Newsletter | January 2013 - Calgary Board of Education

Bowcroft School
3940 73rd Street NW, Calgary, AB T3B 2L9 t | 403-777-6020 f | 403-777-6028 | email: Bowcroft@cbe.ab.ca
http://schools.cbe.ab.ca/b111
Newsletter | January 2013
Message From Administration
Guten Tag and Hello Parents and Guardians!
In der Bowcrofter Grundschule findet man viele Lehrer und Schüler unterschiedlicher kultureller
und linguistischer Abstammung. Diese Vielfalt macht Bowcroft einzigartig und eine wunderbare
Schule, an der es immer interessante Dinge zu lernen gibt: sei es in Ausflug zum COP für einen Tag
skifahren; eine deutsche Theateraufführung hier an der Schule; Kinder, die mit einer Künstlerin für
einen Monat arbeiten; eine Woche im Wald für die 5. und 6. Klässler und vieles mehr.
Wir befinden uns jetzt im 11. Jahr des Deutsch-bilingualen Programmes hier bei Bowcroft. Die
Zusammenarbeit des Gemeindeprogrammes und des Deutschprogrammes ist mittlerweile ein
Bestandteil unserer Schule geworden und bereichert die Schüler beider Programme.
ADMINISTRATION
Matt Lowe,
Principal
Meike Thomsen,
Assistant Principal
SCHOOL HOURS
Kindergarten
Bilingual Program
8:40 am to 11:30 am
Community Program
12:35 pm to 3:20 pm
Grades 1 to 6
Monday to Thursday
8:40 am to 3:20 pm
Friday
8:40 to 12:30
Im Januar feiern wir immer den Tag der Offenen Tür des Deutschprogrammes. Das Programm
wächst weiterhin und zieht Familien aus allen Stadteilen Calgarys an. Wir laden Gemeindemitglieder
und interessierte Familien ein, sich die Schule, die Klassenzimmer und die Vorstellungen der
Kinder am
Donnerstag, dem 31. Januar, 2013, von 18:30 bis 20:30 Uhr
bei uns in der Schule anzuschauen. Wir werden Sie mit Apfelscholle, Laugenwecklen und
Bienenstich verwöhnen. Wir werden Sie über die Vorteile des Zweitsprachenlernens informieren,
sowie die deutsche Sprache und Kultur hier in Calgary feiern. Das Ganze wird mit deutscher Musik
untermalt werden.
Wir möchten uns ganz herzlich bei BPAC, unserem Elternbeistand, und AGEC (Association of
German Education in Calgary) für ihre unablässige finanzielle Unterstützung bedanken. Dank ihrer
finanziellen Hilfe werden etliche Anzeigen in Zeitungen und große Werbeschilder an den Straßen
den Tag der Offenen Tür annoncieren.
Weil mündliche Werbung immer noch die beste ist, bitten wir Sie, diesen Termin mit Freunden
und Verwandten zu teilen und, wenn möglich, den Abend des 31. Januars mit uns zu verbringen.
Wir freuen uns darauf, Sie am 31. Januar bei Bowcroft willkommen heißen zu dürfen, und Ihnen
die Vorteile einer Deutschbilingualen Schulbildung vor Augen führen zu können.
Bis bald,
Ihre Meike Thomsen
Hello!
Community is a word with many meanings. Webster’s dictionary, in fact, describes 12 distinct
meanings ranging from describing society in general to a geographic location. At Bowcroft School
we identify with community as a description of our school as a unified family dedicated to learning
and the well-being of all our students. We are a diverse community with students and staff from
numerous cultural and linguistic backgrounds. This diversity makes Bowcroft an exciting place to
learn - where something interesting is happening all of the time.
It has now been almost 11 years since the German Bilingual Program came to Bowcroft School.
The sharing and cooperation between our Community and Bilingual programs has become part of
the fabric of our school and has enhanced the richness of both programs.
Please remember Friday’s are early dismissal 12:30 pm

Bowcroft School January 2013
January is a month where we have the privilege of celebrating and showcasing our German Bilingual Program. Our German
Bilingual program continues to grow, and we are very pleased with its success. We would like to invite our community and
interested parents and families to our German Bilingual Showcase and German Bilingual Kindergarten orientation to be held on:
Thursday, January 31, 2013 beginning at 6:30 p.m.
Our Open House will give our students and staff an opportunity to showcase our German Bilingual program, celebrate German
language and culture within our city and the lifelong benefits of learning a second language. Our showcase will include
presentations by students and staff, classroom visits, displays of student work, music and refreshments.
We would like to thank BPAC and AGEC for their ongoing support of our program and school. With their financial support, we will
be seeing a number of bold signs and print media advertising our German Bilingual Program. We would also like to thank Beatrice
from AGEC who wrote and secured a $ 1200.00 grant from Calgary 2012 Grassroots Inspired Grants.
As word of mouth is the best form of promotion, we ask all of you to invite families and friends to attend our showcase and see
first-hand the opportunities a German Bilingual Education has to offer!
Matt Lowe
Important Dates
January 8
January 9
January 14
January 14
January 31
No School – PD Day
Classes resume
BPAC Meeting 7:00 pm
AGEC Meeting 7:30 pm Bowcroft School
Bilingual Showcase 6:30 – 8:00 pm
February 1
February 4
February 12
February 14 - 15
February 18
No School – PD Day
BPAC Meeting 7 pm
Karneval
No School – Teacher’s Convention
No School - Family Day

Bowcroft School January 2013
Classroom News
Room 1
Ms. Marshall
December was a fast paced, learning filled month. We finished the initial exploration of
democracy, examining the principles and values that correspond, the rights and responsibilities of
citizens and how we can make a difference. We also completed the units Understanding Number,
for Grade 6, and Whole numbers, for Grade 5. We came to the conclusion of our reading of
The City of Ember, and the students did a wonderful job on their final projects. Our winter performance
of The Snow Tree was a success and the students did a great job. We had our first halfday
Friday, which will continue for the rest of the school year.
After a much-deserved break, we will begin the Air and Aerodynamics/Flight
unit in Science, which is always enjoyable. We
will continue on to the next units in Mathematics and will
delve into the sequel to The City of Ember, titled The People of
Sparks.
Room 3
Mr. Schmidt
Bobcats worked hard this December, roaring through many excellent holiday art
projects. We also became less scratchy in our printing skills, as we did a lot of
printing practice. In math we learned to count backwards from 20 bobcat tails
and to skip count by two, with some of us making it all the way to 100. Students
in room three should also be proud of the amazing holiday performance they
gave for the community. Those passing by room three might want to keep an eye
open for our crazy bunch of monkey’s perched high above the coat rack!

Bowcroft School January 2013
Classroom News
Room 4
Mrs. McCashin
December has been an exciting month for us to say the least! A highlight, of
course, was the Winter Concert, where the students worked hard and practiced
diligently to contribute their part – the raccoon – to this year’s theme. The performance
was fantastic and the kids looked great in their raccoon masks.
As always, we have been busy during our Literacy block - we started our Fairy Tale
unit, and are discussing topics such as the characters and settings of these stories.
Kids in Room 4 did a great job describing objects in our classroom, their stuffies and
each other with adjectives. They will continue to learn using descriptive language in
the new year, in order to make their writing more interesting.
Now that we are a little more confident in our place value knowledge, we are working on addition
with regrouping (eeeekk!!) and even though it will probably be one of the toughest things we’ll
learn this year, students have shown great patience and willingness to persevere through the process.
In Science we have just begun discussing buoyancy and have completed an experiment to discover
some interesting facts about what makes some objects more buoyant than others.
Room 5
Ms. Gamble
December has been an exciting month for the students in Room 5! They worked hard for the
Winter Concert and did a fantastic job. December was spent learning about different holidays and
how the celebration of Christmas differs from country to country. In math, the Grade 3s studied
2-D Shapes and 3-D Objects while the Grade 4s studied Fractions with Ms. Point. We are looking
forward to a great 2013!

Bowcroft School January 2013
Classroom News
Room 6
Mrs. O’Hearn
I hope that everyone had a relaxing and safe winter break. This month students
will continue working on their long division and multiplication skills
with an introduction to
measurement.
Students will apply their mathematical skills to our classroom economy.
What a fun and hands-on way for students to demonstrate their
knowledge! In social studies we will be exploring democracy and the
different levels of government in Canada. In science students will be
working on an extreme weather project, students will be expected to work
on this project at home as well as school. Please remember to check D2L
for weekly updates and classroom notes. Room Six is also learning how to
use E Portfolio (a component of D2L). Over the month of December students completed surveys
on their learning modalities. Students are now able to identify the way that they learn best.
January will be an exciting month as they will now apply their individual learning styles to group
work and the personalization of their learning!
Neues von Raum 7
Frau Bosch
Frohes Neues Jahr/ Happy New Year 2013! 2012 has come and gone, it seems, within
the wink of an eye. Does anyone else have the feeling that time is flying by faster? We
have
decided that 13 is our lucky number, and that we will want to make particularly
thoughtful New Year’s resolutions. We will seriously think about ours within the next
week or so.
2012 has left us with some wonderful memories, not the least of which are those
created by our outstanding winter celebration which involved pretty well everyone in
the whole school. We are grateful to all the students, parents, ed assistants, volunteers
and teachers who made this fabulous production possible, as it truly was a joint effort
by all.
St. Nikolaus came on December 6, and guess what? Everyone was on the “nice” list. No
coal for the kids in Room 7! Was there ever any doubt?
Our students are working diligently at improving their English literacy skills, as well as
their German language skills. They are experts at doing daily calendar, reading their
poetry and building their vocabulary. We are certain that they will continue to make
amazing progress, helped along by regular practice at home, access to our online
Raz-Kids program, and many fun and motivating literacy activities.
Currently, we are beginning preparations for our Bilingual Show Case on January 31. Mark your
calendars and get ready for another fantastic event at Bowcroft School.
So….We’re happily back and hard at work. It will be a wonderful, productive year.

Bowcroft School January 2013
Classroom News
Neues von Raum 8 Herr Mueller
December was an exciting month for our Grade 3/4 students at Bowcroft. I am sure that we all
can be proud of the children’s magnificent performance at the Winter Concert. Thank you all for
attending and supporting our school on this special night.
In German we studied traditional Christmas terminology from Adventskalender to
Zuckerstange (candy cane), crafted Christmas Stars and designed Cards for family and
friends. Of course we were singing along various German Christmas Carols and exchanged
letters about us with a German School in the city of Zwickau, Saxony.
In Science the students did a marvelous job presenting their research posters on animal
life cycles and in Socials Studies we started with our new topic Peru.
Let’s all hope that we will not have forgotten our Math skills on subtraction and multiplication
over the holidays. A great free website to practice math while playing fun
games is www.multiplication.com .
It was a real pleasure teaching your children in the Grade 3/4 and I am definitely going
to miss all of them. Also, I want to thank you all for the wonderful Christmas
Cards and wishes.
Wishing you and your families all the best for 2013.
Parents, please ensure that your child has adequate winter clothing for recess
and lunch. The outside temperatures make it unsafe if children are
improperly dressed.

Bowcroft School January 2013
Classroom News
Neues von Raum 11
Frau Andruckow
Welcome back! I hope the holidays were restful and that you are ready to
start back to school. During the month of January we will be focusing on preparing
for our Showcase night on January 31. Our class will be working with
room 13 on different kinds of riddles. Mark the date on your calendar and
come watch us present our riddles! We will continue with spelling homework
starting on January 14. Just a friendly reminder that spelling comes home every
week unless otherwise stated in the agenda. Assignments are due every
Friday (or Thursday if it is a short week), and there will be a test ONLY on Fridays.
Reading is also important as homework and should be encouraged daily.
We will also be starting addition and subtraction with carrying and borrowing
in the new year. Please have your child show you how to do these skills.
Thank you for your support!
Neues von Raum 12 Frau Urmetzer
December was mostly busy with preparing for the performance on Dec.13 th . Between learning
lines, making decorations for the gym and creating masks, we kept hopping. Thank you to Mrs.
Neufeld for all her great ideas, hard work and patience.
In math, Frau Thomsen helped us with a very cool project in
“Transformations” and the kids worked very hard on it in class. We
also continued watching the “Kindernachrichten” in German and the
kids are participating in the question and answering sessions with
great enthusiasm.
This month, our AISI leader has come to work with five of our students
on creating their e-portfolio in D2L. Those students in turn will teach
the rest of the class. E-portfolios are wonderful to have for several
reasons. One is that parents can see the wonderful work of their
children; two, this is that students will be able to look back on their work in years to come and see
how much they have progressed. We are all looking forward to how the e-portfolios will turn out.

Bowcroft School January 2013
Classroom News
Neues von Raum 13 Frau Mujagic
The month of December went by fast. The students worked very hard on their Winter
concert performances and did very well. Thank you to everyone who came out to see it.
The students have been working on finishing their dream cities in German and natural
phenomena assignment in Science. In math they have been learning about area and
perimeter.

Bowcroft School January 2013
Classroom News
Room 16
Ms. Point
A huge THANK YOU to everyone who helped make the winter concert a huge success! The Room
16 Arctic Foxes did an excellent job singing and playing their recorders!
The grade 3/4s have had a very busy month trying new things in P.E. The grade 4s spent a whole
day learning how to ski or snowboard at COP. We also had an in-line skating instructor come from
Alien In-line come to teach the students how to rollerblade.
In math, the students have continued their work with adding
and subtracting decimals and estimating.
In science, we read The Lorax and have been working on acting
like Loraxes and not Oncelers! The students have examined
how they recycle and reuse in their lives and conducted a survey
to see how others reduce, reuse and recycle too.
Just a reminder that spelling lists are given at the start of every
week and the students are quizzed on their list on the last day
of the week. The words are written out in the students’
agenda. Students are strongly encouraged to practice their
words with a grown-up at home!
Mrs. Neufeld
Wow! Congratulations to all the students for two wonderful concerts! I would like to extend a
special thank-you to all those who helped out to make both nights so successful. Handbell Choir
will resume on Wednesday Jan 16 th. We invite new members to join us at this time. We will work
on some pieces for the volunteer tea. I will remind students of our first practice during our first
week back.
Our choir will resume on Thursday, January 17 th only if there is enough interest! I will have a brief
meeting with the choir sometime on our first week back to school before any final decision is
made.
Finally, I would like to begin an Orff Ensemble! Our practice day will be determined depending on
interest and available lunch hours! Please look for details within the next week or two.

Bowcroft School January 2013

Bowcroft School January 2013

Bowcroft School January 2013

Bowcroft School January 2013

Bowcroft School January 2013
ALICE JAMIESON GIRLS’ ACADEMY
LOCATED AT STANLEY JONES SCHOOL
OPEN HOUSE - THURSDAY, JANUARY 24, 2013
The All Girls’ Program for grades 4 to 9 is designed to ensure that girls will develop academic leadership
and organization skills for success in their personal life, their educational endeavours and their career pathways. This program
will celebrate academic mastery and personal best. Unique education initiatives of the program include an emphasis on student
independence, empowerment and leadership, the construction of mentorship networks with successful women, provision of
counsel for post-program pathways with increased access to sciences, technology and math. Girls will have the opportunity to
examine gender roles through Women’s Studies and a girl focused curriculum in addition to the Alberta Program of Studies. The
overall goal is to build on girls’ strengths to create an optimistic and empowered culture.
Parents interested in learning more about this program are invited to our Open House on
Thursday, January 24th from 6:30 – 8:00 p.m.
BPAC UPDATE
Happy New Year!
We are excited to support the German Bilingual Open House on January 31st. Be sure to tell your friends about it.
Some of the other areas of the school that BPAC supports is the aquarium in the library, the music program, field trips and books
for the library.
Our next meeting is on Monday January 14 at 7pm in the library. Please come to see what else is happening in the school. AGEC
will be having their meeting the same day, same place so you can always check that out too!
Looking forward to a successful 2013!
Michelle Janousek
BPAC Chair

November January 2013 2012
SUN MON TUE WED THU FRI SAT
2 3 4 5
Winter break no school
6 7
No School
8
No School
PD Day
9
Back to school
10 11
Early Dismissal
12:30
12
13 14
BPAC Meeting
7 pm
AGEC Meeting
7:30 pm
15 16 17 18
Early Dismissal
12:30
19
20 21 22 23 24 25
Early Dismissal
12:30
26
27 28 29 30 31
Bilingual
Showcase
6:30 to 8:30
Kindergarten Programming for Fridays in January
January 11th
January 18th
January 25th
Community Kindergarten
German Bilingual Kindergarten
Community Kindergarten

November February 20132012
SUN MON TUE WED THU FRI SAT
1
PD Day
No School
2
3 4
BPAC Meeting
7 pm
5 6 7 8
Early Dismissal
12:30
9
10 11 12
Karneval
13 14
No School
Teacher’s
Convention
15
No School
Teacher’s
Convention
16
17 18
Family
Day No
School
19 20 21` 22
Early Dismissal
12:30
23
24 25 26 27 28
Kindergarten Programming for Fridays in February
February 8th
February 22nd
German Bilingual Program
Community Program