Welcome Back!!!
Hello MPE Parents and Guardians,
I trust that you are all having a wonderful and relaxing summer and finally enjoying some summer weather.
- First Day back is SEPTEMBER 6th from 8:30am to 10:42am (please note that our first day back is not just an hour).
Below is some important info regarding first few days back at MPE this coming September..
For all Kindergarten students:
Below is some information regarding the gradual entry process for our Kindergarten students this year.
Tuesday September 6th 11:30-12:30
All Kindergarten students will come for a 1hr. session on Tuesday September 6th. During this session they will be grouped with a other kindergarten students and will rotate through three different activities with all three Kindergarten teachers.
Wednesday September 7th
There will be no School for Kindergarten Students on Wednesday. We will have EA’s calling parents individually on Wednesday to set up an interview time for Thursday or Friday. Please except a call on this day.
Thursday Sept 8th and Friday Sept 9th
Interviews will take place with the Teacher, Parents and student. If you can, please keep any siblings at home, and preferably all guardians can attend. The purpose of these interviews are about building a relationship with the teacher/student and family, and acquainting the child and family to the learning process of Kindergarten.
Monday Sept 12th
Class for Kindergarten students will take place from 8:30 – 12:00. This will be a one day gradual entry. There will not be bus service for K students on this day.
Tuesday Sept 13th
Students attend for the first full day of Kindergarten.
For any new student to MPE in grades 1 to 7:
All new students to MPE should report to the library on Tuesday morning, Sept 6th at 8:30. New students will be placed in a temporary classroom until Thursday morning.
** If you are new to Whistler and still need to register your child at MPE, then please email me at jmaynard@sd48.bc.ca Our office reopens on August 29th, however I will still be periodically checking email over the summer.
For all returning students in grades 1-7:
School will begin on Tuesday, September 6th at 8:30 am. Students will be dismissed at 10:42am. The bus will be running to reflect this schedule on Tuesday the 6th.
Wednesday Sept 7th will be a full day with regular bus schedules
Students in grades 1 to 7 will return to their last year’s teacher for Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday morning. New classroom placements for this year will be done as soon as possible. Our goal is to have students in their new classes sometime on Thursday September 8th.
Sincerely,
Jeff Maynard
Principal
Myrtle Philip Community School
A Leap For Literacy
On Nov 3rd 2015, I jumped off the bridge at Whistler Bungee in response to the Scholastic Book Fair Challenge held by our School Library. These two videos are our way of sharing that challenge with the school community. For your witnessing pleasure, I duct-taped a goPro to my hand so you can all see (and hear) the terror in my face as I plummeted toward the river basin.
The official Trailer…
The Official jump movie with S L o w M o t i o n
The Name Song
Here is the link to our students singing the Name Song that they wrote last year with Glenn Mishaw. It will be on Shaw TV today on a program called GO at 9am, 1pm and 5pm. The easiest way to watch is to click the link below. Thank you very much Glenn for dreaming up this wonderful activity and seeing it through to this final product. This song will also be presented during WE Day in Vancouver.
Marimba at Myrtle
Last year Myrtle Philip was given a substantive grant though Whistler Backcomb to purchase 10 full scale Zimbabwe style Marimba’s. Because each instrument had to be handbuild, this order took several months to complete and the instruments arrived late last spring right in the middle of our Musical theatre productions of the Lion King and Willy Wonka. So it wasn’t until today that our intermediate students were able to start their first Marimba class with me. Each class had 50 min to learn a new song and we recorded the outcome of that block to share with the school here on Sound Cloud. I was very proud of our students today, as they worked very hard as a team, and in a very short amount of time were able to create some great music. It is a real testament to the many years of musical literacy Mrs. Mcphee has been building in our student population. Follow the links below to their songs.
Grade 4’s
https://soundcloud.com/jeffgmaynard/balaphone-4s-2015-2015-10-09-208-pm
Grade 5/6
https://soundcloud.com/jeffgmaynard/two-three-desbrisay-2015-10-09-205-pm
https://soundcloud.com/jeffgmaynard/two-three-beaton-2015-10-09-203-pm
Grade 7’s
https://soundcloud.com/jeffgmaynard/mbira-jam-2015gr7-2015-10-09-1217-pm
Next Friday at 12:30pm – 1:30pm we will hold a parent Marimba session. Please RSVP to jmaynard@sd48.bc.ca if you would like to join in and have some fun playing and learning on these great instruments. We will start playing by learning some of the songs you have just heard above. We will limit this to 20 parents, so please sign-up quickly if your interested
Welcome Back
Dear Parents,
I am very happy to say that we were able to successfully move our students into their new classes earlier today. As always, this is a delicate process, and requires considerable consultation with myself, our learning services team and our teachers. I have been very impressed with the care and concern of our staff in developing our class compositions. I know this is an anxious time for students and parents, however we are very fortunate to have such a dedicated and professional group of Teachers who put in their heart and soul to ensure the best possible placement for each individual child. After a considerable amount of work, we are very pleased with the outcomes and configurations of the students.
Our philosophy for class placements is always built on creating a sense of balance (in the classroom and in the school). We look at the whole child, and build balanced classrooms based on students social/emotional capacity, academic learning, gender, etc. We consider the competencies outline in our district education plan, and discuss how students work collaboratively (how and who they work well with), how they display creative and innovative thinking, etc.. It is a complicated and intricate process. In our final stages of discussion, I have become very confident that we have put ourselves to task to ensure we have built the best classroom compositions possible for our students.
A huge thank you goes out to the hard work and determination of our entire MPE staff. It has been an incredible start-up to the school year, and we are all looking forward to an amazing school year. We are truly a fortunate school.
Calendar Input Process for 15/16 school year and 16/17school year.
Dear Staff, Parents, and Community members,
Below are the calendars sent out via email. We have posted them to our website for further access. Please feel free to send feedback to me directly via email.
The purpose for these submissions is to provide for our parents, staff, and community members an opportunity to consult and assist in the development of our local school calendar.
The Board of Education has established all non-instructional days for all schools in the Sea-to-Sky school district. Each school is responsible for establishing bell schedules, early dismissal days, collaboration dates/times, and other professional development outside the school year.
With respect to collaboration time, teachers have a professional commitment to improving their practice through collaborative methods and recognize this as an effective means of professional growth and development for them, including during Collaboration Time. Professional learning activities established for Collaboration Time are jointly planned amongst educators in respect of student learning needs and related instructional practices at our school. Both sets of calendars propose collaboration time within a “Day in Session”, with an early dismissal time on specified days throughout the year.
Option 1:
Looks at providing early dismissal time (one block) every Wednesday.
2015/2016 Calendar Draft – MPEcalendar-2015_2016_1hrcollab
2016/2017 Calendar Draft – MPE calendar – 2016 2017_weeklycollab
Option 2:
Looks at providing early dismissal time (at lunch) every third Wednesday.
2015/2016 Calendar Draft – MPE_calendar_2015_2016_Collab2hr
2016/2017 Calendar Draft – MPE calendar – 2016 2017_2hrcollab
We welcome your feedback as we endeavour to create a calendar that supports all our learners. Please note that this is a consultative input process. We are not voting between the two calendars. There are many factors that come into play to select a local calendar, and this input process is our opportunity to uncover the areas for concerns and also explore the opportunities each calendar presents.
Please contact me directly by email, or by phone, if you have any questions or concerns.
Cheers,
Jeff Maynard
Myrtle Philip Community School
Principal
604-698-8003 (cell)
604-932-5321 (office)
Calendar Revision
In light of the recent calendar revision survey results, the School Board has voted to cancel the September/October collaboration days (Option 2 as represented in the survey results). To maintain the correct number of instructional minuets/year the elimination of one collaboration day results in a small change to our current bell schedule. Since this revised calendar will be presented to the Board in November, we have elected to adjust the bell schedule after our Winter Break.
We will operate under the current time table and bell schedule until the December break, and when we return in January we will end our day at 2:39pm (not 2:42pm).
Our revised Calendar can be found here MPCS-2014-15_OCT28
If you have any questions of comments, please contact me directly (jmaynard@sd48.bc.ca)
Jeff Maynard
