January was a busy month with everyone getting back to school after the break. It flew by and before we knew it, we were at the end of Term 1. Report Cards are available for viewing on PowerSchool. In March, we will again report on student progress and goals in the form of conferences. We look forward to meeting with you then. If you have any questions in the meantime, please be sure to reach out to your child’s teacher.
February in elementary schools is always a month in which we pause to highlight belonging, friendship, and community connection. February 14 is Valentine’s Day and families are welcome to participate by sending in cards. If your child chooses to participate, we ask that a card is sent for everyone in the class. We ask that no food items be shared. We will also have Pink Shirt Day on Wednesday, February 22. Students have also planned a fun inclusive Spirit Day for February 23 which is also our next Fun Lunch day. Stay tuned to classroom communication tools for more information.
Our February Kindness focus has grown from our continuing efforts to create a strong QES learning community. As you know our School Devlepment Plan goal for Wellbeing is to understand the impact of interpersonal exchanges and intentional goal setting. As a result, we held a winter outreach event with the intention of seeing that when each of us intentionally contributes to personal and school wide goals, everyone benefits. The details are on the website.
At this event our Kindergarten students were inspired by parents, teachers and other students at QES. They began a kindness challenge at the beginning of January. They have been working to enhance wellbeing and belonging through their intentional actions. One of the actions was to make cards for the West Hillhurst neighbours. We have received much positive feedback and our students are learning they can have a big impact on their community by doing a few small things. In fact, their impact was so significant that I was invited to do a short radio segment which will be aired tomorrow at 6:50am on 98.5 Virgin Radio about our amazing QES students. If you happen to miss it, the station will be sharing the audio segment with us and we will share it with you. In addition to our Kindergarten’s continuing inspiring actions, there will be more details to come about all QES students and staff as we share information about our February Kindness Challenge on the school website later this month.
In February and March we will also have engagement surveys, which will be additional opportunities to celebrate our school community. One of the surveys will be for parents of grade 4 students and will arrive in the mail. It is called the Alberta Education Assurance Survey and is conducted by Alberta Education. The other will be shared through email after Teacher's Convention (Feb 16, 17) and Family Day long weekend (Feb 20). We look forward to this month of February and the many ways we can continue to positively impact our school community.
