Winchester Weekly
September 27, 2019
Upcoming Key Dates
October 1: Roller Skating Party 6-8 pm @ Skatin' Station
October 8: Credit Union Deposit Day
October 18: Fall Festival 5:30-8 pm
November 5: NO SCHOOL - Teacher Professional Day
November 7: Picture Retake Day
November 12: Credit Union Deposit Day
November 13: PTA Meeting
ATTENTION WINCHESTER FAMILIES!!
SLOW DOWN PLEASE!
SAVE THE DATE - THE WIZARDS ARE COMING!
Support PTA and Invest in Your Child!
If you haven’t already, friendly reminder to sign up for PTA Membership and Invest in your Child at MemberHub. Through the first month of school, we are at ~60% of our membership goal (which is ~300 members), so ‘thanks’ to all the parents and teachers that have already signed up via the website. Your donations through Invest in Your Child remain our key fundraising effort to support events and programs like Junior Enrichment Series, Breakfast with a Buddy, teacher support, and over 20 other efforts.
Thanks again for all your support.
7 Habits at Home - October Focus: Be Proactive
Our Habit for the month of October is Habit 1: Be Proactive. To be proactive means to be in charge of, or take responsibility for, yourself. Click on this link to learn more: Be Proactive.
Below you will find a pdf of a Choice Board with several activities to choose from that you can complete as a family. We encourage you to complete some of these activities this month to learn how your family can use this habit. When you complete an activity, have your child color in that box. Return this paper to your child’s classroom teacher by the end of October to earn a ticket. Tickets will be entered into a drawing for a book!
Snap a picture of your family completing any of these activities and send it in as well. We will add it to our 7 Habits Family Learning bulletin board in the lobby!
National Walk/Ride Your Bike to School Day
Winchester is participating in National Walk and Ride your Bike to School Day. This event takes place on Wednesday, October 2. Ms. Haite, Mr. Stark and Mrs. Lindsay will be outside in the morning to greet students who are walking or riding their bikes. We will pass out a special Winchester Winner to those students who participate. Students will write their name on this special Winchester Winner and turn it into the school office. We will have a drawing and 10 students will earn free play time in the gymnasium during lunch/recess one day! We hope you will join this great celebration of health!
As a reminder, the student handbook requires all students riding their bikes to wear a helmet.
Classroom Snack Procedures
We work hard to reduce the likelihood of any contact with specific food allergens by instituting several steps in our classrooms. Each classroom has established specific procedures based on the children with allergies in their classrooms. Please adhere to these procedures specifically as it relates to snacks allowed in the classroom.
Children who bring in items that do not appear on this list will be asked to put their snack back in their backpack or lunchbox (as long as it is fully wrapped) to enjoy at home or in the cafeteria.
Birthday celebrations can be noted with a small, non-food token. Please clear these tokens with your child’s teacher.
Families are still welcome to make broader choices for student lunches. In order to keep all of our students safe, please be certain any products containing dairy, peanuts or nuts are contained within your child's lunch box and/or lunch bag.
We ask for your understanding as we strive to provide a safe and healthy environment for all children.
Does your child enjoy writing stories, poems or even conducting interviews?
Winchester’s Dragonflyer Junior is kicking-off in October and we would love for any 3rd, 4th or 5th Grader to join!
Meetings will be held during recess/lunch in the computer lab on most Thursdays. We eat together and then get to work and have some fun. Our plan is to publish 2-3 newsletters throughout the year. Students type their final work and utilize Google Documents.
Please email Andrea Conrad at winchesterdragonflyer@gmail.com with your student’s name, grade, school email address and teacher’s name.
2019 Fall Festival
The annual Winchester PTA Fall Festival will be on Friday, October 18th! We are seeking 6 volunteers to oversee the (1) Carnival Games, (2) Prizes, (3) Cake Walk, (4) Raffle, (5) Food, (6) Special Attractions. Please contact Jill at winchesterfallfund@gmail.com if you can volunteer on 10/18!
Hello from the Winchester Parent Teacher Association!
Our Winchester PTA coordinates student enrichment activities and social events that enhance school life and bring together the Winchester Community. It is the volunteer energy from parents like you that make the Winchester PTA successful, so please consider the various opportunities to stay involved and show your support.
Building on last year’s initial success with online PTA enrollment (which simplifies payments and saves paper), please make your donation to Winchester PTA’s Invest in Your Child fundraiser and join the PTA at MemberHub. PTA members will receive a Winchester family directory!
Your donation through Invest in Your Child is critical in providing support for more than 20 programs and events at Winchester! Instead of asking our families to buy/sell items via small fundraisers throughout the year, we simply ask that you donate via the Invest in Your Child campaign. All funds stay at Winchester! These donations fund the Junior Enrichment Series (e.g. Ann Arbor Hands On Museum and ScienceAlive! visits, Kids Empowered, and other assemblies) and March Is Reading Month (author visits and reading rewards), among other programs. Last year, the PTA also funded the two new filtered water drinking fountains with water bottle refill stations!
To donate to Invest in Your Child and to join the 2019-20 PTA, please visit: https://winchesterpta.memberhub.store/
You can also support Winchester students through volunteering and participating in PTA meetings. For volunteering, please reach out to the PTA board to express interest. You will find our contact information and the latest PTA meeting schedule at the Winchester PTA website on the Get Involved tab. This year we plan to use Google Hangouts so you can participate in PTA meetings even if you can't be at the school!
Winchester PTA Volunteer Opportunities are listed below. Please contact both winchesterptavp1@gmail.com and winchesterptavp2@gmail.com to get connected with these opportunities.
1) Committees that need a Chairperson or Co-Chair this year:
· Yearbook: Jean Sterioff will continue as Co-Chair, and we need another person to Co-Chair with her who can continue as a Chairperson next school year. We also need additional volunteers to help arrange Yearbook pages and to take group photos. The Yearbook Co-Chairs make the yearbook successful by requesting online picture submissions, taking group photos, advertising yearbook sales, learning the yearbook software and building the actual yearbook page layouts. This committee works throughout the school year.
· Health & Wellness: Elisabeth Deller is Chairperson continuing from last school year, and a Co-Chair would be helpful. Main activity is the Spring Girls On The Run (GOTR) and S.T.R.I.D.E. for boys, which involves being the lead volunteers and gathering volunteers to coach students to run a 5k as part of this YMCA program. Other opportunities and ideas to share Health & Wellness with our students and families would be greatly appreciated too!
· Math Pentathlon: Two Co-Chairs are needed (one for Grades 2-3, one for Grades 4-5). You will gather volunteers and teach students the Math Pentathlon games at Lunch/Recess or After School. Suggest running the program once a week for 6- to 8-weeks beginning in November. Online training videos are available for volunteers. More information available athttps://www.mathpentath.org/.
· Reflections: A Chairperson is needed to communicate this National PTA art contest and assist students in submitting qualifying artwork. Volunteer will communicate theme, entry deadlines, and rules for participation in October. Collect entries by November deadline, and then arrange local judging of entries in December to select submissions for state-level PTA contest.
2) Committees that have a 2019-20 Chairperson, but will need a new Chairperson next school year (i.e. opportunity to help this year's Chairperson so you can Chair the committee next year):
· Winchester Directory: Current Chairperson is Allison Dowling. This position compiles directory information for families and staff and classrooms, then gets it printed and distributed to PTA members. Bulk of the work is done in September & October.
· Community Financial Credit Union: Current Chairperson is Sonia Sandu. Primary roles are to provide the CFCU Representative with a list of parent volunteers who are able to help the 5th graders in their respective "bank" roles and to schedules student deposit times.
Parents At Lunch (PALS)
PAL is a PTA-sponsored program that provides support at lunch from 11:45 am -12:35 pm daily. This is a great opportunity to be present in school for your child, while providing valuable support for students and lunch staff.
Please consider volunteering!. You can sign up for lower or upper elementary lunchtimes or both and volunteer as often as you would like beginning September 16, 2019. IChat forms are required and they take some time to process, so please submit forms as soon as possible. The form is attached for your convenience.
Please use the following sign-up genius. https://www.signupgenius.com/go/60b0f49adaf28a75-winchester3 Thank you!
Lunch Menu
Don’t’ forget to print this month’s lunch menu:
http://www.northvilleschools.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?uREC_ID=350830&type=d&pREC_ID=761214Office Hours
Our office is open from 8:00 to 4:30.
Contact us at (248) 465-2400
Website: http://winchester.northvilleschools.org/
Follow us on Twitter: @ WinchesterElem
Would you like something included in the Winchester Weekly?
Please email: sandra.presher@gmail.com by 4pm Wednesday with the information you would like included.