Impress the Guests

 This past week, we had a lot of visitors come into our school for various reasons. We wanted to WOW them, and I think we may have succeeded. Here's an overview of all the events and what contributed to the positive perception we left people with at the end.

Monday, June 17, 2024 = Red Maple Marketing Campaign

Our Red Maple Marketing Campaign was smaller this year. We only had two schools participate, although there were still six teams competing. Our guest judge was Mark Sarner from Manifest Communications. We held it at Port Royal Public School, which was both convenient and helpful. Nour came with his ice cream truck to begin the festivities. A lot of credit must go to Alyson Walters, the teacher-librarian at Port Royal, who arranged coverage for herself, space for the event, and supervision for my students when I had to drive our honoured guest back to the subway station.

The pitches that the students gave were excellent. They all stayed within the allocated time frame and Alyson and I kept giving pleased glances to each other as the groups used different strategies to promote their book.

Mark gave some helpful advice at the end (although his illegible writing made deciphering the written feedback sheets nearly impossible). He talked about the CTA (call to action) and that focusing on the market (aka the target audience) was even more important than the book to be marketed. He explained why a comparison tactic sometimes backfires and how copyediting is an important skill. The winning group was the team that created the campaign for A Bucket of Stars. (This group came from my school; they were surprised and delighted that they won.)

Why were people impressed? = Mark isn't used to hanging around students. However, in our drive back to the subway, he commented on how hard-working and goal-oriented the students from both schools were. He admired their videos that they made and was particularly impressed with the quality of writing on their websites to describe the book and author. 

Tuesday, June 18, 2024 = Volunteer Appreciation Event

Our volunteers mean a lot to us at our school. They assist with field trips and pizza lunches and serve on the parent council. We wanted to demonstrate our appreciation and so we held this social in the library. As in the past, we placed a book plate inside new acquisitions for the school library, celebrating individual volunteer contributions to school life.

Why were people impressed? = Many of our staff members showed up to chat with our volunteers. This shows that the educators genuinely care and appreciate the help of the parents and community members. The volunteers also like finding their names inside the new books and seeing what titles are new to the collection. 

Thursday, June 20, 2024 = Grade 8 Graduation

I knew many of these students when they were in junior kindergarten. Ten years flies by! I had the privilege of presenting three awards.

Why were people impressed? = The ceremony went smoothly, and that's because of our Grade 8 teacher, Farah Wadia. She coordinates the Graduation Committee, so we all feel involved and included, and she attends to the smallest of details. The students rehearsed at least four times prior to the event and all the practice pays off. (Here she is in the library giving final instructions before the Grade 8 students' grand entry.)

Friday, June 21, 2024 = Kindergarten Graduation

From the oldest to nearly the youngest, our senior kindergarten students had their big event the day after the Grade 8s. I really liked some of the changes to the format that gave each student the spotlight. Kindergarten graduation is more unpredictable than the Grade 8 graduation, due to the young age of the participants and of the younger siblings in the audience. (It can be hard to resist interfering when toddlers run around the gym, but our focus has to be on the graduates.)

Why were people impressed? = I hope you notice a theme. It is the behind-the-scenes efforts of a group of people that makes these events work so well and charms the visitors. In this case, it was the joint work of the kindergarten team. The photo below contains all of the adults that were involved with teaching the kindergarten students this year. (From left to right: Mrs. Maliszewski, the music/drama/dance teacher, Ms. Chiu, the classroom teacher of K2, Mr. Malisani, the classroom teacher of K1, Mrs. Isidro, the ECE of K2, and Ms. Wadia, the eco-literacy teacher. Ms. Wadia and I were the prep providers for kindergarten this year.)

I haven't even mentioned the Primary Division Story Jam and the TDSB TL Facilitators end-of-year meeting that also occurred last week. Congratulations to everyone for all their hard work preparing these important milestone events. It's paying off!