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Dear Prep families, 

Happy Fall! This time of year is always a special time filled with renewal and reflection. We had two very successful assemblies this week for the Primary and Middle Divisions. On Tuesday, Primary students had an assembly focused on caring for others which can be viewed here. Today, Middle students had a visit from Ice and the Blue Army Generals to build excitement around A-Day, and learned about the upcoming Jewish High Holidays in a talk from Upper School student Josh Golger. He connected the High Holidays to overarching concepts of gratitude and renewal that are common in so many of the cultural and religious celebrations in our community. Please see the Middle Division Assembly video filled with pictures from the first months of school here. We always love when students from the Upper School come back to speak and act as role models for our students in the Prep.  

Yesterday we acknowledged Rowan’s Law Day and wore purple to raise awareness for concussion safety. Students learned about concussions in their classes and talked about ways to keep their brain safe.

On Monday, we will be honouring the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation by wearing orange shirts. In order to support conversations at home, we are providing two resources that provide information about residential schools, and strategies for engaging with your child as well as suggestions for learning more about the history and culture of Indigenous communities in Canada.

• Residential schools

• Talking to you child about Orange Shirt Day

Hopes and Dreams Conferences: The first conferences of the year will be held on Thursday, Oct. 10. These are foundational conversations between parents/guardians to discuss how your children are settling in, and what your hopes and dreams are for your child’s experience this school year. These conferences are being offered both in person and virtual. There will be no school for students on this day. Please note there is a half day of school on Friday, Oct. 11.  

Your partners in learning,

Sarah Fleming, David Girard and Gareth Evans

The Prep Leadership Team

The Prep Terry Fox Run

A huge thank you to the families who donated and participated in this year's Terry Fox Run in support of cancer research. 

On Friday, Sept. 20, the Prep participated in the Terry Fox Run, which started off with a special assembly to learn about Terry Fox. Next, we met with the Upper School on the Prep Fields to start our campus-wide fun run and finished with a school-wide delicious BBQ and some friendly Colour House events. It was a great day for our community!

If you haven't donated yet and would like to, please click here, find your child's homeroom and follow the donation prompts. Thank you for supporting cancer research and continuing Terry’s legacy.

Chen Lin (7B) and Ibrahim Chaudry (7B)
Community Service Council

Message of Support

Dear Prep School Families, 

As we settle back into the routine of the school year, we want to thank you for the partnership in support of the College and our students. We also want to recognize that members of our community may be feeling the weight of geopolitical events, devastating violence and uncertainty in political and social contexts and that this may have a deeply personal impact.  

A reminder that the following supports are available to our students who may be impacted by events occurring around us:

• Home form advisers

• Health Centre support and counselling — students may drop in or book a session with:

  • Geoff Sorge  

  • Caitlin Dobie (Upper School) 

  • Alicia Versteegh (Upper School) 

  • Martha Boyce (Prep School)

  • Kayla Gosse (Prep School) 

Drawing on our values, particularly in support of community, let us offer support, care, kindness and empathy to each other now and throughout the year. 

Warmly,

Sarah Fleming

Head of the Preparatory School

Reminders | Partnership and FLEXtime

Hello UCC Prep Parents,

I hope this edition of Heads Up finds you doing well and making a comfortable—yet possibly hesitant—transition to fall.

I consider it a privilege to be working with you and your child during his time in Year 6 and Year 7. Recently, I’ve been fortunate enough to observe the students laser cutting while in design class, compete in CISAA athletic fixtures, bring Weston Hall’s stage alive with lively theatre and musical performances, and all while wearing their UCC uniform with pride and representing their school in the best possible way. I do not take this for granted and continually remind myself that our students and their relationships with their teachers are an immense part of what makes UCC a fantastic community.

I want to take this opportunity to remind all of you that myself and our faculty sincerely appreciate the partnership we have with you, the parents, in ensuring that your son enjoys the best possible experience while at The Prep. Our partnership with you allows us to gain valuable feedback and make possible adjustments to our program and operations. This is especially important when we consider how students feel during Year 6 and Year 7, and as Phyllis L. Fagell suggests in her book Middle School Matters:

“Middle school can be kind of a mess—there’s romantic drama, friend drama, and pressure to figure out who you are. Everyone’s pretending to know exactly what they’re doing, but no one does.”

By partnering together and trusting one another, we can assist students with understanding the importance of advocating for themselves when feeling uncomfortable, stepping outside of their comfort zone by taking risks, building relationships with their peers, owning their mistakes, and being kind to one another. This way, we increase the chance of our students developing the mindset necessary to navigate the inevitable difficult moments that all children face during their years in middle school.

As always, please never hesitate to reach out to the Prep Leadership Team or your child’s form adviser with a question, your own insights into your child’s school experience, or possible suggestions. We truly feel a strong partnership will benefit our wider community, our faculty, and our boys.

Lastly, please highlight the importance of FLEXtime with your child. FLEXtime takes place on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays from 1 to 1:35 p.m. The first 10 minutes are set aside for students to meet with their form adviser for attendance and to organize the rest of their day. During the remaining 25 minutes, students may see subject specialists or the Centre for Learning faculty for support with their academic or organizational skills, or use the time wisely to get a head start on their homework. One of our goals is to assist students in determining how to make the best use of FLEXtime to support their learning goals. FLEXtime is an excellent opportunity for faculty to explicitly teach students the IB’s Approaches to Learning such as self-management, communication, social, and thinking skills. 

Please see the specific FLEXtime schedule below:

Sincerely,

Gareth Evans

Assistant Head of the Prep, Middle Division

A-Day | Tour the Chen Innovation Lab

We hope to see you at A-Day on Saturday Oct. 5!

After enjoying the fun of Soccerfest, we invite all parents to drop in for a tour of our new Brenda & Reid Chen Innovation Lab. 

From 10:45 a.m. to 12 p.m., you'll have the chance to explore our exciting new SK to Year 5 learning space, which features a robotics and coding area, a green screen recording studio, and a hands-on fabrication and makerspace. Discover the tools and technologies your children will be using to explore, create, and innovate. We look forward to showing you around!

Message from 1M

We have had a wonderful start in Year 1! It has been an absolute pleasure getting to know your learners. They are asking thoughtful questions, practicing new routines and are incredibly curious and enthusiastic to learn. 

 We will be launching our at-home reading program soon. Each week, students will bring home a decodable reading passage to add to their Home Reading Folder. Here's some guidance on home reading:

• Read to your child. This alone builds a passion for reading. Read with expression, wonder, pause to talk about the text, and have fun. 

• When your child is ready and confident, have them read. It seems simple, but we all know the more you practice the better you become. 

• Read the same wonderful books/passages over and over again. Keep a book for a week and read it each night. By the end of the week, the expression, fluency and comprehension will be much stronger than just picking up new books. 

• Make it a routine. Pick a time of day and a location, make it cozy. 

• Make it a pleasurable experience; do not fight over ‘sounding out’ words. If they are struggling with a word, give it to them. Reread the book again the next night and watch how they pick up the word.

• Be the parent (not the teacher), have fun and enjoy the books/passages. Share moments and laugh.

Thank you to the Year 1 families for your support and partnership. I look forward to a wonderful year together!

Anna Marshall

Year 1 Form Advisor

Message from Years 6 and 7 Language and Literature

We are off to a great start in Years 6 and 7 Language and Literature. In Year 6, students are engaging in a novel study of Jerry Craft’s middle grade graphic novel, New Kid — a fitting theme, we thought, for the beginning of the year. In Year 7, students began their study of dystopian literature, debating the timeless quality of classics like Lois Lowry’s The Giver, and new titles like The Hunger Games series and Marie Lu’s Legend. Units of study such as these, with high interest level and real world connections to our students, are only part of our new program in Middle Language and Literature. In keeping with current best practice around the science of reading, as well as Ontario’s new Language curriculum, we have developed our program based on three core components: 

Independent Reading

• Overall goal of developing confident, life-long readers with strong reading stamina, who love great books.

• Students keep a digital independent reading journal to build reading wish lists, set goals, reflect upon progress and celebrate reading growth and success.

• Students who read for 20 minutes per evening at home are exposed to 1.8 million words per year compared to 8,000 words per year for those who read one minute or less. With this in mind, students are expected to read for at least 20 minutes per evening.

Advanced Word Study

• Systematic and explicit instruction of word and sentence-level reading and spelling, in accordance with the Ontario Curriculum, Language (2023).

• Morpheme Magic program teaches students morphological awareness: The understanding that words are composed of meaningful units.

• This awareness will strengthen students’ word recognition and spelling. It will help students develop richer and deeper vocabularies and improve comprehension and writing.

• Language Power program develops students’ reading comprehension at the sentence level.

• Skills taught include grammar, punctuation and parts of speech.

Inquiry-Based Units of Study

• We use the workshop model of instruction, meaning students engage in a 15 minute mini-lesson then dedicate the rest of this time to daily reading and writing practice.

• Small-group guided reading.

• Building handwriting and printing skills, plus visual-spatial organization, through the use of writer’s notebooks.

• Texts are engaging and current middle grade novels are chosen for their connection to our students’ interests and daily lives.

• Mentor texts help students learn great writing from great authors, with reading comprehension and writing skills explicitly taught.

Michaela Trelford
MYP Language and Literature Learning Leader

Mathematics | Update

Curriculum: Students in Year 6 are exploring concepts involving variables and patterns. Year 7 students are engaged in a mini-unit to review and solidify their number sense including operations with rational numbers and integers.

Resources (Connected Math – CMP4): Students in Year 6 received their first text booklet (Variables and Patterns) to match their current unit of study; additional texts will be distributed over the course of the year. Students in Year 7 received four of their booklets including Completely Rational, Stretching and Shrinking, Comparing and Scaling, and Moving Straight Ahead; these will complement the current and upcoming units of study. 

Resources on Brightspace: Please have your child highlight some of the resources available on Brightspace. In Years 6 and 7 math courses, students have access to practice resources, additional optional practice and challenge resources as well as an extension unit including access to past contests/solutions and good (mathematical) problems. 

Middle Year French Update: Years 5–7

The Prep French Team is excited to kick off the new school year, bringing with it a host of exciting activities, such as concerts, plays, and engaging learning experiences in French. Below is a snapshot of what each grade level will be diving into in their French classes this term:

Year 5: Students in Year 5 are wrapping up a comprehensive review of vocabulary and grammar. Soon, they will begin their novel study of En vacances, where they'll develop their reading comprehension, practice answering questions, and grow their vocabulary through various engaging exercises.

Year 6 Standard French: Our students have embarked on their first unit, Me Voici. This unit focuses on self-expression and the introduction of key vocabulary and grammatical rules, helping students master personal introductions and everyday conversation.

Year 6 Enriched French: Students have started a unit based on the video series Là où je dors, where they explore the daily lives of children from around the globe. This unit is paired with a review of regular and irregular verbs in the present tense. Students' listening and writing skills will be formally assessed at the end of the unit in early November.

Year 7 Fast Track and Standard French: Students in both the Fast Track and Standard French classes are diving into the unit Où j’habite. They will learn how to describe their neighbourhoods using a range of city-related vocabulary and grammatical structures. The unit also emphasizes reviewing verb groups and preparing students for Criterion A (Listening) and Criterion C (Oral) assessments.

Year 7 Enriched French: Students have begun an adapted reading of Le Comte de Monte-Cristo. As they explore this classic, they review verbs from all three verb groups. Their reading comprehension and writing skills will be assessed with a formal evaluation scheduled for early November.

We are looking forward to a year filled with language exploration and cultural discovery. Stay tuned for more updates!

Peter Labancz
French Learning Leader

SIGN UP | Hopes and Dreams Conferences on Thursday, Oct. 10

This is an opportunity for families to meet with their child’s form adviser to discuss how the year has started and begin to build the family-teacher partnership. Our "Pick A Time" system will open on Monday, Sept. 23 at 9 a.m. for families to choose a time to meet with the Form Adviser. It closes at 4 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 7. If you don't sign up for a conference during this window, you will need to reach out to your child’s form adviser personally to choose a remaining time slot. Click here for instructions on how to use Pick-A-Time. Please note that these conferences can be booked either in person or virtually. 

VEX IQ Robotics Returns!

Years 6 and 7 students are once again invited to participate in the VEX IQ competitive robotics program. This year’s game is called Rapid Relay (click here for game description). 

VEX IQ is a fun way to develop skills in teamwork, design, engineering and programming. It is also excellent preparation for students interested in high school robotics.  

The nature of the program will require a significant commitment from participating students. The group will meet on Mondays and Thursdays from 3:50 to 5:15 p.m. in the Upper School Design Lab (room 329). Some weekday and weekend competitions may be in the schedule for the year depending on a team’s commitment to competition levels.

Please note that students cannot be on a sports team with either games or practices on Mondays or Thursdays for the fall and winter seasons. Spring sports can be accommodated.

Students will work in teams of 3 to 4 to design and build their robots. Students may sign up individually and select their teams or will be placed on a team if they do not have a preferred group to work with.   

There is no cost to participate on the team, but there may be costs associated with competitions and team clothing throughout the year.

We cannot guarantee a spot in robotics as numbers are limited. Please indicate your intent to participate in VEX IQ robotics by completing this form no later than Monday, Sept. 30. All students will be notified by Oct. 2  about their status on the list. The first build day will be Monday, Oct, 7.

RSVP | PPO Coffee Mornings

The PPO was thrilled to host the Fall Coffee Morning for Year 7 parents today and invites parents from SK through Year 6 to connect and enjoy coffee and snacks together in the coming weeks. Please RSVP in the links below for your respective coffee morning:

• Monday, Oct. 7: SK–Year 3 

• Tuesday, Oct. 8: Year 4–6

Coffee mornings take place in the Foster Hewitt Foundation Lounge (inside the William P. Wilder ’40 Arena & Sports Complex) from 8:30–10 a.m. We look forward to seeing you!

Thank You |  Teacher Appreciation Breakfast

Thanks to the generosity of parent donations for the Staff Appreciation Lunch last May, the PPO is also able to provide a special breakfast for the Prep teachers. This breakfast will take place on Tuesday, Oct. 1. We hope our teaching staff feels our parent community’s genuine appreciation for their work with our children.