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Update | SK

It is hard to believe we are approaching the end of 2024 and the end of our first term with the SKs. It has been incredible to watch this class blossom into the supportive and kind community they are now. They are so inclusive, responsible, and helpful and we are enjoying watching them find new ways to share their knowledge and kindness with one another. 

A key focus of this unit has been encouraging students to embrace all emotions as a natural and safe part of the human experience. We discuss how some emotions feel comfortable and others may feel uncomfortable, but “all emotions are okay!” This learning is especially significant for young boys, as research shows that social norms can discourage boys from expressing a full range of emotions as they mature, which can have long-term consequences. We talk about different strategies that help us work through and express our big emotions in productive ways and we will continue exploring this topic in January. 

In literacy, we continue to build fluency with CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words and expand our repertoire of heart words to strengthen reading and writing skills. Meanwhile, in math, we have been exploring repeating patterns and working to solidify number formation for 1–10. We are also learning about place value, using base ten blocks to represent two-digit numbers, which is helping to develop a deeper understanding of how numbers work.

Every day, your children’s kindness and positivity brighten our classroom and remind us why we love what we do. We look forward to continuing this journey with them after the winter break and watching their continued growth throughout the year. 

Kind regards, 

Anna Crawford and Pina Porto

Update | SK–Year 4 French

Throughout November, our Kindergarten students engaged in a project exploring their family trees. They created lovely drawings of their close relatives, cut them out, and glued them onto tree templates. The project culminated in delightful presentations, available on Seesaw, where the children proudly introduced each family member.

As we transitioned to our next unit, the focus shifted to learning the names of different body parts. The children loved the interactive reading of "Va-t’en, Grand Monstre Vert!" by Ed Emberley. Families can enjoy a video on Seesaw of the children reading the book together. This engaging story, paired with sing-alongs and vocabulary games, made learning fun and memorable.

Through listening, active participation, and repeated practice of words and short sentences, our young learners not only expanded their vocabulary but also developed their ability to recognize and produce sounds. It has been a joy to watch them grow and learn through these engaging activities!

Using a kinesthetic approach combined with oral communication games and activities, Year 1 students have developed their listening and speaking skills. They have learned new vocabulary, improved their pronunciation, and gained confidence in constructing sentences, including positive, negative, and interrogative forms.

With these skills in place, they are ready to tackle their first story after the winter break: La Poule Maboule. In this unit, students will identify key story elements they have been exploring in their Inquiry Unit, such as the title, characters, setting, problem, and solutions.

We look forward to seeing their progress as they delve into storytelling!

Year 2 students have been developing their reading and communication skills by exploring the setting, problem, and characters in the story Comment y aller? Along the way, they practiced answering closed-ended questions in writing, gaining experience with French spelling, including accents and apostrophes.

To conclude the term, students will collaborate with a partner to prepare for oral presentations, retelling the story using provided keywords and responding to related questions. With this foundation, they are ready to delve into the narration and dialogues of Scene 1, further enhancing their reading comprehension skills as they begin the new year.

In Year 3, students have grown in confidence as French speakers through class discussions focused on the first scene of the play L’arbre ungali and the story of Rémi, the multimedia component of our program. It has been rewarding to see new students learning to formulate simple sentences while more experienced learners continue to refine their communication skills.

Collaborating with a partner, students enjoyed preparing for oral presentations, retelling the first scene of the story using provided keywords and answering related questions. They also practiced answering closed-ended questions in writing, gaining a deeper understanding of French spelling, including the use of accents and apostrophes.

Term 1 has been a productive and enriching period of growth and learning for our Year 3 students!

In Year 4, students completed an engaging project, available on Seesaw, focused on the annual francophone festival Le festival du voyageur. The project involved research into the Festival’s activities and explored the historic first contact between Indigenous peoples and European voyageurs in the 17th century. Through this research, students gained valuable insights into the topic while honing their writing skills, with particular attention to proper syntax, spelling, and punctuation.

In addition to the project, students continued alternating between independent reading activities using the reader Le voleur and enjoying new episodes of Rémi, the multimedia component of our program, which further develops their listening and speaking skills.

As the term comes to a close, we are wrapping up the reading of the story L’aventure de Stéphanie and reviewing closed-ended questions through written responses. Open-ended questions were also provided for students who benefited from additional reinforcement.

Ultimately, everything we do in class — whether through a specific text or multimedia resource — focuses on providing meaningful opportunities for students to engage with the language. Our classroom serves as an immersive space, where students are exposed to and practice French in authentic situations. Year 4 students will continue to develop their ability to play their part in this language-rich environment.

Guillaume Dupre
Primary French Specialist

Update | Middle Music

Year 6 Music

Students have been making great strides since the beginning of the school year when they started their new journey of playing their band instruments. After starting with the basics of posture, embouchure, technique, the initial sounds, and learning to read the language, students have been advancing their knowledge of instrument fundamentals in the areas of; note accuracy and technique, tone quality, tempo control, rhythmic accuracy, articulation, and symbol recognition to then apply these newly developed skills to playing small musical selections. Students will look to continue developing and expanding the following skills over the next couple of months;

• their range of notes on their instrument (both lower and higher than previously learned)

• a variety of articulations and styles of music (including musical symbols)

• a variety of dynamics and how to transition from one to another (including symbols)

• their ability to read and perform a variety of rhythmic symbols at varying tempi

• their tone quality throughout a variety of new playing challenges, including, but not limited to; softer, louder, lower, higher, slower, quicker

January brings some exciting times for Year 6 students. They now have the opportunity to join our co-curricular program as a member of the Year 6 Concert Band and possibly the Year 6 Jazz Ensemble. Rehearsals are once a week within the school day and their commitment will be until the end of the school year when they will have the wonderful opportunity to share their musical talents with family and friends by performing at both the Spring Concert and Generations Day events. 

Year 7 Music

After welcoming 43 new Year 7 students to UCC to start the school year, the music program started patiently, reviewing basic fundamental skills to unify an approach to a student body with a wide variety of both skill level, and approaches to instrument performance. However, at the same time, the school year started much more quickly within its co-curricular program by providing a fairly robust variety of programming for those eager to progress their musical skills and looked to have an opportunity to perform throughout the school year both on and off campus. After spending a fair bit of time developing student’s basic fundamental understanding in the areas of; note accuracy and technique, tone quality, tempo control, rhythmic accuracy, articulation, and symbol recognition, students then started to focus on developing their musical awareness and understanding. This would include learning a variety of symbols and musical details that helped them think about their performance intentions more musically, bringing the music to life off of the page and giving personality to their parts. Students will look at developing and expanding the following skills over the next couple of months:

• their range of notes on their instrument (both lower and higher than previously learned)

• a variety of articulations and styles of world music (including musical symbols)

• a variety of dynamics and how to quickly transition between an ever growing dynamic range

• their ability to read and perform a variety of rhythmic symbols at varying tempi pushing their boundaries and comfort level to see how far they can go

• their tone quality throughout a variety of new playing challenges, including, but not limited to; softer, louder, lower, higher, slower, quicker

• their musical understanding, interpret their ever increasing knowledge of symbols on the page to bring the music to life and emote what they feel in the music!

After getting a couple of concerts under their belt on Dec. 8 (Festival of Lights) and later today (Thursday, Dec. 12 Prep Holiday Concert) a number of events are quickly approaching in the new year for our co-curricular groups:

UCC Club Blue Note — Jazz Cafe evening (Wednesday, Feb. 5 in Weston Hall, Jazz Band featuring all 4 UCC Jazz Bands, Jazz Choir and Prep Choir) 

OBA – Provincial Music Festival Competition (Thursday, Feb. 13 at the Chinese Cultural Centre, Concert Band)

Golden Horseshoe Music Festival  (Mohawk College in Hamilton on Thursday, Feb. 20, Jazz Band)

Parents are more than welcome, and encouraged, to attend all of these events. Please look for more specific details to come in the New Year.

We look forward to seeing families at future Arts events!

Paul McGarr 

MYP Music Teacher

Director of Bands

Update | Mathematics

Curriculum: Students in Year 6 have completed their second unit involving Number Connections. Year 7 students are engaged in their third unit Ratios and Proportions within which they will significantly explore Comparing and Scaling. 

On mathematics teaching and learning: The LES lesson plan

Often, math classes involve a brief Launch of the task, significant time to work collaboratively to Explore and investigate patterns, and a whole-class sharing of strategies, which includes a Summary of the learning and to correct any misunderstandings. When students explore patterns, they build conceptual understanding which promotes application of those concepts and increased procedural fluency. 

Math contests at the Prep:

BCC contest: On Nov. 14, 127 students from years 5 to 7 wrote the BCC math contest. Students will receive certificates of participation or distinction from their math teacher. The contest and solutions are now available on the CEMC website at this link. A big thank you to Mr. Rossi, Mr. Cooper and Mr. Ma for their efforts in making these opportunities available to the students. 

AMC8 Math contest: Over 100 Year 6 and 7 students are preparing to write this contest. Registration is now closed. This contest will take place on Jan. 28 at 3:45 p.m. in Weston Hall. Links to practice materials are available on students’ math course pages in brightspace. 

Riyaz Ismail
Math Learning Leader

Festive Marketplace | Payment methods

While debit and credit are accepted throughout Festive Marketplace, parents may wish to send younger children to school with some spending money. We suggest $1 to $2 for the Bake Sale, and $5 for the Snowball Grab, if they wish to play.

Year 6 and 7 | Festive Marketplace visit

Dear Families,

Year 6 and Year 7 students will visit the Festive Marketplace on Friday, December 13, at the times listed below. 

Students may bring some money to purchase items at Festive  Marketplace, but they will not be performing.

They will be visiting at the following times:

• Year 6 will visit Festive Marketplace during morning recess

• Year 7 will visit Festive Marketplace during lunch recess/FLEXtime

Please find guidelines below regarding Festive Marketplace visits to the Upper School on December 13:

1. Students are only permitted to purchase from the Bake Sale table and Snowball Grab.

2. Also:

1. $1-2 for the Bake Sale and $5 for the snowball grab is the suggested amount for students to bring to school 

2. Faculty will accompany students during their Festive Marketplace visit

Holidays at Lonsdale | Spirit Week

Year 7 | Niagara Trip 

Once again, we are excited to offer a year-end trip for our Year 7 students to the Niagara Region. The trip will be on June 4, 5 and 6.

All Year 7 families were emailed the permission form last week. If you haven’t already, please complete the permission form by tomorrow, Dec. 13.

Please review this document for a list of frequently asked questions (FAQs) about the trip, the packing list, and the draft itinerary.

Opt-out | Hot lunch 

The winter session of the Hot Lunch program will begin after the Winter Break on Tuesday, Jan. 7.  Email Janet Brock by Thursday, Dec. 19 if you would like to either opt in or out of the lunch program.  Please do not email if you are already signed up and will continue participating in the Hot Lunch program.

Colour House | Vacation competition 

Colour House On Vacation is a House competition that occurs over the winter break. In this competition, students are encouraged to email pictures of themselves wearing their House colours to Mr. Hustler . The House that sends in the most pictures will receive 1000 points (maximum of 2 pictures per student). Please contact Mr. Hustler for more details.

John Hustler

Colour House Coordinator

Last Call | Food Bank Donations

Please bring in your donations to the C.O.T.H Food Bank by, tomorrow, Friday, December 13! Each homeform has been assigned two high-need items. Students can either choose to donate either item independently or partner with a classmate to share the cost of an item.  

Thank you to all the families who have already participated!

Afterschool Program | January–March

In addition to our ExtraEd Club offerings, we're also introducing an exciting new program, brought to you by our very own Ms. Etingen.

"Level Up" (powered by Mentorio) supercharges kids' mindset and confidence through: movement, mentorship and play challenges. Each week, participants embark on exciting quests that foster social-emotional growth while equipping them with essential life skills and strategies.

Our team of expert mentors — mental health professionals and educators — are dedicated to bringing out the best in every child by helping kids identify personal strengths. Through interactive games and team challenges, "Level Up" participants build and refine skills in areas of: resilience, teamwork, grit, and critical thinking.

Join us to level up your strengths and boost your confidence, character, and overall wellbeing — because every child deserves to be their best self! 

Level Up will be offered on Wednesdays at 3:30 p.m. (SK to Year 3) and Thursdays at 4 p.m. (Years 4 to 7). Please use this form to register.

To learn more about programs and clubs offered by ASP from January to March, please click here.