Westminster Public School

On behalf of all Westminster staff, we want to wish you a safe and happy summer break!  We have enjoyed working with you and your children this year very much and are proud of all that we have accomplished together. The office will close as of June 30th and will reopen August 29th. First day of school will be on September 6th at 8:30 a.m.  All students are to meet in the back pavement and will be informed of their class placement and meet their teacher before entering the school. If you have any questions, please contact the school when the office re-opens in August.    See you in September!

A reminder that our last half day of school is tomorrow June 29th.  Dismissal will be at 11:25 a.m. Busses will be arriving at that time to transport your children home. Please make arrangements for your children.  Our exciting end of the year assembly will occur in the morning with a final picture slide show of the year. We will also be saying our final farewell to staff and students leaving us this year.  Final locker clean out and lost and found items must be claimed or will be donated to local charities.    If you are moving over the summer and will not be returning to Westminster, please do not forget to inform the office staff or write a note to the school. this week.     June 28th, final Term 2 Report Cards coming home. If you are leaving early for a family event, we will only be able to mail your reports if you leave us a self-addressed, stamped envelope, otherwise, all report cards will be available for pick up the last week of August when the office reopens.  

Students and staff alike had a great time on our outdoor science trip to Willowgrove last week. Students learned about and explored pond life, farm life and survival strategies in the forest. Definitely a fun day outdoors with great weather! Thanks to our staff supervisors and parent volunteers...great way to end a terrific school year of learning. Go Wildcats!

We've had an amazing year at Westminster and have had many events to welcome our school community! Our School Council Community Outreach committee would like your input on the school events organized this year.  Please take a moment and give us your feedback to help us plan for next year's events.  Thank you to all those who have participated and have made  contributions to our school community this year.  We hope for even more parent engagement next year.  Thank you! As thanks for submitting this survey, you can enter to win a $10.00 gift certificate for your choice of any WPS fundraising events or item (i.e.: hot lunch orders, school events, spirit wear, etc.) Follow the link to the short survey: http://bit.ly/wpsjunesurvey Thank you, Westminster School Council

We are proud to announce that our Grade 8 graduation ceremonies will be held on Monday, June 27th, 2016.  Along with family and friends, the staff at Westminster want to congratulate this group of graduates and wish them much luck as they move onto high school and begin the next phase in their academic careers.  We are proud of how much you have grown and accomplished in your time at Westminster and know you will continue to find success in many areas in the coming years.    Well done graduates!

 June 29th, 2016 Early Dismissal in Elementary Schools All schools in the York Region District School Board are committed to improving student achievement and well-being.  On Wednesday, June 29th, 2016 an early release day will take place to allow elementary teachers and support staff to take part in meetings during the afternoon of that day.  These meetings will allow for school staff to engage in culminating activities regarding the review and revision of the School’s Improvement Plan as well as year-end and transition activities that support student success.  As has been our practice in the past, students will attend school during the morning of Wednesday, June 29th, 2016 only.  Students will be dismissed early that day at Westminster our dismissal time will be 11:25 a.m.  Arrangements will be made to ensure that students who are normally bused to and from school will receive transportation at this time.  Parents/guardians whose children attend after school child care sh

Just a reminder about the Outdoor Science Trip for all our students from K-6. Tomorrow our students and staff are looking forward to a jam-packed day applying the science curriculum in real-life environments.  Students are asked to come to school dressed for a day outdoors (hats, sunscreen and sneakers etc.) along with a litterless lunch.  Have fun!

Please be advised that Flags at all Ontario government buildings across the province will be flown at half-mast from sunrise to sunset on Thursday, June 23, 2016, to mark the National Day of Remembrance for Victims of Terrorism. With the many examples of such hate throughout the world, we are even more committed to teaching our students the importance of our character traits such as empathy and compassion as well as the importance of demonstrating kindness towards each other.   As adults, we must model these behaviours and stand together to show our children how to create a peaceful world.    Thank you for your partnership.

Our yearbooks have arrived and they look great! Lots of pictures of our incredible 2015-2016 year. Such beautiful memories of all our friends staff and events. Way to go WPS! Congratulations to our yearbook cover winners Nate and Anne-Marie! 

The staff at Westminster want to thank our School Council and parent community for providing us with a wonderful Staff Appreciation Luncheon!  The food was delicious and very much welcome by all our staff especially at this time of the year.   Thank you!!

We were pleased to see that Westminster students were featured on the latest Vaughan W5- Thornhill Update Newsletter - Summer 2016 Edition. Councillor Alan Shefman's visit to our school during our Earth Day celebrations and 20 minute Clean-up was well received by our community. Thank you Mr. Shefman and way to go Westminster!

Congratulations Westminster! Together, we raised $2429.25 for the Jump Rope for Heart Campaign to support the Heart and Stroke Foundation. That's awesome!   Special thanks to our top fundraisers all from kindergarten this year, Samantha, Devyn and Isabelle who we heard ran a lemonade stand among other ways to raise funds for this cause.  Special thanks as well to our top fundraisers from our Primary and Junior Divisions; Alyson and Jordy too. All students participated in our jump-off last week and had lots of fun raising their heart rate and staying fit.  Thanks to all those who donated to this cause.  Keep jumping! 

As part of YRDSB commitment to promoting healthy living and student well-being, we now have a new environmentally friendly, healthy school water fountain in our school. This water station encourages our students to refill their refillable water bottles and keep themselves hydrated. How refreshing! 

Wishing all our Westminster father's a happy Father's Day!  We hope you enjoy the day with your children, family and friends.  Thank you for all you do. 

Students and staff alike thought that our Primary Play Day was lots of fun! What a great way to enjoy the lovely weather and learn how to cooperate with one another. Thanks as well to our Junior student captains who took on a leadership role and did a great job helping our younger students at the different activity stations. Way to go WPS!

We are excited to be starting our library upgrades along with other upgrades to our school. We completed our refresh painting in the room and moved our shelves. We are particularly excited about our new accent wall decorated with many words that represent our school and our work with our students.  We think it looks great!  Thanks to Ms Osborne and Mr.Tamblyn along with our student library helpers for their work towards making our Learning Commons a terrific learning space for our students and staff.

Thanks to all our volunteers who were able to come out to our Volunteer Appreciation Tea and to all those who could not make it as well. Your contributions to our school are very much appreciated. Thanks to Ms Lazer's class and Ms Saccucci's class for their sweet performances and Ms Einhorn's class for the lovely cards.   Hope to see you all again next year!

Primary Play Day  for K-3 will be on Friday, June 17 th , 2016 (Rain date: Tuesday June 28 th ).  This is a  fun filled day when your  child will be participating in organized games and activities for the day with their classmates and other students in the Primary Division. These activities will be taking place outside, so please dress your child appropriately for the weather – shorts, t-shirt, hat, running shoes . Please also send a water bottle and sunscreen with your child. To be proactive, please put sunscreen on your child before they come to school in the morning, as they will be going outside to play shortly after morning announcements. Please label clothing items, water bottles and sunscreen. Teachers will ensure that the children are drinking regularly throughout the day and they will be reminding the students to reapply their sunscreen at recess and lunch time. For safety reasons, children should be in running shoes for the day. They will not be participating if

We had so much fun jumping for the Heart and Stroke Foundation this week.  All students, teachers and staff at Westminster spent an hour on a sunny afternoon jumping rope and having fun getting exercise together. Thanks to all those who sent in their donations to support our student jump campaign. Together we made a difference for another worthy cause.   

A day spent at an amusement park like Wonderland is a lot of fun but it's a lot more as well. Did you know that it is also a fun example of many of the learning your children get at school? Take a look at those rides and see all the simple machines and hydraulics that went into constructing them... can you see the hundreds of levers, pulleys and gears?  There are tons of  real-life math problem solving questions you can think about as well in a day at an amusement park such as....h ow long was I on that wild ride? How long will it take me to get through that line to go on it again? How many rides can I go on in an hour? What angle makes the fastest roller coaster train? Do I have enough money to buy an ice cream or a waffle cone? Our Grade 7 and 8 students will be going to Wonderland on Friday and will have the opportunity to think of such questions as well as the concepts they learned in their science class. Wondering how these structures are built and how gravity really works

Our students in Grade 1-3 were happy to welcome a special guest, Lisa the Scientist, from the Scientist in the School program to our school. Lisa came to our classes with boxes of activities that brought amazement and fun to our science class. Thank you Scientist Lisa and thanks to all the volunteers who came out to help us too!     

Please join us for our Volunteer Appreciation Tea on June 10th at 2:15 p.m.- 2:55 p.m. Our staff and students would like to thank all our volunteers for your commitment to our school and school community. Students will be performing for you and yummy goodies will be enjoyed. Westminster is a small but mighty school with many amazing events and activities going on throughout the year thanks to the efforts of parents from School Council and other volunteers. This year we have had many opportunities for our families to come to our school to meet and have fun together at events such as: Community BBQ and Fun Fair Family Games Night Family Movie Night Family Autumn Ball  We have had parenting speakers on important topics such as: Social Media and Cyberbullying Children Mental Health - De-stressing Families  Our parent volunteers have also applied for grants to support our school and organized events to engage our students such as: Fruit - Face off Nutrition campaign  &quo

Thank you to all for your contributions to our Fort McMurray Charitable Campaign. With your help through our popcorn and yogurt sales as well as the games at the fun fair, we were able to raise over $700 to go to the Canadian Red Cross to provide aid to those affected by this tragic event.  We are happy that this contribution with be doubled by the Canadian government and hope it is helpful to those in need. This tragedy has come very close to home for us at Westminster. One of our former families left us last year to go live in Fort McMurray and were caught in this difficult event. They have now come back to rejoin our Westminster family. We welcome back Anaya and her family.  Below are some pictures that they took as they were leaving the city and her description of what she saw.... “Hello, my name is Anaya. I am in Grade 3. I lived in Fort  McMurray, Alberta where the fire was. My school and condo were very close to the area where the out of control fire was. I wish i

With such talented students at Westminster we just had to have another Music Night and Talent Show to show them off!  Come join us for a fabulous evening of music, dance and laughter!   On Thursday, June 9th, 2016  Open at 6:00 p.m. Curtain at 6:30 p.m. Raffle for the "BEST SEAT in the HOUSE" and Popcorn Sales with all proceeds towards school resources and upgrades Come and be entertained by our talented students!

Thank you all for supporting our Jump Rope for Heart campaign. We hope you have been able to help your children collect pledges for our annual Jump Off when we will all be spending time jumping together to support this cause and our own healthy living. Our Jump Rope event is on June 6th.  All donations go to the Heart and Stroke Foundation to continue research and treatment for those suffering.  We ask that all pledges be submitted online or through the school no later than June 7th to give time for prizes to be delivered before the end of the year.

Summer Institute is a program that offers academic, recreational and athletic programs and activities with intentional links to the Ontario Curriculum for children and youth entering Senior Kindergarten to Grade 8.  Programs are offered at in Richmond Hill, Markham, Stouffville, Newmarket, Woodbridge, Vaughan and Georgina from 9:00 am - 3:30 pm Summer Institute Locations Map .  YMCA Before and Aftercare Registration ; programs available at all locations   Weekly Sessions July 4, 2016 to August 12, 2016 For registration information and to see what types of exciting programs are being offered this summer, please visit www.yrdsb.ca and select programs and services.  Summer Institute Programs Index For additional information please email performanceplus.si@yrdsb.ca or call 905-884-2046 ext. 241.  Aldergrove S.I. 150 Aldergrove Drive, Unionville Armadale S.I. 11 Coppard Ave., Markham Crosby Heights S.I. 190 Neal

Thanks to our School Council for organizing another wonderful Community BBQ and Fun Fair last night!  The sun stayed out and the weather was perfect! We had a great turn out of families and community friends and we hope you had a great time. Thanks to our volunteers, staff and students who came out to help as well. All proceeds from this Fun Fair will go towards improvements to our school so having fun and supporting our school go hand in hand. Another terrific community outreach event...another terrific year!  Until next time....

Just a reminder that it is a PA day Friday, June 3rd. Teachers and staff will be busy working in their classrooms, but there is no school for students.  Enjoy the long weekend and see you on Monday!