Students in the French Immersion JK and SK class at St. Charles Catholic Elementary school dove into the story of a lovable African penguin that resides at the California Academy of Sciences’ aquarium. The children first enjoyed the book “Pierre the Penguin” by Jean Marzollo which tells the true story of Pierre’s unique experience. Alarmed when Pierre lost most of his feathers, an ingenious biologist designed a little wetsuit for Pierre which allowed him to swim in the cold pool with his fellow penguins. His feathers regrew shortly thereafter. Through this story, students learned about compassion to all, including animals.In the afternoon, the students watched the celebration of Pierre’s “Hatch Day” (birthday) on a live stream from a webcam at the aquarium in California. Pierre turned 29 on this day! Teacher Michelle Robinson said: “Pierre’s live “Hatch Day” celebration on the Internet offered a great opportunity to use technology for a literacy activity – and the children loved watching the penguins swim and eat fish!”
Category: Schools
Marymount Girls and St. Benedict Boys City and NOSSA Champs Once Again!
The Level 1 Girl’s and Boy’s Alpine Ski Teams at Marymount Academy and St. Benedict’s have once again qualified for OFSAA. This is the second year in a row that the two teams have earned top honours at both championships. Going into the season, both teams knew that they had the potential to be the dominant teams on the hill and the results of both race days definitely proved just that. At the SDSSAA level, Kate Palkovits found her best challenge from her own team as Danielle Burla edged Kate out of top spot in the Giant Slalom. The girls traded first and second positions in both races with Kate just squeaking out the first place overall combined times. Mackenzie Webber finished fifth overall and these three outstanding finishes earned Marymount the overall team title. On the boys side, it was Spencer Dailey and Zack Filipov trading second place finishes in both races with Spencer just edging out Zack in the overall combined times. Adam Goegan’s fourth and sixth place finishes were enough to earn St. Ben’s their city championship. At the NOSSA level, Kate Palkovits backed up her results from the previous week by walking away with first place finishes in the Slalom, Giant Slalom earning the overall combined NOSSA champion title. Danielle Burla and Mackenzie Webber finished fifth and sixth overall and once again, this was enough to crown the Marymount team NOSSA champs. For the boys, it was a bit closer at the NOSSA level. Spencer Dailey finished fourth overall and Adam Goegan finished sixth overall. Zack Filipov’s seventh and eighth place finishes were enough to give St. Ben’s the overall team title for the boys. The club trained Level 2 skiers from both schools also made a name for themselves. Lauren Kyle earned top honours at NOSSA and will represent the association at OFSAA as the top Level 2 female qualifier. This will be Lauren’s first OFSAA experience and she looks to continue making a name for herself on the slopes. McKenna Urso from Marymount also made an impression finishing sixth overall among the Level 2 skiers as a grade nine student.
The five top skiers for both Level 1 teams will travel together to the OFSAA Championships to be held at Blue Mountain February 26th – 28th. Marymount’s team will consist of Kate Palkovits, Danielle Burla, Mackenzie Webber, Kelsey Roy, and Lyndsay Greasley. The St. Benedict’s team will consist of Spencer Dailey, Adam Goegan, Zack Filipov, Tyler Provencal, and Ryan Bell. Marymount will be looking to improve on their 7th place overall finish in the province from last year.
Friendship is flourishing at St. Bernadette Catholic School
During the month of February all the Sudbury Catholic Schools are celebrating the virtue of Compassion and at St. Bernadette they extended this theme on Valentine’s Day with their Fete de L’amitie (Friendship Feast). Every year the grade 5 and 6 students take on a leadership role and organize a series of fun-filled activities from obstacle courses to bowling and floor hockey for the JK and SK students to enjoy. Each student in the school is given a red heart-shaped lollypop to symbolize the love and friendship we have and show to all of our classmates and friends at school. One lucky boy and girl in each class gets to act as le roi et la reine (the king and queen) and they wear their special crowns for the entire day.
JK students at St. Bernadette French Immersion school, Kiley Laforest and Caleb Woods are le roi and la reine for the Fete de L’amitie (Friendship Feast) held every year on St. Valentine’s Day.
Primary Students Try To Defy Gravity At St. Anne School
Walking and being able to stand tall are activities the students at St. Anne School participate in everyday. A recent outing to Centennial Arena made doing so just a bit harder for some of the primary students within the Sudbury Catholic Board.
Armed with their skates, helmets, and a lot of padding from their winter snowsuits, classes from the Hanmer school took to the ice with their classmates and family members. During the next hour, some children practiced the basics of trying to stand and move on skates while a few more daring students moved from one end of the rink to the other. Who knew that trying to move on skates could be so tricky? All in all, the students enjoyed the physical activity and the pride that comes from knowing they were mastering the art of defying gravity. “Do we have to leave?” Those were the words that even the youngest children were asking. Their teacher’s responses, “We’ll be back!”
Cards “Think Pink … or Red” on Valentine’s Day
Students at St. Charles College got decked out in red and pink this Valentine’s Day. The school held its second annual pink or red dress down day to support breast cancer. Students paid two dollars to dress down. All money raised will go to supporting the Breast Cancer Foundation’s Sudbury chapter for the purchase of new equipment. Almost 600 dollars was raised at the one-day event. This year, all high schools in the Sudbury area were asked to take part in the fundraising event.
St. Charles Cardinals Take On the Wolves
It’s not everyday that high school kids get to challenge the Wolves at a game of hockey. On February 14th, Life Skills students at St. Charles College went head-to-head with four members of the Wolves team for a couple friendly rounds of floor hockey.
Classroom teacher James Suchoplas organized the event. “Events like this build special memories for the students whether they are fans of hockey or not. It’s also an important lesson in being a team player and a way for the kids to showcase their school/team spirit.”
Wolves player Ryan Hanes says “It’s a win-win situation for the kids and us players to come in and give a little back to the community that we play for.”
Closing the Gap between Elementary and Secondary School
On February 7th and 8th, teachers and students from St. Anne Catholic School and Bishop Alexander Catholic Secondary School (BAC) in Hanmer participated in co-teaching sessions to help bridge the gap between elementary school and secondary school. These sessions were sponsored by Sudbury Catholic District School Board in hopes that grades 7, 8, and 9 teachers would create a collaborative inquiry into the questioning strategies used across the three grade levels. Teachers were brought together in a collaboration session and encouraged to use open ended questions to facilitate the teaching and learning process. “This is a great learning opportunity for both students and teachers. The use of open ended questions allows students to use more meaningful answers that support their previous knowledge,” said Jody O’Daiskey, grade 8 teacher at St. Anne School.
Over the course of two days, teachers from both schools engaged in co-teaching math lessons using similar styles and the same final assessment . Throughout the lesson, various assessments as, for and of learning took place. Students worked together to solve the final open ended assessment question, while teachers circulated to provide guidance when needed. Students from O’Daiskey’s classroom at St. Anne Catholic School enjoyed this experience. “I thought it was a great opportunity, and we learned that there were several possible outcomes. This showed us that there isn’t always one right answer when you have an open ended question. I also thought it was fun working with teachers
from BAC so they could see what some of us were capable of,” said Taylor Lawless, student in grade 8 at St. Anne School.
Bridging the gap between elementary school and secondary school is an important focus of the collaborative inquiry. All teachers involved agree that activities such as these lead to greater student success when they reach secondary school. “I think that bringing these knowledgeable teachers together in a co-teaching session, can only lead to better success for all students involved,” said Guy Mathieu, current principal at St. Anne School and founding principal at Bishop Alexander Carter Catholic Secondary School. “I believe that given the opportunity to meet with teachers from the elementary panel allows us
to better understand each other’s strengths and weaknesses. This in turn can only benefit the students coming to us in the secondary panel,” said Robert Boucher, a secondary teacher from Bishop Alexander Carter CSS.
Upon completion of the entire inquiry process, the teachers involved will bring all of their findings, including; student artifacts, pictures and video, to a final collaboration meeting with teachers from all elementary and secondary schools in the Sudbury Catholic District school board. These results will be presented and discussed to further bridge the gap and allow for greater student success for all.
Bags for Beds at St. Charles Elementary
The Dearness Conservation team at St. Charles Catholic Elementary Catholic school challenged their students to bring in milk ‘bags for beds’ and they did – “We can’t believe that the school collected over 2000 milk bags” says Rolande Nault, Club 50 Azilda member, ‘this will definitely make life a lot more comfortable for children and their families, especially those children in the Mariam Centre Orphanage and Outpatient Care in Haiti’.
The ladies at Club 50 Azilda take milk bags, cut them into strips, tie them together and then roll them up into balls just like yarn, then crochet or knit them into finished mats. These mats are very useful in keeping out parasites and can be used as beds for surgeries as they can be washed for the next patient. They become very soft in the heat and are also waterproof. ‘The ladies do an outstanding job creating these mats and then ensuring that that are shipped to Haiti’ says Ms. Giroux, teacher and Dearness Conservation Team member at St. Charles Catholic Elementary School. “This challenge had our students ‘think locally and act globally’ a quote that is said many times to our students to instill lifelong responsible citizenship. This challenge was a great opportunity to partner with a community organization, teach students the importance of reusing materials and teaching them the importance of giving back”.
Marymount Regals Take Championship at Bear’s Classic
This past weekend, the Marymount “A” team finished first in the St. Benedict Bear’s Classic Elementary girls basketball tournament. The Regals defeated Carl Nesbitt in the semi-finals and went on to beat St. Denis in the finals!
All-Stars
Carl Nesbit #33 Kennedi
St. Denis #25 J. Tremblay
St. Denis #14 K. Rogerson
Marymount “A” #31 Micela Bertels
Marymount “A” #17 Gabi Schwabe