September 14, 2019

Principal’s Message:

It has been another great week at Langley Meadows Community School.  Students have been settling into classroom routines, making new friendships and working hard.  Our youngest learners have completed gradual entry and are moving looking forward to Monday, a full day in kindergarten.  Our oldest learners have signed up to be leaders in so many ways – K Watch leaders, Lunch Time Monitors and crosswalk duty.  A big thank you to Mrs. Brenneman for organizing our grade 4 and 5 in these service opportunities, along with training them, and coordinating with teachers.

Parents often want to know how to make the year an excellent one for their children and there are some easy ways to support school learning.  Students can’t learn or socialize well if they are hungry.  Filling the lunch kits with lots of healthy options makes a big difference.  If mornings are harried, Langley Meadows Community Association hosts a breakfast program every day beginning at 8:00 am in our Learning Commons.

The more we learn about sleep, the more we know how critical it is.  School aged children need 10 to 12 hours a night but in Canada we are seeing that we have a sleep crisis on our hands, with many children not getting the sleep that they need.  Overtired children can present like children with attention issues, often have decreased memory functions, and struggle to self-regulate.  Lack of sleep can be the root of learning problems and is an easy fix.  Setting a regular  bedtime and creating positive bedtime routines, such as a book before bed, can help get your child the sleep needed to be successful.

Read, read, read!  The only homework for kindergarten to grade 5 students highly correlated with high school completion and long-term academic success is reading.  Reading at home should always be fun reading.  Children can read to parents, parents can read to children, and families can read to each other.  Keeping it both fun and consistent is a key to long-term academic success.  Our teachers have home reading programs and many sent these home this week.  Over the next few newsletters, we will highlight many strategies and supports for parents for home reading.

Finally, being connected to your child’s school allows you to support the work at school while showing your child how important education is.  This week we have our Meet the Teacher evening on Thursday, September 19th from 6 to 7 pm.  This is an open house format for all grade 1 to 5 classrooms.  Our kindergarten teachers have already met with each parent and their classrooms will not be open on Thursday evening.  Please try to drop in, see your child’s classroom and make a connection with his or her teacher.

I look forward to seeing you Thursday!

Warmly,

Beth Cairnie, Principal

Learning from our Week Together:

Thursday morning brought a special treat for our breakfast program and our students.  Beljam’s waffles served up fresh and hot waffles for us at our Breakfast Club.  A huge thank you to   of Beljam’s for this donation of time and food!  And kudos also goes to our parent volunteers and our LMCA leaders for making this special morning possible!

The Week at a Glance:

Upcoming Events:

September 18 – Volunteer Training 9:00 am in the Library

September 19 – Meet the Teacher 6:00 pm

September 20 – School Improvement Day – no classes for students

September 26 – Terry Fox Assembly and Run 1:00 pm

September 30 – Orange Shirt Day

Agenda Calendar Issues

Apologies to you from our LMCS team.  Apparently our draft school calendar and not our final calendar was printed in the Agendas last June.  Staff are removing these sheets with students and sheet of the final dates was to be sent home late last week.  All the dates are also on our website calendar and we sincerely apologize for any inconveniences this error created.

Emergency Preparedness

While no one likes to think long about a major disaster, schools want to be prepared.  Last year, the Langley School District hosted training with provincial experts so that we could begin to develop stronger school plans for emergency preparedness.  As a result of this learning, we have been working to develop systems that would best support all students in the case of a disaster and are moving to collective emergency supplies.

Instead of sending in comfort kits, we are purchasing and collecting supplies to ensure that all of our students would be cared for.  PAC has already purchased water for us all for the year and we are very grateful.  The school will purchase food supplies.  We are wanting to ensure that every child will have an emergency blanket (the aluminum type in a small rectangular package as this provides both warmth and also protection from the elements).  If you have some from previous comfort kits to donate, there is a bin in the front foyer.

We are also collecting tarps, one for each classroom.  This is great for sitting on as we await our grown ups to pick us up or to use in the building of shelters using the soccer goal posts.  If you have a tarp you wish to donate, please drop this off in the bin in the front foyer.  Tarps that are atleast 12 by 16 are preferable.

Finally, you may have emergency ponchos from past kits to donate and we will welcome those if you wish.

Any supplies still needed after donations will be purchased so as to ensure every child is equipped.

In an emergency, we do try to have students get their backpacks, coats and their lunch kits, depending on the level of damage in cloakrooms.  If you want to put an extra pair of socks and mittens in your child’s backpack, that may be of help to them.

Finally, we know by studying other disasters, that schools are places where people flock to and help out.  We also know that most students are picked up from an emergency within the first twelve hours.  As you complete your verification forms, it is strongly suggested that you have an emergency contact who can pick your children up who is within walking distance of the school, such as another family.  This can help to get your children to a safer, warmer place sooner.  

As we work through preparedness this week, as discussed at our PAC meeting, we would like to practice a full earthquake drill and release.  We will need parents or grandparents to help us out with this so that we can rehearse the critical safety work of handing off students to their contacts.  More information will be shared at PAC meetings and also through newsletters.

Volunteer Training:

Our volunteer training has been moved to Wednesday, September 18 at 9:00 in the library.   If you are a regular volunteer in the school, please try to make this presentation.  If you are not available this day, a second presentation is being offered prior to the PAC meeting at 6:15 on October 10.

ALL volunteers must complete the volunteer safety check.

We love grandparents!  If you have grandparents who are keen to volunteer in our school, please invite them to the presentation and they too can complete a form.  There are so many ways to help out, from supporting our breakfast program, to listening to students read, to helping with special day crafts and Aboriginal presentations.  It takes a village to raise a child and seniors have so much to share with us!

Terry Fox Run

This year, our focus is “Don’t be afraid to Stand Out!”  As we remember the inspiring work of the late Canadian Terry Fox, we focus on being difference-makers, standing out in all the great ways we can.  Permission slips and an information letter went home this week.  Please note that our kindergartens will do a Little Fox run on school grounds.  Parents and preschoolers are alway

Twitter Account

Celebrating great learning and amazing community is what we love to do.  There is so much to be proud of and Langley Meadows has a twitter account for these reasons.  This account is used for sharing learning and shouting out about the awesomeness of our community.

In an emergency or school closure, we use every means possible to let you know: email, websites (ours and the District) and Twitter.  Let’s hope we don’t need to do this!

You can follow us at:

@MeadowsMustangs

School Improvement Day

Friday, September 20th, there are no classes for students as staff in Langley work collaboratively around school goals and whole team professional development.  At Meadows, our support staff will be attending Crisis Prevention and Intervention training, a chance for them to receive this vital workshop to support students with diverse needs.  Teaching staff will be working together to review our past goals, establish our school wide “why” and to look carefully at the District Goal for literacy success for all.  They will also enjoy some time collaborating together to set grade level goals and directions.  Thank you for making alternate arrangements for your children to allow for this productive day.

Cross Country Running

This amazing opportunity starts soon!  Look for more information coming to you this week  as we organize this great season of activity.

PAC NEWS from your PAC Executive Team: 

Entertainment Books:

Entertainment Books are a great way to save your family money with local coupons and raise money for the school all at the same time!  All ordering and payments will be made through our online Fun Lunch System https://lmcs.hotlunches.net.  Ordering will be available from Sept 11-27th.  Thank you to Kara Powell for heading up this fundraiser for our school!

Orange Shirt Day: