FEBRUARY 2018 Hello WES families, The month of January seemed to go by rather quickly, yet looking back, there certainly we

re a lot of activities that took place. We are also at the half way mark of the school

year. Yes, hard to believe! At this point in the year, we begin to prepare for our next rep orting periods. Kindergarten Pro gress Reports will be going home shortly followed by Grade 1-4 Learning Summaries in early March. Our goal, however, is to ensure that you are always aware of and engaged in the learning that is happening with your child(ren) through regular feedback.

The Friendship Rainbow is leading much of our work at WES. The month of January was “Be Kind (blue), Be Caring (white)”. We took time to think and talk about what this means; how do we show it, share it, capture it. At our January assembly, we dressed in blue and /or white and we shared a presentation that had photos and videos of students and staff being Kind and Caring. Our focus for February is Be Respectful (pink). Our assembly will be February 28th, which is our “wear pink” day, but is also Pink Shirt Day across the country representing anti bullying. https://www.pinkshirtday.ca/ We will have pink bracelets for sale in the office for a toonie if any students would like to purchase one. And so, as we begin this month of Respect, please talk about respect. We show respect in many ways every day that we may not even realize! Respect occurs when we: listen to others, play fair, use good manners, wait our turn, compliment someone, pick up after ourselves, leave things better than how we found them, etc.. We have the Friendship Basket in the library. We ask students to write down what Respect means to them and place it in the cauldron. We will use these in the morning announcements and place them on our Respect bulletin board throughout the month.

At our January Assembly, we officially shared our new school logo. Staff all wore their new t-shirts and we also have a banner which was recently unrolled at the Knights of Columbus Track Meet where our grade 4 track teams competed. Our next step is to find a mascot. There is an idea box in the library for students to place their creative ideas until Friday, Feb. 9th. We will unveil our mascot in March.

Students and staff will be away from school for the week of Feb. 19-23. Family Day is Monday, Feb. 19th. This holiday celebrates the importance of families and family life to people and their communities. There are many activities taking place in Warman and Saskatoon. I hope all of our WES families have something planned or are able to participate in any of the numerous activities offered throughout our local community or in other communities where you may be.

As we brace ourselves for a few more bouts of cold weather, please ensure your child(ren) wear appropriate clothing to school. There are always items in the lost and found boxes, so encourage your child(ren) to check there if they have any missing items. From your Admin Team

“TO BE ONE, TO BE UNITED IS A GREAT THING. BUT TO RESPECT THE RIGHT TO BE DIFFERENT IS MAYBE EVEN GREATER.” – BONO

Feb. 9 Winter Olympic Afternoon

Feb. 13 100 Days of School Spirit Day

Feb. 14 Pink, White and Red Spirit Day

Feb. 14 Valentine’s Day Booster Juice

Feb. 14 Kindergarten Progress Reports

Feb. 15 Kindergarten Progress Reports

Feb. 19- 23 Winter Break No classes

Feb. 26 Classes Resume

P.O. Box 510 403 4th Street West, Warman, Sk. S0K 4S0 Phone (306) 933-2066

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WES Family Tree

Our tree is growing! Please help us out by either sending a 4x6 picture to school with your child or by emailing us one to wes@spiritsd.ca. Your help in growing our tree is very much

appreciated!

News from Grade 1Vaagen Students are learning and growing as they read, write, and explore!

What are we reading, writing, and exploring? Students started the year off measuring and comparing capacity,

length, surface area, and mass. We are heading into February focused on adding and subtracting numbers to 12.

In Science, students have been exploring their five senses. We have learned about the sense of sight, touch, hearing, smelling, and

tasting! It has been fun exploring our senses and thinking about how important they are in our everyday lives.

In physical education we are practicing gymnastics skills. Students are combining locomotors, rolls, landings, and balances to create a

gymnastic routine to present to class. We are all very excited to view each other’s routines.

We are lucky to be enjoying some wonderful “Willow” literature and are listening attentively and trying to decide which book we like the

best! It’s going to be a tough decision! Students are also busy reading stories, identifying story elements, and retelling stories with detail. We have been very fortunate to share our reading with the elderly at the Warman Care Home. Students are always excited for

this opportunity! They truly shine when reading to their ‘Care Grandparents!’

Students will become poets in February. They will be busy learning and writing a variety of poems to create their very own Poetry

Journal. With February being the month of Valentine’s Day, students have been sharing what “love is” to them. Here are a few

of their ideas. Love is….

Love is giving hugs and kisses. Love is caring about people.

Love is caring for your family. Love is my stepdad.

Love is feeding a Minecraft dog. Love is listening to Minecraft songs.

Love is sleeping with my dog. Love is feeding a kitten.

Love is hugging my teddy. Love is being kind and nice.

Love is learning, growing, and sharing together. Students are very excited to celebrate “100 Days of Learning” on February 13! Wow, how time flies! This will be followed by a Valentine’s Celebration and some ‘Winter Olympic’ fun before we begin our next break!

School enrolment: We are proud of the strong school culture and the learning communities that have been developed at both Warman Elementary School and Traditions Elementary School over this school year. Our elementary schools in Warman benefit from balanced and stable student enrolments. Please note that moving your child from one elementary school in Warman to the other requires the approval of our Learning Superintendent, Mr. Kim Beaulieu (306-683-2840). A request of this nature will be considered if there are special circumstances. Thank you!

If your child will be 5 years old by December 31, 2018 (born in 2013), it’s time to start thinking about Kindergarten! Kindergarten registrations for the 2018/19 school year are now being accepted! Please contact the school to register your Kindergarten-aged child. We will be holding a Kindergarten Open House in early June. Details will be shared with registered families later this spring.

TO 1 VAAGEN!

In 2 WHITE Hello from 2BW! We have such a great group of kids this year with 12 boys and 6

girls! It seems that January just flew by as we have been so busy researching animals. Students worked hard to write their own non-fiction books and here are

some of the things they learned about their animals!

Taya – “Sharks can see a mile away.” Alivia – “Dolphins breathe through blowholes in their back.” Kylnee – “Giraffes have the longest neck of any animal in the world.” Amarpreet – “Eagles have sharp claws to catch slippery fish.” Nathan – “Labrador Retrievers have webbed toes.” Alex – “Sharks eat other sharks.” Parker – “Octopuses eat other octopuses.” Carter – “Honey Badgers go in other animal’s burrows.” Thane – “The wolf is the ancestor of all dogs.” Blake – “Bunnies live all over North America.” Aliviah – “Foxes will wrap their tails around their bodies to keep them warm.” Quinton – “Sea Otters have the thickest fur in the animal kingdom.” Logan – “Cats are omnivores.” Jack – “A king cobra’s hood can help it to float in the air during a sand storm.” Huxley – “Sharks have never ending teeth. If one falls out another grows in.” Jaxyn – “A lynx can see something as small as a mouse 250 feet away.” Endora – “Cats can see in the dark.” Tyler – “Cats have whiskers for feeling in the dark.”

2S is having a great year. We are a group of 21 friends who are having fun and learning together. So far in grade 2, we have learned: -about our Warman community-how to print neatly-new addition and subtraction strategies-about two dimensional and three dimensional shapes in geometry-about animal life cycles-to be kind and caring-about how to be better readers-how to be respectful to teachers and friends-about motion in science-how to share with our friends-how to assess our own writing-how to create some cool art projects-soccer and basketball skillsOur favourite subjects are Math and Art!

From, the awesome students of 2S

Warman Elementary School Choir is returning!

Miss Lloyd and Mrs. Tempel would like to invite students in Grades 3 and 4 to join our noon choir to

learn some songs for a performance at the Fine Arts Night on May 10th.

Practices will be held in Mrs. Tempel’s room on Thursdays from 12:15 – 12:40 beginning on March 15th. We look forward to having

another great turnout of enthusiastic and committed

singers!

We ask that all parents obey the parking and drop off signs at the front of the school and in our drop off lane. The bylaw officer will be issuing tickets for those continuing to park in non-parking areas and stopping in bus lanes during marked hours.

Pink Shirt Day Bullying is a major problem in our schools, workplaces, homes, and online. Over the month of February, and throughout the year, Pink Shirt Day aims to raise awareness of these issues, as well as raise funds to support programs that foster children’s healthy self-esteem. Warman Elementary will be selling Pink Shirt Day bracelets at the school

office for $2.00 each. On February 28, 2018, we encourage everyone to practice kindness and wear pink to symbolize that you do not tolerate bullying.

We have been having a wonderful season of track so far. 30 grade four students signed up for practices on Mondays and Fridays. Two girl teams and one boy team were able to make it to the semi-finals in the relay races at our first track meet. We are looking forward to our next meet on February 14th. Way to go everyone!

We have recently implemented a new school notification system called Alert Solutions. This notification system is loaded with new features that will make it easier for us to keep in contact with your family. To guarantee the

messaging system is used efficiently, we will need to confirm your contact information is accurate and up-to-date at all times. Alert Solutions allows our school to send messages using email, voice, and text messaging. Voice calls will be sent with 306-933-2066 as the caller ID number. You may want to add this phone number to your address book to help you recognize incoming calls from the school easily. Text messages will be sent using a caller ID of 25379. You may want to add this phone number to your address book as well. Please note you will not be able to reply to text messages sent from the school.

Grade 4 Basketball has begun! Mr. Pauls and Ms. Mattila-Bains will be working with grade 4 students on Tuesdays and Thursdays at noon. We plan to have some games with Traditions School in the coming weeks.

Winter Olympic Afternoon Since the Olympics are beginning next week, we thought we should celebrate it. We plan on having an outdoor Winter Olympic activity afternoon on Feb 9th. The nurses are on board and are currently thinking up some station ideas, but are certainly open to suggestions if you have any. As part of the celebration, we'll have classes dress in the Olympic Rings colours.

Kind. wears Green Grade 1 wears Blue Grade 2 wears Red Grade 3 wears Yellow Grade 4 wears Black

Before and After School Program is

available at Warman Elementary for the 2017/2018 school year. The program is run by The Boys and Girls Clubs of Saskatoon.

To register your child please visit the

website.

www.bgcsaskatoon.com

Cold Weather and Busing

As the weather begins to cool please ensure your child is dressed for the

weather. As we approach winter we want everyone

to be aware of the cold weather busing policy for Prairie Spirit School Division:

Buses will not run if the combined temperature/wind chill factors result in a reading of -40 degrees Celsius or below at 6:00 a.m. Buses that do not run at the

regular time in the morning due to weather will not to run at all on that same day even if the temperature warms up. Bus cancellations include busing within

the City of Warman.

Please note that even though the buses may not run, school is still on and parents

will need to find an alternate way of transporting their children to and from

school on that day.

Radio stations will no longer be contacted when there are bus cancellations

If the buses are cancelled for the day, the Bus Cancellations page on the P.S.S.D.

Division website will contain all of the buses affected after 6:00 a.m. You can

find the information at www.spiritsd.ca -click on Transportation and then the Bus

Cancellations tab.

All of the busing policy information can also be located on the Warman

Elementary web page at http://blogs.spiritsd.ca/wes/ - click on the Busing tab.

8:35 A.M: First Bell

8:40 A.M: Classes Begin 10:15 A.M: RECESS

10:30 A.M: Classes Resume 12:00 noon: LUNCH

12:25 P.M: LUNCH RECESS 12:45 P.M: Classes Resume

2:52p.m: Dismissal of Students

Milk is available each day at lunch for 75 cents. Milk

cards are also available for $15.00

Cell Phones and Devices

At WES, we consider ourselves a “device-free school”. Please do not send cell phones, iPods, iPads etc. to school. There may be times when a teacher will ask students to bring a device for an educational purpose but you will receive notice from the teacher. If emergencies arise, parents can always get in touch with their child(ren) by phoning the office.

Exterior Doors at WES

For safety reasons, all exterior doors are locked throughout the day except for the morning and over the recess and noon hour. The main entrance of the school is always open.

Extended Absences

If your child will be going on an extended leave from school (medical, vacation, etc.) please connect with your child’s teacher(s) and the office in advance.

Just a friendly reminder that we do not have supervisors available until 8:15a.m. Please be mindful of that when sending / driving

children to school in the morning. If you do require supervision for your child before that time please

utilize our Before and After School Program.

MILK

BELL TIMES

WES Before and After School Program

Family Health Information

• Pink Eye

• Dental Clinic Services

• Talking to Children about Sexuality

Find more family health info at: www.saskatoonhealthregion.ca

(Search: school newsletter inserts)

HEALTHY STUDENTS = BETTER LEARNERS

Warman Elementary School is in need of your great ideas for a new

Mascot? Enter your idea in our Mascot Idea Box located in the Library…deadline for entries is

Friday February 9th.

®

Home&SchoolWorking Together for School Success CONNECTIONFebruary 2018

© 2017 Resources for Educators, a division of CCH Incorporated

While the 2018 Winter Olympic Games are taking place thousands of miles away, your child can earn a “medal” in learning at home. Turn Olympic magic into educational gold with these suggestions.

ReadingSpeed skating, ski jump-

ing, luge…which Winter Olympics sports does your youngster enjoy watching? Head to the library together to pick out books about their history, the rules, and how the athletes train. Idea: Hold a “reading Olympics.” Let family members count the books they read in February. At the end of the month, everyone can award medals to their three favorites.

MathYour child will practice gathering,

recording, and calculating data to find out which of his favorite countries wins the most medals. Encourage him to divide poster board into four columns: “Country,” “Gold,” “Silver,” “Bronze.” In column one, he can list teams he’d like

I love you because…

Family members can share what they love about each other with this writ-ing activity. Have your youngster cut out paper hearts. Write love notes on them and hide for others to find. For example, maybe your child will put one under her sister’s placemat that says, “I love you because you make me laugh.”

On the road againCarpooling with other parents is a great way to save time and money—and to get to know your youngster’s classmates. When you drive, you’ll probably hear them discuss school, sports, and friends. Note: Ask parents about booster seats—if a child uses one in his parents’ car, he’ll need one in yours, too.

Indoor “recess”—at homeWhen winter weather keeps your family inside, ask your child to show you what she does during indoor recess at school. She could teach you games, crafts, or songs she enjoys. Then, encourage her to come up with new ideas to try at home or in class.

Worth quoting“Life itself is the most wonderful fairy tale.” Hans Christian Andersen

Q: Why did the orange lose the race?

A: Because it ran out of juice!

Olympic-sized learning SHORT NOTES

JUST FOR FUN

Decisions, decisionsLearning to make smaller decisions now will prepare

your youngster to make bigger ones later. Here are ways to build her decision-making skills:

● Hearing you think through your choices gives your child an example to follow. You might say, “I’d like to visit Aunt Sue tonight, but then I might not finish this proposal for work. I’ll go Saturday instead.”

● When possible, give your youngster two to three specific options. That way, she can make a decision without feeling overwhelmed. Example: “Do you want to sweep or dust?” rather than “Which chore would you prefer to do?”♥

to follow. Every day, have him check a newspaper or olympic.org and add tally marks for each country’s medals. After the Olympics end, he can total them up to see who got the most in each category.

Social studies Where in the world do the Olympic

athletes come from? To explore geogra-phy, help your youngster use a map to find countries represented in the Olym-pics. He might put star stickers on the countries on a wall map. Or let him print out a world map and make a dot on each competing country.♥

Sponsored by your School Community Council

© 2017 Resources for Educators, a division of CCH Incorporated

To provide busy parents with practical ideas that promote school success, parent involvement,

and more effective parenting.

Resources for Educators, a division of CCH Incorporated

128 N. Royal Avenue • Front Royal, VA 22630800-394-5052 • rfecustomer@wolterskluwer.com

www.rfeonline.com

ISSN 1540-5621

O U R P U R P O S E

Home & School CONNECTION® February 2018 • Page 2

Q: When my daughter studies for a test, she simply reads through her notes or textbook chapter once

and announces she’s finished. How can I help her study more effectively?

A: Reading is an important part of studying. But writing and drawing can help cement the information in her mind—in fun and interesting ways.

For example, if she’s studying a text-book chapter, she could write answers to

the end-of-chapter questions or even design her own quiz. When she studies with a classmate, they might write ques-tions on index cards and play “quiz show.”

Sketching pictures is another good study strategy. To prepare for a test on

planets, she can draw and label the solar system. Or she could draw pizzas and write fractions on the slices while study-

ing for a math test.♥

Study with a pencil in hand

An anti-bullying attitude

Having a positive attitude toward others can help to keep your youngster from participating in bullying. With these ideas, she’ll be more apt to be kind to others and want them to feel included.

1. Watch your words. Let your youngster know you expect her to speak kindly. Before she says something she’s unsure about, she could ask herself if she would want you to hear it. If she overhears another

student calling a classmate names or gossiping, she could counter the unkind words with nice ones. (“I hear you’re really good at gymnastics.”)

2. Accept everyone. Leaving people out on purpose is a form of bullying. Suggest that your child look for

chances to make others feel that they belong. For

example, she might ask to join someone who normally sits alone on the bus. Or she could invite a new student to her birthday party. She’ll see how good it feels to make someone’s day—and perhaps she’ll even gain a friend!♥

Safe to make mistakes My third grader, Mark,

gets discouraged when he can’t do something correctly right away. While he was practicing his typing skills, he said, “Forget it, I’m no good at this,” and walked away from the computer.

I told Mark that mistakes are part of learning. I admitted that when I was his age, I wanted to quit the violin because I couldn’t get the notes right on my favorite piece. Luckily, the school music teacher encouraged me to continue, and Mark knows that I enjoy playing the violin to this day.

To show Mark his mistakes were “stepping-stones,” I drew circles across a sheet of paper. Each time he made a mistake while typing, I suggested he cross out a stepping-stone and start the sentence again. I knew that if he kept trying, he’d type an error-free sentence before he got to the last stone—and I was right.

Now Mark has a way to track his progress with typing and other things that require persistence.♥

Inspired by art

Art unleashes your child’s imagina-tion and lets him practice fine-motor skills. Try these tips to encourage him to experiment.

Use natural supplies Challenge your youngster to find free

art materials right in your backyard! For instance, he might use sticks or feathers as paintbrushes. Or he could draw on rocks with colored chalk.

Try new formatsSuggest that your child arrange objects

(toys, fruits) on a table and sketch a still life. Or go outdoors where he can paint a land-scape of natural scenery like trees or a pond. If he wants to draw a portrait, he could ask a family member to pose—or look in a mirror and create a self-portrait.♥

Q&

A

PARENTTO

PARENT

ACTIVITYCORNER