We had our Chinese New Year parade lead by the large dragon made by some of our older students. We carried our fans and bells and walked through the halls wishing all “Gung Hay Fat Choy” (Happy New Year). Chinese New Year is the Spring Festival. Days before this holiday, families clean and prepare their homes taking away any bad luck allowing the home to receive good luck. The colour red is used to decorate as this is a symbol of happiness. Fireworks light up the sky symbolizing the end of the old year and welcoming the brand new year. Children receive a New Year present from their parents. They receive lucky red envelopes with money inside. Gung Hay Fat Choy to all our families in our community celebrating Chinese New Year!

We had so much fun on Valentine’s Day. We opened our valentines from our friends. What great excitement as we read the names and hollered across the room such things as “thank you . . . ” and “I love it!”. Thank you to our families for taking the time to help your child to read the names and copy them onto their valentines. Mrs.T. and Mrs. McLeod loved them too and the planning time teachers as well. Hope all had a Happy Valentine’s Day!

We celebrated Pancake Tuesday. We thought this would be the best day ever because everyone loves pancakes! Oops we were wrong. We created a bar graph and found that 5 of our friends did not like the pancakes. Our custodians did though and came for a few. Shrove Tuesday or Pancake Tuesday is the last day before Lent and is the perfect time to get rid of any last minute indulgences and use up any fatty foods. Thank you to our Fieldcrest families for donating our pancake mix, syrup, plates and cutlery.

Today we celebrated 100 days of school. Some of us dressed up like we were 100 years old. We counted many collections of 100 items brought in from home such as buttons, corks, cheerios, beans, etc. We built a tower of 100 cups and did a puzzle with 100 pieces (well actually only 99 as we lost a piece). We made party hats (“I am 100 days brighter”), necklaces with 100 Fruit Loops and tried to make a Love Bug with 100 hearts. We did 100 exercises and did the macarena dance by counting to 100. Wow what a busy day!!

A great big thank you goes out to our Custodial Staff here at Fieldcrest. We wrote a message for our wonderful and hard working custodians who keep our school clean. We made a list of all the things they do from cleaning the floors and washrooms, washing our tables, emptying the garbage and recycling and to shoveling all the snow. Our school SPARKLES because of you!

The children have helped create a pet shop in our dramatic play centre this month. They have brought in many pet stuffies, pet supplies (e.g.leashes, bowls, brushes, etc.) and pet carriers. They have learned what all pets need such as love, play, food and water. We have been singing a song “I Have a Pet” and they noticed that a lion in the song is not a pet. “That is wrong,” said one of our friends. Not many of us have pets at home so we are learning lots about pets. We can’t wait for our “Pet Presentations” to learn more facts about them. We have been also putting our pets up in order and saying which pet is first, second, third or fourth.