Casino Volunteers Needed!

Hey Parents,

It’s time to put on the fancy duds, watch a Rat Pack movie, unleash your inner Moe Green (sorry, The Godfather was on last night) and finally realize your childhood dream to work in a proper casino for about 4 hours!

HMSPA is responsible for staffing two casino nights and we need volunteers. Here is the info:
Dates: Friday, November 19th Saturday, November 20th
Location: Deerfoot Inn and Casino
Positions Needed: Banker, Cashier, Chip Runner, Count Room

Why?: This is the most important part! The money we raise with working this casino, allows us to fund tons of great school programs; including busses, classroom equipment, technology, and in school presentations. We usually manage to raise nearly $40,000 PER YEAR and every single dollar benefits our school!

In order to volunteer, I need some personal information from you. Please print this form and fill it out (except the top part, I can do that).
http://aglc.ca/pdf/gaming/gaming_forms/5400.pdf

If you have the ability, you can email the completed for to me, or I will be happy to come pick it up from you.

We need about 40 people to step up and help out, or we risk losing years and years of funding!

If you have questions, please contact me anytime.

Steve Antonchuk
HMSPA Casino Chair
403-651-1755
santonchuk@westjet.com

Researchers like laptops in Calgary classrooms

(From the CBC website)

Researchers at the University of Calgary have some encouraging words for parents concerned that their children are glued to computer screens.

Michele Jacobsen and Sharon Friesen of the university's faculty of education just completed a research study at Calgary Science School in which students were provided with laptops and then observed over a three-year period.

Their results indicate computer technology can dramatically improve the way students learn — but only if coupled with engaged teaching.

Click here to read the full story.

This re-defines the phrase, "Cycle of Life."

A family of five pedalled back to their home in southwest Calgary on Aug. 23, 13 months after rolling off to bicycle around North America.

Rick and Tanya McFerrin cycled 14,000 kilometres through Canada, the U.S. and Mexico with their sons Sampson, 9, Markos, 7, and Tarn, 5.

"It's been amazing to be with Tanya and the kids 24/7 for a year," Rick McFerrin said while his family ate a picnic lunch on a concrete pad outside the Millarville General Store. "It's reinforced our feeling that we're an adventurous, creative family."

The McFerrins are veteran tourers who once spent two years cycling around the world. They hit the road with their boys on July 15, 2009, heading west from their home in southwest Calgary on two bicycles: one a tandem with Tanya in the front and Markos in the back, and the other a tandem with a "tagalong" third bike. Rick steered the second bike, with Sampson and Tarn behind.

Read more here.

Should parents "friend" their kids on Facebook?

(Shane and I have been talking about Facebook a little recently, so when this article appeared on the Calgary Herald site, I thought it might make for an interesting read for Haultain parents.)

To friend or not to friend is the big question facing many parents dealing with teenagers on Facebook.

Three quarters of parents questioned in a Nielsen survey said they are friends with their children on the popular social networking website which boasts 500 million active users. But a third admitted they are worried they are not seeing everything their children are doing on the web.

Read the full story here.

2010/2011 AGM

A reminder that the 2010/2011 Council and PA school year will begin with our AGM on September 30th at 6:30 pm in the Haultain library.

Back to School - the online way

This article talks about a couple of Ontario Moms who created a website that helps parents get their kids back to school with exactly what they need for the classroom.

"Their website toolsforschools.ca...partners with a number of public and private schools across Ontario to post supply lists for parents"

The website is here and they make it very easy to shop for classroom supplies. I can't find an equivalent in Alberta but if you do, let us know in the comment section.

First of the partnership schools opening this year...

Bridlewood, Cranston, Royal Oak - Just three of the schools opening under the new P3 model of community partnership in Alberta - click here for more information.

Personality set for life by 1st grade, study suggests

From LiveScience.com

Our personalities stay pretty much the same throughout our lives, from our early childhood years to after we're over the hill, according to a new study.

The results show personality traits observed in children as young as first graders are a strong predictor of adult behavior.

"We remain recognizably the same person," said study author Christopher Nave, a doctoral candidate at the University of California, Riverside. "This speaks to the importance of understanding personality because it does follow us wherever we go across time and contexts."

The study will be published in an upcoming issue of the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science.

Read the full article here.

Wireless schools blamed for illness

By SHARON LEM, QMI Agency

TORONTO - Parents in Simcoe County believe their children are getting sick from WiFi transmitters set up in schools across the region.

Rodney Palmer says his two children at Mountain View Elementary School in Collingwood became ill last year.

"Six months ago, parents started noticing their kids had chronic headaches, dizziness, insomnia, rashes and other neurological and cardiac symptoms, when they came home from school," Palmer, 44, said. "But somehow on the weekends, when they were at home, it would disappear."

After further investigation, parents began to suspect it was caused by the exposure to electromagnetic fields from the wireless Internet transmitters in school classrooms.

Read the full story here.

Handwriting skills waning, mother laments

In the age of laptops and text messaging, students in Alberta schools are no longer learning to master the fundamental skill of handwriting, according to an Airdrie mother.

Cursive writing — while still taught — seems to have become mostly an afterthought in the classroom, said Carmen Maidstone.

She recently realized her teenaged son is barely able to connect his letters, preferring instead to print.

Read more here.

When siblings fight over everything

By Roger Collier, Postmedia News

On a humid Saturday afternoon, inside the neutral-coloured walls of a home in suburban Ottawa, two children, ages four and six, engaged in a debate that has bedevilled mankind since 40,000 B.C., when Homo sapiens adopted spoken language as the primary means of human communication, replacing calligraphy.

Read the full story here.

Daycare centres are not harmful to children's development

Eight years after telling mothers that going out to work and leaving their children in substitute care was harmful to children's development, academics combing through the same research material said this week that mothers should not worry after all.

This newest study was published last week by the U.S. Society for Research and Child Development. It was based -- like the 2002 study -- on data collected over several years on more than 1,300 children.

Click here to read the full article.

Calgary drivers, take note: School zones begin a half-hour sooner

Speed restrictions through Calgary school zones will now begin at 7:30 a.m. -- 30 minutes earlier than before.

The rollback was ordered by city council and is designed to protect students who show up early for extracurricular activities. The 30 km/h restriction on school days remains in place until 5 p.m.

Patrick Quinn is vice-principal at Father Scollen School, one of 36 in the city that runs year-round.

The change will be in effect immediately near the northeast school, where students return to classes today after an abbreviated summer break between terms.

Quinn says the extension will provide "a nice cushion" for kids who arrive early for sports or music practice, particularly on a cold, dark winter morning.

"It just makes it a lot safer," he said.

Read more here.