Topics covered in this post:
Wednesday Afternoon Program Spring Registration
Parent Dance
Pink Shirt Day
Climate Coffee Chat
JK Photo Challenge
Black History Month
Trash Team
School Enrolment
Grade 7 Admissions
Upcoming February Events
Upcoming March Events
1. Wednesday Afternoon Program Spring Registration
Registration forms for the Spring term will be available for download on our website on Friday, February 21 at 5:00pm. Nancy will begin to collect the registration forms beginning Monday, February 24 at 8:15 am. The Spring term will begin Wed. March 25, 2020 and end June 10, 2020.
2. Parent Dance
There is much excitement for tomorrow evening’s parent and teacher event “Bring Back the 90s Parent Party” at 25 Howland Ave beginning at 8:00 pm. Thank you for your donations to enrich the Arts at JICS.
Last chance to purchase tickets for the dance or the raffles is midnight tonight.
8:00 pm: Entry to dance and sign-up for Midnight Madness. Sign up for 23 Midnight Madness spots will be on a first-come, first-serve basis. Parents can only sign up for their own child/children and $100 payment is due at sign-up (cash/cheque to JICS Parents’ Association).
9:00 pm: Raffle for Raptors tickets and 2 remaining Midnight Madness spots.
Donation bar (please bring cash)
3. Pink Shirt Day
On Wednesday, February 26 2020, the Lab school will recognize Pink Shirt Day and we invite everyone in the JICS community to join us by wearing pink, as a symbol of the fight against bullying and the promotion of kindness.
4. Climate Coffee Chat: Engaging Families in Preparing JICS Students for the Future
Please join Lab School Educators and Grade 5 Parent Doug Anderson for coffee and a conversation about how Indigenous, climate, and sustainability education are unfolding at JICS. Our intent for this “coffee chat” is to think strategically about how we can build more active engagement on these urgent and important issues with a core parent group (grandparents are also welcome) in a way that adds value, rather than being another item in an onerous list of tasks. Over time, our hope is to create opportunities for families to get together at the school in enjoyable ways to form a community around what our kids are learning. Doug Anderson, Indigenous scholar and co-author of Natural Curiosity, has offered his time to support this core group with organizing and communicating with school staff and families on the possibilities and challenges, with a focus on how JICS leads in these areas as a lab school, and with how events involving the wider school community are shared.
Register HERE on this doodle poll to choose your preferred date: Monday March 2 or Thursday April 2, from 8:30am-9:30am at the Lab School.
5. Black History Month Storyteller
On Thursday March 5th, the engaging storyteller Sandra Whiting will be coming to JICS to weave her magic for the students at the Black History Month Assembly. Next week’s post will highlight some of the Black History learnings across the grades and specialty subjects!
6. JK Pattern Photo Challenge
This week, JK students Kaiya and Emmett decided to go to Richard’s office to share an idea. They explained that they are so inspired by their class’ work with patterning that they have created a “Pattern Photo Challenge” for everyone at JICS. They would like children to locate a pattern at home or in their neighbourhood and take a photo of it, then send the photo to their teacher, Marcia (marcia.bumbury@utoronto.ca) so that a display can be made at the school for everyone to appreciate. Please support this challenge!
7. Note from JICS Trash Team
Dear JICS Families,
What do you do with your dried-up markers? Did you know, at school we collect dried up markers and participate in the Crayola Colorcycle? Colorcycle allows us to ship markers back to Crayola for free and they take care of recycling them properly. The JICS Trash Team will be setting up a container to collect markers near the Terracycle box soon. Please bring in your dried-up markers!
Our Terracycle box is almost full – don’t forget to bring in your wrappers!
Haley Higdon is the JICS Natural Curiosity Director. She leads a low-waste lifestyle and is always sharing tips at school and in her personal life of how to do so. Here is an article she is quoted in sharing important messages about reducing waste: https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/businesses-aim-to-reduce-waste-in-2020-as-consumers-become-more-eco-conscious-1.1372149
Thank you!
The JICS Trash Team
8. School Enrolment is Full
Thank you, parents for being such great ambassadors of the schools. Many of the new families we met to fill the new Nursery cohort and open spots up the grades were very knowledgeable about our school thanks to information they received from you!
9. Grade 7 Admissions
Beginning tomorrow and throughout next week, we will be hearing about acceptances to independent schools for our Grade 6 students. Students who have applied to TDSB Alternative Schools will find out the lottery results in the first week of March. Each year we hear from receiving schools how much they value and highly regard JICS graduates!
10. Upcoming February Events (Black History Month):
Fri 21 – Gr 1-3 morning skate; Gr 4-6 afternoon skate (Bill Bolton Arena)
Fri 21 – PHA Parent Dance 8:00-12:00pm
Tues 25 – Daycare Annual General Meeting 5:00-5:45am (All parents invited – free babysitting) RSVP
Wed 26 – PINK SHIRT DAY
Wed 26 - Fri 28 – Richard attending National Association of Independent Schools in Philadelphia
11. Upcoming March Events (Read-athon Month):
Wed 4 – Last day of Wednesday Afternoon Program-Winter Term
Thurs 5 – OISE Dean’s Advisory Board for the Lab School Meeting with parent reps Nadia Thomas and Hasina Lookman; alumni parents Fred Cassano and Grant McCutcheon.
Mon 9 - Fri 20 – March Break (week 1) School closed. Daycare open. Registration info coming next week.
Mon 16 - Fri 20 – March Break (week 2) School and Daycare closed.)
Mon 23 – Spring Term begins. Daycare opens at 8:00am; School opens at 8:45am
Tues 24 – Parent Education Event: Robbie Case Memorial Lecture with Dr. Herb Ginsberg, Columbia U. 6:00pm Register
Wed 25 – First day of Wednesday Afternoon Program-Spring Term
Thurs 26 – School-wide lice check, courtesy of the JICS Parents’ Association
Thurs 26 – Parent Education Event: Robbie Case Memorial Lecture with Dr. Doug Clements, University of Denver 6:00pm Register
Tues 31 – Grade 6 & Grade 7 Reunion “Pizza Night” to learn about transitioning to new school 3:30-5:30pm
The Grade Ones have had a number of families come in to talk about their community growing up. This week we had presentations from Eli's mom Nicole and his Grandpa about Jamaica and from Zayden's parents Asma and Faiz talking about Pakistan. We had Jamaican patties on Tuesday and mango lassi, paratha, and dahi puri today from Zayden's family.
