Monday Memo Musings

"Every Problem has a gift for you in its hands."   Richard Bach How did we get to the point where we think all problems are bad? Maybe that problem when solved will be a gift for us. How we handle those problems either builds our integrity or has us losing our integrity.  Our job in Outreach/Home schooling has us solving hundreds of problems a day. Do we solve them with honor in a calm, cool, quiet way? Things  go wrong in the school, how do we approach that problem? Is it in a calm, cool manner which has us keeping our integrity? It's impossible to do it all the time however 99% of the time is a good stat.  Recently, a young couple, who are expecting in spring, came to me with their problem of being kicked out of their house in a month. I had them think of reasons why being out of their current home would be good. ie: no fighting, calm, no stuff going missing, could keep the place clean. Next, we thought of the three options, (all of which required them to be

Did you catch that gorgeous sunrise this morning?? This is Norah Jones' Sunrise.  Can you guess where these sunrises are from?  It's been a gorgeous weekend. Hope you went outside to enjoy it. I sure did with an attempt to put up Christmas Lights. Of course, we hit a snag,( ha,ha snag like in tangled Christmas lights, is it funny if you have to explain it? maybe not!)) many lights were burnt out. However the type of light we have, can't be found anywhere. Sooooooo that means we need to buy new ones. What a disposable world we live in... Our kids have grown up in this disposable world, it's no wonder they have some of the views they do. Phone breaks get a new one... lose my jacket, get a new one.... Lose a module, get a new one... I'm going to try to be less wasteful and I'm going to keep searching for that weird type of Christmas light before I throw them away.  Thanks so much to: Bonnie for doing many jobs over the passed two months. She has

You had to enjoy the weather this weekend. We lit our first fire of the year. No fire bans in October! It's the first time in the passed two months, that I have walked and needed to shed a layer! Get outside its gorgeous! Enjoy it. We will enjoy the good mood that comes with this weather. Our students will be happier, perhaps getting more sleep. Sleep is crucial! Jody Carrington says the two questions/statements are: Tell me more, what happened next? add this question, how are you sleeping? One of our students told me he is having real trouble sleeping and had only slept three hours in two days. He says he spends all his time trying to get to sleep. To be well, sleep is needed.  Each school has access to mental health workers. The process is that we fill out a referral form then the team evaluates the situation and if need be, assigns a team member to our student. Chat with me and we will wrap around our students.  We  realize that you need to be well, there are options for

Hoping you all had a lovely weekend and you were able to indulge in some tasty treats. I started walking again in the mornings because of those treats. My best treat was rocking my grandbaby River to sleep several times over the weekend.  Staff Wellness It's important that we are well, so we can help our families and the students. Our school division does have access to a Counselor/psychologist, his name is Willard. All staff can access his services. I will post his contact in a separate email. Please know that we would do anything for you  (okay within parameters) your wellness matters to us.    Please remember we are on a short week here, 4 days. I always say these are the weeks to get things done. To catch up with student contacts, to catch up with marking, inputting marks, organizing.... Love these weeks.  Thank yous Thank you to Chad for assembling some Learner's License materials for Allan and I. We are teaching the course on the 18th. This is not for cr

Dr. Jody Carrington reiterated with us that everyone has a story. If we took the time to build relationships, we might get to hear that story. If you missed that PD, please go on You Tube and catch some of her teachings. Many of us really enjoyed her talk and will continue to focus on building relationships in our schools. We are all educators, she said there should be at least one person in the school who has that child's heart. One person that the child really likes and who really likes that child. If you aren't the one, find someone who can connect with that kid.  She said, "Joy was our most vulnerable emotion." We don't let ourselves be joyful for very long. We look for things to go wrong. Just enjoy joyful moments for what they are, it's okay to be joyful. Just as it's okay to grieve and be sad. Thank you  Thank you for sitting for 6 hours in those uncomfortable chairs and listening to both speaker's messages. We know we can learn a litt