Hello everyone interested in service learning!

The intent of this post is to give everyone an update on our status and progress so far.

Our club is meeting on the FIRST TUESDAY of each month, although we are tentatively considering the SECOND TUESDAY FOR JANUARY ONLY – no school the first Tuesday that month.

Meetings run officially from 3:42pm until 4:45pm.

We had a great signup and great turnouts for our first two meetings in October and November. So far this year, our kids have helped organize and execute the Halloween costume drive, Trick or Treating for UNICEF, and a great activity for Mott childrens hospital that involved our kids putting together activity kits for Mott kids – these included crayons and coloring kits as well as putting together fleece “crown” kits that give Mott kids distractions and warm fleece “hats” to wear.

I’m not sure if this is the best forum for this.

I’d like to do what I can to get BP kids excited about chess. Ann Arbor has an abundance of opportunities and resources to help kids discover this rewarding pastime.

I’m not sure how many parents are aware that Ben Finegold, who comes to BP every Tuesday, is Michigan’s strongest ever chess player, and is #19 in the country. He also happens to be a great kids’ chess teacher.

There are also a couple statewide scholastic chess events including a team tournament in early spring. Many Ann Arbor elementary schools, including King, Wines, Logan and Thurston are well represented, but BP has for the most part been absent.

Please bear with us while we work on the format of PTO meeting reports…...

Highlights:

• We passed a budget for the 2006-7 year, including increases for PTO grants to teachers for classroom use (making up for cuts from the district).

• While the budget was balanced even with conservative revenue estimates, there was broad agreement that the PTO should not scale back fundraising activities. Continued cutbacks by the district are likely to put sustained pressure on the PTO budget as we try to maintain school programming.
• This budget is the first to reflect changes to the Golden Apple grant system, with money set aside for special enrichment assemblies that have typically been funded each year. Other programs, proposed by parents and teachers, will still need to go through the application process.

Thanks to everyone who has shown interest in the new service learning club at Burns Park Elementary, Burns Park Kids Care!

This week, we will be sending home a flyer with details about the initial club meetings and how to get started.

As of now, meetings are planned for the first Tuesday of every month, beginning October 3rd, at the school (room is currently TBD, as of this posting, but we will make it known and will post directions to the room at the front doors.) WATCH THIS SPACE!

Meetings will run from 3:45pm till 4:45pm (FIRST TUESDAY OF EACH MONTH.)

Please feel free to use this forum to ask questions or post ideas for the group, potential project ideas, and comments. Also, you can read more about the national Kids Care Club organization, which is a good resource for us with no constraints or obligations, here: www.kidscare.org

[Originally posted by Kelly Bumgarner]

Over the last two years, I have noticed that attendance at our PTO meetings is somewhat low, and usually consists of the same small group of people. I would like to see attendance increase because the meetings are where we make decisions about what to do for our kids and our school with the money we raise. Are there thing we can do to get you to come and get involved? Ideas we have so far include:

• trying different meeting times
• varying the meeting time

• limiting the meeting to only one hour

There have also been plenty of ideas floated about options for math, science and ecology enrichment. Let’s discuss them here.

A place to discuss how to enhance the Burns Park Bucks scrip fundraising prrogram. All ideas welcome!

In the early May PTO meeting, we talked about some options to expand on service learning. Some of them focused on ways of showing kids the impact of the work they are doing: for example, to help deliver the lunches made in “Lunches with Love” to see why they are doing it, or to follow through with charitable fundraising to see what is being funded.

Other ideas included expanding on community service work such as keeping the park clean, ecology-related projects and even projects that might link to the science curriculum (such as a focus on energy efficiency).

Some parents have proposed programs for kids that will encourage reading and literacy. These could be either after-school or during school as something like “Lunchtime Choices.” Ideas floated include: team competitions based on close reading of books, organized discussions of books, a kid-style book group, etc. What should the role of competition be? How much should it focus on just reading or reading for deeper understanding? Should it be topical, or organized by age? How can we complement what is being done in the classroom?