CANNON CONNECTION
A newsletter for Cannon Elementary families - 2018-2019
WEEK OF FEBRUARY 11, 2019
Hello Cannon Families!
It's hard to believe, but this is the time of year we start planning forward....for the NEXT school year! The GCISD Personalized Programs Lottery will begin in early March, and since Cannon is a campus that GCISD students can attend for our STEM program, through this lottery, we must start planning now to determine our anticipated enrollment numbers for next year and we need YOUR help! It is also the time of year we start providing information for our 5th grade parents regarding middle school next year.
Kindergarten - 4th grade parents: In order to determine the number of available seats we will have in the lottery for each grade level, it is critical for us to confirm plans from our current Kindergarten - 4th grade parents for next year. PLEASE SEE THE INFORMATION BELOW AND CLICK ON THE LINK TO LET US KNOW ASAP IF YOUR CHILD WILL BE RETURNING TO CANNON NEXT YEAR! COMPLETE BY FEBRUARY 22nd.
Parents of current 5th graders - please see the information in this newsletter regarding planning for middle school next year. Take a few moments to review all of the information & dates about important events/timelines that are specific to 5th graders moving up to middle school.
Proud to be your principal,
Mrs. Blizzard
#BeCannonProud
IS YOUR CHILD RETURNING TO CANNON NEXT YEAR?
ALL PARENTS OF CURRENT KINDERGARTEN-4th GRADE STUDENTS MUST COMPLETE THIS ENROLLMENT FORM BY FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 22nd to let us know if your child will be returning to Cannon next year. If you have an incoming Kindergarten student, there is a place on this form for you to share that information with us!
CLICK HERE TO COMPLETE THE STUDENT ENROLLMENT FORM
Please note the following:
- If your child currently attends Cannon through the STEM lottery or an approved transfer, you do NOT have to reapply to the lottery system this year.
- If you have an incoming Kindergarten student and DO NOT LIVE IN THE CANNON attendance zone, you will need to complete a lottery application in order for your child to be automatically placed at Cannon. GCISD plans to make the lottery applications available in early March this year. All other available spaces in Kindergarten will be determined via the GCISD lottery. (Only Kindergarten siblings of current Kinder-4th grade STEM/transfer students are eligible for guaranteed placement @ Cannon. Incoming Kindergarten students of 5th grader Cannon STEM/transfer students must participate in the lottery for placement in Kindergarten 2019-2020.)
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Mark Your Calendars.....
UPCOMING EVENT
2/14 Class Valentine's Day Parties - 2:00 pm
2/18 Student Holiday - Teacher Professional Learning Day
2/18-2/22 Engineering Week
2/19 5th grade Middle School Parent Information meetings @ Cannon - 1:30 pm OR 6:00 pm
2/25 Texas PTA Rally Day
2/26 Class Picture Day
2/26 Cubs Night Out @ Chipoltes in Southlake
2/28 1st Grade Musical - 6:00 pm
3/01 Cannon Art Show - 5:30-7:30 - Cannon gym
3/01 Cannon Talent Show - 6:00 pm - Cannon cafeteria
3/07 Family Engineering Night 5:30-7:00 pm - MARK YOUR CALENDARS FOR THIS AWESOME EVENT!
3/11-3/15 Spring Break
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SEEN @ CANNON LAST WEEK!
2nd Grade Engineers Design Lighted Canes!
Comparing Texts in 4th Grade
1st Grade Holiday Parade!
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CAMPUS & DISTRICT UPDATES
DO YOU KNOW SOMEONE WHO IS INTERESTED IN STEM @ CANNON NEXT YEAR?
Attention Cannon Parents!
Please feel free to share the information tour dates shown below and ask them to sign up for a tour using this link. Thank you for your help!
ATTENTION 5th GRADE PARENTS!
Please take a moment to review all of the following dates/deadlines. Please note that on 2/19, Cannon will be hosting some parent meetings with our counselor to discuss all of the possible options and provide additional information about middle school!
February 19th - GMS Counselors visit Cannon 5th graders
GMS counselors will share middle school information with 5th graders during the school day and students will receive course selection sheets to take home on this date.
February 19th - Middle School Parent Meeting @ Cannon - 1:30 pm OR 6:00 pm
Cannon counselor, Mandy Coburn & Mrs. Blizzard will meet with Cannon 5th grade parents to share an overview of middle school programs & offerings.
Middle School Showcase Nights - Come & learn all about your middle school ! Check middle school websites for event times on these dates.
- Grapevine Middle School & Heritage Middle School - February 26th
- Cross Timbers Middle School - February 21st
- Colleyville Middle School - February 21st
February 28th- Course Selection Sheets due from 5th graders
All 6th grade course selection sheets must be returned to Cannon by this date! Course selection sheets must be reviewed for accuracy prior to online course selection process.
March 1st - STEM Academy @ GMS Seat Acceptance Letter Due
If your 5th grader plans to continue in the STEM program at GMS, they will receive a letter of acceptance that must be signed by a parent and returned by March 1st. All students who turn in this letter by March 1st will be guaranteed a seat in the GMS STEM program as a 6th grader. All remaining seats will be filled through the GCISD Personalized Program lottery, which will be held in March. You do NOT have to complete a lottery form if your child's GMS STEM Acceptance Letter is turned in by 3/1/19. (These will be provided to students when GMS course selection forms are provided in February.)
March 8th -Students will complete online course selections at school
Mrs. Coburn will work with all 5th graders on this date to complete the online course selection
process for 6th grade.
If you have any questions about any of these important date/deadlines, please contact Mandy Coburn @ 817-251-5684 OR email her @ amanda.coburn@gcisd.net
School Report Cards Now Available
Engineers Week 2019 is going to be such an exciting week at Cannon!!
Check out some of the activities planned in each grade level below!
KINDERGARTEN: Kindergarten scholars will explore the various strands of engineering throughout the week. Students will be divided into groups and they will rotate through each classroom. We will be studying chemical engineering, civil engineering, computer engineering, and robotics. There will be a specific design challenge aligned to each strand in every rotation.
1st GRADE: First grade will be learning all about aviation engineering as they design paper airplanes under the direction of a Lockheed Martin engineer and learn how to code drones to complete a variety of tasks!
2nd GRADE: During Engineering Week, second graders will be going to the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History to enjoy the Engineers Week STEM exhibits as well as the regular exhibits. Presenters from Lockheed will come Thursday to give a brief presentation about aviation engineering. Students will be building and testing paper airplanes and engaging in activities related to patterns of movement.
3rd GRADE: Third grade scholars will have several exciting experiences to celebrate National Engineers Week! Scholars will be using Lego WeDo robotics to explore concepts of force and motion. In addition, they will begin working on a Derby Car engineering challenge and they will end their week working with the GHS STEMbassadors, as they by participate in some hands-on, interactive STEM demonstrations provided the Perot Museum STEM truck that will visit Cannon.
4th GRADE: During Engineer's Week, 4th grade will have multiple opportunities to discover different aspects of engineering. Scholars will be participating in several design challenge stations, as they work to create flashlights. They will also host a Lockheed Engineer, who will lead an engineering challenge for the entire grade level. Finally, they will end their week working with the GHS STEMbassadors, as they by participate in some hands-on, interactive STEM demonstrations provided the Perot Museum STEM truck that will visit Cannon.
5th GRADE: 5th grade will be hosting our very first Cannon STEM University for this year's Engineering Week. They will be hosting 5 to 8 engineering professionals who will speak at staggering times about their profession and what it is like to be an engineer in their field. Students will create their own schedule for the event based off of availability and their engineering interest. On February 19th, students will travel around their “University” and get hands on experience from the professionals themselves!
FEBRUARY BOOK OF THE MONTH
We are SO excited about this month's Book of the Month! The author of this month's book, Joe Hayes, will be at Cannon on February 11th to present to all of our K-5 Cubs! His bilingual book, A Spoon For Every Bite, has provided the inspiration for this month's super creative design challenge!
Our Cannon scholars will be challenged to create a spoon sculpture and various grade levels have been assigned different "themes" for their spoon sculpture, with K-1 creating animal spoon sculptures; 2-3 will design spoons based off of book characters; and our 4-5 Cubs will create a spoon sculpture to represent a specific strand of engineering. Please encourage your child to participate in this month's book challenge and turn them in to the Learning Commons by 2/11. We would LOVE to have these sculptures on display when Joe Hayes visits our campus, so that he can check out all of the creative designs!
Check out all of the design challenge criteria and details in the Book of the Month S'more below and please watch the Adobe Spark video with your child to see some awesome examples of spoon sculptures for inspiration!
Also included below is a copy of all of the BoM details in Spanish!
You Art What You Eat Contest
You Art What You Eat Contest The Texas Department of Agriculture's (TDA) annual You Art What You Eat statewide student art contest is here! The student art contest offers Texas students a chance to earn statewide recognition for themselves and their school. Student winners receive a custom prize package and their artwork will inspire the design for TDA's National School Lunch Week and School Breakfast Week campaigns!
To enter the art contest, students w ill create artwork highlighting good nutrition and TDA's theme for National School Lunch Week 2019 / School Breakfast Week 2020. The new theme is "Save the Day with a Healthy School Lunch/ Breakfast" This year TDA provides teachers with a new , easy way to upload and submit student entries.
The Submission Packet and Guidelines can be found online at www.SquareMeals.org/artcontest. The submissions deadline is April 12, 2019. Please join TDA in encouraging students to focus their artistic talents on healthy school meals by entering the You Art What You Eat statewide student art contest.
GOT OLD ELECTRONICS?
One man's trash is a curious STEM Cub's treasure!
Do you have any small old, broken electronics gathering dust? We are collecting these for our Breaker Space and our 4th grade scholars also have a project coming up and could use your old electronics to explore!
Suggestions for small items to donate: (No items with GLASS screens please! )
- Electronic toys - we LOVE these!
- Keyboards
- Remotes
- Small appliances (hair dryers; coffee makers; toasters; styling tools, etc...
- Clocks
- Phones
- Smoke detectors; Flashlights; Tools
- We would love to learn from anything you might have!
Please drop these items off in the front office or send them to school with your students to be taken to the office. THANK YOU FOR YOUR HELP!
NEW Sessions Announced For GCISD Parent Technology Academy
Spring Parent Technology Academy Sessions
GCISD Technology is excited to announce our Spring Session line up with several new sessions. Stay tuned as more will be added to our list as we keep receiving the request from the community.
February 12th - Hour of Code - Parent Edition -SIGN UP HERE
Come dive in and experience what students across GCISD do each day with hands-on activities around coding
February 26th - Understanding Minecraft ( Presented by Microsoft) -SIGN UP HERE
Come and learn about the power of Minecraft in education, get tips directly for Microsoft on parental settings for use at home.
March 21st - Internet Addiction " Gaming"--SIGN UP HERE
More than 5 million kids may be addicted to video games. 31% of males and 12 % of females report that have felt addicted to gaming. Come to hear from Dr Kay Trotter, PhD, LPC-s, RPT-S from local Kaleidoscope Behavioral Health as she discusses the signs and symptoms of this growing addiction. Learn some tips and be a part of the discussion around online gaming and internet addiction.
April 16th - Apps Parents Need to Know -SIGN UP HERE
Take part in this interactive discussion around the growing world of apps that students are using. Go being the scenes to hear the truth behind the apps and what dangers there are to those who use them
Virtual Session Coming Soon - Fortnite ( a Parents Guide ) - SIGN UP HERE
Many have asked some come and experience Fortnite for parents. Hear about details of the game and dive into parental settings for the various gaming systems students use to play online.
All sessions can be found on the Parent Technology Academy Webpage
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NEWS FROM CANNON PTA
PTA QUICK PICKS!
Check out these "quick picks" of reminders & information from PTA:
TALENT SHOW
Cannon’s Got Talent will premier on Friday, March 1. Mark your calendars for this special event showcasing all of Cannon's top talent!
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PTA ADVOCACY
Did you know that our PTA travels to Austin, TX to meet with the Texas state legislature and advocate for our student needs? We would love for you to join us on our trip and share your story of what the needs of our children are! Click here for more information about our one day trip to Austin! February 25th - you do not want to miss this educational trip! Join us as we advocate for our students!
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CANNON SPRING FLING & SILENT AUCTIONS
The Cannon PTA will be hosting a Spring Fling and Silent Auction on March 21, 2019 to raise funds for a Tinkerspace at Cannon. What is a Tinkerspace? A Tinkerspace brings STEM learning outdoors. Students continue their learning with play during recess time with building, engineering, and STEM-focused outdoor play areas. If you have a company or talent that you would like to offer, the silent auction committee is looking for donations from businesses and parents. Please contact Liz Chalmers at 2nd-VP@cannonpta.com for more information.
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Thursday, February 14 – Class Valentine’s Parties
Monday, February 25 - PTA Rally Day in Austin, TX
Tuesday, February 26 - Cub Night Out @ Chipotle
Thursday, February 28 - Cannon Spirit Night @ Cicis
Friday, March 1 - Talent Show
…more dates and information available at https://www.cannonpta.com/calendar and Like Us on Facebook or Twitter!
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QUICK LINKS FOR PARENTS
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I want to make you aware of where you can see information and resources, specifically about the Cannon construction project. Also, check out the awesome exterior renderings of our new school below!!
Please reach out to me to let me know of any questions you may have about this project. This is a VERY exciting time for our Cannon school community and I want to make sure all of our Cannon families stay informed!
Click here to see project updates on all GCISD Bond programs
Click here to sign up for construction updates by email about the Cannon project!
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Cannon Elementary: A GCISD STEM School
Email: tona.blizzard@gcisd.net
Website: http://www.gcisd-k12.org/Domain/1428
Location: 1300 W College St, Grapevine, TX, United States
Phone: 817-251-5680
Facebook: facebook.com/CannonSTEM
Twitter: @canSTEM