Dear 5B families,
PLEASE NOTE:
• Wednesday, January 8th: Early dismissal at 2:00 p.m.
• Thursday, January 9th: Epiphany Mass at St. Patrick’s Parish at 10:45 a.m.
• Friday, January 24th: No school for students.
• Tuesday, February 4th: Student-led conferences from 3:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.
• Wednesday, February 5th: Early dismissal at 2:00 p.m.
• Friday, February 7th: No school.
I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for your wonderful class Christmas gift of a gift certificate and the cards and other meaningful gifts and artworks. You made me feel so happy and special and it was another reminder of how lucky I am to be in 5B at our great school! Your kindness means the world to me. It was very special to connect with each child today to thank them and as well to let them know how much I loved seeing their beautiful nativity scenes (either live in person or via photograph). I will make time to create a blog post to showcase those soon!
I was so sorry to be so sick and miss the last week of school before vacation–I was hit with that bug that impacted a number of students, staff and families and it had me coughing all through the holidays and even up to New Years. Fortunately, I am back to being healthy and delighted to see a full class of healthy students here today!
As for today, we had a gentle start back with (a.) an assembly, (b.) a Health Ed. discussion of feelings around making transitions and strategies for finding a sense of calm during transitions, (c.) a study in Religion class about the meaning of Epiphany, and (d.) an introduction to how to do “Personal Interest Projects”(P.I.P.)–ask your children about that (and I will post a blog and video links about that soon).
The P.I.P.s will be a fun way for students to personalize their learning and growth their core and curricular competencies across the grade 5 curriculum and beyond with special emphasis on “Career Education” goals.
The projects are not due until June and there will be many hours of in class direct instruction and support for these student-driven projects.
There is nothing for parents to buy or do for these projects–just relax and know that your child is in charge and very well supported at school; but feel free to support if you have time and would like to do so.
A great way to encourage your child is just to have conversations asking questions like, “What do you think you might do for your personal interest project?” and “What is your next step in your project?”
As I said, there will be loads more information to come about the P.I.P. journey–which will be a non-rush, creative adventure that will re-enchant your child with his/her learning.
****REMINDER: This Thursday, Jan. 9th is the Epiphany Mass at 10:45am at the Parish and full uniform (including tie) is the dress code. Thank you for helping your child to remember.
Happy new year!
Tiffany Poirier, 5B teacher
Tiffany Poirier 