Happy Holidays

It seems like just yesterday that we began another school year together and now we prepare for the another calendar year to pass.  At this time, I take the opportunity to wish you and your family well.  The staff members at Cameron Street Public School most certainly and sincerely appreciate the support and dedication of our school community.  To our students and to you, parents and family members, thank you.  Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.  However you and your family choose to recognize this season and this time of the year, it is our hope that you enjoy this time with each other.  Take time for family time.  As we know, time passes so quickly.  Cherish the time we have with each other.  We will see you and our students in 2011.  All the best!

Mr. Giffen

Cameron Street Students and the Sounds of the Season

We were pleased to take choirs of primary students recently to Rogers Television studios to tape the Holiday music special.  Thank you Mrs. Lockhart and thank you Doug Measures from Rogers Television.  The broadcast dates and times of this special are listed below!  If you subscribe to Rogers Television, then you will be able to see the show once (or as many times as you would like!).  It is exciting to know that on Christmas Eve (11:30 a.m.), the show will air on most Rogers Television stations across the province.

Mr. Giffen

Holiday 2010 - Collingwood
Date:                   Time:
Friday Dec 10        12-noon
                             5:00pm 
                             8:00pm
Sat. Dec. 11          12:30pm 
                              5:30pm 
                             10:00pm
Sat. Dec. 12           11:30am 
                               8:00pm
Sun. Dec. 13            8:00am 
                              12-noon
Tues Dec. 15            5:00pm
Wed Dec. 16           12:30pm 
                               7:00pm
Thurs Dec. 17          12-noon 
                               3:30pm 
                               5:00pm
Fri Dec. 18              12:30pm 
                               5:30pm 
                               10:00pm
Sat. Dec. 19             11:30am
                                2:30pm
                                5:00pm
                                8:00pm
Sun. Dec. 20             8:00am 
                               12-noon
                               
Wed Dec. 23            12:30pm
                                7:00pm
Thurs. Dec. 24          12-noon
                                5:30pm
Thursday Dec. 24  * All Ontario Channels of Rogers TV  various local cable channels -  11:30am  

Surprise, Surprise, Surprise!

Thank you to our School Council who planned and delivered a wonderful event at our school.  The Cameron Christmas Surprise was a holiday success thanks to planning and your presence.  Once again, we appreciate the support from you, our

Cameron Street

families and from our community.  Thank you to Aaron, Drew, Collingwood Town Council members, Collingwood Fire Fighters, Matt MacLean from 95.1 THE PEAK FM and other local celebrities who served breakfast to our many friends, families and neighbours who came.  Santa and his reindeer had a very busy weekend as they spent time here and at various parades in the area including Stayner, Creemore, Meaford and of course the Town of Collingwood parade yesterday. I appreciate our many staff members who worked hard to make our event such a success.  Once again, a heartfelt thank you to everyone!  I am very proud of our school, our accomplishments and our connection with the community.  

Cameron Cares about Giving

The holidays are coming.  In anticipation, we have many special events planned for the month of December.  Today, Ian Adams from the Collingwood Enterprise-Bulletin came to take a picture of a few of our students as we prepare to accept donations in our "Tis the Season for Giving Food Drive - December 1 to December 17".  Items collected will be donated to the Salvation Army Food Bank and to the Heritage Church, Collingwood.  We have issued a challenge to other schools in our area. 

Cameron's Christmas Surprise will take place next Saturday December 4, 9 to noon at the school.  Special guest servers will include Mayor Carrier and members of the council elect.  Collingwood Fire Fighters will also be flipping pancakes and serving our customers.  We welcome Drew Wright and Matt MacLean from 95.1 THE PEAK FM, not to mention Santa and some of his reindeer.  Come and visit the Christmas Marketplace and get some shopping done after breakfast.  Thank you for your contributions to our classroom Christmas Theme Baskets that will be created and available at the Surprise.  Listen to 95.1 THE PEAK FM this Friday morning as we are guests on the CHATS program.  We will also keep you posted on Saturday morning as we go live to air on 95.1 THE PEAK FM with Matt and other guests from the school.

Then, Sunday afternoon, December 5, watch for members of our Builders' Club, in partnership with Kiwanis, in the annual Town of Collingwood Santa Claus Parade.

Wednesday December 15, our Primary students (Junior Kindergarten to Grade 3) will celebrate the season with story and song.  There is an open house that afternoon in the Kindergarten classes and a special performance after school with students in Grades 1 to 3.

We look forward to seeing you at one or more of our special events this holiday season.

This morning, we welcomed cast members from Big Kid Entertainment Inc. Toronto who presented the story of Cinderella's Frog Prince.  This unique blend of fractured fairy tales included a very interesting and entertaining message about the fact that each one of us is different and that is what makes us special.  I had the opportunity to participate as the story teller, Mrs. Hare had a speaking part as well as one of our students from Grade 5. 

We learned that respect, acceptance, individuality, equality and friendship, patience and understading are important words to live and play by.  Also, we learned that it is important to accept and respect differences.  It is important to work together to make our school, our community and our world a better place.

Today, I visited Mrs. McFarlane's class and students shared their messages with me.

"In the story Cinderella's Frog Prince, I learned about respect.  Respect is when you include someone in your games."

"In the story Cinderella's Frog Prince, I learned about respect.  You treat others with the way you want to be treated."

"In the story Cinderella's Frog Prince, I learned when they got to be friends even if they are different."

"In the story Cinderella's Frog Prince, I learned you should include others."

I enjoyed it when the students read their messages to me and allowed me to include them in this blog.

Cameron Street is on the Path to Rogers Television

This year Kathi Wallace, our SCDSB Director of Education, introduced the Simcoe Path, Your Future...Our Priority.  The Simcoe Path sets out priorities for the next 3 to 4 school years.  Developed with input from trustees, staff, parents, community members and students, the goals and directions reflect key areas related to increased student achievement, increased parent and community engagement and ways to ensure exceptional services and opportunities to support learning.

The Simcoe Path includes 4 overall goals:

Relevant, purposeful learning supporting high achievement, well being and learning for life

Inclusive, equitable and safe learning and working environments

Confidence in public education

Responsible stewardship of resources

In our Cameron Street Public School Improvement Plan for student achievement, one particular area relates to our program and pathway.  Our overall school goal is:

Students will develop and maintain positive relationships with others.  Students will learn and practice mediation, negotiation, conflict resolution. We expect our students to be kind and considerate, respectful and responsible, peaceful and polite.  A positive attitude is power!

One specific school goal relates to Confidence in public education

CSPS will promote public education through the work and achievements of students and staff.  Specifically, a Media Club, consisting of staff and students will meet twice per month to link literacy and learning goals, make authentic connections to the community and celebrate success.  Media releases will be prepared and delivered to various local outlets.  Opportunities for purposeful partnerships such as a connection to 95.1 THE PEAK FM and Rogers Community Television will be made in October, 2010 to allow for student voice to be heard, and to ensure integrated, timely and strategic information to be shared with the greater community.

I am happy to report that our Media Club has visited 95.1 THE PEAK FM studios downtown and works to create media releases to promote special school events.  Our School Council also has a very active role in organizing and promoting special events.

This afternoon, some Cameron Street students will travel to Rogers Television to tape a Christmas choir special that will air on local television throughout the month of December.  To date, we are proud of our efforts and our connections to our community through media.  We are working to achieve our school goals!

We hope you enjoy the show!

. 

Cameron Street Public School Family Handbook

I hope you have received your copy of the Cameron Street Public School Family Handbook.  It has been created for you by our School and our School Council.  Our Family Handbook proves to be a very informative one!  Thanks to a Parents Reaching Out Grant, we are able to have this printed and copied for you.  To the members of the School Council who worked on this project, especially Patricia Wark and Marsha Cann, I thank you very much for your time and your assistance.  Enjoy your copy!

A Time to Remember and Reflect

This week is Veterans' Week.  It is a time to remember, to reflect and to give thanks to those men and women who have served or who currently serve our country throughout the world to make it a better place.  Challenges and risks faced and courage demonstrated by Canadian service men and women on land, in the air or on sea have brought and can bring positive change, as our history has taught us and continues to teach us.  This year, we honour Remembrance Day with a special ceremony of song, story and reflection this November 11th at Cameron Street Public School.  Our Remembrance Day Assembly will begin shortly after 9 o'clock this Thursday morning.  Members of our school community are more than welcome to attend. 

Thank You School Council

Thank you to our School Council for the wonderful coffee and home made muffins this morning.  The Meet and Greet before class today in the staff room was a welcome start to our day.  Our CSPS staff appreciates this very much.  Have a good weekend everyone and thank you for checking our school blogs on a regular basis.  This is such a great way to communicate with you.  Should you wish to contact me by email, please do so mgiffen@scdsb.on.ca or come to the school.  My door is always open unless it is shut!

Making Progress

We are currently preparing for our Student Involved Conferences for this year.  As in the past, your child will present samples of their work and talk about their strengths and areas for improvement during the conference.  There will also be an opportunity for your child’s teacher to comment and answer any questions you may have.

This year the Ministry of Education is replacing the first term report card with a fall Elementary Progress Report.  The Elementary Progress Report will facilitate better communication among parents, teachers and students by assessing students early in the school year in a new format.  It will assess key learning skills and work habits and instead of assigning a grade or mark, it will indicate how a student is progressing.  The indicators for progress in learning skills and work habits are excellent, good, satisfactory, or needs improvement.  Subject areas will be reported on using the indicators progressing very well, progressing well and progressing with difficulty. 

It is essential in making the Student Involved conference more meaningful and relevant.  The Elementary Progress Report goes home with students on November 12^th.

Parents of Junior Kindergarten students can look forward to discussing their child’s progress at our November conferences and receiving their child’s first report card in February.

Please look for the Student Involved Conferences 2010 form coming home soon.  We ask you to read it, complete it and return it to school.  Thank you very much and have a great weekend.

Michael Mitchell Comes to Cameron

Canadian entertainer Michael Mitchell performed at our school today.  Staff and students enjoyed the show very much.  Michael shared stories and songs important to him that are truly Canadian.  The gym was decorated with pictures and posters created by students.  Thank you to Madame Colbourne for inviting Michael to our school and for planning this special event.

Walking to New Heights with 95.1 The PEAK FM

Congratulations to our families who are taking our iWALK challenge.  We are pleased with the results so far.  The challenge continues next week and we will continue to track and graph results on our SMART board in the main hall.  On Wednesday October 27, we will share our challenge, our goal and the most up to date results with our community.  Listen for us on CHATS next week on 95.1 The PEAK FM after the 9 o'clock news.  Also, next Thursday afternoon, members of our school Media Club are going to visit the radio station, meet the staff and tour the studio.

Have a great weekend.

Cameron Cares about Halloween for Hunger

In recognition of the Free the Children initiative, we are collecting canned goods and other non perishable food items this week and next week to donate to our local food bank to help fight hunger in our community.  Food baskets are available at our harvest display in the main hall.  Our collection will continue until the Halloween Howler next Friday October 29 (6:30 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.).  Your community thanks you.

Cameron Cares about Your Health and Nutrition

Each morning between 8:40 and 8:50, the Cameron Street Fruit and Juice Shack offers breakfast to students.  Thank you to the staff members who are ready to serve students with a smile, a good morning and healthy options before class.  Also, I am happy to provide my apple basket in the main hall.  Apples are available to staff, students and guests who would like one for a snack.  Our School Council is pleased to offer our Cameron Street Lunch Program.  Students and staff can enjoy Mr. Subs on Mondays, pitas from the Pita Pit on Tuesdays and pizza from Topper's on Thursday...also on the menu, JD's Scrumptuous Lunches available to order.  See me for more information.  Bon apetit!

Cameron Cares about Healthy, Active Living...October is Walk to School Month

Our classroom competition starts Monday October 18.

Everyday between October 18 and 29 classes will log their walking travel time to school.  The total minutes walked by each class will be displayed in the front hall for everyone to celebrate.  The classroom that has walked the most number of minutes to school will win a pita lunch sponsored by School Council. The second place class will win pedometers for each student sponsored by the Environment Network.

Park it and Walk it

To conclude the two week campaign, on October 29 Cameron Street School is hosting a “Park It and Walk It” celebration! Support our initiative and celebrate our students walking to school.  On this morning, all Cameron Street families are encouraged to leave the car at home and walk to school, drop into the school to view classroom graphs on display, grab an apple as a healthy snack and hear more about the health and environmental benefits of walking to school on a regular basis.

Have a wonderful weekend everyone.

Run Away Hit

Congratulations to our Comet cross country runners.  I am proud of our students and their ability to run and represent our school at cross country meets this fall.  Good luck to runners who will compete at the county level next week!  Go Comets Go!!

Happy Thanksgiving

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend.  Take the time with family and friends and give thanks for that!