Month End Wrap Up - Nov. 2016

IMPORTANT DATES Dec. 23rd holidays begin

Jan. 9th—Classes resume

CHOOSE TO MATTER—GATORS CARE! Gators Care is happy to announce our December activities.

We are holding a food drive for Community Care, a pyjama day

on Dec. 6th to raise money to buy pjs for children at Women's

Place, and we are creating beautiful holiday art to adorn the

walls of local nursing homes. Our Gators are doing a fantastic

job and earning brag tags all the time. Please encourage your

children to continue their culture of mattering, in the commu-

nity and with family and friends, this holiday season.

I matter, you matter, we all matter!

HOLIDAY COMMUNITY NIGHT WITH BAKE

AND HOT BEVERAGE SALE! A reminder that our Holiday Community Night is on Dec. 13th

from 5-6:30pm. We will have basket raffles, bake sales, cof-

fee and hot-chocolate sales & activities for students to par-

ticipate in throughout the school. As this is a family evening,

please do not send students un-supervised! Parents who are

helping to bake are asked to drop off donations for the bake

sale at the school office the morning of. If you or your busi-

ness are donating a gift basket for the raffle, please call Mrs.

Jones to let her know! Thank you! See you on the 13th!

FROM THE OFFICE Just a reminder that ALL STUDENTS should be at school by

8:40 am each day when our entry bell rings so they can begin

their day on time. Every time a child is late, they not only

miss out on their own learning, but disrupt the learning of oth-

ers by interrupting class. If you have an appointment and will

be late/absent, kindly call Mrs. Jones {905-684-4359} and

leave a message. If arriving late for any reason, have stu-

dents sign in at the office, and send students off to class

with their late slips independently. If you need to pick your

130 Woodrow Street St. Catharines, ON L2P 3T7 905-684-4359 app@dsbn.org

Achieving Success Together

PUBLIC SCHOOL

AN IMPORTANT MESSAGE ABOUT

INCLEMENT WEATHER PROCEDURES There may be times during the school year where inclement

weather or other situations could cause transportation can-

cellations or school closures.

At times when student transportation has been cancelled and

schools remain open, the decision of whether or not to have

children in school on that day rests with the parent/guardian.

Should you decide not to send your child to school in the

event that transportation is cancelled but schools remain

open, or if your child is ill or late, please ensure that you call

your child’s school to inform them of your child’s absence.

A key resource in any emergency is the DSBN Emergency

Information form that you filled out at the beginning of the

school year. Please let the school know of any changes in con-

tact information or procedures you wish to be followed

throughout the school year.

Information about transportation cancellations and school

closures will be available as soon as it is available through the

following channels:

Websites:

http://www.dsbn.org/inclementweather or www.nsts.ca

Subscription Features:

DSBN Facebook or Twitter

NSTS Transportation Delay or Cancellation Alerts

Phone:

Niagara Student Transportation Services 905-346-0290

Radio Stations:

CKTB (610 AM) St. Catharines

CHRE (105.7 FM) St. Catharines

WAVE (94.7 FM) Hamilton

CHTZ-FM (97.7 FM) St. Catharines

CKOC (1150 AM) Hamilton

2DayFM (105.1 FM) Niagara

CHML (900 AM) Hamilton

K-LITE-FM (102.9 FM) Hamilton

CHAM (820 AM) Hamilton

GIANT FM (91.7 FM) Welland

Y-108(107.9) Hamilton

Television Stations:

CHCH – Hamilton, CTV Toronto

Cogeco Channel 10 (Jack.Custers@cogeco.com)

child up early, we need you to come up to the office and sign

them out before they leave. Thanks for your help in keeping

our young gators safe!

HOUR OF CODE We live in a world surrounded by technology. And we know

that whatever field our students choose to go into as adults,

their ability to succeed will increasingly depend on under-

standing how technology works.

But only a tiny fraction of us are learning how technology

works. Only 1 in every four schools teach computer science.

That’s why our entire school is joining in on the largest learn-

ing event in history: The Hour of Code, during Computer Sci-

ence Education Week (December 5-11). More than 100 million

students worldwide have already tried an Hour of Code.

Our Hour of Code is making a statement that Applewood P.S.

is ready to teach these foundational 21st century skills. To

continue bringing programming activities to your students, we

want to make our Hour of Code event huge.

See http://hourofcode.com/ca for details.

Sincerely, Mrs. Vince

D2L In an effort to enhance communication and support student

learning, we will be incorporating the use of Desire2Learn

(D2L) into our program. This is a web based learning manage-

ment system that will allow us to post important information

and content into a secure online environment.

What makes D2L secure?

The Ministry of Ontario has purchased the license to D2L (a

company based out of Kitchener, Waterloo) and has rights to

all of the information on its server. Therefore, we have legal

rights to all of the content posted. As well, D2L is username

and password protected and cannot be accessed by anyone

other than the student with the proper login information.

To access our class website, students go to

dsbn.elearningontario.ca. Students can access D2L

using the same username and password as they do to log into

school computers. If username and passwords are sent home,

the intent is that parents use the login cards to help students

log into D2L. The goals being that students can log in inde-

pendently and that parents and students can engage in mean-

ing dialogue to support learning. This is great way to increase

the home/school connection.

Hopefully you are as excited as we are to log in and stay con-

nected. If you have any questions or concerns with regards to

the use of D2L, please feel free to contact us.

See you online,

DREAMBOX All students at Applewood have access to Dreambox math

software from school and at home! This software runs on a

standard computer or on the I-Pad. Students are familiar

with log-in from a standard computer via our School Web

Page, but need to access I-Pads differently. The pass-code

for the I-pads is 42cv/applewood Please log in under school

when accessing the program! To access the program from a

desktop or laptop computer, use the link on our school web-

page and use the student log-in!

FROM THE OFFICE—DREAMBOX CHALLENGE Students at Applewood are excited about our ‘DreamBox Chal-

lenge’. Students are competing to see which individual will

demonstrate the greatest amount of academic growth on

Dreambox. A super prize will be announced shortly! The con-

test period runs from December 1st until January 8th, so en-

courage your children to log some math time on DreamBox

during the Holiday Break! Play to Learn, Play to Win!

NOTE FROM PUBLIC HEALTH! Stop the spread of Infection!

-Stay home if you are sick and return when you are well

-Wash your hands with soap and water or use hand santizer

-Cover your cough or sneeze with a tissue or in your sleeve

-Keep your distance -Get a flu shot

For more information, talk to your school nurse or go to

www.niagararegion.ca/health

WHEN TO KEEP YOUR CHILD AT HOME! Please keep your child at home and away from others if they

have any of these symptoms:

Fever Diarrhea Vomiting Rash Frequent coughing or sneezing Yellow or green discharge from the nose, ears, or eyes Sore throat

Contact your family doctor for advice about care and treat-

ment. For more information, talk to your school nurse or go to

www.niagararegion.ca/health

CLEAN YOUR HANDS! Cleaning your hands is the most effective way to prevent the

spread of germs. Regular hand cleaning with soap and water,

or an alcohol based hand sanitizer will reduce the risk of get-

ting sick.

Cleaning your hands should occur:

Before preparing meals

Before eating

After using the washroom

After coughing or sneezing

After blowing your nose

After playing with pets

After playing outdoors

Use warm water and soap and lather and scrub for at least 15

seconds if your hands are visibly dirty.

For more information, talk to your school nurse or go to

www.niagararegion.ca/health.

Thank your child’s teacher this holiday with a tribute gift

to the Foundation.

All proceeds provide basic necessities for DSBN students!

An acknowledgement holiday card will be sent to your

teacher in your child’s name!

Visit efnniagara.ca to donate! Or call 905-641-2929 x

37712 or email efn@dsbn.org

Student Reading Assessment Targets in BAS A guide to help parents know how well their child should be reading in various grades.

LITTERLESS LUNCH Did you know that packing a disposable lunch cre-

ates about 30 kilograms of waste every school

year? That means that you and 200 of your clos-

est friends at school generate almost 8,000 kilo-

grams of lunch garbage.

That’s more than 600 bags every year – enough to

stink up your gymnasium!

Switching to a smart or garbage free lunch will

cut down on the waste in your school. It’ll also

keep garbage from entering the environment and

clogging landfills that are already full to the

brim!

Let your family know that you plan on going litter-

less with your lunches. They’ll probably jump for

joy when they learn that they’re usually cheaper

than a pre-packed garbage-grubbing version!

Swap disposable forks and spoons, juice boxes

and plastic bags for:

Reusable containers, like Tupperware or stain-

less steel

Fresh fruits and veggies (bonus, they come in

their own wrappers!)

Cloth napkins or napkins made from recycled ma-

terial

Stainless-steel forks and spoons

Reusable drink containers

A reusable lunchbox or bag

You can also get creative and design your own

lunch bag out of cloth, or find an old-school tin

lunchbox and decorate it up with stickers!