Millstream Elementary Message from Ms. Gerow

626 Hoylake Road ~ Victoria, BC V9B 3P7Tel: 250-478-8348 ~ Email: mgerow@sd62.bc.ca

February 23, 2017

Pink Shirt DayThe original event was

organized by David Shep-herd and Travis Price of Berwick, Nova Scotia, who in 2007 bought and distributed 50 pink shirts after male ninth grade student Charles McNeill was bullied for wearing a pink shirt during the first day of school. In 2008, the then Premier of Brit-ish Columbia, Gordon Campbell proclaimed February 27 to be the provincial anti-bullying day. It was then celebrated on February 25 in 2009. In 2009, Boys and Girls Clubs worked on pink T-shirts that say “Bullying Stops Here.” and “Pink Shirt Day” for Anti-Bullying Day.Thanks to everyone for taking part in the annual Anti-bullying Pink Day. There were many students and staff who sported pink shirts to show that we do not tolerate or accept bullying.

Allergy ReminderA reminder to all parents when packing their child’s

lunch to consider the life threatening allergies that are a very real concern for many of our students. I know how much the parents of the children with these allergies appreciate your efforts to adjust lunch and snack menus in order to avoid ingredients that can cause an anaphylactic reaction. Additionally, if you are thinking of sending in treats for any class-room event, please check with the teacher ahead of time, to ensure that any allergies in the classroom are considered. Non-food items are always a great alter-native for treats.

Scholastic Book FairThe Scholastic Book Fair will

be running from Thursday, March 2nd to Monday, March 6th. It will be open from 8:30 – 3:30 Thursday and Friday, Mon-day from 8:30 – 12:30. Thank you in advance to the parent volunteers who have offered to help man the sales tables. The book fair is a big fundraiser for the Millstream Library and helps to bring in new reading material for the students.

The Magic Flute and Victoria Youth SymphonyA group of 30 students plus 7 adults had a won-

derful time on February 14th attending the dress rehearsal of Pacific Opera’s The Magic Flute. Madame Papineau was impressed with the overall behaviour and the way students helped each other with reading the subtitles. It was a wonderful event and a good introduction for students to the world of Opera. Other opportunities to attend classical music performances occurred this past weekend with some students attending the dress rehearsal of the Victoria Youth Symphony at the Braumann Centre. A big thank you again to Madame Papineau for organizing these special extracurricu-lar events.

Student Lead ConferencesIn many schools, educators are transform-

ing teacher-led parent-teacher conferences in favour of student-led meeting formats that en-gage students in the process. These conferences can provide powerful opportunities for students to advocate for their own learning. Encouraging students to take responsibility and ownership of their learning also deepens their involvement in goal setting and understanding the assessment

1| Millstream School - Website: http://millstream.sd62.bc.ca/

Message from Ms. Gerow

2| Millstream School - Website: http://millstream.sd62.bc.ca/

process. And additional benefit is the engagement of families having richer and more transparent

conversation with their child about his/her progress. On March 15th from 3 – 7pm, Millstream teachers will be holding student lead conferences in their classrooms. This is an

opportunity for the students to show their parents and guardians the work that they have been doing and explain in their own words what learning has been occurring over the second term.

Family Movie NightThe PAC held it’s first Family Movie Night on Friday, Feb 17th. It was wonderful to see so many families gathering

to watch the movie Stork. Thank you to the PAC for organizing this fun evening event. Thank you to the families who brought donations for the local food bank.

Les Bucherons PerformanceAll French Immersion students were bussed to

Ecole John Stubbs this morning to attend a perfor-mance by the French Canadian group Les Bucherons. Les Bucherons (the Lumberjacks) is compromised of

two musicians, Gilbert Parent, Yves Manseau and Joanne Martineau. Their performances comprise of traditional step dance, fiddle and spoon playing, and song. Their primary goal is to promote French Canadian

Culture and History in an entertaining fashion. The bussing costs and the performance were sponsored by the Canadian Parents for French as part of the mandate to promote French culture.

Guest SpeakersThe school has been a hive of activity over the past

few weeks with presenters coming to the classrooms to share their knowledge of the world of science and more. Students in Div 2 & 7 have had presentations from a parent, Dr B. Sharatt. Dr Sharatt is a doc-tor of engineering and has done three presentation

to date. One on gravity and force, the second was about planet earth in relation to the other planets and the sun in the moon, the third was on matter. In Division 5, parents have been sharing different ca-reers including a paramedic with BC

Ambulance Service and a freelance videographer and cinema instructor from Pacific Design Academy. Dur-ing the snow week, Connel Bradwell from Northwest Wildlife battled the weather coming to the school to do presentations to classes about ocean and wildlife found in our part of the world. Thank you to all the teachers that put together these learning opportunities for the students of Millstream. Each time a speaker comes in, it is another learning opportunity for our students to see what possibilities are out there in terms of future studies and careers.

100 Day CelebrationsThe creativity of how 100 days has been cel-

ebrated was at work at Millstream. There were many activities organized by teachers and some very creative projects brought in by the many students. The 100th day of school is literally the 100th day of the school year. It is a great way for elementary school teachers to cel- ebrate the vari-ous mathematical concepts that can be taught using the number 100. From the very first day of school, classes begin keeping track of the number of days they’ve been in school in anticipation of the 100th day. It’s this anticipation that is actually the first math lesson, as the days are often marked using coffee stirrers or Popsicle sticks, ten of which become a “ten bundle,” paving the way to counting by tens and ones. The 100th day of school varies with each class depend-ing on when school started, school closures for pro development or inclement weather. It generally falls around the middle of February.

Millstream Elementary

Millstream School - Website: http://millstream.sd62.bc.ca/ |3

Our SUPER Supervisors!We are most fortunate to have three lovely lunch time supervisors who are out and about during our

lunch recess break. You will see these ladies out and around the school supporting students while they play and eat their lunch. In case you have not met them here is our fabulous team from left to right: Arlene, Rena and J.

Boys and Girls ClubFor those parents that are not aware, we have

operating out of the school, Boys and Girls Club of Greater Victoria. This program is a before and af-ter school care. The contact for the program here is Nik Richardson who is the Team Lead and Site Manager. Many of you may see him in and around the school in different classes as he connects with the students that are in his care in the morning and afternoon. Please feel free to say hello anytime.

Carnaval Next week, Millstream will be celebrating Carnaval.

There will be a variety of activities during the week including blue and white day, pancake breakfast, castle building and a hockey match between students in Division 1 and the teachers. A big thank you to Mme. Tate, Mme. Ambriz-Gomez, Mme. Papineau and Mlle. Whicher for organizing the activities.