I walk around DSS a lot during a day and I come across many interesting things as I cruise the halls and classrooms. I will post that “neat stuff” here to help tell the story of our school. In addition I’ll post things I come across outside of school that have educational value to students, parents and teachers.

I had the honour of being away from the school yesterday to spend some time with our wrestling team at a tournament at St. Catharines Collegiate. I could only spend an hour or so there but I came away with a renewed appreciation for these athletes. They train here at DSS 3 to 4 days a week, they go to meets and wrestle on their own but with the whole team backing them. Scott Smith is their highly dedicated coach and he runs from mat to mat-room to room trying to offer coaching to each athlete during these tournaments.

Medals were won yesterday but in the grand scheme of things that hardly matters. These student athletes are becoming stronger more intelligent and more mature people because of this sport and because of Mr. Smith. Congratulations to all of you, I was honoured to be able to watch you yesterday.

Tonight’s the night. Lots of energy in the building today as we prepare to host the local Grade 8 students and their families. For the first time ever we are having dinner for those who want to come early. Our amazing cafeteria staff have stepped up to organize a turkey dinner for $6.00 a person. We are expecting almost 100 for dinner. Dinner starts at 5:30 and the evening program starts at 6:30. It’s going to be awesome.

Grand Erie has spent a lot of energy over the past year to develop a multi-year plan that will provide direction for the years to come. Below is a link to a video produced by Grand Erie to give you a flavour of the plan. The wonderful part about the video is that it is full of our kids. By our kids I mean students from all over the Board, and yes–there are DSS kids.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJ6oJBQgqKE

What a busy day!! The first day of school was awesome. All the grade 9′s found their way to classes despite their worries about getting lost. It was great to see all the senior kids back and find out how summer went, where they worked or what they did. It really is the best day of the year.

I dropped in to every class at some point during the day. Many teachers started right to work and some kids said they have homework tonight! This week is a short one and will go by quickly. Ms. Chalmers and I will be holding grade meetings in the cafeteria on Thursday and Friday. We’ll cover things like behaviour expectations, school and classroom rules, dress code, and even parking policies for those senior students old enough to drive to school!

Today was a great start- a feeling of real energy in the building.

I’ve been in and out of the school a number of times in the past few weeks and do things ever change quick around here. Our cleaning staff are doing an amazing job thoroughly cleaning every room in the building. The construction is almost complete-just some fascia in the courtyard area. Students will be thrilled to know that all of the bathrooms will be open again!!!

The Smart Boards were installed in the math rooms today and one of the science labs. The projectors and laptops will be moved into the math rooms for start up in September. New desks and chairs will be in all the math rooms by the end of this week.

Our new Vice-Principal, Ms. Chalmers, has been here preparing for her new role  and organizing a lot of things in preparation for September. Make sure you welcome her when you first meet her in September.

Don’t forget about Grade 9 orientation and Grade 10-12 registration on Wednesday August 31st.

Prezi is an online presentation program that students can use for many different purposes. You need to work with it for a while to master it but it’s a big change from PowerPoint. All you need is internet access so you can present at school in any math room, room 121,  the cafeteria and a number of other classrooms that have web access. Here is a link to a student generated Prezi that outlines a history of World War 2.

Wetoku is similar to Skype but with a few differences. I have included a link to an Edutopia page where they are exploring web technologies in the classroom through a summer boot camp for new teachers. The site has examples of how Wetoku has been used and an assignment for new teachers to challenge them to develop a use for it in the classroom.

All you need is a webcam on our end and a webcam on the other end to make this work in your class. Do you know a colleague working, living or volunteering in another part of the world? Perhaps a former student can talk to your class about what they are doing now without having to physically come to your classroom to talk to your kids. Maybe a professional or an expert in your field can talk to your students without the out of the building class trip.

We can add a webcam to room 121 for this application and figure out a way to add this in the cafeteria.

Skype is still a great option and a lot of your “guests” may already be familiar with Skype so it may make sense to use it but this is another option even if it is just another resource for ideas on how to use this type of software.

Here’s a link to the Edutopia Boot Camp page
and a link to Wetoku

Tomorrow-Wednesday March 23rd is parent – teacher interview night for second semester. It will take place in the cafeteria beginning at 6:30 and running until 8:30. It’s a great opportunity to meet with all of your student’s teachers at once. We hope to see a great turnout of parents and guardians-hopefully as good as the one first semester.

Both Mr. Kostelny and I will be there as well as the Guidance and Special Education teachers to answer questions related to those areas.

Friday night was awesome! Friday was the High School Challenge at the Caledonia Fair and for the first time in a long time it didn’t rain. The Challenge is a fun night where all 4 Haldimand high schools get together to compete in some fun games and activities. We select a group of 8 senior students to be our team and then we bring a crowd with us to cheer the team on. Never in the history of the Challenge have we brought such a large crowd. We had 110 students on the busses and another 20 or so that arrived on their own. The cheerleaders were particularly loud and proud bringing over 30 team members-Great Work! The Challenge team is to be commended for there efforts, their DSS pride and for winning three of the eight events. In the end McKinnon Park won the title by just two points!!!

Congratulations to the Fair Board for another successful High School Challenge and thank you so much to the teachers who organized such a large undertaking–your efforts paid off, school spirit has never been this high.

A slideshow of pictures from the event will be shown in the cafeteria at lunch this week.

The Grade 9′s survived!!! I know they worry about it, some for weeks before school even begins. Will I get lost, will I have friends in my classes etc.,etc.,etc. No, they didn’t get lost and they not only had friends in class but they made new ones as well.

As I walked the halls and dropped into classrooms I saw a lot of very enthusiastic faces and smiles. At the end of the day I asked grade 9 students what their favourite class of the day was and the winner was….Math! Didn’t see that one coming.

We’re off to a great start.