The Tohickon Golden Eagle
November 2016
Dear Tohickon Families,
We are rapidly approaching the holiday season and this time of year is typically busy for everyone. Keeping this in mind, there are some significant November activities that you may want to mark down for your planning purposes.
The Team Discovery Bike Drive will be taking place on Saturday, November 5th, between the hours of Noon and 3:00 PM in the Tohickon Parking Lot. Through Pedals for Progress, donated bikes will be shipped around the world, to families who need them for transportation.
Parent-Teacher Conferences will occur on November 8th, between Noon and 8:00 PM. Teachers have already reached out to parents if they thought a meeting was needed. If you would like to request a meeting, please contact the main office by the end of the day on Friday, November 4th.
The Veterans' Day Wall of Honor will take place on Thursday, November 10th, between the hours of 6:30 PM and 8:00 PM on the first floor of Tohickon. Images of service men and women spanning from the Revolutionary War to present will line the walls. All are welcome to come tour and participate in this special event.
The Veterans' Day Breakfast will take place in the Tohickon Library on November 11th, beginning at 8:30 AM. Veterans from the surrounding area will join us for this special event. Students that are related to Veterans in attendance will be joining them for this celebratory occasion.
Lastly, the administration/main office will be adding Twitter to its list of communication tools. The purpose of this addition will be to keep our community up to date with all of the unique things happening in school. Tweets are expected to begin by the second or third week of this month. We are hopeful that you will find this new tool to be informative and helpful!
If you have any questions or should need more information regarding these events, please contact the main office at 267-893-3300. Have a fantastic month!
Sincerely,
Kevin Marton, Principal
THE ANNUAL HALLOWEEN DRESS UP CONTEST CONTINUES TO BE A FUN TRADITION AT TOHICKON
On Monday, October 31st, students were given the opportunity to participate in the Annual Tohickon Dress Up Contest. The competing categories included scariest, best group, prettiest, most original and funniest. Interested students were sent down to the main lobby area during homeroom and were judged by faculty members. This is a traditional event at Tohickon that our students really look forward to.
Cyberbulling Assembly - District Attorney Matt Weintraub presents to 9th Grade Students
On October 27th, Tohickon Middle School's 9th graders attended an assembly hosted by Bucks County District Attorney, Matthew Weintraub. The assembly was part of the T5 Program at Tohickon. The program focused on cyberbullying and making the right decisions when thinking about placing things on-line and using social media. Mr. Weintraub concluded the assembly by answering several questions posed by students. It was a pleasure having Mr. Weintraub as a guest speaker at Tohickon.
The Holiday Season Approaches
There are several upcoming events that students and parents should be aware of. The events for the month of November are as follows:
November 3rd
9th Grade PEN Students to Franklin Institute
November 5th
Team Discovery Bike Drive - Noon - 3:00 PM
November 7th
End of Marking Period One
November 8th
Election Day
Parent/Teacher Conferences (12:00 - 8:00 PM) - No School for Students
November 10th
Tohickon's Wall of Honor Tour 6:30 - 8:00 PM
November 11th
Tohickon's Annual Veteran's Day Breakfast in the Tohickon Library
November 16th
First Marking Period Report Cards available on Parent Portal
November 17th
"Got Milk Day"
Parent Council Meeting in Library 9:00 - 10:30 AM
November 18th
Fall Recognition Assembly
November 22nd
Early Dismissal for Students 10:45 AM
November 23-25
No School - Thanksgiving Break
Parent Council Meeting Reminder
TEAM HAPPENINGS!
TEAM SUMMIT - GRADE 7
Team Summit is kicking off a community service project! We are going to collect items for OEG. Operation Eternal Gratitude (OEG) is a military support group who initiates projects to help support deployed military personnel as well as their family members. OEG has engaged in many service related assignments ranging from sending care packages to the Middle East to giving holiday gifts to military children. We are working with the OEG group at CB South. Students at Tohickon will be asked to bring in items that the military personnel need (please see the Team Summit website after November 4th for a list of items). Team Summit students will be responsible for making posters, boxes, and collecting the items. On Monday, November 7th, Mrs. Reese and Mr. Harris will open the wall in between their rooms and students will write letters to the service men and women during their English classes. We hope that you can help us with this project!
Pictured are some of our students during T5 this week. Students decorated doors with messages about being drug-free. Mr. Marton and Mr. Dudley will judge the doors and winners will be announced next week.
TEAM DISCOVERY - GRADE 7
Over the last month, Team Discovery students have been preparing for our upcoming Pedals for Progress Bike Drive. Pedals for Progress is a non-profit organization that collects used, unwanted bicycles and keeps them out of landfills by giving them to people in need of a primary means of transportation around the world. Some social studies classes conducted research on the countries that are partnered with Pedals for Progress. Through their research, the students developed an understanding of the need for the bikes in different impoverished areas. The students showcased their findings on posters, which are currently hanging around the school advertising the bike drive. In ELA B classes, students designed flyers advertising the drive to hang or distribute throughout the community. Students should be taking photos of all of their advertising efforts for a photo collage they will need to hand in to their math teacher. Our hope is that the students will feel rewarded for their efforts when they see the bikes being donated at the drive! The drive is scheduled for Saturday, November 5th from 12-3 PM. Any child or adult bike in repairable condition will be accepted; a $10 donation is requested with each bike to help cover shipping costs. For more information on Pedals for Progress, please visit their website at www.p4p.org.
TEAM ODYSSEY - GRADE 8
In anticipation of this year's Presidential Election, students are bringing in signs, posters, bumper stickers, etc. for Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. These items are being placed on the back wall of the classroom which allows for a discussion on the different types of advertising that each candidate is conducting prior to the election. Students also took a trip back in time to view some of the campaign posters of some past elections to see if they could remember any of the presidential election "losers." Many students never heard of names like Mitt Romney, John McCain, or John Kerry, people who were very close to becoming the President of the United States!
Here you can see Team Trailblazer students exploring the wonders of chemistry in the flame test lab. They are attempting to learn how metal salts, that are bonded ionically, will react when split into their individual ions. The results were a rainbow of flame colors as they explored each ionically bonded metal salt. No eyebrows were lost in the lab so we consider it a success.
TEAM EXPEDITION - GRADE 8
With the coming cold weather, students warm both heart and soul in T-5. This month, groups focused on teamwork, cooperation, and held discussions on bullying. Members of various classes were asked to work together to build towers out of notecards. The team that was able to communicate and cooperate built structures that were tall and stable.
The start of the year in science class is the study of Geology. Students learn about the physical features of the Earth and how the physical earth changes over time. This unit lays the foundation for the future study of evolution and environmental science. Pictured are students in our outdoor courtyard area engaged in an activity about Continental Drift. Students are moving magnetic landforms around a placemat to simulate how the Earth has changed since Pangaea existed, over 225 million years ago.
In social studies class, students spent the last month working on their Oral History Projects. For this assignment, the students had to find someone to interview about a historical event. In addition to conducting the interview, they had to research their topic and then write a script which was recorded as an MP3 file. The final product is a Power Point slide that contains a picture of the person they interviewed and a QR code that allows the viewer to listen to the story.
Our living history projects will be available for public viewing at our open house on November 10th. Please feel free to stop by and see the students work. We hope to see you there!
Sports and Community Service Update
The fall season is winding down for our sports teams. As it does, winter sports prepare to start. Wrestling and girls basketball both begin in November, while boys basketball begins after the new year. The handouts from the informational meetings for wrestling and girls basketball are available on the Tohickon athletics website. Boys basketball will have its informational meeting on Thursday, November 17th, during Resource.
On Friday, October 14th, Tohickon fall sports hosted its annual Family Movie Night. This year featured the movie Hotel Transylvania 2. The cost of admission was one non-perishable food item. In total, the fall athletes raised nearly 300 pounds of donated food and $100 dollars from concession proceeds for the Doylestown Food Pantry. Thank you to everyone who participated!
AFTER SCHOOL CLUB INFORMATION
Diversity Club Information
Tohickon’s first Diversity Club meeting of this year had a very good turn-out. The club tries to promote understanding and foster respect for everyone we encounter throughout our lives. Through our lively discussions about current social issues and team building activities we try to find ways to challenge stereotypes and gain a deeper understanding and appreciation for people from all backgrounds.
General Information about After School Clubs
In order for clubs to run, a teacher must be willing to sponsor the club after school and there must be a reasonable level of student interest. For these reasons, Tohickon clubs may be different from year to year. Over the course of this year, Tohickon will be running the following clubs:
Debate Club - Sponsored by Mr. Forney
Diversity Club - Sponsored by Mrs. Fox
Anime Club - Sponsored by Mrs. Bongiorno
Math Club (2nd Semester) - Sponsored by Mrs. Bellavance and Mrs. Rissing
Science Olympiad - Sponsored by Mr. Weir and Mr. Collins
Garden Club (Seasonal) - Sponsored by Mr. Neely and Ms. Mangold
If you are interested in joining one of the clubs at Tohickon or have any questions, please see the club's sponsor in order to sign up.
Tohickon Wellness Update
Got Milk Day will be on Nov. 17th and we will be serving samples of fresh milk from the local Penn View Farm.
Please check out the informative Health and Wellness link, on our Tohickon webpage, where you can find pictures of our events and other helpful links to parent resources and anxiety information.
From the Nurse's Office
State Mandated Screenings:
Scoliosis screening for seventh grade students will take place on November 10th in the nurses office. A team of school nurses will screen each student individually in the privacy of the health office. If you do not want your child to participate in this state mandated screening, please e-mail or send a note with your request to Colleen Fox, School Nurse, cfox@cbsd.org
Hearing screenings were completed on seventh grade students and special education students during the month of October.
Height, weight and vision screenings are ongoing and expected to be completed during second semester.
FROM THE GUIDANCE DEPARTMENT
SAP – Student Assistance Program
Tohickon recognizes students who are subject to a variety of pressures. The mission of our Student Assistance Program (SAP) is to identify students through a referral process and to intervene in an effort to promote achievement and academic success. We seek to promote healthy, safe and substance-free lifestyles by connecting these students and their families with appropriate school based or community resources. For more information, please visit the link on the Tohickon webpage under Guidance:
http://www.cbsd.org/Page/28103
Parent Portal
Online Census Verification is a feature available in Infinite Campus Parent Portal. Each year, the Central Bucks School District asks our families to fill out a census verification form. This year the form is online. This form ensures that student information is accurate and also provides our school nurse with important medical permissions for your child. If you have not already done so, please complete the census verification through the PARENT PORTAL as soon as possible.
For more information, including trouble shooting suggestions, please go to: http://www.cbsd.org/Page/26952
If you are unable to complete the online verification, please call the Tohickon Guidance office at 267-893-3310.
Haven’t set up your Parent Portal Account?
Go to www.cbsd.org
Click on “Parent Resources”
Click on “Parent Portal Information” in the left column
Select link “Need a Parent Portal Account”
Complete “Parent Portal Online Request Form”. Submit.
Do we have your E-Mail Address?
In an effort to communicate with all of our families in a fast, efficient manner, we are asking parents/guardians to enter their E-mail addresses through the parent portal. Having a contact E-mail address on file will allow us to mass E-mail all of our Tohickon families at once regarding urgent news and information. Not only will the information reach you faster than through the traditional mail service, but we will also save considerably on paper and postage costs.
How to add or update your E-Mail address?
Log on to the Parent Portal
Choose option to “Change Contact Info”
Enter E-Mail address in field and SAVE
Thank you for helping us improve our communication with our families!
CB Cares Newsletter - Click following link:
Tohickon Middle School
Email: kmarton@cbsd.org
Website: cbsd.org
Location: 5051 Old Easton Road, Doylestown, PA
Phone: 267-893-3300