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Dear Parents,
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Yesterday, the school conducted a test of the School Messenger Emergency contact system. Please immediately contact the school office if you
did not
receive either an email or phone communication from the school. School Messenger is the system that is used to contact family in the event of an unexpected closing due to weather, etc., so it is important that the school has the most up-to-date contact information on record. Thank you for your attention to this important detail.
We conclude the week with a wonderful festivity this Saturday: The International Fest!
Please come to visit with friends, both new and old, and share your culture!
I ask that you keep the 8th grade Confirmandi in your prayers as they receive the sacrament of Confirmation this Monday, October 23, at 7pm. These students have been preparing through 7th and 8th grade for this important moment in their lives and we are very happy for them and their families.
Lastly, we look forward to a terrific day of racing during next Wednesday's Race for Education. Thank you to all families who have supported and sponsored students as they work to raise needed funds for STM School.
God bless,
Eleanor McCormack
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PIZZA THIS FRIDAY, OCT 20, FOR ALL STUDENTS WHO SUBSCRIBED
This Friday Pizza Lunch supports PE!
Pizza and Market Table volunteers are needed in the school cafeteria from 10:45am-1:15pm. You must be VIRTUS-compliant to volunteer. Come for the entire time or just for an hour.
Market Table
Appropriate items and some favorites are individually bagged popcorn, fruit snacks, chips, pretzels, cheese puffs or Jell-O and small items like bubbles, novelty pens, stickers, and mini-notepads.
Please do not send in cookies or nut products.
Do not send in latex items such as balloons or any item made with latex.
For every $15 spent you earn 1 volunteer hour.
If you have any pizza questions, contact Mike or Cecelia Gilliam at
[email protected].
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NOVEMBER HOT LUNCH ORDERS ARE DUE
Hot lunch for the month of November will begin on Wednesday, November 1, 2017, and will run through Thursday, November 30, 2017. A total of 14 hot lunches will be served for a cost of $87.50 per child. Click
here to view the November menu and download the order form.
Completed order forms must be returned to the school office no later than October 23, 2017.
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BOX TOPS FOR EDUCATION - CLASSROOM CONTEST!
Help your child's classroom compete in this month's
Box Tops for Education Collection Contest
! The contest is happening now - the final day to send them in is
Friday October 20! The winning classroom gets to choose its big prize of either a Dress Down Day pass or a Donuts Party.
Participating is easy: Start by clipping out the bright-pink Box Tops logos from common household & food items in your home. Double-check that each Box Top isn't expired; only valid logos count. Then, put them in a Ziploc-type bag marked with your child's classroom number or teacher's name, to ensure that class gets the credit in the contest. Send the bag in via your child's backpack mail, or drop off at STM's front desk, by the deadline. That's it! Each Box Top means money for STM, and those little logos really add up! STM earned $1200 last year from this fundraiser. If you're new to Box Tops clipping, visit
www.BTFE.com/earn. ###
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LIONS VISION/HEARING SCREENING
NOVEMBER 8, 2017
The Lion's van will be at STM on Wednesday, November 8th
to screen vision and hearing for students in 1st to 8th grade. Please complete the attached form to sign up for screening.
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VOLUNTEERS NEEDED--WILL TRAIN
--If you can help, please email
Mrs. Menacho at
[email protected].
Training will be provided and it is a great way to earn your
volunteer hours! We are looking for at least 5-6 volunteers to assist
from 8am-12:30 or for any portion of that time. Any assistance that you can provide is greatly appreciated. Thank you!
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RE-REGISTRATION IS NOW OPEN 
Registration is now open for
current STM families.
Please click
here
to
be directed to the site and the digital registration form.
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IMPORTANT INFORMATION
FOR STUDENTS RECEIVING CONFIRMATION OCT 2017
Sunday, October 22, 2:30 pm
: Rehearsal Students and Sponsors
Monday, October 23, 6:00 pm: Confirmation Students and Sponsors meet in Burke Hall
7:00 pm: Confirmation Mass
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RACE FOR EDUCATION
Parents, we need your help!
We are half way to our $20,000 goal! St. Thomas More's Race for Education will take place on October 25, 2017. If you haven't already done so, please visit
www.pledgestar.com/stthomasmore
and follow the instructions on the website. Pages can be created and managed through a computer, tablet, or even a phone! It literally takes less than two minutes to get started! You can check our progress on the banner in the school lot at either drop off or pick up.
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INCIDENTAL FEES
Parents--Please take a few minutes to log on to your FACTS account and review and pay your incidental fees.
Auto-payments do not roll over from year to year so you may need to reactivate your incidentals account for auto-pay. Families with an outstanding incidental account will not receive their child's report card. If you have any questions, please contact Tara Ashworth via email at
[email protected].
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ATTENTION ALL STM HOOP PLAYERS!
SIGN UP NOW BECAUSE REGISTRATION WILL BE CLOSING SOON
It's time for the STM CYO basketball registration and season! Many of you will remember that last year the Diocese adopted a new online registration system for all CYO sports. It is mandatory that you use this system to sign up your child for basketball.
I have attached a link here for you to register:
If you have not done so already, you must set up an account first and then register your child for their grade and team. You also need to set up an account if you wish to coach. All teams and classes are listed as unassigned. For grades with more than one team, your child will be assigned to a team by your coach after you register.
A video to help you navigate the sign up can be found here:
Couple of things to note:
Teams are forming now with the hope of getting practices started by the third week of October. No child may practice until they have fully registered and turned in their paperwork and permission slip to their coach. These can be printed during the registration process.
The fee this year is $80 per player for grades 3-5 and $90 for grades 6-8. You may select to have your fees billed using the FACTs program. The uniform deposit is still $65 per player, and we ask that you send a check to your coach for the uniforms or indicate that you wish this to be billed to your FACTs account if a uniform is not turned in at the end of the season. Our costs are still lower than most programs in the Diocese. Any family needing financial aid should email
[email protected]. Due to the generosity of so many of our families, we have money set aside to make sure that every child that wants to play can play!
You will be prompted to print your forms during the sign-up process.
WE STILL NEED COACHES and Assistants FOR SEVERAL TEAMS; if we don't have a coach, we won't have teams. Right now, we need head coaches for the 3rd-grade boys and 5th-grade girl's teams. There is a mandatory coach meeting on Thursday 10.19. All teams must send a coach or representative.
Practices should be starting by the end of the month, games start the first week of December.
Go Royals!
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40 DAYS FOR LIFE CAMPAIGN
The 40 Days for Life campaign is scheduled from September 27 through November 5. Join the silent vigil at 900 S. Washington Street., Falls Church praying for the end of abortion and for the closing of the Falls Church abortion facility. Any day you can be present is a good day, but STM Cathedral parish is concentrating on the Mondays and Tuesdays in October: anytime on Mondays and 2-4 pm on Tuesdays. Your presence outside of the abortion facility does not go unnoticed by women considering an abortion and will sometimes discourage them from going inside. You can also participate in 40 Days for Life by remembering to pray daily for the end of abortion.
Clicking
here will connect you to SignUp Genius. This scheduling hardware will help us ensure that all hours during our committed time are covered.
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FREE NUTCRACKER TICKETS
FOR
THURSDAY, NOV 30th
BalletNova Center for Dance is once again offering STM families a free opportunity to attend their annual Nutcracker performance. BalletNova has set aside 20 tickets for their 7:00pm Thursday, November 30th performance at Kenmore Middle School Theater located at 200 S. Carlin Springs Road, Arlington, VA. To receive a free ticket, you must RSVP to Karinn Cologne, Director of Program and Operations for BalletNova, at 703.778.3008 by November 20th to guarantee a seat.
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Parenting by Dr. Rene News
Parenting Workshop Schedule
2017 - 2018
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Join Dr. Rene for an informative parenting workshop! These workshops are praised for being engaging, thorough and full of practical solutions. These workshops currently meet in McLean at Country Day School. For more information and to register, please click here.
Screen Time Decisions
Sat. Oct. 21 9:00 - 11:00am
Movement & Learning: Importance of Motor Skills
Thurs. Oct. 26 9:20 - 10:20am
Managing Children's Anger & Frustration
Sat. Nov. 4 9:00 - 11:00am
Encouraging Honesty & Respect
Thurs. Nov. 16 9:20 - 10:20am
Kindergarten Readiness & Academic Motivation
Wed. Nov. 29 7:00 - 9:00pm
Positive Discipline 1-Day
Sat. Dec. 2 9:00am - 3:00pm
Managing Mealtimes & Picky Eaters
Wed. Dec. 6 7:00 - 9:00pm
Teaching Money, Chores & Allowance
Thurs. Dec. 7 9:20 - 10:20am
Tantrums, Whining & Backtalk
Mon. Dec. 11 7:00 - 9:00pm
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Tips for a Better Clean Up Time
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Your kids have been playing all afternoon, moving from one activity to the next. You realize dinner is 20 minutes away and the house is a mess. There are toys EVERYWHERE.
- Start young - I tend to think clean-up should be part of play from the beginning. Even before children can help, you can talk to them about how "we are done playing now so I am going to put these toys away." By eighteen months to two years old, give them small jobs as part of the clean up. By two and a half they should really be participating and hopefully by four years old taking ownership.
- Get organized - For kids to be able to put away toys, there should be clear places for toys to go. This means having a preferably clear bin for each type of toy, a box for puzzle pieces, a cabinet or shelf for puzzle boxes, a big basket for balls or a cabinet for dress-up clothes. It may take a few months to teach kids where and how things get put away and it is worth the effort.
- Have a consistent plan - If you find your kids do better cleaning up after each activity, make that the expectation. Better to clean up at the end of the day, that's good too. Find your plan and then stick with it.
- Everyone cleans - Everyone who gets to play, helps to clean.
- Give warnings - Clean up time is a transition. Many children benefit from having a warning before transitions. With my own kids, this is "We are done in five minutes, finish up," and "One more minute, do your last thing." It works best if you say the same things for each warning and mean the same amount of time. If sometimes when you say "five minutes" you mean two because you are in a hurry or you mean twenty because you get distracted, your warnings aren't very helpful.
- Clean-up songs - Every preschool teacher and most of the parents I know sing "Clean up time. Time to clean. Everyone is helping." That's a start. Google "clean up songs" or "clean up games," there are lots.
- Divide and conquer - Several children working together can distract each other. If this is the case, it may work best to assign each a specific job or area of the room to clean. This might also mean one cleans at a time.
- Set small goals - If there really are toys absolutely everywhere, it can be an overwhelming task to clean it all up. It may be helpful to start small and clean up the trains before snack and the legos after.
- Positive choices - Giving children choices would be saying "do you want to start with the blocks or balls?" or "Would you like to throw those in or dump truck them in the basket?" When a child makes a choices they are that much closer to doing the behavior. Here is a full blog post on how choices work in discipline.
- Challenges - Can child count all the blocks they put on the shelf? Can child pick up more blocks than you? Can child make neat stacks? Can child put all the blocks away in two minutes? Ready, go!
- Jobs - Jobs around clean up time might be the block supervisor, the doll organizer, or the art supply sorter. Give a title and a brief job description.
- Read books about it - Children's story books include:
- Pigsty by Teague
- Super, Completely and Totally the Messiest by Viorst
- The Messiest Room on the Planet by Kulling
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BLAST SUBMISSIONS
STM Blast items
must be submitted to [email protected] by noon on Monday
in order to be included in that week's edition.
All submissions must be in print-ready form.
Items received after this deadline will be held until the following issue.
Thank you for your cooperation.
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Upcoming Events
Saturday, October 21
International Fest
Noon-3pm
STM School
Monday, October 23
Individual Picture Day
Monday, October 23
CONFIRMATION
STM
Confirmandi
and Sponsors gather in Burke Hall at 6:00pm
Confirmation at 7pm
Wednesday, October 25
RACE FOR EDUCATION
Friday, October 27
NO SCHOOL
Professional Development Day for Teachers
Friday, November 3
Report Cards Distributed
Wednesday, November 8
Lions Van Hearing & Screening
Thursday, November 9
11:30am Dismissal with Extended Day
Thursday, November 9
Parent-Teacher Conferences
Friday, November 10
11:30 am Dismissal with Extended Day
Friday, November 10
Parent-Teacher Conferences
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