, November 18th. Please also send in any hats, mitts, gloves, scarves and boots. For more information, please visit www.snowsuitfund.com.
Please note: before donating anything, ask yourself, would you wear it?
Merci,
Les Ambassadeurs
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IMPORTANT PARENT RESOURCES
| As a school council, we are regularly updated on information, events and initiatives put forth by various education-related associations, as well as by our school board. We think it's important that these resources are shared with you! So for the next few newsletters, we will highlight one of these associations, explain what they do and how they support parents. All the information shared here will also be available on our website under the *resources* tab.
This month, we are highlighting Canadian Parents for French (CPF):
Canadian Parents for French (Ontario) is a non-profit charitable organization and is the provincial Branch of the national organization, Canadian Parents for French. The have numerous local Chapters across the province that carry out activities that support French as a second language (FSL) learning, both inside and outside of the classroom. CPF is an amazing resource for parents to help their child learn French, tips to help with French homework, as well as links to french programs, camps and online resources. Check out their FAQs and their newsletter! Visit their website: www.cpfont.on.ca CVESC is already a member, so if you need any information or are interested in some of their resources, please just email council! * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Other organizations we like and will highlight in the future are: Ottawa Carleton Assembly of School Councils Ottawa Carleton District School Board OCDSB - Parental Involvement Committee People for Education (PFE) If you know of an organization that has helped you support your child's learning, please let us know! |
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HAVE ANY UNUSED SLEDS SITTING IN YOUR GARAGE?!
| | On our Kindergarten teachers' wishlist this year are winter sleds for the Kindergarten yard. If you're cleaning out your garage this fall, why not consider donating any sleds collecting dust - sleds with a rope that kids can pull other kids on! You can drop any donations in the school foyer. THANKS! |
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We hope you found this newsletter helpful and relevant :)
Sincerely, Communication Coordinators
Castor Valley Elementary School Council |
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