December 2019 Newsletter Dear Parents/Caregivers:

We’re not sure where the last three months have gone, but it’s already December! We have had a terrific year so far and we are so thankful for all the blessings that come our way each day at FMT. We’ve completed a successful term,

focused on developing literacy and numeracy skills, and using Flex to support and enhance learning.

Most importantly, our students have had many opportunities to learn together, pray together and play together to help build our caring FMT community.

During this Christmas Season, we sometimes get so busy that we forget about the true importance of the Christmas and Advent Season. We are blessed to have the opportunity, in our schools, to celebrate and speak about this significant event in our church’s history. So, let’s not forget that there is so much more to Christmas than Santa Claus and that the birth of Jesus is the most important part of the Christmas Season.

We ask God to bless the families and staff of the FMT community and to fill their Christmas with Peace and Joy.

Have a Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year,

Jeff Fillion Principal

“Our Faith in God and the love we share with one another—these are the things that mean the most.”

DECEMBER 2019-January 2020 Key Dates

December

2 Immunizations for Gr. 9

2 Term 2 Tri-Semester Options Begins (G7)

5 Parent/Student/Teacher Conference 1:30 - 4:30pm / 6:00 - 8:00pm

* Christmas Break 21 to January 5

5 Parent - Student - Teacher conference (1:30-4:30 and 6:00-8:00) Login to book your appointments: http://www.schoolinterviews.ca/ EVENT CODE: fmtjh Site is active at 4:00 pm, MOnday, December 2, 2019

9-13 Drumming Residency for all students

19 Advent Celebration @ Corpus Christi (10:30 am) FULL DAY

20 Renaissance Rally - Early Dismissal (12:00)

Dec 24-Jan 4 ***Christmas Break***

January

6 Classes resume

20 School Advisory Council Meeting - 7pm in Library - all are welcome

23 Musical Showcase Evening 7pm

24 Basketball Jamboree - Juniors

PARENT/STUDENT/TEACHER CONFERENCES As we end the first term of the school year, we encourage all parents and students to attend parent/student/teacher conferences on Thursday, December 5. There will be afternoon and evening appointments scheduled between 1:30 - 4:30 and 6:00 - 8:00. These conferences provide you, as parents, with an opportunity to learn more about your child’s academic achievements and progress this term. All students are encouraged to attend and be a part of the conference process. * These fill up quickly. If you are unable to secure a suitable slot with one or more teachers, we invite you to email or call that staff member to connect at another time in December, before or after school. Please book your conference times by visiting our appointment booking website: http://www.schoolinterviews.ca/login ENTER EVENT CODE: u6jeb (The site is currently not open but will be active as of December 2nd, 2019 at 4PM)

Father Michael Troy School Parent Advisory Council 2019 Poinsettias Fundraising Sale

Father Michael Troy School Parent Advisory Council is fundraising once again with Ever-Green Greenhouses. The money raised will help to subsidize field trips and other school activities, which our fundraising from casino funds cannot cover. The orders will be delivered and ready for pick-up at Father Michael Troy School on December 4, with pick up on December 4 from 2:00-4:30 pm.

Thank you for your continued support of our school.

If you have any questions, please call Debbie Greenwood, Fundraising Coordinator, at 780-995-6733 or email debbie@netalberta.com.

SCHOOL FEES If you have not yet paid your school fees, please click here to access PowerSchool and Select School Fees. If you have any issues, please contact the school office. Drumming Residency Aaron Zorthian will be joining us at FMT to celebrate our indigenous peoples. Aaron will be spending 45 minutes with each class throughout the week.

Closed Campus

In the interest of student safety, Father Michael Troy is a closed campus. All students must stay on campus during school hours. For parents who permit their child to go home throughout the year for lunch, the school will require a written note indicating so.

Musical Showcase

January 23 @ 7:00 p.m.

Help us bring some warmth to a blustery January evening as we celebrate the artistic talents of the students of FMT. Please join us at our Musical Showcase on Thursday, January 23 at 7:00 p.m. Our celebration will feature all 7, 8 and 9 Band students as well as our Jazz Band and Choir.

Renaissance Rally 2019 & Talent Show

The Renaissance Program continues to celebrate and recognize the academic achievements of our students as well as the effort that this achievement requires. Our 16th Annual Renaissance Rally will be held on Friday, December 20, 2019 beginning at 10:30 am and ending by noon (school dismissal at noon).

Parents are invited to join in the fun and entertainment as we celebrate our success and showcase the talent of FMT students at the Rally. Congratulations to our Renaissance Student Team for their efforts in helping Renaissance be so successful!

Congratulations to our Renaissance Student Team for their efforts in helping Renaissance be so successful!

Alisha A., Ianna B.,Jayden B., Antonio C., Ethan C., Mackenzie C., Krista C., Joshua D., Caitlyn F., Grace G., Zyryll I., Milana J., Mataya M., Rhys N., Taylor N., Renton N., Ammy P., Jessy P., Morgen S., Jericho S., Estelle S., Josephine V.

STAY NEWSLETTER- DECEMBER

Assertiveness Training for Our Children

We want children to be able to stand up for themselves and learn to interact well with their peers. Teaching them to be assertive and self-confident, as opposed to aggressive or submissive, contributes to their social and emotional development. Children who are aggressive blame, name call, threaten or fight with their peers. They are combative because they often lack social skills. These children need to learn better ways to interact with others or they will continually have difficulty developing positive relationships. If children are submissive, they may become targets for bullies. These children need to be taught that it is okay to say “no” if a child or adult attempts to harm them with words or deeds. They need to be able to identify their feelings, learn how to express themselves, and believe that they have rights. The more children trust and value themselves, the more likely they will be able to avoid bullying.

1. Teach the difference among aggressive, submissive and assertive remarks. For example:

● Aggressive (being mean): “Give me that book or you’re going to get it!”

● Submissive (being weak): “You can have my book. I don’t need it.”

● Assertive (being strong): “I’m reading this book now. You may have it when I’m finished.”

2. Have them practice looking a bully in the eye and saying “No!” with a strong voice (see Teaching Children Refusal Skills). They could also state what they want. For example, “No, I want you to leave me alone,” or “No, I need to do my work.”

3. Explain that they have a choice of how to respond to another person’s comments or to situations (see Making Choices Activity).

4. Teach children how to ask for something (see 24 Ideas for Instilling Manners in Children). For example, “May I have that book when you’re finished?” and how to respond to requests in a polite manner, “You may have it after me.”

Teach children that if they are physically threatened or feel afraid they need to tell an adult (see Tattling Versus Reporting). However, encourage them to work out other relationship problems themselves. Explain that the use of “I message” helps children deal with their difficulties in an assertive way. “I message” format:

● I feel ... (state the feeling)

● when you ... (describe the action)

● because I ... (say why) - A child is left out of play. (“I feel unhappy when you won’t let me play because I let you play when you ask. I want to play with you.”)

- A child is told he/she must give up his snack or be beaten up. (“I feel angry when you threaten me because that’s not how we are supposed to act at school.”) December 2019

We’re waiting for Jesus like Mary, We’re waiting for Jesus the Lord. Come down, Lord Jesus! Come quickly, Lord Jesus! The whole world is waiting for Love, The whole world is waiting for Love. (Misetich, The Whole World is Waiting for Love) The lyrics of this beautiful hymn capture the essence of the Advent season. Just like our Holy Mother, who said “yes” to God, we are excitedly waiting for the birth of Jesus, our Saviour. We will spend the upcoming weeks preparing our hearts to welcome that greatest of gifts, God’s love, made flesh, in the form of a tiny babe in a humble manger. It

is a time for us to gaze inward and find some silence and peace in the busyness of our days and the noise of the world around us to focus on this love. This is truly the grace of getting ready for Christmas! The Division Satisfaction Survey will run from November 25 - December 6. Every household will receive one parent survey per child enrolled in an Edmonton Catholic School. Please respond to each survey separately from the point of view of each child's educational experience. You can either return your parent survey to your child’s school or use the postage paid envelope and Canada Post. If you don’t receive your survey, or if you would like more information about a question as it relates to your school, please phone the principal. The voice of our parents is so important to us! The recent provincial budget is a difficult one. Edmonton Catholic Schools is committed to keeping services to classrooms intact for the rest of this school year and to strategically and thoughtfully managing decreased provincial funding for the 2020-21 year. This will require us to draw on our reserves as an interim measure and to scrutinize all non-essential spending for the remainder of the year. We are grateful to have, due to prudent long-term financial management, the emergency resources in place to allow us to provide uninterrupted educational services to our students for the remainder of the school year. We are in the process of determining the impact that the current budget will have on transportation user fees and will report our findings as soon as possible to give families time to budget accordingly. Our Board will approve our Budget at the December 17, 2019 Public Meeting of the Board, and they will continue to advocate for appropriate per pupil funding to meet student needs and address enrolment growth. I leave you with a beautiful Advent message from Pope Francis during an Address last year: “We Christians are called upon to preserve and spread the joy of waiting: we await God Who loves us infinitely and at the same time we are awaited by Him. In this way, life becomes a great period of betrothal. We are not left to ourselves, we are not alone. We are visited, now already.” (12/01/18) Have a blessed December and a wonderful Christmas Break, enjoying the love of your family and friends, and the love of our God! Sincerely, Joan Carr Superintendent

Storytelling and the Wisdom of Time

Over the summer, I read a new book by Pope Francis: Sharing the Wisdom of Time.

When Pope Francis was praying one day, he received an inspiration to shed light on the role grandparents and seniors play in the lives of their children and grandchildren. He began to preach about the need for the world to pay attention to the wisdom we gain from them. Then, another idea

began to take shape. Over 250 elderly people worldwide were interviewed, their stories shared with Pope Francis, and together with his personal reflections, all was captured in a book on the gift of wisdom.

One such story is that of Maria Gabriella Perin, a mother and grandmother from Italy. Maria was only nine months old when her dad died shortly after the end of World War II. She grew up wondering what it would have been like to have a father. As a young woman, she met a young man, and over a number of years broke up and reunited with him at least a hundred times, she says. While they never married, a child was born, a boy named David. Now much older himself, David awaits the birth of his first born. Maria eventually found new love and married.

Maria looks back at her life and ponders about different paths and courses that could have shaped her life otherwise.

In her own words, she writes: “What I know is that God makes stories. In his genius and mercy, he takes our triumphs and our failures and weaves beautiful tapestries that are full of irony. The reverse of the fabric may look messy with its tangled threads – the events of our lives – and maybe this is the side we dwell on when we doubt. But the right side of the tapestry displays a magnificent story, and this is the side that God sees.”

In Pope Francis’ response to Maria’s story, he writes: “What complicated stories we live! Threads are woven. And sometimes we understand, and sometimes we do not understand what we are experiencing. But God looks at us with the eyes of a creator and of an artist who is capable of organizing our mistakes, our sins, and the good things as if they were all parts of a tapestry. On that tapestry, there is good and bad, death and life. If I look at my life, I like to think that the Lord would say with a smile, ‘Look what I did with all your mistakes!’ When older people gaze on life, often they know instinctively what lies behind the tangled threads. They can sense the shape.”

The Holy Father then adds his own wisdom: “Often, mistakes are the raw material of miracles. Peter’s mistake of denying Jesus led him to the miracle of tears. The mistake of the prodigal son showed the mercy of the father. The mistake of the lost sheep revealed God’s care and desire to bring each sheep home.”

May we truly appreciate the gift of our grandparents and all elders. May their stories inspire younger generations with wisdom.

As we begin our preparations for Christmas, take some time to sit and listen to the elderly in your family. Invite them to reflect on what the Christmas Story and the birth of Our Saviour Jesus Christ means to them. In some sense, they are the Magi of today, the Three Wise Persons who have come to lead us to adore and worship Emmanuel – God With Us!

God bless!

Bishop David