March break - what are you doing?

First of all, may we recommend that you get the weekend...or Friday...off to a great start by attending Fitness Fridays at 8am before school. Parents welcome to help and to work out!

Secondly, check out the latest newsletter from FSLAC (the TDSB's French as a Second Language Advisory Committee) which includes updates about French immersion and things to do in French during March break.


Thirdly, the Scholastic bilingual book fair is on this week in the library. Students can attend at recess so why not send them along with some money to spend to stock up on reading for March break? The school recommends having a bit of a chat with your child to ensure the money is well spent at the fair! Money spent at the fair benefits the school library.

Finally, make sure to celebrate St. Patrick's day on the 17th of March! Yes, yes, my roots are showing, I know! Toronto has its St. Patrick's day parade on Sunday, 13th March.

1st of October - already! Updates and information.

School Council Meeting

Please note the first school council meeting will take place on the 26th of October, 7pm to 9pm in the library at the school. It's a great opportunity to meet other parents and hear what's going on in the school even if you don't have time to volunteer. Please let us know if you will require childcare. The date is in the school calendar there to the right which will also inform you of PA days and the like.

Labour Dispute Update

Ms. Mills posted this letter - https://lordlansdowne.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/29sept_elementary-ltr.pdf - on the school blog and many of you, if you are signed up to the TDSB email list, will have received it via email also.  The latest I heard - yesterday on the news - was that the EFTO (teachers' union) are heading back to the bargaining table. Fingers crossed that we will avoid any strikes.

Cross Country Meet - Thursday, Oct 8th

The meet will take place next Thursday at beautiful Ashbridges Bay.  Parent volunteers are needed - sign up here  - and parent supporters are very welcome too! So far the forecast looks good and it's another good way to meet parents, get involved and support the school. It's incredible to see so many children getting out there and giving their best. It is worth noting that the course is mostly run on sand so if you do have a child taking part and you could get them to practice running on sand this weekend, that would be great. The courses for the races have been posted on the main school blog here and the distances vary from 1km for the Grade 1s and 2s up to 1.5km for Grade 3, 2km for Grades 5 and 6 and 3km for Grades 7 and 8.

Weekly update - Indigo adopt a school, work to rule, blogs and newsletters

HELP WIN BOOKS FOR OUR SCHOOL
If you are on the internet most days, in particular for the next 2 weeks or so, please consider adding this link - https://adoptaschool.indigo.ca/eng/schools/743#.VgLvlni2NdA.facebook - to your favourites and making sure you click every day! The top 3 schools in the province will win books for their school and each click really makes a difference - we went from 101st to 84th in a matter of hours with only a few clicks. You can also make a donation of $12 to get an extra 10 "adopts" but you don't get more for bigger donations.



EFTO AND WORK-TO-RULE
Just an anecdotal update really about this. Firstly, I was chatting to Miss Mills (the principal) earlier in the week and she mentioned that the situation within the school feels pretty tense with the teachers having to be careful not to step outside the boundaries set for them by their union which, at times, is frustrating for everyone including the teachers themselves. I have spoken to several of the teachers and they definitely are doing their best to get things done within the confines of what the union rules are currently allowing. It's great to see the cross country practices, for example, have not been curtailed. It's not easy for everyone and though things from the playground seem relatively smooth, there is a lot of work going on inside the school to keep it all ticking over!

In terms of next steps, the union rep is going to a meeting on Tuesday (29th) for further discussions and I hope to hear from her soon after that and will keep an eye on the news also. Let's all hope for a resolution to it all sooner rather than later so everyone can concentrate on getting on with learning and teaching!

SCHOOL COUNCIL COMMUNICATIONS & NEWSLETTER
At the moment, I have not been sending out newsletters- partly because I have had busy work weeks and feel I am still settling in to the new school term but also because we are working to compile the email list and class lists from the forms that have been returned. We have had a pretty good return rate on those forms so thank you so much for that! It's also better late than never so please feel free to send them back if they got pushed to the bottom of the pile - you can drop them off in the office if you get to the playground or ask your child to do so if you don't. Some teachers are just putting them in a pile in the classroom if they get returned to class so they should eventually get to us! We think class lists will be really helpful for all parents and are delighted to have had a good response.

Newlsletter images - apologies!

Just a quick note to apologise to those receiving the email newsletter who could not see the images in the last couple of weeks. I am not sure what the problem is but will be doing my best to solve it nonetheless!

Newsletter News

Given that email subscribers have been recipients of at least 2 Lord Lansdowne emails this week (the Alex Russell announcement and the reminder about the party to celebrate the school community efforts to #saveoursunshine and #stop484spadina), we decided not to send out an email newsletter on top of this.

However, all going well, you should receive the paper one as we didn't want non-email people to miss out on this and other news.
The pdf of the paper newsletter can also be seen here .

I hope to resume normal service with the newsletter being sent out on Friday next week.

Holiday Concert and 125th Birthday Celebrations

JK/SK birthday cake for
Lord Lansdowne's 125th birthday

The New Year seems like a long time to wait to write about the wonderful holiday concert that happened last night at Lord Lansdowne.  There were lovely displays in the entrance hall of the school, near the stairs and in the library.

Grade 3 French Immersion models
of classrooms from 125 years ago

A close-up o f one of the gorgeously detailed classrooms
to show what school might have been like 125 years ago, when
Lord Lansdowne first opened its doors

A video of the beautiful dance (with thanks to Jessica Runge) performed at the end of last year by grade 1 and up, and a soundtrack of the children singing was playing in the library.




Also in the library, there was a genuinely fascinating collection of PowerPoint presentations with the history of the names of the laneways in the neighbourhood and some lovely artwork on display which the photos do not do justice to!

As for the concert itself - well, the children excelled themselves from the singers to the skit to the strings and band, it was clear that they had all put in a lot of hard work and were enjoying it all. Those of us who were able to stay to the very end heard an exclusive song penned by Mr. Gilman with vocals from a past pupil who is now studying music. Some enthusiastic dancing from teachers and students was noted for the Blues Crew performance!

Many, many thanks to all the teachers and staff and to the students for putting on such a great show!

NEWSLETTERS (and a nice picture of Lord Lansdowne in this morning's beautiful snow!)

Lord Lansdowne this morning!

Paper newsletters have been distributed to teachers' cubbies this morning so you should be receiving those in backpacks this evening. They usually go out on Wednesday mornings but weren't distributed yesterday due to sickness. (Hoping they might they are becoming a regular feature to parents and teachers and that somebody will have noticed this....!)

 Our email/online newsletter can be found here and we will be switching fully to this format to save time and paper which will be in keeping with Lord Lansdowne's EcoSchool efforts.

You can find past newsletters on our newsletter archive page.