PRINCIPAL FINDLAY’S MESSAGE

STAFF UPDATES: It is extremely hard to say good-bye to

staff members, but it is that time of the year when we are making plans

for the next school year 2014-2015. Unfortunately, Miss. Ashton (Early

Learning Kindergarten Program) who filled in for Mrs. McNaughton

will be leaving, I have appreciated her hard work and caring attitude in

providing the best learning opportunities to all of our students. Mrs.

McNaughton will be returning half time (mornings) in the fall to be our

Kindergarten teacher. Mrs. Koppejan will be the Kindergarten teacher

in the afternoons. We welcome Mrs. Koppejan to Grand Avenue. Congratulations to Mrs. Moore who

has become a Vice-Principal at a school in our Board. We will be getting a new Instructional Coach

next year that will be shared amongst several schools. We are extremely sad to see Amanda Sample

(Youth Councellor) will be leaving us. We appreciate all of her successful efforts with our students in

the DSBN over the years and we wish her all the best. Please understand there still could be more staff

changes for the fall as the staffing process is not complete.

Since the May newsletter, there are changes again to the classes for next year. Please remem-

ber it may change again because it depends on the number of students who enroll in what grades over

the next few months and which student(s) moves. Please tell the office asap if you have moved/or

plan on moving (thanks to all the families who have notified the office already...this helps all schools

with planning of classes next year). As of today, here are the classes and teacher assigned to each

class:

Kindergarten– Ms. Howe and Miss Weir

Kindergarten– Mrs. McNaughton (a.m.), Mrs. Koppejan (p.m.) and Mrs. Morin

Grade 1 (20 students) - Mrs. Arghittu

Grade 1/2 - (1 Grade 1s and 19 Grade 2s) - Mrs. Height

Grade 2/3 (1 Grade 2 and 19 Grade 3s) - Miss Esau

Grade 3/4 (6 grade 3s and 17 Grade 4s) - Ms. Molloy

Grade 4/5 –(2 Grade 4s and 26 Grade 5s) - Mme. Lemke

Grade 6/7 (16 Grade 6s and 9 Grade 7s) – Mr. Dodman

Grade 8 – (23 Grade 8s) - Miss Whittal

Fundamental Skills –Mr. Nicholls,

Learning Resource Teacher—Mrs. Watt

Prep teachers—Mr. Vedder and Mme Garcia

Just a reminder about special requests for placement for 2014-2015 should be made in writ-

ing stating reasons for the request to me, Miss Findlay by Friday June 6. Also, please understand it is

not always possible to honour requests made, but I will try my best. Final class lists and teacher assign-

ments will be posted on the first day of school (Tuesday September 2, 2014).

Please note that our last school assembly will be held on Wednesday June 25 at 9:00 a.m.

All parents are welcome to join us in celebrating our students and the end of a school year.

Thank you to the parents/staff and grade 7 and 8 students who will be helping to clean up

our school gardens. Your help is greatly appreciated. Special thanks to Mrs. Barendregt. Special thanks

to Ridgeview Garden Centre. Also, thank you to the Arborwood and the Kindergarten class who

planted a tree at the back of our school.

Parents, please remember that you have access to Dreambox/ Prodigy (math online pro-

gram and Raz Kids (reading online program) all summer. Please take advantage of these programs

so your son/daughter keep practicing their skills.

Thank you to our School Council members for all their hard efforts in creating a parent lend-

ing library of excellent resources on a variety of topics locate in our front foyer. Please take advan-

tage of these wonderful books.

For your information the Ontario Elections are using our gym on Thursday June 12.

Please note the gym will not be available for our students.

Thank you to all the families for supporting the Wilson Family and the West Lincoln Hospital

during our two fundraisers.

Other items to take note of: a reminder that we have to complete 3 fire drills and 1 lock-

down. Apparently ticks are bad this year, please be aware and explain to your son/daughter.

We have a busy month ahead of us. Have a great June.

Achieving Success Together

JUNE 2014

UPCOMING EVENTS THAT NEED TO

BE ADDED TO YOUR

SCHOOL CALENDAR

* Wednesday June 4, 11, 18 and 25

Golf at Twenty Valley 4-8 p.m.

* Thursday June 5

Wax Museum Presentations in the gym.

Parents are welcome at 9:30 a.m.

* Friday June 6

Gali Festibrations (few grade 7s and 8s)

* Tuesday June 10

Welcome to Kindergarten Open House

5:00-6:15 p.m. and last School Council

meeting at 6:30 p.m.

* Wednesday June 11

Special Olympics and Junior 3 Pitch

Tournament

* Thursday June 12

Kindergarten Dogs for Dads, Science Trip

for Grades 1, 2 and 2/3 and the Ontario

Elections (gym)

* Monday June 16

DSBN Track and Field

* Wednesday June 18

Intermediate 3 Pitch Tournament

* Thursday June 19

FS class trip to Queenston Heights

* Friday June 20

Special BBQ student lunch and Interme-

diate Rugby

* Sunday June 22

Grand Avenue Family Picnic 1-4 p.m.

* Tuesday June 24

Grade 8 Graduation 5:30 p.m.

* Wednesday June 25

9 a.m. End of the year assembly. All par-

ents are welcome. Report cards go home

* Friday June 27

Last Day of School

Dear Grand Avenue Families,

The following titles will be available for parents to borrow from our NEW Parent Resource Library located in the front foyer. These books were purchased using PRO-Grant funds for the 2013-2014 school year and all topics are related to the subject of mental health. The

books have been ordered and we expect them to arrive at the school over the next 1-2 weeks. Parent Council is very excited to be able to offer these resources to families! It is also our goal to continue to build our parent lending library in the years to come. These titles will also be posted

on our school website for future reference.

The Parents Guide to Psychological First Aid

The Bully, The Bullied and the Bystander: From Pre-School to High School—How Parents and Teachers can help break the cycle of violence

Bullying Hurts: Teaching Kindness through Read Alouds and Guided Conversations

Parenting Through Crisis: Helping Kids in Times of Loss, Grief and Change

Healing Your Life: Workbook on Dealing with Death

What to Do When You Worry Too Much

The Grief Recovery Handbook 20th Anniversary Exp/Edition

Helping Children Cope with Death

Mindful Parent Happy Child: A Guide to Raising Resilient Children

101 Ways to Heal the Hurt: Dealing With the Death of a Loved One

Hope, Help and Healing Eating Disorders

The Parents Guide to Eating Disorders—Self-Esteem, Healthy Eating and Positive Body Image at Home

The Parents Guide to Childhood Eating Disorders– what every parent needs to know

Keys to Parenting your Anxious Child

The Shyness & Social Anxiety Workbook for Teens

The Defiant Child: A Parent Guide to Oppositional Defiant Disorder

Raising Resilient Children

Peaceful Parents, Happy Kids

Have a New Kid by Friday—Participants Guide: How to Change Your Child’s Attitude, Behaviour & Character in 5 days

Have a New Kid by Friday

123 Magic: Effective Discipline for Children

123 Magic Workbook: Effective Discipline for Children 2 to 12

The Explosive Child

The Good Divorce

ADD-Friendly Ways to Organize your Life—Strategies that work from a professional organizer and renowned ADD Clinician

Taking Charge of ADHD—the Complete Authoritative Guide for Parents

Just Because it’s Not Wrong, Doesn’t Make it Right

Start Fresh: Jumpstart to Lifelong Healthy Eating

Get your Family Eating Right: a 30 day Plan Teaching your Kids Healthy Eating for Life

Yes Your Teen is Crazy: Loving Your Kids Without Losing Your Mind

Eating my Feelings: Tales of Overeating, Underperforming and Coping with my Crazy Family

Learning How to Slow Down and Pay Attention: A Book for Kids about ADHD

Driven to Distraction: Recognizing and Coping with ADD

Cyber Bullying No More: Parenting a High Tech Generation

Best Lunch Box Ever: Ideas and Recipes for School Lunches Kids will Love

Bully Stop Now: Superintendent Tells How

Words Will Never Hurt Me: Helping Kids Handle Teasing, Bullying and Putdowns

Cyber-Bullying: the definition and Effects

The Promise of Sleep: A Pioneer in Sleep Medicine Explores

Parenting your Anxious Child with mindfulness and Acceptance

Anxious Annie, The Worlds Greatest Thinker

Freeing your Child from O.C.D.: A Powerful Practical Program for Parents of Children and Adolescents

10 Mindful Minutes: Giving our Children and Ourselves the Social and Emotional Skills to Reduce Stress and Anxiety

Beyond the Blues: A Workbook to Help Teens Overcome Depression

Coping with Depression in young People: A Guide for Parents

101 Games and Activities for Children with Autism & Sensory Disorders

Parenting a Child with Sensory Processing Disorder: a Family Guide to Understanding & Supporting your sensory Sensitive Child

A Complete Guide to Aspergers Syndrome

The Everything Parenting Guide to Sensory Processing Disorder

The Everything Parenting Guide to Children with Aspergers Syndrome

Calm, Alert & Learning: Strategies for Self-Regulation

Calling all Grand Avenue families…

You are invited to our first ever

Enjoy fun, quality family time and meet other families

in our school community. This is not a Fundraiser!

Fun activities like, egg and spoon races, potato sack races,

water balloons, face painting, family Karate and so much more.

There is no cost to this event,

so pack a picnic or choose to purchase from our BBQ menu options.

(Food order form will follow in a week.)

A great way to celebrate the end of a fantastic school year.

Bring your family and friends!

It will be a blast! More details to follow…stay tuned!

Sponsored by Grand Avenue School Council

Where: Grand Avenue School

When: Sunday June 22, 2014

Time: 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.

GRAND FAMILY

PICNIC

CHARACTER VIRTUE FOR THE MONTH OF JUNE –CITIZENSHIP

Citizenship– The ways we contribute to our community and our country.

Do you try to make your school a better place?

Do you take responsibility for what goes on around you?

Do you participate in Community Service?

Do you help take good care of the environment?

Are you a good neighbour?

Do you treat other people with respect?

Do you follow the rules of your school, family and society?

If you answered yes to most of these questions you are a good citizen.

THANK YOU TO THE FOLLOWING

BUSINESSES FOR SUPPORTING

GRAND AVENUE THIS YEAR...

Gino’s Pizza Pizza Pizza

Sobeys—Grimsby Creative School Images

Petals and Parties Joe Dog’s

Pizza di Nonna Real Canadian Superstore Cake Queens M & M Meat Shops Ridgeview Garden Centre Tim Horton’s

Sound Solutions—Disc Jockey Service

BOOK RETURNS

Please return all library materi-als to the library by Thursday, June 12. Please check your home and

make sure all library books get returned. Thank you

2014/15 IMPORTANT DATES September 2, 2014 First Day of School September 12, 2014 Early Release Day October 10, 2014 Professional Activity Day October 13, 2014 Thanksgiving Day November 5, 2014 PIC Conference November 14, 2014 Professional Activity Day December 22, 2014- January 2, 2015 Winter Break

January 5, 2015 First Day of Class After Holiday January 16, 2015 Professional Activity Day February 5, 2014 Kindergarten Open Houses February 13, 2015 Early Release Day February 16, 2015 Family Day March 16, 2014 - March 20, 2015 March Break April 3, 2015 Good Friday April 6, 2015 Easter Monday May 15, 2015 Professional Activity Day May 18, 2015 Victoria Day June 12, 2015 Professional Activity Day June 25, 2015 Last Day of School for Students

PA DAY Friday June 13, 2014

No school. Teachers are working on student

assessment (report cards).

DRESS CODE

Student should wear appropriate clothing for a school environment. Some general guidelines include: - Tops need to either have sleeves or straps that have a three finger thickness and they need to cover the abdomen and back - Shorts/skirts must be an appropriate length (not shorter than extended arm). - “See through” tops, backless tops or mesh, unless worn with an undershirt should not be worn. We do not want any exposed undergarment - Purposely ripped jeans/slacks should not be worn. - Pants should be worn no lower than the hips. - Clothing should be free of inappropriate language or diagrams (pictures, logos, people) involving violence, drugs, alcohol, racism or hurtful messages. - Hats, bandanas and sunglasses are appropriate for recess time but are not to be worn inside the school. These items should be removed upon entry to the school and not worn indoors.

BADMINTON

Mr. Dodman and Mrs. Arghittu would like to congratu-late the intermediate badminton team of their amaz-ing effort at the Brock DSBN Badminton Tournament. All players had a winning re-cord in the round robin, with 3 groups moving into the playoff rounds. Thanks to Josh C., Maddy M., Christian M., Con-nor J., Alyssa A., Kianna B., Nick H. and Grace H. for their great dedication and positive attitudes throughout the sea-son.

Grade 4 Science Grade 4’s in Ms. Molloy’s and Mme. Lemke’s classes are studying habi-tats in Science. Students are learn-ing about the elements of a habitat. We made our own habitats with fish, snails and a plant to investigate the role that producers, consumers and decomposers play in a habitat.

A huge thank-you to Ruffin’s Pet Centre in Grimsby for generously donating the fish, snails, plants and gravel to make this project happen!

TAKE A MATH HIKE

You can help your children continue to learn and stay active by taking a math hike. Walk or bike together through

your neighbourhood or along one of the many beautiful trails or bike paths in our area. You may want to use a pe-

dometer to track your steps. You can also have children help to plan the outing by discussing how far you might go,

how long it will take and how fast you might travel. Children can be math detectives as they consider and discuss

some of the following:

Can you find leaf or petal clusters in groups of 3,4,5,6....?

Can you find spirals?

What geometric shapes can you find, manmade or natural?

What patterns can you see?

What equations might you use to describe the patterns you see?

How could you estimate how tall or wide something is?

Do you see symmetry anywhere?

Are there arrangements that make it easy to count how many objects you see?

Can you guess the angles formed by branches or leaves? How did you estimate?

Do you see numerals anywhere? What do they tell us?

For long lasting fun, take along a camera to capture pictures of the math you see or a notebook to draw and label

your discoveries. Other friends or family members can guess what the image is and where the image came from as

well as talking about the math that they see! You could even create a collage, scrapbook or slideshow.

STUDENT RECOGNITION

Mrs. Howe/ Nicolas N.

Miss Weir (K) Ella H.

Isabelle G.

Miss Ashton/ Liam M.

Mrs. Morin (K) Emma C.

Lucas M.

Mrs. Arghittu (Gr.1) Lucy B.C.

Reese I.

Mrs. Height (Gr. 2) Avery M.

Grace J.

Kaitlyn S.

Tanner M.

Charlotte C.

Calvin G.

Miss Esau (Gr. 2/3) Natalie S.

Ms. Molloy (Gr. 3/4) Alison H.

Gracie K.

Cole M.

Mme Lemke (Gr. 4/5) Erika I.

Adam M.

Payton C.

Mr. Dodman (Gr. 6/7) Hayden S

Noah H.

Robert W.

Madyson L.

Miss Whittal (Gr. 8) Nicolaas D.

Jack L.

Cassandra M.

Maddy L.

Sierra M.

Avery W.

Mr. Nicholls (FS) Ashley B.

MAY NEWSLETTER DRAW FOR A PRIZE

My child(ren) ______________________________ Class(es) and I have read the newsletter. Question: After reviewing the titles in the Parent Lending Library, are there any other topics that you would like to see in our parent lending library? _____________________________________________ _____________________________________________ _____________________________________________

Thank you for completing

(Please return to the Office)

MAY NEWSLETTER WINNERS

The winners for the May newsletter are the Cullen Family and the MacDonnell family. Each family will receive two free large pizzas from Gino’s.

Congratulations and thank you for your feedback. Thank you Gino’s for supporting having two family win-ners from Grand Avenue School each month.

THANK YOU

GINO’S PIZZA

NED Presentation—May 28

Never Give Up!

Encourage Others!

Do Your Best!