Primary school students paraded on stage the toy penguins they made in the wood shop at a special assembly on Thursday, January 18. Dressed in a tuxedo to mimic the iconic black and white birds, woodworking teacher Gerry Clifford led his gaggle through the school and onto the stage in the Lowell Center, waddling all the way along with their new penguin friends.
Read more...
Photo by Miriam Stulin
News & Notices
Family Bingo!
You could be a winner at this fun family event! Please join us
Tonight, Saturday, January 20, 5:00-7:00 p.m. in the Rand Gym for pizza, bingo, and prizes!
Walk-ins are welcome - you can pay at the door!
Click here for the flyer and registration form. Contact Ellen Volpe (
ellenhvolpe@gmail.com) or Amy Starmer
Middle school students are running a drive for Cradles to Crayons, an organization that provides children from birth through age 12 living in homeless or low-income situations with the essential items they need to thrive, at home, at school, and at play.
Starting on Monday, January 22, bring your
new and gently used items, including coats, (youth sizes 0-20 and adult sizes small and medium), hats, gloves, and scarves to the bin in the front lobby. The most needed items are boys' size 7/8 pants, boys' and girls' 18-to-24-month tops, onesies, diapers and diaper wipes, chapter books, cribs and twin bed sheets, and toothpaste.
Products donated to this effort will become part of our new, community-wide Cradles to Crayons activity announced at the MLK Assembly. During the month of February, a special Cradles to Crayons "pod" will be available on DCD's campus to accept donations of a wide variety of clothing, shoes, winter gear, books, toys and other needs for kids. These items will be screened, sorted, and packed up right here in DCD's Rand Gym! Please save the date of
Saturday, March 3 for a morning of volunteering with the whole family. All DCD families are invited to participate (siblings welcome)! More details to come.
The PA Invites You to an Evening of Knitting and Conversation
On
Monday, January 22, at 6:30 p.m. at the Herrick House, the DCD PA invites parents for an evening of knitting and conversation. All levels are welcome. Yarn, needles, and refreshments will be supplied.
Spread a Little Kindness The Great Kindness Challenge is one week dedicated to creating a culture of kindness on campuses nationwide. Our school is proudly participating in this proactive, positive kindness initiative. The primary and lower schools will participate during the week of January 22and the middle school will join the challenge the week of January 29. All classrooms will have a checklist with 50 kind acts (12 kind acts for the primary level). Please encourage your child to have fun and complete the checklist. We are also happy to invite you to participate using the new Family Edition checklist. Your family can complete the checklist anytime and anywhere. For additional information, check out the website
Once again the Kindergarten and 8th graders will be heading over to Nobles for a special Buddies skating party on
Friday, January 26. We have quite a few 8th graders who do not have
skates for the event. If you would be willing to loan a pair of skates that would fit one of the following
shoe sizes listed below, please send an email to
Ruth Gow with the size of the
skates and then bring them in to be tried on by the students. Please be sure to put your name on your
skates, so that we can get them back to you promptly after the event.
We need
skates to fit the following shoe sizes (not skate sizes):
BOYS: 9, 10, 10.5, 11.5, 11.5
GIRLS: 6, 8, 10.5
Join Us for an Evening of CommUNITY
Please join us for a special evening on
Wednesday, February 7, at 5:30 p.m. here on campus. The featured speaker of this year's CommUNITY evening is Rosetta Lee of the Seattle Girls' School. Her topic is,
What I Said and What I Meant: Improving Cross Cultural Communication. All parents are invited to attend. View the video to learn more about our speaker and her thoughts on diversity work.
RSVP by February 1 to
Kylie Lacerda.
Save the Date for These Upcoming PA-sponsored events
Parent-to-Parent Meeting for Lower School
On
Tuesday, February 20, at 7:00 p.m. at the Herrick House, the DCD PA invites lower school parents to an informal discussion.
DCD Book Club
The next meeting of the DCD Book Club will take place on
Monday, March 5, at 6:30 p.m. at Herrick House. We'll be reading and discussing
The Woman in the Window. The Book Club is coed and open to faculty and staff as well as parents. Come join us for a lively conversation. (Reminder: if you buy the book through Amazon Smile and choose Dedham Country Day School as the charity you support, your purchase will also benefit DCD:
www.smile.amazon.com.)
Idea Log: DCD Middle School Faculty Blog
The Benefits of Audiobooks by Dr. Beth Nolan Conners
When audiobooks are suggested to students, the first thing that is often asked is: But isn't that cheating? Audiobooks are not cheating. They are a wonderful, multi-sensory avenue for children to access reading material, particularly when the audio is paired with the written word.
Early audiobooks were created for those who could not read written words, such as people who were blind or visually impaired. Read more...
The Week Ahead
Saturday, January 20
Family Bingo
5:00-7:00 p.m. Rand Gym
Monday, January 22
Day 1
Morning Assembly: Pre-K Multicultural Puppets
8:15 a.m. Lowell Center
Kindergarten Admissions Playgroup
12:45-2:00 p.m.
Knitting and Conversation
6:30 p.m. Herrick House
Tuesday, January 23
Day 2
Wednesday, January 24
Day 3
Thursday, January 25 Day 4
Morning Assembly: Geography Bee 8:15 a.m. Lowell Center
Annual Fund Ambassador Wine and Cheese Reception 6:00-8:00 p.m. Herrick House
DCD uses locally grown organic produce when available. This year, we harvested from our own garden and also served lettuce, tomato, cherry tomatoes, pumpkins, basil, rosemary, thyme, oregano, and carrots from local farms along with radishes, apples, pears, nectarines, corn, and potatoes.
That brain of mine is something more than merely mortal; as time will show. - Ada Lovelace
This quote by Ada Lovelace (1815-1852) is not exactly humble, but neither were her parents. Ada's father was the poet, Lord Byron. A month after she was born, Ada's parents separated. Her mother, Anne Isabella Milbanke, Lady Wentworth, retained complete custody, which was unusual in the male dominated English society. Ada never saw her father again, and Lord Byron died when she was eight years old.
Lady Wentworth always worried that Ada would become
imaginative and reckless like her father. To combat this, her mother instructed Ada in mathematics. She was an anomaly because there weren't many female mathematicians during the first half of the 1800s. When Ada and her mother toured factories, as many wealthy families did for entertainment, Ada's imagination came alive with ideas. She called one of her first ideas, Flyology, as she imagined a mechanical horse that would take to the air. ...
The next meeting of the DCD Book Club will take place on
Monday, March 5, at 6:30 p.m. at Herrick House. We'll be reading and discussing
The Woman in the Window. The Book Club is coed and open to faculty and staff as well as parents. Come join us for a lively conversation. (Reminder: if you buy the book through Amazon Smile and choose Dedham Country Day School as the charity you support, your purchase will also benefit DCD:
imaginative and reckless like her father. To combat this, her mother instructed Ada in mathematics. She was an anomaly because there weren't many female mathematicians during the first half of the 1800s. When Ada and her mother toured factories, as many wealthy families did for entertainment, Ada's imagination came alive with ideas. She called one of her first ideas, Flyology, as she imagined a mechanical horse that would take to the air. ...
