Start of the School year!

Dear Parents,

Here we are, at the start of a new school year! We finally have met all of our students and their families.

It was so nice to see the many smiles on our children’s faces on their first day of preschool.

We are looking forward to a fantastic and exciting year with our pre-schoolers!

September will be a busy month for all of us. In order to help with a smooth transition into the year, I would like to provide you with some important information and dates.

If you have not done so, please read the 2017-18 Parent Handbook that each of you should have received at the sneak peek day in May. It contains important information about school policies, curriculum etc.

Here is a list of things that we will help you to keep on track.

CLASS TIME  9:00 a.m. – 11:45 a.m.

ARRIVAL

Brevoort Park School opens the doors for their students at 8:50 a.m. and it can get a bit busy in the hallways around that time.

Our classroom door opens at 9 a.m. (If you are still in the hallway and hear the Canadian National Anthem “Oh Canada”, Brevoort Park School asks all parents, students and staff members to stand still until the anthem is finished). We thank you in advance for your co-operation in regards to this daily routine.

ABSENCE

We keep daily track of attendance. If your child will be absent, please let us know by emailing or texting (306-2814-428).

SCHOOL DOORS

ALL back and side doors of Brevoort Park School will be locked after 9 a.m. and remain locked during the day.  If you are arriving after 9 a.m. you will have to enter the school through the main door at the front.

However, you are still able to EXIT through the boot room doors throughout the day!!

REMOVAL OF WET FOOTWEAR

When entering the school, we would like to remind all parents, care givers to remove their (and their child’s) wet/muddy footwear.

BATHROOM

As we start this new year, I strongly encourage you to take your child to the bathroom prior to when class starts. The need “to go” seems to be as contagious for pre-schoolers as yawns are, for most people. Once one of their friends has to go, it always unleashes a tide of others. J Thank you for your anticipated co-operation.

OUTSIDE PLAY AND WEATHER APPROPRIATE CLOTHES

Please remember that we will take our students outside on nice days until it gets cold or muddy. Please dress them in weather appropriate clothes and shoes that they can run with safely.

Most of our students know how to take off their shoes and how to put them on with no or little help. We encourage, teach and foster independence and cheer for every step along the way. It’s very empowering for children to realize how much they can do by themselves!

DISMISSAL

Dismissal time will be 11:45. Parents (or whoever will pick up your child) are invited to join us for the last 5 minutes of class time. We will open the door at 11:40 a.m. and invite you to hear about our day.

Children will get dismissed only with the designated person that is on your registration file. If someone else is picking up your child, please let us know.

Depending if we are outside or inside dismissal will be in the classroom or the boot room.

Don’t forget to check your mailbox and take your lunch kit before leave.

Thank you in advance for being prompt on your pick up, and drop off times. It means so much to us, but especially to your children!

SCHOLASTIC BOOK ORDERS

Please find more information on the September order form that you have in your mailbox.

October book orders might have to go out before the September books have arrived to ensure that next month fall themed books will arrive on time.

BIRTHDAYS

If you would like to, you may bring a small treat (cookie, sticker etc.) to share at school when it’s your child’s birthday. If you want to share baby pictures of your child to document their growth, please share them with our class. Our class will also learn how to sing “Happy Birthday” in German. Please remember Brevoort Park School is nut-free and we ask you to not bring anything that contains nuts.

VOLUNTEERING

What would the world do without volunteers?  There will be occasions that we have to rely on helping hands from parents, grand parents etc. We will have a sign up sheet in the hallway for certain activities that we will need help with.

Especially when we go on field trips with  (12-16) pre-schoolers, every extra hand will help us to keep our ducklings in a row. J

NEWSLETTERS

I will email a monthly newsletter to give you an overview of the month’s theme and activities.

Each month I will send home a calendar with your child. It will remind you of special events, school closures and your child’s day to share. The newsletter will also be posted here on the blog.

(If anyone needs a paper copy of the monthly newsletter, please let me know)

Happy Beginnings!

Uli Hecker & Larissa Lorenz

Story time on September 9th

May Newsletter

MAY NEWSLETTER 2017

SPRING IS HERE!

Finally we are all able to see, smell, touch and listen to the sounds of spring again! Looking at the current temperatures we might move straight to summer. Our school year is coming to an end soon and it is hard to believe how much all of our children have grown! Many of our little ones are going into Kindergarten and start a new adventure in their life this fall. We are happy to keep at least some of our precious children for another year of “FUN and LEARNING”.

Sun Protection

From now on we will spend as much time outside as possible and even take our snack outside to have a picnic under a tree (the kids just love it).

We ask parents to please apply sunscreen on your child before they come to class. (We have extra sun screen at school in case that you forgot). If your child has a sun hat/sunglasses etc., please remind them to take it out of their back pack before we play outside.

Our children like to run down the hill and climb the low branches of trees.  Therefore, we ask your child to not wear flip flops and only wear outside shoes that allow him/her to run safely.

MAY THEME

LIFE CYCLE OF A CHICKEN

We had been blessed enough to be invited to another annual spring event. The grade 1 teacher at Brevoort Park School had an incubator with 15 chicken eggs in her classroom. We stopped by every day last week to watch the miracle of a chick, hatching from an egg. The highlight was when each of our students had the opportunity to pet one of the newly born chicks!

LIFE CYCLE OF A BUTTERFLY

Our caterpillar larvae arrived last week and we now get to watch another wonder of nature! We will study and observe the life cycle of a butterfly, happening right in front of our eyes. Feel free to come into our classroom to take a look at our butterfly cage to see the different stages.  The life cycle process usually takes about 3 weeks and at the end of the month we will have a picnic in the park and say “Auf Wiedersehen” to our butterflies.

Brevoort Park School safety drills

Our preschool participates in all school safety drills, along with all of Brevoort Park School students. There will be a fire and evacuation drill this Monday morning at 10.15 a.m.  Once all classes of the school have gathered outside after the fire drill, the school will walk to St. Mathew School (across the park) and go to the gym there. The drill is expected to take 30 minutes. There will be appropriate signage on the doors indicating where we are in case you are picking up your child earlier that day.

      You can find more information on safety drills at  www.saskatoonpublicschools.ca.

The principal of Brevoort Park School, Gwyn Fournier will send out a note after each safety drill and inform teachers and parents on how the drill went. I will forward this information to you. So far, all drills that the school and our preschoolers have had were mastered very well and we are very proud of our little ones.

Treasure and Bake Sale, Friday May 12 (Brevoort Park GCC Garage Sale Saturday, May 13)

I had sent home a previous note about these special Brevoort Park fundraiser events.

Part of the proceeds from these events will go the Entwistle family. Brooklyn is a student at Brevoort Park School and one of our former care partners. Last summer, Brooklyn was diagnosed with Osteosarcoma (bone cancer) at the age of 10. Brooklyn has had 3 surgeries including a recent rotationplasty, a partial amputation of her leg.

Proceeds of the treasure and bake sale will go to Brooklyn and her family to help pay bills, buy food and cover medical and other expenses while Brooklyn is healing and continuing her journey of therapies and rehabilitation.

The school is still taking items for the treasure sale (gently used items like toys, ornaments, giftware, board games, toys, sports equipment, jewelry, craft kids, picture frames ect). Please bring any sales donations to the front office this week.

We will be getting together with our grade 4 care partners this Friday.  They have offered to take our students to the treasure sale in the large gym, in case our children want to buy some toys etc. Our teachers will join them and guide them through the sales tables. If you would like to bring some money   (prices will start at 25 cents) for the treasure sale on Friday, please put the money in a labeled zip loc bag or envelope for your child. The treasure and bake sale will take place throughout the day. Feel free to donate or buy your own treasures and baking when you come for pick up or drop off on Friday.

     DATES and REMINDERS

MAY

Monday 8/Tuesday 9   Scholastic Book orders are due

Friday 12                     Care Partner activities

                                    Brevoort Park School Treasure and Bake Sale

Saturday 13                 Brevoort Park GCC garage sale

Tuesday, May 16         Brevoort Park Kindergarten Sneak Peek Afternoon (1-3pm)

Wednesday, May 17 MWF classes:  COMBINED Fieldtrip to Mother Earth Greenhouse           

·       The bus will be leaving at 9:15 am and both classes will be back at 1:00 p.m.

·       Please bring your own lunch and a water bottle for the picnic at 12:00-12:30 p.m.

·        NO afternoon class on this day!!! (Please let us know if you/we need to make special arrangements for your child after dismissal).

      Thank you to all the parents that have offered to volunteer that day!!!

Friday, May 19               No School 

Monday, May 22            Victoria Day, No School

JUNE

Friday 9                     No School

Thursday 15             Last Day for Tue-Thu class: Year End Celebration with families

Friday 16                  Last Day for MWF classes: Year End Celebration with families

Please check your May event calendar for the specific time!  We will have a short children’s performance, year slide show and a snack buffet outside at the end of the day.    

(Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook!)

Enjoy the beautiful spring!

Kind Regards,

Uli Hecker, Larissa Lorenz, Susanne Pachal, Samina Roohi

       

                      

Library Storytime

April Newsletter

               APRIL NEWSLETTER 2017

Dear Parents,

We “warmly” welcome spring and hope that from now on the weather will be on our side.

The children enjoyed our unit about senses last month. Our highlight was when we made popcorn in the staff room and listened to the kernels, popping open in the microwave.  As part of our taste unit we had each child try a pieces of lemon. It was so funny to watch the sour expression on their faces. At least, now they also know that most lemonade drinks taste sweet, only because they contain lots of sugar!

APRIL SPRING THEMES

BABY ANIMALS

Spring is the season, when many baby animals are born. Many of our books and table toy activities this month will evolve around the topic “signs of spring” and “baby animals”. We will teach our students some new German words, learn how to sing “Frühling (spring) ist hier” and they will get to listen to the German version of the song  “Mary has a little lamb” (“Mary hat ein kleines Lamm”).  One of our Brevoort Park teachers will have an incubator in her classroom and we will be invited to observe little chicks hatching from eggs.

EXPLORING SPRING

Soon, we will start to take our children outside again to explore the change of seasons.  “Sensory walks” will help our little ones to sharpen their 5 senses. We will be looking out for grass turning green, buds on the trees, listen to the honk of returning geese in the sky, touching melting snow and sticking our noses in the air to sniff the first signs of spring!!

Part of our daily April routine will be sorting, counting and categorizing spring items, such as flowers, eggs, baby animals etc.

LETTER ACTIVITIES

Our Tue-Thur 3 year old class will continue to learn, trace and decorate a new letter of the Alphabet each week.

In our M-W-F 4 year old class (Kindergarten readiness class), the majority of students already recognizes most letters of the alphabet and is now able to print their name without help. We therefore don’t focus too much on individual letters but rather on letter formation and printing activities. Using the terms “long line”, “short line” and “curve” helps to remember and print letters. Here is an example: ”R” is made of a “long line”, ”curve”, and “short line”. We are so proud to see many of our children getting really curious and excited about printing letters and numbers. We hope this excitement will last and help your child with a smooth transition to Kindergarten.

NUMBER ACTIVITIES

Memorizing your phone number is a real and important life skill and might be another way to play around with number recognition. Try to have your child dial the numbers when you make your next phone call. Don’t be surprised, we might even have them call you when we are in class! J

If you would like to support your child’s learning at home, you can play letter games (e.g. putting together letters of their name), go on “I spy” tours around the house or look for letters (and letter sounds) in their favourite books. Try to keep it fun and engaging! We will have a little “sign in” poster in the hallway. This is a fun way to make them recognize and/or print their name on a daily basis before they come into class.

OUTSIDE PLAY

Once the grass has dried a little bit more, we will start taking our children out to the park again. Please make sure that from now on, your child is dressed in layers, and wears weather appropriate shoes for outside play. As much fun as it is, to jump in the puddles, we want those little feed to stay dry. On days that we are going outside, “show and tell” will also be outside.  Final dismissal will be in the boot room on those days.

SCHOOL DOOR ACCESS PROCEDURE

Please remember that all side and back doors will be locked from the outside after 9:15 a.m. If you are entering the building after that time, please use the front door! FYI: For fire safety reasons, students, staff and parents will still be able to leave the building through all doors of the school.

We had to say “ Auf Wiedersehen” to Sherray, Olivia and Joe from our MWF class this month. In return, we are welcoming our new student, Jacob in the MWF pm class!

       DATES and REMINDERS

April

Wed, 5/6         Scholastic Book Orders due

Sat    8            2 - 2:30  p.m. English - German Family Story Time: Saskatoon Public Library, Mayfair                         Branch  (Frau Hecker will be the storyteller that day)

Sun  9             Family Fun Day at German Cultural Center with Easter Activities from 1-3 p.m.

Fri 14              Good Friday (no school)

April 17-21      Spring Break (no school)

April 24           School resumes

May

Wed 17            MWF am/pm class:  Combined Field Trip to Mother Earth Greenhouse

                        (9:15 am – 1:00 p.m.)

Please mark your calendar for this field trip in May. It will be a combined field trip with both classes. Class times will be different that day. Please try to make arrangements for your chid!!   Both classes will be leaving at 9:15 am and returning at 1 p.m. that day. I will send out a separate note later this month.

We will need many parent helpers!!!   A volunteer list will be hanging in the hallway.

Happy Spring!

Uli Hecker, Larissa Lorenz

Suanne Pachal, Samina Roohi