À l’écoute

Great Things Seen & Heard

  • We sure loved the gratitude messages on our lunch boxes the other day… Thank you, ladies!
  • It’s great to know we have a new doorbell that rings only in the office and that the loud one that rings throughout the whole school will be programmed to only ring after hours.
  • The latest news on the fob story is that our keys will be deprogrammed and will no longer be working in the new locks on exterior doors since we now have our own fobs.
  • You know it’s been a long week when you start writing the date as “August” instead of “December” as seen on the meeting notes shared with staff…
  • Overheard in a Math class this past week: a student asking his teacher what would it be that had two butts and killed people? No fancy equation to answer that one…
  • Do you know what a Canadian tuxedo is? It’s a jean jacket!
  • You know we’re flexible when a student goes to a truck in the parking lot at school to write an exam since he can’t come in the building…
  • Overheard in TP’s office when going in there to find a solution to a difficult situation: her phone piped up, “That’s no problem!”
  • Some Covid messages just come out sounding weird, such as, “When using the bathroom, be sure to wipe all areas carefully!”
  • Overheard between staff members: “Why is your mother allowed in the school?” (It’s because she has a job at the school!)
  • You may not know this, but one of our secretaries is very good at kangaroo-hopping all the way to the ESP classroom from the office!

Great Things Seen & Heard

  • Something creepy to watch out for: an unknown person logged into one of our Google classrooms!
  • Great job, SM & CW, getting your classes to perform on the Wellness Coach Google Classroom Challenge!
  • Our online meeting with the trustees went very well!
  • We have another new staff member: Tretta! Was that Tretta Lewis?
  • When a teacher asked what F.O.B. stood for at a our staff meeting, it was interpreted as “what does S.O.B. stand for?” Oops!
  • Discovered after students started learning at home: a collection of hall passes stuck on the back of a bathroom stall door!
  • In the old days, we used to call it “talking back.” Now we call it, “advocating for self.”
  • One of our students has been staying inside his house because that’s what he thought he was supposed to do. He was sure happy to hear from his teacher that he can go outside!
  • Did you know they use leaky oil in the foods lab? It’s spelled “Lee Kee” oil.
  • One of our custodians has the most well-lit houses on our street: right across from the school!
  • A student asked to be excused from the online class because his cat ate a thumbtack—again!
  • We had visitors coming to school looking for trouble, it turned out that they were already double trouble! (although they themselves said it was more like dumb and dumber…)
  • One teacher had a unique approach to improving engagement with his online class this week: he was singing to himself when he noticed he wasn’t muted like he thought! At least his students loved it!

Great Things Seen & Heard

  • One CALM student that took an interactive baby home commented that she’s tired of being a single mom after a long night!
  • A male CALM student that held a wailing interactive baby in the hallway was counselled by a younger student to take precautions next time (but in much cruder language, of course).
  • Overall, the CALM babies were not calm at all: we could hear them crying from the office!
  • Overheard: isn’t Cuba close to Cape Breton?
  • You know you’ve got too many students vaping when you see a chocolate on the floor and think it’s a vape…
  • New vocabulary: shack-whacking means “stir crazy” (being cooped up inside at home too long)
  • We have a new code word for announcements: code “buzz” means come help, it’s a work bee!
  • Another new staff member: Bernard (or is that just a previous staff member with yet another new name?)

Great Things Seen & Heard

  • We have a tight race for first place with the Wellness Google Challenge: way to go SM, CW and JA for cheering on your Block 2 classes!
  • One of our staff members has been on the Oprah show! She’s a celebrity!
  • When a teacher told a student that he did a good job, he thought he’d get the day off tomorrow!
  • This week (November 19th) we had full staff for the first time since September 8th!
  • I heard what the best thing is to do on a Friday night: to go home and lay like broccoli! (That’s a different way of saying to “veg out”; I hope it doesn’t mean the same thing as “Netflix and chill” since I’m quoting it in public.)

Great Things Seen & Heard

  • We thought lunch hour was short, but it turns out that it is long enough to buy a car!
  • We have two new words this week: “browngies” (a variation of boundaries) and “voluncheering” for those helpful staff members that are often offering assistance!
  • Overheard: “If I wanted to be a maid, I would have taken a job at a hotel.”
  • A slip of the tongue: a staff member asked to bite a colleague’s ear instead of bending it.
  • Learning a new word that is commonly used in describing how to use a cell phone in class: “sneakily” (it really is a word that is found in the dictionary!).
  • Student comment: “I’ve never been in a room full of smart people before!”
  • A tropical storm was named after me J !
  • Do we have a secret pizza door? No, we have a substitute teacher who orders pizza for students!
  • New use for a hall pass: stick it to the camera observing the bathroom entrance and then forget about it! (Of course, only one student is tall enough to reach the camera on the ceiling so it’s easy to find out who did it…)
  • People in this school are so nice; even with putting “meet” sauce or hot “dots” on the memo, no-one complained!

Great Things Seen & Heard

  • We passed the government’s health inspection with flying colours! Way to go team!
  • A student thought he earned a sleep-in day by working hard for three consecutive days!
  • The student that took the sleep-in day for his hard work also thought he earned the afternoon off!
  • Student perspective: anyone who walks in the hallways to supervise is an EA!
  • When zooming with a class, it could mean walking fast instead of a virtual meeting!

Great Things Seen & Heard

  • Some place have signs that say “Do not feed the bears” but at our school, we’ll have to have a sign that says “Do not feed the finance secretary” (watch for the traffic carrying plates to her office to know more).
  • When we have visitors to the school, it’s a day to do your hair!
  • We’re glad we don’t have to pay when we forget to disarm the alarm upon entry to the school!
  • Our LST is ready for spring: all the OCA copies are already made!
  • One of our more withdrawn students was overheard giving our day janitor compliments!

Great Things Seen & Heard

  • Posting wasn’t delayed by power outage this week!
  • Different classes are practicing using Google classroom to submit assignments!
  • We may be seeing more “Number of Days Without Incident” posters at school!
  • Reading lessons will be required before reading locker graffiti to improve accuracy.
  • Overheard: a volunteer to answer phones answered with the wrong school name!
  • We can see camera feedback in the office now!

Great Things Seen & Heard

  • Great volunteer work with people pitching in to bake (and decorate and wrap) 1000 cupcakes for the funeral! I’ve never seen so many people work together in a kitchen!
  • We have discovered we have the Queen of Selfies on our staff!
  • Rumors are circulating because a murderer in the US has the same name as one of our teachers!
  • Some EWP staff were accidentally harassing bystanders to join our Terry Fox Run, thinking they were students! At least we realized that only the one in the fur hat and blaze orange jacket was recognizable from a distance…
  • Our school raised more than ever for the Terry Fox Run!