Clarion Newsletter, March 11, 2022

March 11, 2022

Happy Friday Clarion parents and friends of Clarion!

Bubbles Popping: KHDA has cleared schools to mix bubbles during class lessons, recess breaks, and throughout the school day.

This means that we can begin to go back to doing some things we did before COVID:

  • Grade level teams of teachers can set up groups for challenges such as extended Math challenges for students who need differentiation especially at an upper level.
  • Whole Grade levels can mix at outside play times- such as the 3 sections in K2, or the 3 in Grade 1 or in Grade 2!
  • Teacher teams in Grade level groupings or even in our 4,5,6 team can begin to mix students across groups for academics and project work.
  • “Buddy Reading” can return to Clarion!
  • Parents can come in to school for events in classrooms- like culmination projects and parent conferences.

We are so excited to have this opportunity and want to thank KHDA for this new flexibility. Even if we still have to work on social distancing and wear masks (above age 6) in school, bit by bit things are opening up!

Re-enrollment: Don’t forget the form that was sent out to re-enroll for the 2022-2023 school year and here is the link again:

https://forms.office.com/r/cEjuB5QDL9

Book Fair: On March 22-23-24th we have another book fair and as parents you are invited to come in to see what they have for your children! The company is “Booktopia” and we have heard good things about them from other schools. So come in after drop off at 8 AM and pop in at pick up as the company will be here selling their wares until 4 AM (all 3 days). It’s a great opportunity to pick up some fresh books for your children right as the Spring Break hits on the tick tock at 12 o’clock noon on the 25th!!!!

Clarion Commons: The Clarion Commons will have an event on March 15th at 2 PM related to the book donations so many of you have made already. Ms. Rachel Ellyard, a Clarion parent, will do a presentation of her family NGO called “Bouncing Books!” that is putting together a library bus for villages in Tanzania.

So far Clarion families have donated many boxes of books and I am confident we can continue to do so much more! Please set aside time on the 15th to pop in a bit early at pick up to listen to Rachel and to ask questions about how we can all help.

A few reminders for special days at school: An updated calendar is attached.

Parent teacher conferences are rescheduled for Thursday, April 14th: We did this as with the shift in the work calendar it made no sense to have them the 12th, only one day after coming back from Spring Break. We are still giving you the option to have this online so when you sign up for your slot(s) with teachers, please keep this in mind. However, we encourage parents to come to school that day with their children for their conference so it is a more functional parent-teacher-child conference!

Eid Break from May 2nd to 6th: We have arranged so that all of our community has the week after Ramadan off to maybe get in some travel so school will be closed for Eid on May 2-3-4 and the 5th and 6th are school holidays! Not many schools will have saved vacation days to do this, so we are lucky to be able to have a nice break opportunity before finishing up the school year.

Last Day of School: Friday, July 1st: KHDA had mandated that this be the first possible last day of school. No, there is nothing we can do about this switch- we tried! KHDA noted to us that they pushed the December break an extra day, so in order to ensure that schools have the appropriate length of school year in terms of days of attendance, all schools have Friday July 1 added to their schedules.

The heat is on: Hats and Sunscreen: The sun is shining hotter and the weather is hotter. Please ensure that you apply a nice high level sunscreen before your child(ren) come(s) to school. Also include a hat in their bags and remind your child to wear it at their outside break times!

The School and Nursery Show this weekend: I will be there 4 hours each day, and it is a wonderful opportunity for our team to trumpet the great things happening at Clarion.

Final word: The Grades 3,4,5 and 6 and their teachers had a wonderful field trip yesterday to the “Crossroads of Civilizations” Museum in old city Dubai.

Combined with the museum trip was an event called “Pearls, Plants and People” run by one of our Clarion families, Ms. Paola Balbi. Many of you saw her running the “Italy Booth” at International Day and giving the children wonderful storytelling seminars in the middle of the international day madness! I did a special pop in during the field trip and was blown away at how well it was going and at what a fascinating museum it is; I certainly will return there to see all the exhibits as the Emirati family that owns the museum has curated a one of a kind collection of artifacts from the UAE and around the world that is unlike anything I have ever seen- and I have been to a lot of top museums!

There is a special event with a storytelling performance as well as a visit to the museum “Pearl Gallery” for adults on Saturday the 12th, 7:30 PM at the museum (admission is 80 DHS) and I highly recommend it- our students and teachers and the parent chaperones LOVED their experience yesterday. please contact the museum for booking at info@themuseum.ae thestorytellingcompany@yahoo.com (this is for adults, but children over 10+ may attend; I presume they are ticked too as adults? Ask when you register!).

Parking: You may have noticed that there are 30 more cars parked in the front lot of school each morning at the far end when you arrive for drop off and they are still there at pick up at 3 PM.

These are the Clarion staff cars, as we have had to close the back parking lot to prepare it as a construction support site. Thank you for understanding that as parents, particularly at 3 PM pick up, you can use the Mosque parking lot as ‘overflow’ for Clarion. In fact, to be honest, it might be a bit easier to use the Mosque parking lot rather than get ‘stuck’ at the far end of our parking lot!

Thank you for understanding that as we grow, we need to do construction, and this parking situation should finish up in time for the start of the 22-23 school year given the projected time frame to completion.

Sincerely,

Jim #ParkedInTheFarthestSpot Pastore

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