General News
My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour…, Luke 1:46b-47
It was good to have great attendance at our parent-teacher conferences. The mission of the school states that we “assist parents” in the education of children of the covenant. These conferences allow us to strengthen that bond between home and school as we do this work together. One of the hallmarks of reformed education ties into this- Bound In Unity. May God graciously provide for us as we seek to magnify Him in the work that is done here.
The past few weeks have been abuzz in the school with four pre-service teachers busy honing their skills in different classrooms. We say farewell to Miss Marissa Lof who was in Grade 2 with Mrs. Vanderee, Miss Makayla Kruisselbrink who was in grade 5 with Mrs.Kelly, Miss Claire DeVries who was in the other grade 5 with Miss VanderLaan and Mrs. DeBoer, and Mr. Ben Kampen who was in grade 8 with Mrs. Tesfaye. We enjoyed your company and wish you continued blessings as you return to Covenant Canadian Reformed Teachers College to continue in your studies. May your experiences here help develop you in your training as a teacher.
Our students actively participated in the Remembrance Day Poster and Literature Contest. The folks from the Legion stated that we had one of the larger contributions to this competition. We congratulate all of the students who participated in this contest. With our “larger contribution” also came a good array of rewards. Congratulations to:
Avery Watson – 1st place for colour poster (Primary)
Hailey VanPykeren – 2nd place for colour poster (Primary)
Eden Rozema – 3rd place for colour poster (Primary)
Emmett Evers – 1st place for B&W poster (Junior)
Aiden Schulenberg – 2nd place for colour poster (Junior)
Corban Brasz – 3rd place for colour poster (Junior)
Azlynne Lof – 1st for colour poster and 1st for poem (Junior)
Claire Hummel – 1st for essay and 3rd for poem (Junior)
Arli VandenOever – 2nd place for poem (Junior)
Sophia Witten – 3rd place for B&W poster (Junior)
Continue to encourage your children to read. For this week of reading month, we will be logging our reading. Encourage your children to fill their log as we track how much JCCS reads in a week!
It has come to my attention that there is some confusion about dropping children off at school. The turning circle is to be used during school hours to drop off and pick up your children. You cannot use the turning circle before school and at the end of the school day when the busses need it. In those cases, please drop your children off in front of the school and tell them to use the sidewalk. I’ll end with a gentle reminder to be careful with your speed in the parking lot. We want to keep this a safe place for our students.
This Chronicle arrives in your inbox one day early. Tomorrow, we hope to immerse ourselves in developing curriculum for Science.
May the LORD bless and strengthen you this weekend.
JVI
Tuesday – Volleyball Practice, Board Meeting
Wednesday – K, 5 Skating
Thursday – Volleyball Practice
Classroom News
Kindergarten
It was such a blessing to be able to meet with all of the kindergarten parents this week! Book Character Day was a hit in the kindergarten classroom. All students came dressed up and they were so excited to see each other’s costumes! They had a good chuckle at my costume (Pinkalicious) and Mrs. Visser’s costume (The Book With No Pictures). Next week we will be starting our reading challenge. The book logs will be going home today or on Tuesday. On Wednesday we plan on going skating. The Grade 8 students will be coming along to help us skate! We would love to have parent volunteers as well. If you are able to help, please send me an email to let me know. Here’s a look at next week’s schedule:
Monday – SH – Samarah
Tuesday – SH – Letty
Wednesday – Library day, skating, combined day
Thursday – SH – Mathias
Friday – SH – Logan
Grade 1
Book Character Day was a fantastic success in Grade 1! There were many giggles as each new character came walking down the hallway. We’ve completed our Church History stories about Church Life: The Worship Service. Next week we will turn our attention back to the Bible stories; beginning with the Israelite people in bondage to Pharaoh. In Language Arts we’ve been reading stories in our reader using the blending skills we’ve been honing these last few months. It’s such an exciting step in the students’ reading development and their joy is a delight to see! That’s all for this week! Have a blessed weekend!
Grade 2
It was so nice to see so many parents this week at the parent teacher meetings. 🙂 In Bible study this week we talked about Jesus being our good Shepherd and heard more about His stories and parables. In Science we did a lot of sorting liquids and solids, and searching around the classroom and our lunchpails for items to identify and sort. We also are looking at what it means when liquids and solids change state. Grade 2 is also looking forward to all the extra reading time they will have next week for the planned DEAR days for Reading Month. Have a great weekend and a blessed Sunday! BV&MB
Grade 3
It was so good to meet with all of you on Tuesday and Thursday evening. We thank the Lord for the communion of saints. Thank you for your encouragement and prayers.
May God continue to bless us in our tasks and that His name is magnified.
In Math, we began a new unit on subtraction. Ask us for some different strategies. We also started a new Church History unit dealing with church life. Ask us about the communion of saints.
Words: before, discover, enough, first
Memory Work: Psalm 15:1
Grade 4
It was another wonderful week in Grade 4. We are continuing some different concepts in math such as roman numerals and financial literacy. Grade 4A is working on their first coding unit and is doing excellent at debugging problems in code and understanding how to give instructions to a computer. We have started a unit in Church History on the household of faith, and are finishing up Owls in the Family in reading. Students are strengthening their skills of organization in writing. Grade 4B is starting on a large social studies project, so stay tuned for the final product! Grade 4A will be learning which province or territory they will research for their two-part project next week. Since we have been learning many Christmas program songs, students won’t have a memory text assigned for memory work.
Mrs. VA & Mrs. T
Monday:
Tuesday: Mapping Quiz #2 4A (Provinces & Capitals)
Wednesday: Vocabulary Test – Owls in the Family (4A); Mapping Quiz #3 (4B); French Script due (both classes)
Thursday: Library;
Friday: Spelling Test; Psalm 60:1
Spelling Words: Garbage, Became, Jail, Beside, Orange, Plane, Job, Broken, Change, Drove, Jungle, Where, Cage, Across
Grade 5
We bid farewell to our student teachers, Miss Kruisselbrink and Miss DeVries, as they have now finished their practicums and are headed back to the Teachers College. We thank them for all the work they did and wish them the Lord’s blessings moving forward! It was great to see and talk with so many parents this week for Parent-Teacher Conferences. We pray that these discussions will serve to benefit our work here at school as we seek to magnify the Lord. We had all kinds of book characters in our classrooms on Wednesday, and it was fun to see all the different costumes! We have begun our first Science unit and are learning about nutrition. We will be going skating next Wednesday from 1:15-2:15! Students are reminded to bring a helmet if they wish to play hockey. Parents are most welcome to join us. Devotions for next week are as follows:
5A – M. Lincoln, Tu. Joey, W. Nadia, Th. Logan, F. Seth
5B – M. Denver, Tu. Jonathan, W. Oden, Th. Sawyer, F. Jaelyn
Have an enjoyable long weekend! RK/KV
Grade 6
Congratulations to the students from 6B who won an award and money from the Legion for their Remembrance Day entry. We continue to practice the songs for the Christmas concert and have been keeping up with this very well. In art we have been showing value in a number of different ways. The students during Social Studies labelled the world map with a variety of items from the classroom and home and the country that they were made in. It was good to meet with the parents and discuss the progress of the students. May the LORD continue to bless our endeavours in teaching His covenant children. Have a blessed weekend. TB/CVA
Grade 7A
We are into the planning stages of our stir stick bridges, as we use Google Drawings to create a design for our structures. Our trip to Turkstra Lumber helped us configure trusses and envision design ideas. Mr. Abreu, the truss designer from Turkstra, has graciously offered to evaluate our end results. There were six options given for the New France unit ending project in History; be sure to ask your child which one they chose. Our next chapter in Math deals with expressions and equations. In Church History, Martin Luther will share his breakthrough and joy with others… what will be the reaction? Parent/Teacher interviews went well; what a blessing that Home/School have the same foundation! Enjoy your weekend.
Grade 7B
It was a blessing to sit down with parents this week to discuss their child’s progress thus far. As we look ahead, students can look forward to some changes in curriculum. We soon hope to start our public speaking unit while in history we are getting prepared for a hands-on project dealing with New France. Have a blessed long weekend. Cheers, Mr. J
Grade 8
We are working our way through Tom Sawyer and should be in Chapter 11 or 12 by the time you read this. Count on a Chapter 3 Geography Test on Thursday next week. In History, there is an ongoing Confederation assignment. We are also tying up the end of Part 1 Ministry of Christ unit this next week, with a test planned for Nov. 30th. Our coding/geometry units will also be finished next week, and we will resume our regular scheduling for Math. We will be working on both our newest writing assignment (recess 5 paragraph essay) and planning for/presenting our demonstrative speeches over the next few weeks. Please check in with your student to make sure they have practiced several times at home before presenting in class. Wishing you a blessed extended weekend, AL, RT