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Let us put our minds together and see

what we can do for our children. ~Sitting Bull~

A.E. Wright

Community

School

REPORT TO

COMMUNITY

June 2020

Building ...

Healthy Minds

Healthy Hearts

Healthy Bodies & A

Healthy World

♥ H - opefully

♥ E -veryone

♥ A -cts

♥ R -esponsibly

♥ T -ogether

♥ S -ustainably

REPORT TO COMMUNITY 2020

A Year Like No Other…

As we reflect on this past school year we can unequivocally say that

it has been like no other! We begin by acknowledging this incredible

A.E.W. community, where working together, families and school,

continues to see us through good times and challenging ones. As

Dr. Seuss states in the logo above—not even a global pandemic

can stop us all from helping our children achieve good things. We

want to thank Mr. Mendoza, for thoughtfully gifting a few of our staff

members this perfect gift! Dr. Seuss gets it right yet again, we will

teach them here or there, we will teach them anywhere! As a prov-

ince, as a school division and as a school, we have worked hard to

learn what we needed to make a go of distance learning. We all

learned a lot! Being away from one another in the learning process

felt very difficult for many reasons. Teachers and schools operate

with kids in them. Everything we plan, with children in mind, as-

sumes we are all present in the educational relationship. Our staff

has articulated how much they have learned in this process, but not

one person has said, yes, this is the way school should

be...Although our community rose to the occasion of teaching and

learning from a distance, this is not the way any of us see it at its

best! This experience has given us so much to continue building our

perspectives around and we can’t wait to very soon have kids in the

building with us for good. In the meantime, we will continue to find

ways that give kids our best while we work through a global pan-

demic as a united world!

A.E. Wright Community

School continues to

build understandings by

teaching to the whole

child. Our focus remains

steadfast in developing

curricula which consist-

ently includes develop-

ing Healthy Minds,

Healthy Hearts, Healthy

Bodies and a very

Healthy World!

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♥ Reading, Writing,

Talking, Listening

♥ 7 Keys of Compre-

hension

♥ Thinking Critically

♥ Mathematics, hands

on, discovery, problem

-solving

♥ Feedback for kids

and teachers

♥ Discovery/

Exploration

♥ Social /Play

♥ Interactive

♥ Passions

♥ The Arts

♥ Relationship, Rele-

vance and Rigour

♥ Documentation

♥ Projects, Presenting

♥Communication

♥ Mentor Texts

♥ Teachers and chil-

dren as learners

♥Technology

♥Science

♥Social Studies

♥Our World

♥Rich Learning Experi-

ences

♥Indigenous Teachings

♥ Teaching each other

♥ Cross Curricular

Learning

♥ Inquiry Based Learn-

ing

♥ New ELA Curriculum

♥ Adults Journal

♥ Process Writing

“According to Tristan Harris, a ‘design ethicist,’ the problem isn’t that peo-

ple lack willpower, it’s that ‘there are a thousand people on the other side

of the screen whose job it is to beak down the self-regulation you have.”

p.3

Irresistible—The Rise of Addictive Technology And The Business of

Keeping Us Hooked by Alter was our staff shared read this year. After

much discussion and lots of observation we decided some of our collec-

tive professional development would focus on how we, as educators, can

help our kids navigate the temptation of losing themselves and all the im-

portant human characteristics necessary for a healthy life in relationship

to ourselves and others. We learned lots

about how to teach kids about assessing

the quality of their learning and living

based on how they interact with technology

available to them. We do feel better

equipped to continue to help children un-

derstand what their responsibility to their

learning is and how it can be affected by

overuse and inappropriate use.

Jo Boaler and Susan Zimmermann, continue

to help us to consider ways in which our

school is building critical thinking skills in all

areas of the curriculum. Children have been

learning strategies that will support their in-

teraction with all curricula so they are better

able to be thoughtful in their learning and go

deeper with it:

Inferring, Questioning, Synthesizing, Build-

ing Mental Images, Building on their Back-

ground Knowledge (Schema), Fixing up

Strategies—What Doesn’t Look Right, De-

termining Importance

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♥ I Love to Read

♥ United Way

♥ Volunteers

♥ Sports / The Arts

♥ Roots of Empathy

♥ Indigenous Teachings

and Learning

♥ Siloam Mission

♥ Bake Sales

♥ Kids in the Know

♥ Leadership Groups

TMTTs

♥ Choir

♥ Band/Guitar/Ukulele

♥ Tablah and Harmonium

Lessons

♥ School-wide Assemblies

♥ Parent-Child Early Years

Program (0-6 years of age)

♥ Friday gift of song

♥ Nations

♥ Gardening

♥ Clubs

♥ Evening of Hope

♥ Main Street Project

♥ Filipino Cultural Club

♥ Picture Books Shared

♥ A Read You Need

♥ Project 11 grades 3-6

♥ A.E. Wright Project Hope

♥ Filipino Bilingual Pro-

gram

♥ Welcome to Kindergar-

ten in person!

♥ AEW Car Parade

♥ Online Learning

♥ Safer technology habits

To put it simply: in addition to a

brain, we have a heart—and we

want to put it to use in promoting

young people’s learning. Exclude

this vital organ from our work, and

you get compliance at best.

~Ronald S. Barth~

Thanks to our Families As

Partners Group who joined

us for the My Life On Line

Series. Having parents un-

derstand deeply how an un-

healthy online presence for

their children can lead to

mental health challenges is

significant to supporting the

kids both inside and outside

of school. The arts continue to be an

important focus for learn-

ing at A.E.W. We use the

Arts to help build bridges

and understandings

across cultures and all

curricular areas. Art is the

unifying language that

continues to build relation-

ships and deeper under-

standings. Thanks to Mr.

Militano’s class for the self

-portraits built into the

Medicine Wheel Teach-

ings.

As the Province began to open up allowing small

groups of children to come to school, we hosted

a wonderful WELCOME TO KINDERGARTEN

EVENING. Helping our newest and youngest

children see their new school and meet some

staff was essential in thinking about beginning a

new year. All of our children were welcomed with

a special gift box addressed to them loaded with

all kinds of hands on creative tools for learning.

At A.E.W we believe it is our responsibility to be

ready for our kids. The idea that we were able to

meet them all and send them off with some tools

to explore felt great, given the year we have had.

Their enthusiasm was uplifting and we can’t wait

until they can join us in the Fall.

Dr. Perry was slated to do a mutli-school PD day in

7 Oaks this year; due to the Pandemic his visit was

cancelled with us. Many of us read a couple of his

books. We hope to have him in WPG soon.

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♥ Track/Cross Country

♥ Yoga

♥ Brain Breaks

♥ Gym class

♥ Active Living Breaks

♥ School-wide Healthy

Snacks

♥ Relaxation strategies

♥ Team Handball

♥ Badminton

♥ Intramurals

♥ Camp

♥ Dance

♥ Cooking Club

♥ Safe and Caring

Schools—All Belong

♥ Active Living Green

Space

♥ Play

♥ Leadership

♥ Basketball, Volleyball

♥ Cyber safety

♥ Child Nutrition Council

♥ Personal Safety

♥ Learn to Skate

♥Learn to Swim

♥Active Transportation

to School

♥Smoothie Shack

♥Breakfast

♥Soccer Club

♥Learn to Bike

♥Body image awareness

♥Heart Rate Monitors

♥Coaches

♥Team work

ACTIVE LIVING & HEALTHY EATING

A.E. Wright ACTIVE LIVING GREEN SPACE

The ParticipACTION Report Card gives children and youth a D+ for Overall Physical Activity and a D+ for Sedentary Behaviours. Less than 1 in 5 children (5-11 year-olds) and youth (12-17 year-olds) in

Canada are meeting national movement behaviour guidelines for physi-

cal activity, sedentary behaviours and sleep. ~2019ParticipACTION Re-

port Card on Physical Activity for Children and Youth~

We know our work in this area is far from done. The results you read

here in the ParticipACTION Report card is another reason our staff

chose to study Atler’s book, shared in our report. One year ago January,

we had a dream as our grade 5/6 classes were exploring Place Making,

specific to active transportation and urban planning. From this teaching

and learning, we decided to pair the passion children were demonstrat-

ing around learning to bike in our learn to bike program, along with their

need for streets to be safer for bikes. In partnership with Urban Systems

and Scatliff+Miller+ Murray, a design for an A.E.Wright Active Living

Green Space was created. Last Spring we wrote grants to support this

project and we are delighted to share that we have received the majority

of our funding through the grant process. We want to give special thanks

to the Province of Manitoba, The Winnipeg Foundation, The Seven Oaks

School Division, the A.E. Wright parent community, and the City of Win-

nipeg for their generous support! Construction will begin July 15th and

the project should be competed by August 31, 2020. This project is proof

that if community partnerships are forged, exciting and meaningful things

happen. The Green Space is designed for use for people of all ages—

birth –99years of age. There will be riding trails that host biking features

for skill development as well as walking, running and cross-country ski-

ing trails. There will be areas for people to gather and some recreational

soccer space. We are so excited to share this new space with you and

would like to send a special thank you to our Families as Partners group

for supporting us all the way!! Getting fit and staying active will be facili-

tated through our Active Living Green Space!

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At A.E. Wright we continue to draw attention to

what the work of every citizen is in making sure

all of us are working at living a life of under-

standing around what sustainable means from

social justice to environmental justice!

We define sustainability for the kids in a way

that helps them understand that a long, long

time is essential for keeping things working well

and making sure generations are involved.

We know that the Healthies we learn about at

our school are interwoven, far reaching and

overlapping, while they need to remain ever

present in our consciousness of all the curricula

we teach, if we are going to make an impact on them. As teachers we know that this is lifelong work

and we also know that the sooner our kids understand their place in that, from a very early age, we

will succeed in making the world a better place! Having to work from a distance for the latter part of

this year has had an impact on our work as a whole school, in terms of what we could share with

our community—hence our grade 7/8 musical turning from on stage production to a recorded radio

show aired on Channel 7 Oaks. We thank them for their support in helping us share the message

intended.

At every level you can be sure we will continue to have the children inquire about what they see

around them with regards to equity, social responsibility, our Canadian History (T.R.C.), the com-

mon good, community understandings, environmental responsibility, global interactions, and citizen-

ship. Public school continues to be an excellent place to grow strong people that build a strong

world!

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Healthy Hearts!

Healthy Minds!

Healthy Bodies!

Healthy World!

Healthy Hearts!

Follow us on TWITTER @AEWrightSchool

STAY CONNECTED TO WHAT WE

LEARN DAILY!!

As we live the Wolf’s humble truths, we have grateful

hearts based on the wonder around us. Just like the

Wolf, we see our small place in the world and under-

stand the importance of our contribution to it. “We see

that we are part of the pack that takes and gives

back to the whole. We see that the gifts around us:

the falling and rising of the sun, the seasons, the

gifts of food, shelter, love and friendship are indeed

wonders to behold.” (David Bouchard)

When people ask us what our policy is around a

variety of things, we start by saying that our poli-

cies are based on Divisional objectives and val-

ues. The question for us might better be, “what

do you believe in and how do you enact that?”

At our school all of our values are executed

through the application and belief in the 7 Sa-

cred Teachings: Love, Humility, Respect,

Truth, Honesty, Wisdom, Courage. Ask us

more about that…

So good to see

our kids back at

school with us!

Check out our new blog:

https://aewcommunityschool.wordpress.com/