Community Report 2020-2021

Mission: To provide a safe, respectful environment where the school community works together to encourage social responsibility and ensure quality education for all our students.

Our Mission

Arborgate School

What a year it has been; unprecedented, strange, distanced, unlike anything any of us have encountered ever! Despite the challenges of COVID, our staff & students rose to the occasion time after time; whether they were required to move classrooms, adjust seating arrangements, develop and adjust to new plans, use individualized materials or learn how to be effective online teachers & learners they have been tremendous!

The staff responded quickly with positivity & encouragement with the stu-dents, in order to minimize the impact on them. The students continued to learn and engage with each other positively, despite the stressors of life in these new times, rising to the challenges they faced in such strange circum-stances. As we end this year, we applaud our staff, students and community for the positivity and enduring commitment to support one another. We also pause to reflect on the positive outcomes of this year, despite the shift in our living and learning environments.

We are proud to highlight the following:

Support of parents & community in response to new guidelines and shifting practices-online/phone calls instead of in-person meetings

Flexibility and ingenuity of staff to respond quickly to evolving guidelines to ensure quality learning opportunities-Music instruments on carts, individual student learning tools

PE teachers making outdoor physical education a priority & accessing com-munity spaces for learning at the fitness park, outdoor skating rink, Tetrault Park, absorbing the positive benefits of being engaged in nature as well as exercise along with outdoor Band & Music, weather permitting

Ongoing Collaboration between teachers to learn together in meeting the needs of the students, supported by itinerant teachers from SRSD

Students celebrated as authors with evidence of their critical thinking and learning regularly posted in hallways to be shared, showing their growth

We have had a very successful year despite all of the changes along the way and are very proud of our students, staff and community! Have a wonderful summer & see you in September!

Mrs.Borkowsky & Mrs.Gauthier.

Principals’ Reflections

We strive to provide an

environment which emphasizes rich learning experiences in literacy,

numeracy and social-emotional well-being

Outdoor Inquiry

Gr.8 Green Space donation

Priority # 1: Across the school it was evident that writing was a focus as the student writ-ing on the bulletin boards rapidly changed as the year progressed. Students were exposed to many forms of writing, from recording their observations out-side in Kindergarten, writing riddles in Gr.1, explaining their learning about the importance of water in Gr.2, explaining life in ancient Egypt in Gr.3/4 and writ-ing persuasive letters to keep worms for composting in the classroom in Gr.3/4.Z. In the Middle Years, students experimented with mystery writing in Gr.5, used their voices to advocate for change in Gr.6, and the Gr.7 & 8 stu-dents collaborated to create their own Health magazine with advertising, arti-cles related to physical and mental health along with positive lifestyle habits. The students used their critical thinking by making personal connections and responses to different texts.

Overall, the students saw themselves as authors with voices and purpose to communicate their learning, share their understanding and advocate for change. Many teachers received letters from around the school as students sought to find out more about the office staff, request new playground equip-ment, ask for timetable changes, request fieldtrips and to also write mystery letters to pen-pals in a different class. As we examined student progress throughout the year we also looked at our practice in reading strategies, and explicitly teaching strategies which would support students’ growth in both reading and writing. We continue to access the work of the following authors/titles to support our work: Regie Routman, Fountas & Pinnell, Jan Richardson, Crafting non-fiction, Explorations in Non-fiction Writing & Reading for Understanding. We also continue to emphasize the use of Learning Intentions and success criteria to help our students under-stand what they are learning, and why, and the steps they can take to improve their work.

School Priority Progress

There were many academic achievements to celebrate in 2020-21. Because of all the ongoing shifts, teachers and students alike developed an increased com-fort with technology and even found creative ways of using it.

Virtual Field Trips allowed students and teachers to experience new infor-mation and contribute positively to their learning without the added 2-hours of driving time to Winnipeg. Technology also allowed for parents to see their child’s level of participation and work samples more often via TEAMS, Class Dojo, and See Saw apps.

The online platforms allowed for staff and students to join classroom in-struction if & when they were required to self-isolate which allowed for teachers to maintain student connections, reducing lost instructional time and allowed students & their families the opportunity to keep abreast of classroom instruction.

Art lessons with Gr.5/6 cohorts via TEAMS was a huge success, when classes had the opportunity to learn clay techniques from one teacher’s expertise.

Teacher collaboration when planning instructional strategies and units to-gether allowed for rich dialogue on strategies which were having the great-est impact on student learning.

TEAMS Weekly Planners promoted intentional use of common topics and strategies for students in the same grade groupings.

Academic Achievements 2020-2021

Community Report 2020-2021 Page 2

Thank you PAC, for the new hockey sticks for PE

& recess

Critters for Inquiry

Gr.1/2 Water Everywhere!

Kinder writing about nature

Community Report 2020-2021 Page 3

Priority # 2: Our Divisional Numeracy Assessment is administered at the beginning of the school year, which looks at our students’ achievement in the Number strand of the Provincial Curriculum. The data we receive is used by teach-ers to plan for and target specific student needs. The assessment data also opens up many conversations by the staff regarding our next steps as a school. Our students used writing as a means of communicating, justifying and so-lidifying their understanding in Math this year, all as an integral part of problem-solving. Teachers worked to develop students’ clarity with writing by building in opportunities for accountable talk which then lead to writ-ing, as they were asked to explain their thinking, think critically to answer word problems, and analyze data as they worked through different strands in Math. Students were involved in many learning scenarios which included: estimation using referents, demonstrating learning using various hands-on materials, drawing pictures, building models to support their ex-planations and using the numerical representations. We continue to explore the work of Marian Small and Kathy Krpan to guide our teaching and planning for open and parallel tasks, providing de-

scriptive feedback for students, making meaning-ful and ongoing connections and pushing our under-standing. Some of our teachers also continued to work with our Divisional Numeracy Support teacher. The PD provided for our Gr.8 teachers allowed them to examine their student data and plan to support their students’ transition to High School by con-sidering the requirements of the upcoming school year.

Priority #3: Our third goal examined the resiliency we see in our students, as tracked through our school-wide PBIS data. Many school-wide initiatives which would have involved our students con-tributing to the learning of others, and thereby contributing to resiliency, had to be put on hold to avoid student interactions across different co-horts and meet health guidelines. That said, our students demonstrated ongoing resiliency with a willingness to continue learning in response to the ongoing changes in school. We also noted a significant reduction in PBIS office referrals, with only 60 PBIS forms being submitted from September to June. Our students experienced the outdoors al-most all year long, in the snow, rain and sun-shine and the teachers noticed the out-doors had a very positive effect on the stu-dents as they were engaged in learning in many different natural environments.

About us: 356 students, 18 teach-

ers, 3 learning support teachers, 17 educational assistants, 1 library technician, 3 custodians

Some of our regular pro-

gramming includes:

Roots of Empathy

Daily Breakfast Program

Play-based Kindergarten

program & KAP

Zones of Regulation

Inquiry and experiential

learning opportunities

Career Trek-virtually

DBT Lite

Mind Up

Thrival Kits for Gr.3-6

Treasure Keepers Day

Care on site

Collaboration with RM

of La Broquerie Leisure

Services

Careful observations of

worms vermicomposting

You can reach us at:

Box 40

71 Normandeau Bay

La Broquerie, MB

R0A 0W0

(204)-424-5607

Email: arb@srsd.ca

Grade 8 Class “Leaving a Legacy” As a class they decided to add a beautiful contribution to our green space for students to enjoy for years to come. This came as a result of being recognized by the Board of Trustees for their Citi-zenship award back in Grade 6.

The students who helped lift our spirits every morning with their hilarious and sometimes confusing jokes and riddles-an Arborgate Joke Book will be in the works for next year, so stay tuned!

Student inquiry leading to positive change for others-the Gr.5 & 6 classes which advocated for more hockey equipment from the PAC for recess and PE classes resulted in more students being able to play as well

The Gr.3/4Z class advocating for vermicompost in their classroom will continue to benefit the school in ‘green’ endeavours

The students planting the Community Gardens which will result in harvesting fresh vegetables in the fall, consolidating their understanding of plant growth.

Student Contributions 2020-2021

Arborgate School will continue to deepen our work on the priorities from this past year with a focus on grade level collaboration, in the areas of lit-eracy and numeracy to build consistency in practice and common language throughout the school. Our professional learning emphasis will be on deep-ening our understanding of planning and implementing lessons based on as-sessment data, which provide opportunities for teachers to model strate-gies and for students, to engage in guided practice and share their learning in a variety of ways. Within these two priorities below, each grade group has their own specific goal to concentrate our learning for the next year.

Literacy Priority #1: Our students will become independent, confident and strategic problem-solvers who are engaged and motivated to read, write and communicate effectively for a variety of audiences and purposes, focusing on literacy across the curriculum. Numeracy Priority #2: Our students will strengthen their core under-standings and build flexibility with which they approach number sense and number concepts, including how they are able to solve mathematical prob-lems.

Priorities for 2021-2022

Gr.1/2 Signs of Wind

Gr.5/6 “Human Body” Learning in Science

Grade 3/4 planting the

community gardens

Community Report 2020-2021 Page 4

Support and positivity during the ongoing changes and adjustments to learning spaces, protocols and access to their children’s learning

Attending online/phone conferences to support the children's learning Mrs. Buhler for donations of socks, mittens and gloves which were a tre-

mendous help during the winter months Communicating openly with school staff with questions around COVID and

following the online weekly planners when children needed to isolate PAC for purchasing new sticks for floor hockey and outdoor play and for

awarding on Gr.12 SAC student with a $50.00 Alumni Award

Reaching out to school staff when students and/or families required di-rection to access support for physical, social-emotional or academic needs

Mrs. Stalman for the donation of soccer balls for the entire school

Parent Contributions 2020-2021