February Newsletter

FEBRUARY NEWSLETTER 2016

Dear Parents,

I hope you all enjoyed the unusual “heat wave” that we experienced last month. The weather has taken us on another roller coaster ride.

Thank you to all children and parents for contributing to our “Children from around the World” unit last month! The highlight was our “International Snack Day” and it felt like going to a multicultural restaurant. Thank you for bringing all the different food samples from around the world. We had so many interesting Show and Tells and we traveled around the globe with toy cars, airplanes and ships. It truly helped the children to develop a basic understanding of how we have to use different forms of transportation to get to other places.

Our students had a blast, celebrating “Fasching” and scaring away winter. It used to be my favourite holiday when I was a child. When else do you get to dress up, dance on the sidewalks and catch candies that people from the floats toss in the crowd? J

FEBRUARY THEME

This week, we have celebrated love and friendship. You might have seen the various Valentine activities on our center table. We also read books about how important it is to “fill our buckets” by being gentle and kind to each other. February is a fairly short month, as the break starts next week.

TRANSPORTATION

As we had already touched the topic of “Going to Places” last month we will take a closer look at different ways of transportation. Part of this unit will be sorting, categorizing vehicles, flying paper airplanes and exploring “sink and float”. Pretty soon your child will teach you how to say car, boat, train and airplane in German.

If you know someone who drives a truck, flies an airplane or is a captain, pirate (may be not) etc., please let us know!!! We had a student’s dad visiting us this Wednesday. Thank you to Don Atchison, who is a pilot and dad of one of our students. He told our MWF a.m. class about his profession and how airplanes work.

We always encourage and welcome parents, family members and friends to join us and share their stories and knowledge with our children!

DATES to REMEMBER

Monday, February 15   Family Day, Holiday, no school

February 16-19           February Break, no school

March 4                    PD Day, no school

March 25                   Good Friday Holiday

March 28 – April 3     Inclusive Spring Vacation

Openings for the 2016-17 School Year

Our classes for the Fall are starting to fill up. Many of our current families have already pre-registered their child or younger siblings.  If you haven’t done so yet or   know people who have children that are eligible for preschool, please contact us at 306-281-4428 or coordinator.Hanselandgretel@gmail.com.

Have a wonderful February Break! For those of you heading off to destinations, please drive or fly safely and enjoy your holidays.  For those of you staying here, let’s keep our fingers crossed for continued great weather! J

Kind Regards,

Uli Hecker, Ruth Skinner

Susanne Pachal, Samina Roohi

Available spots!

Celebrating Fasching!

Dear Parents,

We will have two "special event" days this week!

On Monday, we will wrap up our “Children from around the world” unit with  our international snack day!

On Wednesday this week,  we will be celebrating FASCHING!

Parents and care givers are invited to join us for the last 20 minutes of class time on both days!

FASCHING Party: February 3^rd

We will be celebrating Fasching this month. Fasching is a traditional German holiday season, often associated with festivals of the Christian church (letting loose before Lent and fasting begins). However, it goes back to pagan times, and was a way of driving out the spirits of winter and encouraging the coming of spring and good crops. In Germany, at this time of the year, many people in different areas of the country dress up in costumes and join floats Fasching/Karneval parades that are happening all over the country.

The most exciting part is the candy toss throughout the parade. In many cities of Germany you  will see hundreds of people on the sidewalks, shouting “Helau” or “Alarf” and trying to catch Fasching candies.

There will be a poster hanging in the hallway of our preschool, with more information on Fasching.

Faschings Party:

We will have a Fasching Party in our classroom. Children are invited to wear a costume that day. Parents are welcome to join us for the last 20 minutes and be part of the candy toss parade. 

I will order traditional German “Krapfen” (doughnuts) for our Fasching Party and children will not need a snack that day!

Please remember that there is no class this Friday!

Have a great week!

Uli Hecker

Just a reminder!

“CHILDREN FROM AROUND THE WORLD”

Dear Parents,

Our January Theme will be “Children from around the world”. We would like to take our children on a multicultural journey, exploring some of the fascinating and exciting cultures and places around the world and within Canada.

Show & Tell

Show & tell will look a little different this month:

We want every child to have an opportunity to share something from/about another culture in the world.

In order to squeeze every child into our schedule, we will double-up our show & tell calendar. One student will have his/her show and tell in the morning and the other student at the end of class.

Kids can bring:

·         An item from family travels (maybe relatives have given them a souvenir)

·         Some thing from your own or a different cultural heritage

·         a picture from a book, or something you found on the internet, or at 10.000 Villages (store)

·         wear a cultural outfit, if you have one ( or just a hat, dress, shirt etc.)

·         bring music, dance etc.

I have a special globe that plays a variety of national anthems of different countries!

Help needed

Parents, please help your child to be able to tell their friends a bit about their show & tell (keep it very simple and age appropriate). You could even write a little note and we can help them with their little “presentation”. J

We also welcome and invite you as a parent, relative or friend if you would like to come in and help your child introduce a certain country or culture to our students.

International Snack: Monday, February 1/Tuesday February 2^nd

Students are invited to share a food item, small (bite size) portions. That way our children can sample many foods without much wastage. Due to allergies/food restrictions, please be sure all food items are nut/pork free.

Please sign up on the food item list hanging in the hallway.

We are looking forward to a colourful unit about “Children from all around the World”!

Thank you for your support!

Open House 2016

December Newsletter

December 2015 Newsletter

Dear Parents,

We are approaching the end of the year, and I cannot believe how quickly time flies. Have you realized how much all of our children have grown over the last few months? As much as we enjoy watching them grow I have moments when I wish they could just stay little forever.

Parent teacher Interviews

Thank you to all the parents who were able to come to our Parent Teacher Interviews. It was great to connect and celebrate all the wonderful things your child contributes to our class. Meeting with our parents has truly helped us to feel a stronger bond with our families. Please continue to contact us at any time if there is anything that needs to be addressed, suggested or discussed.

Our children had a blast at our hibernation day! Did you hear our little bears snoring in their caves? How can you explore “hibernation” with all your senses? You cover a gummy frog with pudding, blue jello and whipped cream. Then you take a spoon and eat the mud, the frog, the pond water and feel the snow melt in your mouth.

DECEMBER THEMES

December will be a relatively short month, and we will focus on activities that will evolve around winter and the Holiday Season. The visit of St. Nikolaus/ Nicolas will be one of the highlights of our theme for season. I am certain the children will remember him and the German tradition of filling children’s boots with fruit and chocolate. Speaking of cultural traditions, we always encourage families to share their own individual cultural traditions with us. Please feel to contact me if your family is celebrating a special holiday, that you would like to share with us. J

ST. NIKOLAUS (historical background)

Some of you might not be aware that the so well loved Santa Claus in North America was actually derived from St. Nikolaus of Myra.

(In order to avoid confusion between the two characters we have decided to not tell our little ones about the historical background of St. Nikolaus. We are just introducing the cultural tradition of filling the boots as celebrated in Germany.)

The legend goes back to the third century and took place in Myra, a small village in Turkey. A young man, named Nikolaus, who grew up in a wealthy family was famous for helping poor families and especially children. He was also concerned for the safety of sailors and ships. He became a bishop later in his life, and after his death was named a saint. Nikolaus died on December 6^th in AD 343. People in Germany (and other countries in the world) celebrate St. Nikolaus on the night of Dec 5^th/6^th. Every year, children put their boots on the front step, hoping that St. Nikolaus will come that night and fill them with fruit and treats.

We are looking forward to celebrating this cultural event with our children and families on Dec 3^rd and Dec 4^th. Please join us for traditional German “Christmas Punch”, cookies and a childrens’ performance for Nikolaus!!

Brevoort Park Winter/Christmas Concert: Thursday Dec 10^th @ 7.oo p.m.  

Drop off time: 6:30 p.m.

The concert STARTS at 7:00 p.m. We ask parents to bring their child to our classroom at 6:30 p.m. This will allow us to get them ready for the stage. There will be many families attending the concert and our little ones will be performing first, so please be on time!

Pick up

We will take the children back to the classroom after our 5 minute performance.

• If you are planning to leave after your child’s performance, please stand by the wall instead of taking seats, out of courtesy for the other audience. 
• Children can stay and play in our classroom until the end of the concert. 
• If your child has not seen the show at the rehearsal and you want him/her to watch the rest of the concert, please let us know and we will find a way to “sneak them back in”.

Dress Rehearsal: Thursday, Dec 10^th @ 9:30 a.m.

An optional dress rehearsal for the Brevoort Christmas Concert is on Thursday, Dec 10 at 9:30 a.m.

·      All T-Th students will be participating in the rehearsal as it will be during their regular class time.

·      MWF parents may bring their child (only) for the rehearsal. This is also a great opportunity for students to see the whole show. At the evening concert, children will be in the large gym (on the stage) only for their performance part and then go back to their classroom.

·         Parents are welcome to stay and watch the rehearsal.

·         If you have a M/W/F student and want him/her to participate for the rehearsal in the morning, please let us know by December 4th!

·      There is no specific dress code for our preschoolers. The rehearsal and the concert however, are a wonderful opportunity to dress up!!

REGISTRATION and OPEN HOUSE for 2016/17 School Year:

January 25^th 2016 @ 6:30 p.m. –  8:00 p.m.

Hansel & Gretel Preschool will hold its Open House on Monday, January 25^th 2016. This will also be the day when Registration for the fall will start. Last year, some of our classes filled up on the day of our Open House. We ask all current families, that want to enrol their child (or sibling), to pre-register with us, so we can  save you a spot in our 2016-17 M-W-F class.

PRE-REGISTRATION

Pre-registration for the 2016/17 School Year will begin on January 5th! As of January 25^th registration will be open to the general public and we will take registrations on a first come first served basis.

DATES to REMEMBER:

Thursday/Friday, Dec 3/4:      Scholastic Book Orders are due

                                                Picture orders due

Thursday, Dec 3^rd:                  St. Nikolaus Celebration  10:40 -11:40 a.m.

Friday, Dec 4^th:                       St. Nikolaus Celebration  10:40 - 11:40 a.m.

                                               St. Nikolaus Celebration   2:15 - 3:15 p.m.

Thursday, Dec 10^th          9:30 a.m. Dress Rehearsal 9:30 a.m. (MWF students optional)

Thursday, Dec 10^th         Christmas Concert @ 7:00 p.m. (drop off 6:30p.m.)

Friday, Dec 18^th              Last day of school before Christmas Break

Monday, January 4^th       Classes resume

Monday January 25^th 2016/17 School Year Registration and Open House for new     families 6:30 – 8:00 p.m.

German Songs and Rhymes

We have learned a number of English and German songs and rhymes in the past couple months. Many of the German songs that we learn have the tune of an English nursery rhyme/song. Most of these songs are made up by us teachers,  trying  to come up with theme related lyrics that match up the familiar tune of nursery songs.

It was very rewarding to hear that many of our students sing German songs at home. Way to go!!  Here is one song that we will sing this month:

WINTER IST HIER  (tune “Frere Jacques”)

Winter ist hier! Winter ist hier!            (winter is here)

Schau dich um! Schau dich um!              (look around)

Schneeflocken fallen                             (snowflakes are falling)

Schneebaelle fliegen                             (snowballs are flying)

Eins – Zwei – Drei                                  (one-two-three)

Here are some winter words that you might want to use at home as well:

Jacke – yak’uh (jacket), Muetze-Mutzah (touque), Schal-shaal (scarf), Handschuh-hand’shoe/heh (mitten/s), Schuhe-shoe/’heh (shoe/s)

Check your indoor shoes

We noticed that some of our student’s indoor shoes are getting too small. Please check periodically if their shoes still fit their growing feet.

Frau Hecker will be gone from December 15 -23. Her last day of teaching will be Monday, Dec 14.

Frau Skinner will be filling in for Frau Hecker. The last day of school will be Friday, Dec 18^th.

If you need to contact Frau Skinner during that week, please call (306) 292-6335 or email prskinner@sasktel.net

We wish you all a happy holiday season filled with family and friends. Enjoy your kids as they grow up so fast!!!!

Merry Christmas!                        Frohe Weihnachten!

Happy New Year                          Gutes Neues Jahr!

Uli Hecker, Ruth Skinner

Susanne Pachal, Samina Roohi