Adopt A Family "Wrap up"

Our Winter Carnival was a huge success thanks to the hard work of so many students, staff and parents. The day raised over $3500 for our adopt-a-family program. Special thanks for many donations of prizes, food and discounts making it possible to make such a large sum in one day for charity.

Thank you to The Filling Station and the Campbell family for their generous donation and time, Canadian Wholesale Club, Carnival for Kids at Heart, Fatburger, Opa, and the Steed family and the Powell family for helping to secure some great prizes. In addition Robert Richmond from Head to Toe Safety for donating a custom banner that will be used for our Carnival for many years to come. We are so proud of our students and their work for charity this holiday season. A challenge was put forth for student playing at the carnival to put the name Adopt-A-Family instead of their own name, and it was touching to see just how many tags were for Adopt-A-Family. This displays the character and generosity of our kids and as a result, one of the prizes is going to a family.  Thanks to the Fish Creek grade 1 teachers for bringing over their kids to be a special part of our day.

Congratulations to all the winners and the students responsible for coordination of the carnival.

ADOPT A FAMILY has been a huge success for the families in need this holiday season. Due to the generosity or our families and the work of our students in the carnival and bake sale, we had enough money to adopt a fourth family. Special thanks to Superstore in Shawnessey for their generous donation and discount, Save-On-Foods, Superstore and Home Depot for all donating gift cards for our families,  Bath and Body Works, Bluenotes and Bootlegger at Southcentre for making our dollars stretch well beyond our budget! The students are busy wrapping presents as our fitness room has turned into Santa’s Workshop for a few days. A huge thank you to all of our MidSun Families for taking 99% of the tags from our Christmas tree and purchasing gifts for individual family members!  The spirit of giving is definitely in the air J

 

Merry Christmas

Last Week before Christmas

Happy Holidays Laker Families,

We have a fun week planned for our last week before Christmas.  Wednesday will be Christmas Sweater day and Friday is Pyjama Day!  The rumours that there was no school on Friday are unfounded…there will be lots of fun holiday time from December 19-January 3^rd. First day back in 2016 will be January 4, 2016.

January 4^th will be the first day for Chris Giffen, our new principal.  He has already been by to meet the staff and attend our last School Council meeting.  He is very excited to get to know everyone and lead the Lakers in the New Year.

Thank you to all who have contributed to the Adopt a Family program.  The generosity of our school community is outstanding and three families are sure to have the best Christmas ever because of your big hearts.  Our whole fitness room is filled with presents waiting to be delivered this Wednesday.  It is a happy place, what joy it is to give. 

As Friday is my last day I would like to extend my warm wished to everyone for a happy holiday and a bright new year.  I am excited to keep up with the many great things that have been going on at MidSun. Things like our home reading program, Read Theory, Hour of Code, Debate Club, Learning Commons events, Charity Basketball game and the upcoming basketball season.  I will miss the busy and exciting life of MidSun and the opportunity to work with such amazing staff, students and parents. 

All the best,

Veronica Saretsky

Code Week in the Library Learning Commons

 This week we are taking up the Hour of Code challenge as part of a global initiative to have students around the world participate in an hour of learning computer coding. Classes will be coming down to the Library Learning Commons (LLC) where they will be introduced to coding and the Hour of Code website https://hourofcode.com/ca. The actual learning occurs in the LLC via https://code.org. Students are able to choose between Minecraft, Star Wars and Frozen as themes while they work with increasingly complex coding capabilities. More than just jumping on a trendy bandwagon, we are attempting to prepare students for the jobs of the future, jobs which don’t even exist yet. We sincerely believe in diversifying the skills of our students in hopes of preparing them for the future.

Throughout the year you will see an increase in technology in the LLC including 5 new coding stations equipped with Raspberry Pis. These are tiny computers which use several coding languages and can assist students in building their own games and other activities. Here is a helpful link if you are curious https://www.raspberrypi.org/help/what-is-a-raspberry-pi/. Additionally, we are bringing in Lego in hopes to give your children a chance to explore stop motion animation (we are still looking for donations of extra Lego you may have around the house which isn’t being played with anymore). 

News from Grade 7

First of all, congratulations to all of our Gr. 7 volleyball players, who finished the season with a tournament at Strathcona Tweedsmuir School; it was a great experience for all.   And, to our wrestling team members who are in the midst of several tournaments and are seeing amazing results, good luck on finishing the season with a bang.

Gr. 7s are immersed in their learning this month!  From discovering “Who’s Who in New France” in social studies to preparing for the famous “Egg Drop” experiment in science, students and teachers are inventing a variety of clever ways to explore the world around them.  Thank-you in advance to our parents for helping their student ensure they have the proper materials for upcoming classroom tasks.  A quick check on teacher D2L pages will also help students come prepared.

Winter carnival was a big success this month; students had a great time participating in events, gobbling up treats and raising funds for charity.  As December continues, please check out the Midsun blog for information on the annual Adopt-A-Family campaign.  Your support of community members is very much appreciated. 

Please remember to remind your child to come to school dressed appropriately for the weather and school.  This is a good time for layers as it tends to be cold outside yet quite warm in some of our classrooms.  Also, just a reminder to send students with their own water bottles to keep with them in class. 

Wishing our families warmth and joy as you prepare for this holiday season! 

Midsun Gr. 7 Team

 

 

 

 

Parent/Student/Teacher Interviews this week

We are looking forward to this week’s Parent/Student/Teacher interviews which take place on Thursday December 3rd from 5:30-8PM, and Friday December 4^th from 9 AM – Noon.  Please make sure to book through our new on line system. Our school will be following a Friday schedule with a short day on Thursday and of course, there will be no school on Friday for students.

We will also be hosting a REVERSE BOTTLE DRIVE again during interviews. All proceeds will go towards program enhancement. Please bring empty cans and bottles to school during interviews and drop them off in the REVERSE BOTTLE DRIVE trailer in our parking lot. This is a great and easy way to support our school.

Thank you for your support.

Sincerely,
Sherri Chatani
Assistant Principal

MidSun Basketball Tryout Schedule

MidSun Adopt-A-Family Campaign Information

Volleyball Season Results 2015

Winter Carnival Information

Invitation to Grade 9's

Grade 9 students are invited to attend a performance of Twelfth Night at Centennial High School on Monday, December 7.  Students are asked to return forms and admission fee of $5 to their homeroom teachers by December 1.  We are asking that attendees bring a bag lunch as they will eat lunch and walk directly to Centennial for the afternoon performance.  Students will return in time for dismissal.  Those not attending the play will stay at Midsun and attend a study hall for the afternoon.

Extra forms are available on the D2L shell of grade 9 core teachers and any questions can be directed to the grade 9 Learning Leader, Mrs. Kaiser (mekaiser@cbe.ab.ca) or our Drama teacher, Ms. Smith (knsmith@cbe.ab.ca ).

Overdue School Fee Information

Notices of Overdue school fees have now been mailed out.  If you receive this notice, please pay by one of the following options:

Online – by Credit card or debit, Credit Card either in the office or over the phone, debit card in the office, send a cheque with the student, bankers draft or cash, by person in the office.

We are aware that unexpected life changes happen and may create financial stress and so we would ask that you would contact our bookkeeper, Edwina Ewart 403 777 6430 ext 2377, to set up a payment plan for your fees.

Unpaid fees at the end of January 2016 will go forward to the collection process.

MidSun Complementary Subject Update

Hello again!
It is really exciting to see students start to complete many of their projects in their complementary subjects.  I would also like to take this opportunity to provide a technology update and let you know about a famous event that will be occurring soon at our school.

Fine Arts Night
The Complementary subjects at MidSun School will be hosting our 2016 Fine and Practical Arts Evening. The grand event will take place on Thursday January 21nd 2016 from 6.30 to 8.00pm in the Drama Room, Atrium and Atrium Balcony at MidSun School. 

This event will showcase our students' award winning talents in Art, Drama, Dance, Construction, Foods, Fashion, Jazz Band, French, CTF Design/Media Technology Studies and more! 

Admission is free to this amazing event. The event is open to the public. Please mark your calendars, as we hope to see you then! 

Technology Update

We have a wide variety of capital/technology projects happening at our school. With the support of parent council, we have purchased 30 additional Chromebooks that will be deployed into classrooms to support teaching and learning. We also have engaged with engineering services to retrofit four of our classrooms with Light Raise interactive projector units to support student engagement. Our 3D printer is also in use to support teaching and learning in the classroom.

Regards,
Kaushik Tailor
Complementary Subjects/Technology Learning Leader – MidSun School
Calgary Board of Education | cbe.ab.ca/b691
t  | 403-777-6430 ext: 3010

Wordfest 2015 @ MidSun

WORDFEST 2015

 

The first week of November we celebrated Wordfest at MidSun.  On Monday afternoon, we had author David Rvachew speak with two groups of grade 7 students in the Library Learning Commons.

He was very engaging and we look forward to having him return another time to speak with more students about the writing process. 

We also had the pleasure of having a parent, Adria Laycraft, who is a published author and professional editor and ghostwriter come and talk to the kids Wednesday.  She spoke with 6 of our grade 7 groups including those who missed out on Monday’s author talk.  It was great to hear from her unique perspective.  We also look forward to having Mrs. Laycraft return to work with some of our eager writers to help them in their goal to get published.  If you’re a student at MidSun who dreams of being published one day, stay tuned for announcements of this in the spring!

To top it all off, author Simon  Rose was another great speaker we had this Wordfest.  He kept up his amazing energy and stamina all the way through 7 fabulous sessions of 60-90 kids, about his many books and the writing process.  You can find out more about him through his website:  http://simon-rose.com.

Actually, there were a number of other ways we found to celebrate words this year.  At lunches, students had opportunities to participate in various activities that celebrated words – both spoken and written, including:   Wheel of Fortune, Readers’ Theatre, and Karaoke.  There is a display of Staff Picks favourite books as well!  In classes, many teachers took the opportunity during this week to focus on the power of words through vocabulary studies, games, and other word-related activities. 

Finally, Humanities teachers used this week to kick off our new Home Reading Program.  In seeing that our students’ scores have dipped from previous years in the areas of reading, and especially in drawing inferences, we are instituting this exciting new program.  Humanities teachers sent home materials for parents to use in support of this new program.  In a nutshell, students are expected to read at home 20 minutes a day, 5 days a week.  Afterwards, students and parents choose a prompt from the list provided and have a short 1-3 minute discussion about what was read.   Lastly, parents sign off that the reading and discussion happened and when the sheet is completed, students return them to their teacher.  The research tells us that the number one way to improve reading is to do more reading, so we are very optimistic that our students will experience improved scores as a result of this program.  See your child’s Humanities teacher should you have any questions about this new program. 

A special thanks goes out to all the teachers and students who made this year’s Wordfest a big success!

 
M. Hayden-Isaak
Humanities Learning Leader
MidSun School

Update from the Learning Commons

Grade 8 Update from MidSun

Grade 8 Update:

What a busy first couple of months we have had in grade 8:  Parent teacher conferences, final selection of the SEAs students, large scale humanities/science audio/video project, a fabulous Remembrance Day Assembly and a French Fieldtrip to sample some ratatouille at a French restaurant.  There are 5 weeks left before Winter Break and so many events will be happening before then as well. 

It was great to have an opportunity at the parent conferences to share the many fabulous things the students have been doing.  We were glad to see how many parents checked on D2L for marks and assignments.  We are committed to offering the students access at home to the learning resources and information they need to be successful through our classroom D2L shells.  Please make sure that you check with your child about how each particular D2L page is organized and where to find assignments, announcements and marks.  As well, you should be contacting your child’s teacher if you have any questions or concerns.

This month, the grade 8’s have been working on a combined science/humanities project involving how we are impacting our water around the world.   Some students are working on reporting about the impact plastics have had on the oceans.  While other groups are reporting about the devastating effects of the sea star Wasting disease.  Each group has researched and created a broadcast to communicate the information that they have found.  We hope to be able to post some of these projects to our website.

There are five weeks left before Winter break.  It usually around this time of year that students lose track of many of the beautiful new supplies that they started the school year with.  It would be very helpful if the students could review what supplies they have and what needs to be replaced.  One item in particular is the calculator.  Many students have resorted to using cell phones as calculators.  We have asked that students refrain from having cell phones in the class unless they are being specifically used (as directed by the teacher) for learning such as research, audio/video recording or calendar reminders. 

We look forward to an eventful and spectacular last five weeks of 2015! 

 

Douglas C Stretch

Grade 8 Learning Leader, MidSun School

Calgary Board of Education | cbe.ab.ca
dcstretch@cbe.ab.ca
t | 403.777.6430 (3016)

Adopt-A-Family Information

Adopt-A-Family

MidSun will be ‘adopting’ 5 families from Calgary that are in need of some support during the holiday season this year.  If your family would like to support this cause we will be accepting cash donations (Leadership teachers and students will use donations to shop for gifts for the family) as well as new gifts (unwrapped). 

Step 1: Have your son/daughter go to one of the trees posted in their pod and take a photo showing potential gifts to purchase for the family. 

Step 2: Decide as a family what gift you would like to buy and have your son/daughter go to the tree and remove the tag and bring it home.

Step 3: Bring gift(s) back to your TA teacher with the tag attached (we need to keep gifts sorted and separated and the tags are how we know what belongs to whom – please do not lose the tag!).

If you would rather donate cash, please send it in with your son/daughter to be collected by their TA teacher.  The use of our debit/credit machine is available in the office if this is a better method for you.

Thank you for your support J

Grade 9 Leadership Students

 

Update from Athletics

Terry Fox Run was a huge success!  Thank you to all families at MidSun for your support!  We raised a total of $3,128.45 for the Terry Fox Foundation and our fight against cancer. 

Athletics

Cross Country

Congratulations to all of our cross country runners!  It was a great season with three meets that took place for our athletes to compete against other schools. 
Final Results: As a school we finished 4th out of 20 schools! The junior boys won their division, senior boys came third, intermediate girls 4th and both junior and senior girls 6th, intermediate boys came 12th.  Overall a great job done by MidSun!!

Thank you to our coaches for giving their time and expertise to ensure our students had the opportunity to be on the cross country team this year!  Mr. Bredahl & Mrs. Ryall & Ms. Saretsky

Volleyball:

Our teams are in their final weeks of their season with playoffs coming up November 12^th.  Good luck to all of our teams as you represent MidSun to the best of your abilities!

Wrestling:

The season has begun for our wrestlers.  With numerous tournaments and competitions during the season it is imperative that our athletes make it to all practices.  Talk to your coach (Ms. Hayden-Isaac) if you are unable to make it and good luck to all wrestlers during your season!!

Basketball:

Sign up for the teams will begin the first week of December.  Tryouts will begin December 3^rd as rosters must be decided upon for grade 8 & 9 teams must be determined before we leave for the holidays.  Now is the time to brush up on your jump shot, work on your footwork and increase your fitness level before tryouts begin.

Thank you to our coaches:                 Grade 7 Boys & Girls: Mr. Moulton

                                                                Grade 8 Boys: Mr. Woods           
                                                                Grade 8 Girls: Ms. Miles & Ms. Hill
                                                                Grade 9 Boys: Mr. Slaughter
                                                                Grade 9 Girls: Ms. Amirault & Mrs. Slaughter

Call for input

I have had the great pleasure of serving the MidSun community over the past seven years.  In that time we have been able to implement daily physical activity and create a MidSun fitness room.  We have teamed up with Centennial High School to support learners with an innovative tutoring program. We have moved to a new outcomes based reporting system; we have changed our library to a learning commons. We have put a Smartboard in every core classroom and added a portable as we have grown in size.  We now have an annual Fine Arts and Complementary Subjects evening and a wonderful WordFest week. We have become more inclusive and respectful of diversity with the addition of two system classes of ACCESS and ALP learners. We have worked together with parents to see the creation of the MidSun Education Enhancement Society that has worked hard to get us extras like sewing machines, drill presses, books for our learning commons, chromebooks, author talks, and professional performances.  We now have a beautiful outdoor classroom and plenty of bike racks to encourage students to ride to school.  I am very proud of the way our staff have implemented technology like Iris, an online student portfolio tool, and our new 3D printer.  We continue to be innovative in our desire to make learning relevant and engaging to our learners.

And now it is time for me to move on.  My last day at MidSun School will be December 18, 2015.  Our director will be hiring a new principal shortly and is seeking input from you about the qualities and skills you would like to see in your next principal as MidSun meets upcoming challenges.  Please consider taking  a few moments to fill out this survey:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/SXQ8ZYL

I know there are many more exciting things in MidSun's future and I am proud to have had the opportunity to work with an amazing community, staff and students.

Take Care Lakers!

Veronica Saretsky

Open House Information

For our grade 9 parents,

Information on Calgary Board of Education High School Open Houses is now available at:

http://cbe.ab.ca/schools/events-sessions-open-houses/Pages/default.aspx

It is updated often so be sure to check back regularly!

Purdy's Chocolatier Fundraiser - Chocolate for Chromebooks

 Purdy’s Chocolatier Fundraiser

Monday November 1 – Monday November 16

Please Support our

 

Chocolate for Chromebooks

 

Our community raised $2189.25 through Purdy's Chocolates last year!

With your continued support we would like to carry forward this fundraising initiative to enable additional Chromebooks purchases for our school.

At a cost of $400 each, Chromebooks provide our children with the necessary technology in the classroom.

This program gives 25% of the profit back to the school.

 

https://www.purdysgpp.com/join/24054

Invite family and friends to join our school group 24054

Step 1: Register or Log In 

                        IMPORTANT ORDER INFORMATION

                        a) STUDENTS NAME should used  during Registration after your own name for online orders 

                                    eg.) In LAST NAME Field; enter your Last Name & then Students First & Last names 

Step 2: Join A Group - Enter Customer Number  #24054  Select MidSun School 

Step 3:   Go to Group Homepage 

Step 3: Select the Shop Online Tab

Step 4: Choose your preferred shopping method (Order Form or Marketplace)

 

If you prefer to submit your paper order form please be certain to include 5% Alberta GST when calculating your payment

Cheques Payable to: MSEES

 

ALL ORDERS MUST BE PAID IN FULL BY NOV 16 DEADLINE

 

DELIVERY INFO:

ORDER DEADLINE: Monday  NOVEMBER 16

PRODUCT DELIVERY:  Thursday DECEMBER 10

Product Orders are available for pick up at the school: Thursday Dec 10

Convenient online shopping or by order form, found inside the Brochure or a printable version below. 

Parents of LARGE orders;

Please arrange to pick up your order. It is very difficult for student bus riders to carry large orders on the crowded bus or even make the bus in time with so much to carry.

CONTACT INFO: 

Coordinator:   Pamela Howell

Phone:           403-988-2471 - VM/Text

Email:             midsunpurdysfundraiser@gmail.com

 

Thank you for your continued support!

Printable  Brochure

http://www.purdysgpp.com/images/file/FUND_Christmas_2015_BROCHURE.pdf 

Printable Order Form
http://www.purdysgpp.com/images/file/Order Forms/Christmas 2015 FR BC AND AB TAX incl.pdf 

MidSun Technology Update

Last week, our students had an opportunity to listen to a presentation about online safety from Calgary Police Services (CPS). Students learned ramifications about their actions online, and also learned about pro-active strategies to support effective digital citizenship practices.

CPS recommends various strategies to help parents protect their children from online hazards. Some of these tips include:

• Maintain open lines of communication between parents and children.
• Make sure children to not disclose any personally identifiable information (i.e names, photos) to any strangers, websites, or chat rooms on the internet
• Teach children to stop using the internet immediately and advise parent if they see or read anything that upsets them.​
• Keep your computer with the internet access in a high traffic area of the home.
• Restrict access to the internet when there is no supervision available.
• Monitor long distance telephone/cell phone bills for unknown telephone numbers.

Additional resources, tips, and information can be found at the CPS website:

http://www.calgary.ca/cps/Pages/Community-programs-and-resources/Crime-prevention/Protecting-children-online.asp

Mr. Tailor

Technology/Complementary Learning Leader
MidSun School

MidSun Reminders Around Rememberance Day

MIDSUN REMEMBERS

Until November 10th, MidSun School will be collecting cash and food bank donations for the Calgary Poppy Fund and Veterans Food Bank.  Students can bring the non-perishable food items or money donations to their TA for collection and earn TA points at the same time.  The Calgary Poppy Fund helps raise money for local veterans, their spouses and dependents.  All the funds collected stay here in Calgary and assist with the costs of rent, utilities, aids to daily living, and any of their other basic needs.

Poppies will be distributed in homeroom on Tuesday morning.  Students are encouraged to make a donation when receiving their poppies.

On Tuesday, November 10^th at 9:00 am we will be holding our Remembrance Day Assembly in the gym. We are honoured to have guest speakers Michael Hornburg, who lost his son in Afghanistan in 2007, and Joey Bleviss, the Chief Administrative Officer of the Calgary Poppy Fund joining us for this year's ceremony.  

Parents, relatives and members of the community are invited to attend.  Please contact the office prior to the date and let us know how many people you will be bringing.  

In a demonstration of our respect and thankfulness to the Veterans we are asking students to wear all black on Tuesday.  The school will be closed on November 11 as we honour Remembrance Day, and classes will resume on Thursday.

Thank you

Student Services Update

WiseGuyz

MidSun and WiseGuyz have partnered up again this year.  Wiseguyz is a weekly program for Grade 9 boys that addresses the following topics: human rights, sexual health, gender and positive relationships.  It has been a great way to connect boys from diverse backgrounds and we look forward to working with the WiseGuyz team again this year.

GSA at MidSun

MidSun’s official start date for this year is Tuesday, November 3 at lunch.

What is a GSA?

A GSA is a school-based group run by students and supported by teachers that works to create safe, caring and inclusive spaces for LGBTQ students and their allies.

All students are welcome as we spread the words of kindness, acceptance and diversity throughout MidSun.

Natalie Norcross

Learning Leader, Student Services
MidSun School

Message from Mme. Ryall - French 8 Field Trip

Cuisine et Chateau Interactive Culinary Centre Field Trip forms were sent home today with Grade 8 French students.

See D2L for more info.

Forms due back Thursday November 5, first come first served.

Grade 9 Update from Midsun

Grade 9 students are off to a busy start!  They are involved in studying politics, chemistry and exponents.  Students are also proudly representing Midsun through their athletic and extra-curricular involvement.   As we prepare our students for future plans and high school study there are some upcoming events we encourage them to participate in.

Take Our Kids to Work Day

November 4, 2015

Take Our Kids to Work Day (TOKWD) is an annual event sponsored by the Learning Partnership that encourages grade 9 students to spend a day with their parent/guardian/family friend at their worksite.  It is an opportunity for students to develop an appreciation for the importance of staying in school, gaining exposure to skills required in today’s workplace, developing an appreciation for parents’ roles in making a living, and exploring career options in a practical way.  This is not a CBE sponsored event but we strongly encourage all our grade 9 students to attend.  Forms have been sent home with students and if they are attending, the form must be returned to their teacher ASAP.  Please note: the letter and form are available from the D2L shells of grade 9 core teachers.

Centennial High School Open House
November 19, 2015  7-9pm

Centennial High School, our feeder school, will be holding an open house from 7-9pm on November 19.  This is an opportunity for Midsun students to explore Centennial, meet staff and hear about courses, options, the Advance Placement Program (AP) and the Registered Apprenticeship Program (RAP).  Students are encouraged to attend and see what Centennial has to offer!  Please note, if a student is considering attending a different high school, they should meet with Ms. Norcross to discuss.  Open houses will be scheduled throughout November and December at all Calgary high schools and families are encouraged to check the school websites for information on these events.

If you have any questions or concerns related to grade 9, please contact Mrs. Kaiser, grade 9 Learning Leader, via email (mekaiser@cbe.ab.ca) or phone (403-777-6430 x3045).

Picture Retake Day

PICTURE RETAKE DAY   Wednesday, October 28th

 IF A RETAKE IS REQUIRED, PLEASE RETURN YOUR ORIGINAL PROOF ORDER FORM 

TO THE PHOTOGRAPHER. STUDENTS NEW TO MIDSUN SCHOOL OR STUDENTS THAT MISSED ORIGINAL PHOTO DAY ARE INVITED TO HAVE THEIR PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN TO  BE INCLUDED IN THE YEARBOOK.

Please contact Lifetouch if you have questions regarding proof order forms and picture packages.

Lifetouch Canada Inc. - 1.866.457.8212