Feb. 25-Vision Screening Feb. 26-Ash Wednesday Mar. 3-CUI Choir Festival Mar. 6-Open House/Science Fair Mar. 8-Daylight Savings Time begins Mar. 12-ACappella Choir Concert-7:00 PM Mar. 14-Concordia Handbell Festival Mar. 15 Kindergarten Signing Day! Mar. 15-K-2 sings 10:55 Mar. 20-Bethany Golf Tournament Mar. 22-Troubadour sings 8:00, Trinity sings 9:30

School Bulletin #24 Feb. 25, 2020

Tomorrow marks the beginning of Lent, a time of repentance and reflection. One writer called a season of TURNING: Turning from what is hurtful and toward what is healing Turning from what is shattered and toward what is whole Re-turning to the Lord.

Some folks observe this season by giving up something in recognition of what Jesus gave up for us, others choose to add something out of gratefulness for His sacrifice. However you choose to observe this special season, my prayer is that you are drawn closer to Him in the process.

God bless your journey, Dr. Fink

Bear Facts The Weekly Newsletter of Bethany Lutheran School

Long Beach, CA www.bethanylutheran.org

Communication+Responsibility+Organization+Service+Sharing

Chapel Leaders Feb. 26-Pastor Kritzer Mar. 4-6th Grade Mar. 11-Kayleigh

Parents, you are always welcome to join us!

Coming NEXT WEEK: Open House and

Science Fair (and the PTL Ball Drop!)

Friday, March 6

Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. During our chapel service tomorrow, students and teachers will have the

option to have ashes put on their foreheads or the backs of their hands as a reminder that we are all sinners in need of a Savior. Parents, you are welcome to join us, or you may return for Ash Wednesday services here at Bethany at 7:00 PM.

Our 5th Annual Golf Ball Drop PTL Fundraiser is scheduled for the beginning of the Science Fair NEXT FRIDAY (5:45.) Proceeds support Bethany Lutheran School and Preschool programs! Our goal is for each family to sell at least 10 balls. See the order form attached to today’s Bear Facts!

Monthly Awards This year we are honoring

character traits associated with healthy “Habits of Mind.” In February, we were watching for students who “Persist!!” K- Eli Baldwin 1st-Henry Cerulle 2nd-Samantha Baldwin 3rd-Zara Germain 4th-Bryson Edwards 5th-Garret Morgensen 6th-London Perez 7th-Jasmine Rambo 8th-Marcus VanderHorck

We’ll hand out February’s certificates after chapel this week.

Our faithful Scrip coordinator, Carol Grudt, has retired after 25 years of service. In addition to selling and promoting Scrip, Carol was a friendly face in the school office and applied more than her fair share of band-aids and ice packs to injured students. We will be thanking Carol for her faithful service on Sunday, March 8. If you would also like to thank her, you may send a card to the office!

Middle School Corner

The church season of Lent starts tomorrow. The focus of the Lenten season suggests that the season of Lent serves not only as a time to

meditate on the suffering that Christ endured on our behalf but also as an opportunity to reflect upon our own baptism and what it means to

live as a child of God.

The middle school students will be invited to pray through Lent using a beautiful heart visual to help focus

our eyes on Jesus. They will be encouraged to add prayers of

thanks, prayer requests, or just words of praise, and then we will

pray over their requests. You’re invited to join in this Lenten

activity at home! Attached to the Bear Facts you will

find a Lent 2020 Heart. Interested in sharing this with other

friends and family? You can send them the link below:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GsyLsVdWLI64G5fanh9IvLXmSc

QOe9D6/view

“My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my

heart and my portion forever.” Psalm 73:26

The FISHin’ Hole Opportunities to Serve Scout leaders, did you know that your service to Scouts can be counted for FISH hours? Report your Scout time using a FISH slip, the Bethany app or

the Bethany website!

Bethany Students and Families, The Girl Scouts of Troop 4833 are working our Silver Award project. We are gathering supplies and collecting donations for the homeless. We’d like your help! There will be a box in the school office to collect: • canned food • clothes for kids, teens and

adults • baby formula for infants • personal care items Thank you for your support and God bless you all!

Troop 4833

Seeking gently-used jewelry and accessories!

Student Success will once again be hosting our gently-used accessories sale on Saturday, May 16 during the Bethany Block Party and Sunday Morning, May 17 between services. Please bring your gently-used accessories (jewelry, scarves, handbags, belts, etc.) to Bethany and drop them off for Jill Moorman. Separately-baggied items are greatly appreciated. (Items remaining after the sale will be donated to a worthy cause.) If you would like to help with this sale, please contact Jill Moorman: jmoorman@bethanylutheran.org 562-307-6123

February’s chapel offerings will support Mission India, a joint

project with our sister schools in the district.

I read an article today about focus. It said that student pilots are often told “When things start going wrong, don’t forget to fly the plane.” Many plane incidents have resulted from pilots concentrating so hard on finding the problem that they lose sight of their core job of flying the aircraft. As a mom, I can easily get distracted by the smaller stuff – sibling squabbles, a jam-packed calendar, if I’m serving a healthy dinner (or Taco Bell…again!), if that pesky science fair project is on time/done, or if the darn theme t-shirt is clean for the field trip this Friday. I fail to see the bigger picture: that I’m raising young humans to turn into incredible adults. My job is to each them life skills. Whether it be how to get along with others, to make time for family (either around a dinner table or somewhere else), the value of being involved with events that excite you, but also the magic of down time on your calendar to gain rest and reset, the values that we build our family on should be my focus. I need to be able to see the difference between the background noise of day to day stuff and my real job and “fly the plane”. Thankfully, we – you and I – have the Master Pilot guiding us and letting us focus on our job as parents. Fly the plane, friends! See you at our February PTL meeting tonight in the library! 6:30 p.m., free child care provided!

Jennifer Carlson, PTL President

Bethany’s Student Council is holding a bake sale next week to raise funds for a tetherball set. If you’d like to bake for the sale, please bring items bagged in sandwich/snackbags for individual sale (two cookies or one brownie/bar) to the school office. Thanks for your support!

Lent 2020

PARENT PAGES // VOL. 19, NO. 6 // FEBRUARY 2020 1

Parent PagesRESOURCES FOR CHRISTIAN PARENTS IN THE 21ST CENTURY

Accepting Children with AUTISM

PHOTOS: GETTY IMAGES

The Lutheran elementary school I attended was full of stairs. We had a set that went straight up without a landing. When we thought teachers

were not looking, we loved to climb up on the railing and slide down. As we trudged up and down, we rarely, if ever, thought about how these stairs represented a barrier for people in wheelchairs.

Now our churches and schools operate under legis-lation that requires accommodations for disabilities. This legislation is a blessing not only for those who need ramps or automatic door openers but also for those of us who have never had to consider barriers. When we learn, worship and live in areas with diver-sity, we are richer for the experience. For children and adults, when we accommodate a need for a fellow student, we learn empathy and coping skills.

While wheelchairs, walkers, hearing aids and white canes can make a disability recognizable to the observ-er, there are other challenges that we might not be able to so easily distinguish. Children with autism often have specific needs that can be met to enable them to participate in learning and worship just as ramps and elevators assist those with mobility challenges. Because our brains work differently than a child with autism, we might not understand the behavior of these children, but we can learn how to welcome them into our church or school.

First of all, we should recognize that when an autistic child reacts by crying, by screaming or with repetitive

motions known as stimming, it is not due to a lack of discipline or a weakness of character. These events happen because the child’s brain processes informa-tion differently. It is not because the child’s parents have been lax in teaching social or emotional skills. Our first step should be to support the child by sup-porting the parents. Get to know the parents and any other children they may have. If siblings are comfort-able with you, then watching them while parents tend

VOL. 19, NO. 6 // FEBRUARY 2020Parent Pages

Published by The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod // 1333 S. Kirkwood Road, St. Louis, MO 63122-7295 // 314-965-9000 // lcms.org

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. TO REPRINT: Permission is granted to reprint articles from this newsletter with the credit line “Reprinted with permission of LCMS School Ministry.”

Writer: Dr. Kim Marxhausen Designer: Frank Kohn

© 2020 LCMS

A RESOURCE OF LCMS SCHOOL MINISTRY

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

to the child with autism might be your best avenue of support.

The next step to supporting parents of children with autism is to encourage these families to attend church and school functions. Because of their child’s behav-ior, these parents might not feel welcome. They need to know that if their child has an episode, others will be supportive. If you are on a planning committee for an event, ask the parents what accommodations might help. Many children with autism simply need a quiet place to calm down and decompress when social interaction becomes more than what their brains can process.

Accept invitations to the homes of families with a child with autism. Such children are more comfortable in a familiar environment and do better when playing with a smaller number of children. Get to know the family and learn about the unique assets of their child. Children with autism are not so much disabled as they are different. Their brains can be very good at things that escape the abilities of more typical children. Help your children to celebrate the assets of a child with autism.

If your child has a friend who uses a wheelchair, it is likely that the two of them will play differently than two friends without mobility challenges, but will still enjoy each other. The same can be true for playing with

a child who has autism. These children may withdraw from others or might be awkward in how they ask to play. But, just like an elevator helps some students get to the next floor, patient teaching can help a child with autism become comfortable with social skills.

Encourage your children to interact with children with autism they meet at their church or school. Explain what might be different and help your children to understand that talking with this child, including him in recess play, working with her in small groups and sitting with him at lunch are essential ways they can learn how to be a friend. Playing with a child who processes sensory information differently may not look like typical play, but it can be fun too. With patience and persistence, your child might discover a fascinating and loyal friend. Let your child know that it is OK to correct a friend gently. Make sure your child knows that jokes work better than teasing as a child with autism might not know when teasing is an act of friendship.

God gives each of us unique gifts with which we can serve Him. Children with autism are no exception. Many of these children will grow up to be authors, artists, musicians and scientists, among other things. Even children who may not achieve these accom-plishments are still children of God: loved, valued and forgiven by the blood of Jesus. In this crucial way, we are the same.

DETACH AND RETURN BY ENTRY DEADLINE: MONDAY, March 2, 2020

Please register ________ persons @ $125 ($500 per foursome) *Open to first 144 PAID golfers.

Please Print Information!

Name: ____________________________ Name: ____________________________ Address: __________________________ Address: __________________________ City: _______________ Zip: ___________ City: __________________ Zip: ________ Phone #: (________)_________________ Phone #: (________)_________________ Email: ____________________________ Email: ____________________________

Name: ____________________________ Name: ____________________________ Address: __________________________ Address: __________________________ City: _______________ Zip: ___________ City: __________________ Zip: ________ Phone #: (________)_________________ Phone #: (________)_________________ Email: ____________________________ Email: ____________________________

Arrive for Buffet Dinner at 5:30PM and Raffle Tickets are available at Dinner.

New this year! If you wish to ONLY come for dinner and not golf...the cost of dinner is $25/person.

# of dinners: _____ Name & Phone #: ________________________/ (______)______________ *Make all checks payable to: Bethany Lutheran Golf Tournament *Mailing Address: Bethany Lutheran Church / Attn: Karl Fink 4644 Clark Avenue Long Beach, CA 90808

*ONLINE Registration is NOW AVAILABLE at www.bethanylutheran.org. Register & pay with either this form OR online!

Bethany Lutheran Church Presents:

Lakewood Country Club & Tennis 3101 Carson Street

Lakewood, CA. 90712 (562)421-0550

Tee Time: 1:00PM Check In: 11:30AM

Golf Tournament!

The Brianna Esswein Memorial

PLEASE CHECK APPROPRIATE BOX & SUBMIT WITH BUSINESS CARD.

BEVERAGE SPONSORSHIP……. $1200 SNACKS SPONSORSHIP………….. $750

HOLE-IN-ONE SPONSRSHIP……. $1100 LONGEST DRIVE SPONSORSHIP.. $750

HOLE SPONSORSHIP……………. $1000 TEE SIGN SPONSORSHIP……….....$100

RANGE BALLS SPONSORSHIP… $850 RAFFLE DONATION

SUPPORT BETHANY LUTHERAN'S ANNUAL PTL GOLF BALL DROP!

Friday, March 6th, 5:45 PM

(All proceeds raised will go to purchase preschool supplies including

Christian toys/puzzles/puppets for the classroom and new student furniture for Bethany Lutheran School)

Families can purchase golf balls and will receive ticket numbers that correlate to the number on the balls. On March 6, a fire truck will drop the balls from the top of their ladder onto the grassy field where we’ll have a wooden bear head and paws.

Winners:

• If your ball lands in (or nearest the bear's mouth): $550 (If more than one ball lands in the bear's mouth the prize will be split by the winners)

• If your ball lands on a bear paw:

$50 Scrip card of your choice

• If your ball is farthest from the bear's mouth: $50 Scrip card of your choice

You do not need to be present to win!

The cost for the balls is $10 per ball or 6 for $50.

Balls can be sold to families, neighbors, friends, co-workers or anyone else. Please include payment and order slip. Our goal is for every family to sell at least 10 balls. Families will receive 1 FREE BALL for every 10 balls they sell!

Deadline to turn in order slip is March 5.

Tally Sheet Ball Drop

Student’s name:____________________ Teacher:____________

Name: Number of balls

Paid (cash, check, Facts)

Name: Number of balls

Paid (cash, check, Facts)

Name: Number of balls

Paid (cash, check, Facts)

Name: Number of balls

Paid (cash, check, Facts)

Name: Number of balls

Paid (cash, check, Facts)

Name: Number of balls

Paid (cash, check, Facts)

Name: Number of balls

Paid (cash, check, Facts)

Name: Number of balls

Paid (cash, check, Facts)

Name: Number of balls

Paid (cash, check, Facts)

Amount of check's included: $__________________

Amount of cash:$_______________________

Charge my FACTS account for this amount:$____________________

Signature authorizing charge on FACTS account:____________________________