It was a thoughtful and reflective week in the Kindergarten.  Much of our thoughts, discussions, stories and activities revolved around our preparation for the Remembrance Day assembly.  

In the Kindergarten classroom, we focus on “what is peace?” and how the events of the past have shaped our present and future where we can have the freedom to choose to live our lives as we wish.  We talk about the significance of the poppy and represent that in our creative efforts. Our children made Canada flags, printed poppies (with an acorn squash and potato, no less) and sharing, drawing and writing our thoughts about what peace means to us.  We contributed much of our art to decorate the gym.

For many of our children, attending a serious assembly, such as Ridgeview’s Remembrance Day ceremony, is their first opportunity to see what it feels like to be part of a large school united in thought and intention.  

Our student population assembled silently in the gym, many children dressed in black, white and red.  The Kindergarten children sang “O Canada,” 400 voices strong. The Grade 7 Assembly Committed hosted our ceremony and wove the history of the world wars and the story of John McCrae’s “In Flanders Fields” throughout student presentations.  We listened to our two singing groups, the Grade Two/Three Primary Singers and Ridgeview Voices (Grades 4-7) under the direction of our Music teacher, Mrs. Soderling. Grade 3 students spoke about the Highway of Heroes, the stretch of highway from Trenton to Toronto, Ontario, which honours Canadian soldiers killed in Afghanistan.  Finally, we listened to the emotional trumpet call “The Last Post,” followed by a moment of silence and then “Reveille,” performed by a Grade 7 band student.

Our children were exemplary and we were (and are) very, very proud to be their teachers.  The children listened carefully, focused on the speakers and presentations and were mindful of their social situation and what we (as their teachers and as parents ourselves) would deem to be important, appropriate and expected behaviour.  We wish to thank you for working together with us to help prepare your children.

We also know, as part of their foundational learning, that the Kindergarten’s understanding of self-regulation, including learning and practising strategies to self-regulate their bodies, developing their social awareness and knowing about and understanding feelings, is an essential part of getting along together and being part of the greater community.  It is at moments like this, we are reminded again of the importance of teaching self-regulation and other pro-social skills so that our children are able to make friends, maintain social relationships and relate well to others.

Upcoming Events and Reminders

We’re still collecting Hallowe’en candy donations.  We will fill small with the candy treats and donate these to our sister school, Grandview Elementary in Vancouver, the Union Gospel Mission and Covenant House.  Thank you for your generosity.

Save the Date:  Our Winter Concert will be on Tuesday, December 10 and Wednesday, December 11 at 1:30 pm.  We will let you know more details as they are released to us. For certain, we will have a run-through of the show on Friday, December 6 and a dress rehearsal on Monday, December 9.  Our songs will be taught during Music class.  

If your child is going to be away anytime between now and the last day of term, December 20, please let us know as this helps us in choosing dates for our special days in Kindergarten.

Monday, November 18 is a Professional Day and students are not in session.

Our classrooms were filled with fairy tale characters, superheroes, community helpers and tiny animals on Hallowe’en Day, and what a wonderful day it was!

We’ve been getting ready for the past two weeks to mark what has become one of the most popular celebrations ever:  Hallowe’en. Our home and school neighbourhood displays ranged from the adorable to the macabre. But in our classrooms, all is sweet and fun (we were gently reminded by our students, “not too spooky.”

We really kicked off our decorating with our Hallowe’en wreaths.  Our Big Buddies helped us with the tracing and cutting of the characters, but the funny faces and sticker placement is all Kindergarten.  This is a really fun activity to complete with our Buddies. Many Kindergarten children have become quite proficient with their fine motor skills, so our Buddies are allowing independence to reign and learning to provide support only for “the tricky bits.”

Drawing and painting our huge pumpkins is an art activity we very much enjoy teaching.  It’s important for the children to work on a variety of scales, and this terrific Deep Space Sparkle art project allows for the children to make as large a pumpkin as they wish.  We drew the pumpkin ribs with white pastel, colour mixed yellow, orange and red paint to create a textured effect and individually made stems and leaves. Aren’t these pretty? 

We considered leaving the pumpkins as they were, but the children wanted to turn them into jack-o-lanterns, and who are we to refuse?  Black and white construction paper and some new drawing and cutting directions (“fold your paper in half, draw a circle, and cut them both at the same time”) gives the children another practical strategy for making faces, and answers the question, How did you get the eyes to both be the same size?

This past Tuesday we had our annual Hallowe’en Centres Party.  Thank you again to the many parents who volunteered their time either through baking, running a Centre or both!!  The children coloured their Hallowe’en books, played with Hallowe’en playdough, made spider cupcakes and ghost ornaments and we finally finished our bats.  It was so much fun, and the chocolate cupcakes were as sweet and gooey as all cupcakes should be.

We read many Hallowe’en storybooks, listened to lots of Hallowe’en music and completed some writing activities, too.  Here’s our past Hallowe’en big book, “On Hallowe’en Night” that was the final literary task before we pack up our decorations.

Now, about all that candy you collected on Hallowe’en.  Every year Ridgeview creates candy gifts for our sister school, Grandview Elementary in Vancouver, the Union Gospel Mission and Covenant House.  This is a Christmas Buddy activity, and we use any Hallowe’en candy donations from the children. We would gratefully accept any candy (except for those marked with Hallowe’en symbols).  Your children can bring the treats they are not going to eat to the classroom and we will have a spot to collect it.  

Upcoming Events and Reminders

October Homework Calendars are due any time now, and into next week.  You can return it even if it’s not fully complete. 

Friday, November 8 is the Ridgeview Remembrance Day Assembly.  We have a very high standard of behavioural expectations for this Assembly.  The children are to enter the gym in silence, be self-regulated and very calm.  There is NO APPLAUSE during this ceremony. We will be reviewing these expectations (and others) and ask that you do so as well. We do not expect to have to remind our students about behaviour during the ceremony. Please refer to our previous post on Assemblies here. 

Monday, November 11 is Remembrance Day and school is not in session.