Burns Park Elementary PTO Weekly Notes – Week of May 10, 2010

School Announcements

• Teacher and Staff Appreciation Luncheon: May 12
• BP Movie Night, ‘Chicken Little’: May 14
• Come garden! Help needed for ‘Weed and Seed’ Thursdays in the garden
• BP is on the NY Philharmonic for Kids website; 5th grade Compositions concert: May 18
• Ice Cream Social Volunteers needed: May 26

Community Announcements

• Children’s Book Week: Author Deborah Diesen and ‘The Pout Pout Fish’: May 11
• One Million Reasons to Support Ann Arbor Public Schools: May 17 and May 24
• Support Trevor Staples and the Family Learning Institute!: June 4
• Ms. Erdstein and Frank Connolly on Gears and Beers team!!: ride to cure ALS, June 12, 2010
• Children’s Community Garden at the Produce Station: May 15-August 21.
• Gardening Classes for Kids at the Produce Station: May 16-June 18

If you are a PTO committee member and want to announce something about your committee, or anyone that has something to share with the school community, please send it to Lynda Norton <llnorton at okno.com> by Sunday at noon of each week.

School Announcements:

• Teacher and Staff Appreciation Luncheon, Wednesday, May 12th: Please remember to bring in your dish. Thank you!
• PTO Movie Night, Friday, May 14th. Our previous Movie Nights have been great successes. The kids love to hang out with their friends and watch a fun movie! Parents enjoy two kid-free hours! Join us this month for Chicken Little. Drop off at 6:30, pick up at 8:30. $5 ticket donation includes popcorn. Please remember to bring your own water bottle! Interested in helping out? Look for volunteer details on the back of the flyer. Courtney McCreadie
• Help needed for “Weed and Seed” time for students in the school garden during lunch recess on Thursdays (11:30-12:45). Please let us know if you can come one Thursday, a few Thursdays, or every Thursday, or during part of the time to help students plant, water, dig, and journal! It’s quite the hit with the kids!

  Thanks!  Emily Hastie <emilyhastie at comcast.net> and Lynda Norton <llnorton at okno.com>

• Burns Park School is on the NY Philharmonic for Kids website!  Check out the thanks that our 5th grade classes composed in Fall ’09 for Jon Deak, principal bassist of the NY Philharmonic, who had come to work with our 5th graders the previous week.  If you’re on a mac, best to open the site, nyphilkids.org, with Firefox, as Safari takes a few minutes to load the movie.  PC’s shouldn’t have any difficulty.  We’re under the Composer Workshop, “Meet Some Very Young Composers.”  Very cool!  Thanks to Arts on Earth and Theresa Reid for giving us the day-long Jon Deak residency.  If you’d like to hear the compositions of the 2010 5th graders, they will be performing their group compositions on May 18th, Tuesday, at 7 p.m. in the auditorium.  Thanks and enjoy! Cynthia Page-Bogen
• Burns Park Ice Cream Social on Wednesday, May 26 is looking for volunteers!  Please visit this website to view the volunteer positions still needed and sign up - www.mysignup.com/BurnsParkIceCreamSocial.  This fun-filled event is a great opportunity to catch up with your friends and to meet the new ones.  Your help will only make the fun possible.  Please sign up to help as a sub-committee chair or work on a 30-minute shift or two.  

Community Announcements:

• One Million Reasons to Support Ann Arbor Public Schools! In the face of state budget cuts, disappearing programs, and a lack of resources, the very things that make our public schools special are being threatened. The Ann Arbor Public Schools Educational Foundation is taking a bold stand. We are aiming to raise one million dollars to help fund some of the very programs that could disappear.  Please join us at one of two scheduled informational meetings about this campaign:  Monday, May 17th at 7:00 pm and Monday, May 24th at 9:00 am in the Burns Park Auditorium.  There will be a brief presentation (10 – 15 minutes) and an opportunity to ask questions.  Parents, teachers, school staff and community members are invited to attend!  Questions? Helen Starman, hstarman at comcast.net or (734)994-8553.  For more information about AAPSEF please visit our website http://www.aapsef.org .
• From Rachel Erdstein: Here’s a great event that I think a lot of families with younger children would enjoy. A lot of our students are familiar with Pout Pout Fish because it was the Michigan Reads book this year. It’s really a cute book and I’ve heard the author is a good presenter.

  Children’s Book Week: Michigan Reads Author Deborah Diesen And ‘The Pout Pout Fish’: Tuesday May 11, 2010: 7:00 pm to 8:00 pm — Pittsfield Branch: Program Room

  ‘The Pout-Pout Fish’ is a fun, rhyming picture book about a gloomy fish who discovers that being glum isn’t really his destiny. It was named the 2009 Michigan Reads picture book and was also named as one of the top 10 children’s books of 2008 by Time Magazine. ‘The Pout Pout Fish’ author Deborah Diesen will read from the book and talk to children about the story. A book signing will also occur and Deborah’s books will be on sale.

• From Trevor Staples: I’m going to be in a spelling bee on June 4 to support the Family Learning Institute in Ann Arbor. I’ve gotten together some folks from the Skatepark Committee to help the FLI out with their fundraising efforts. As you know, the Family Learning Institute provides low income students in Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti who are performing below grade level, a no cost supplemental academic program guided by one-on-one tutoring that incorporate the tools for becoming successful learners. Check out their website here: http://www.familylearninginstitute.org/

  We’re trying to get $500 in donations, so that we can enter the bee, and help out this great non-profit (what, you think all we cared about was the skatepark?!). It’s super easy to give. We’ll take $5, $10, $100, or whatever you can give. It’ll help us, and it’ll help the FLI. Click here to donate: http://www.crowdrise.com/flispellingbeeskatep1/fundraiser/trevorstaples

  Thanks so much! We can make a difference together!

  Trevor Staples

• Rachel Erdstein and Frank Connolly (Ana’s dad) on Burns Park Team for Gears and Beers. Gears and Beers ride to cure ALS, June 12, 2010 is an organized bicycle ride put on by the ALS Association Michigan Chapter to raise money for ALS research. Frank rode in this event last year and this year created a Burns Park team. Please consider joining the ride on the BP team or donating for the BP team (sponsor the team or anyone who joins the team). The routes start and end at Olson Park in Ann Arbor. If you ride you have a choice of 25, 75, or 100 mile routes. Rachel and Frank will be doing the 100 mile and the 75 mile route respectively. This year the post-ride party food is provided by Zingerman’s and beer is again provided by Arbor Brewing Company.

  To register to ride or donate (or for more information) please go the web site http://webmi.alsa.org/site/TR/Rides/Michigan?fr_id=6380&pg=entry.

  To register hit the "Register" button and then select "1. Join or form a team" to find the Burns Park team if you would like to join. Enter Burns Park and hit "Search for a Team". After you register you can ask people to sponsor you or the team.

  To donate for the Burns Park team hit the "Find a Participant" button, then select "Search for a team" (Burns Park, of course) and then select the Burns Park link or anyone registered to the Burns Park team to contribute to the team total. Gears and Beers asks a minimum $40 donation if you are a non-rider planning to attend the post-ride party at Olson Park.

  Contact Frank Connolly at fconnoll at peoplepc.com if you have any questions or need any help registering or donating. Thanks.

• Children’s Community Garden at the Produce Station for kids 8-11 years old, Saturdays from 3-4pm starting May 15 through August 21.  $35/Child = Participation in  all classes. Vision: The Produce Station believes that gardens need to be accessible to all children.=A0The Children’s Community Garden aims to provide garden education to children in order to nurture children’s awareness, confidence and connections to the natural world, promote healthy food practices, and foster hands-on, lifelong learning. Classes include: Lettuce Learn, Rooting for Root Crops, and Teepee Bean Trellis. For more information: http://www.producestation.com/events/community_garden.php

  Gardening Classes for Kids at the Produce Station, for kids ages 5-7: These start Sunday, May 16 and continue through June 18 from 3-4 pm; $5 each class. They include The Edible Garden for Kids! Sunday, and Herb Gardening for Kids! For more information: http://www.producestation.com/events/kids_gardening_classes.php

DO YOU HAVE QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS?  Please don’t hesitate to contact one of us.

Lynda Norton, President
Wendy Burke, President-elect

llnorton at okno.com or 761-1478
Wendy.burke at mac.com or 585-5570