JANUARY’S CHARACTER ATTRIBUTE:

With December being Kindness and Caring

month, our students participated in various

activities that demonstrated this character

attribute including posting positive messages

on lockers for students to find at the end of

the day, to bringing in toiletries for our

Shoebox Drive and participating in a lunch

hour Write for Rights.

There were many other special activities in

which our students were involved in

December and some are highlighted below

and more will be shared in our student

written newsletter coming out in the next

month.

Our grade 8 students had an exciting day at

the beginning of the month at a Raptors 905

game. We received compliments on the

maturity and consideration demonstrated by

our students on public transit.

Our students continue to develop their skills

in technology. We had a great turn-out to

our Hour of Code sessions and our Lego

Spartans were up early on a Saturday

morning for the TDSB First Lego League

qualifying event.

Message from the Principal and Vice-Principal

Upcoming Events

January 2020

6 Back to School and a Day 1, Pizza Lunch forms go out

7 MADD Canada presentation

for grade 7 and 8 students 10 Pizza Lunch payment due 14 Social Media awareness

presentation for grade 6 students

15 School Council Meeting 17 PA Day 27 TDSB Grade 6 Class

Webcast – Hana’s Suitcase 28 Recognition Assemblies

Safe Arrival

If your child will be absent

or late, please call:

416-395-3951.

Kindly leave a message

with your child’s full name,

homeroom number and

reason for absence.

You may also contact

SchoolMessenger

(automated call-out system)

directly at 1-833-250-2290

between 7:00 a.m. and 3:00

p.m. for the current day or a

future date.

MVMS Newsletter January, 2020

Milne Valley Middle School Principal: L. Moore Vice Principal: C. Harvey Kerr Superintendent: I. Allison Trustee: T. Doyle

100 Underhill Drive, Toronto, ON M3A 2J9 416.395.2700

MilneValley@tdsb.on.ca http://schoolweb.tdsb.on.ca/milnevalley Twitter @MilneMS

Our grade 8 band performed for our recognition

assemblies and two of our grade 8 classes

participated in STEM activities with students at

Cassandra Public School.

We look forward to more opportunities for students

to enrich their learning outside of the school day. If

there are any clubs or teams they don’t find but are

interested in, we ask them to please let their teacher

know. We also welcome participating from any

parents or guardians who would like to support any

of our teams, clubs or activities.

TEAMWORK Your child is involved in learning activities designed

to develop good character and help children make

good choices. Our focus this month will be on

TEAMWORK.

What does teamwork mean to you?

Your child can show teamwork by:

• helping to complete a household chore with other

members of the family

• working with peers in a group to complete school

assignments

• participating in a sport and working as part of a

team to be successful

• taking responsibility in household chores for the

benefit of the family

Questions to discuss with your child:

• What does it mean to be a team player at home and

to be an integral part of the family?

• How do you deal appropriately with conflict when it

occurs during teamwork?

• What are some of the ways to resolve some of the

arguments that occur at home?

• Sometimes a teammate may have to make a

sacrifice so that the team can succeed. What does this

mean?

Milne Valley Middle School Principal: L. Moore Vice Principal: C. Harvey Kerr Superintendent: I. Allison Trustee: T. Doyle

100 Underhill Drive, Toronto, ON M3A 2J9 416.395.2700

MilneValley@tdsb.on.ca http://schoolweb.tdsb.on.ca/milnevalley Twitter @MilneMS

Projects to do together:

• Play games as a family to develop teamwork and

good sportsmanship.

• Participate in sports or leisure activities together

and encourage communication including active

listening.

Encouraging teamwork in your child:

• Stress the importance of teamwork and the aspects

of being a team player that make being on a team

worthwhile.

• Stress the importance of being willing to work and

play with others at school, in the home, and in the

community.

• Share a story that will help your child understand

that sometimes “fair” does not mean “equal.”

Thank you for supporting our Character

Development program.

SAFETY PATROLLERS Our Safety Patrollers will be starting their training on

the morning of Tuesday, January 7, in the bus loop to

assist students with crossing driveways safely and

with our morning drop-off to greet students and keep

the traffic flowing. We would ask that when you are

dropping students off that you pull all the way

forward in the loop and have students exit your

vehicle from the passenger side ONLY. Safety

Patrollers will assist with opening and closing doors

to keep the flow of traffic moving. As our program

grows, we will be looking to close access to our

parking lot for drop off.

STUDENT MID-MORNING SNACK CONSULTATION As you know, our school participates in a Student

Nutrition Program. We apply for funding for our

program from the Toronto Foundation for Student

Success, the City of Toronto Student Nutrition

Program grants, consideration for provincial grants,

as well as contributions from our school community.

We are looking to make this program more accessible

to all students in our school.

Our Student Leadership Council has lead discussions

in classrooms around our current snack program and

students have noted that while they would be happy

with the program to continue at the current time, they

recognize that it is challenging for students who do

not have breakfast to wait until 10:00 a.m. to have

only a snack and more so for students who have not

contributed to the program financially to not be

accessing the food at all. We are looking for

feedback from parents and guardians on some

proposed changes including a change of timing to

make the snack available earlier in the morning, and

possibly prior to the start of the school day in the

cafeteria, as well as moving to a breakfast program

for September, 2020. Further details will be shared at

our upcoming School Council Meeting on

Wednesday, January 15, at 6:30 p.m. and then

communicated to our families.

MADD CANADA PRESENTATION FOR GRADE 7 AND 8 STUDENTS We will be hosting a MADD Canada presentation of

“Over The Edge” on Tuesday, January 7. On

average, every day in Canada up to 4 people are

killed and over 100 are seriously injured as a result of

crashes involving alcohol and/or drugs. Impaired

driving is the number 1 criminal cause of death in

Canada. The devastating impact on victims/survivors

and their families is immeasurable. In an instant, their

lives are changed forever.

It’s never too early to teach our youth about the

dangers of impaired driving and getting in a vehicle

with an impaired driver. Traffic crashes remain by far

the largest single cause of death among 16-25 year

olds. Amongst the age group, more than half of those

motor vehicle fatalities are alcohol and/or drug-

related. While young people are significantly

overrepresented in alcohol-related deaths as drivers,

they are overrepresented to an even greater extent as

passengers. The problem of impaired driving among

youth in Canada is very real.

You may not have been aware that Canadians

between the ages of 14 and 25 have one of the

highest rates of cannabis use in the world. Therefore,

Milne Valley Middle School Principal: L. Moore Vice Principal: C. Harvey Kerr Superintendent: I. Allison Trustee: T. Doyle

100 Underhill Drive, Toronto, ON M3A 2J9 416.395.2700

MilneValley@tdsb.on.ca http://schoolweb.tdsb.on.ca/milnevalley Twitter @MilneMS

the combination of drugs and driving is also a major

concern for our young people.

The film being shown this year is called Over the

Edge and it opens with a fictional story that illustrates

the tragic consequences of driving while impaired by

alcohol and/or drugs. Throughout the film, students

are shown times when this tragedy could have been

prevented by making different choices. The second

half of the movie contains real testimonials from

victims/survivors of impaired driving. These are very

emotional and powerful.

So why is it important for students in grades 7 & 8 to

view Over the Edge? Although your child isn’t

driving yet, he or she will soon be thinking about the

future possibility of driving. They may already find

themselves in situations where alcohol and drugs are

present. As well, they may have opportunities to ride

with an inexperienced teen driver. As they learn to be

more independent, they need to know the facts and be

ready to avoid dangerous situations involving

impaired driving.

Did you know that the 2015 Ontario Student Drug

Use and Health Survey published by the Centre for

Addiction and Mental Health indicates that 15.5% of

grade 8 students drank alcohol within the last year?

Those percentages represent thousands of young

people. So before students even reach high school

and begin to drive, many are already exposed to or

participating in risky behaviors that could lead to

impaired driving, among other harmful

consequences, in later years. Delivered through

Canadian schools since 1994, MADD Canada’s

School Assembly Program presents students with

solid information and best practices to help them

understand the issue of impaired driving from alcohol

and drugs. The hi-tech presentation has proved to be

an effective method to raise awareness and for

providing safety strategies.

Over the Edge has an enormous impact on Canadian

students and will influence their own decision-

making for years to come. We hope that after your

child sees this presentation that you will be able to

have a family discussion about what they have

learned. By educating our future generation about

impaired driving, lives will be saved and injuries

prevented. Impaired driving is a totally senseless

crime and is 100% preventable.

If you would like to view a preview of Over the

Edge, it can be found here:

https://madd.ca/pages/programs/youth-

services/school-programs

For additional information and resources for parents

go to:

http://madd.ca/pages/programs/youth-

services/information-for-parents/

TDSB RECOGNIZES TAMIL HERITAGE MONTH IN JANUARY The TDSB is celebrating Tamil Heritage Month in

January 2020 with the theme of "Vision 2020:

Yengal Kathaigal – Our Stories”. In October 2016,

the House of Commons voted unanimously to

recognize every January as Tamil Heritage Month.

This month was chosen as it coincides with one of

the most important celebrations for Canadians of

Tamil heritage, the Thai Pongal Harvest Festival.

Millions of Tamil people around the world,

irrespective of their religion, celebrate Thai Pongal,

and offer thanks for an abundant harvest. TDSB

proudly marked Tamil Heritage Month for the first

time in 2016.

As Toronto has the largest Tamil populations outside

of the South Asian subcontinent, this committee aims

to ensure that the objectives of TDSB's January's

Tamil Heritage month are reflected in the curriculum

and learning objectives for students. To explore these

themes, the planning committee will be inviting

students to learn about the rich culture of the Tamil

heritage and how their own respective ancestry can

be used to shape their future through essays, original

artwork and public speaking contests. The poster for

the month was open to students to submit their work

and we are very proud of Milne Valley Middle

School Grade 8 student Khaviyaa. Her poster was

selected by the committee as the winning entry and

she was recognized for this at the Tamil Heritage

Launch at Woburn Jr. P.S. by TDSB Director John

Malloy, Chair of the Board, Robin Pilkey, and

System Superintendent Uton Robinson – pictured

below, on December 16.

Milne Valley Middle School Principal: L. Moore Vice Principal: C. Harvey Kerr Superintendent: I. Allison Trustee: T. Doyle

100 Underhill Drive, Toronto, ON M3A 2J9 416.395.2700

MilneValley@tdsb.on.ca http://schoolweb.tdsb.on.ca/milnevalley Twitter @MilneMS

The poster will be shared with all schools in TDSB

this month – pictured at bottom left.

MILNE MAKERSPACE MATERIALS NEEDED We are hoping you would be able to help support

our Science and Technology teams. We are

looking for spare parts and beautiful junk. The

grade 6, 7 and 8 students are constantly using a

variety of recycled/reclaimed materials to create

and build different projects.

All reusable materials will be accepted

including:

- buttons

- nails/screws

- spools of thread

- containers

- canisters

- paper (GOOD paper, scrap, computer

paper, wrapping paper, books, magazines

etc.)

- cardboard (egg cartons, boxes, paper

towel rolls and other paper tubes etc.)

- ribbons/ties

- wool/felt/fabric

- scrap material (metal, plastic, wood)

- plastic flowers

- carpet

- tins

- old toys (used Lego, K’nex, other build

toys)

- old computers and electronics

- wires, strings, ropes

- styrofoam trays, etc.

We highly appreciate any materials you can

share. Please have your child deliver anything

you can spare to Mr. Vaisman. It will all be used

for the benefit of the students.