Carver PTO

Hi!  We hope everyone had a great time at the Carnival this weekend.  I know I did!  I love to watch the kids play games and win prizes.  I love to see them get excited as they walk the track around that pile of books at the Book Walk!  I love to hear the squeals as someone gets pummeled in the face with a wet sponge!  And I'm sure we all enjoy Mr. Mealey's jokes!

We would love to hear about your own Carnival experience.  What did you love?  Is there anything else you'd like to see, hear, or eat?  What did you think of the Silent Auction?  Leave a comment here.  You can do so anonymously, if you'd like.  Just leave the name and email fields blank.

Thanks to all who came out and enjoyed the day.  And thanks to all the fantastic volunteers.  Without you, the Carnival couldn't be the great event it always is!

Everyone at Carver is so excited for the Carnival, happening, oh my gosh, TOMORROW!  We hope to see you there!  This is such a fun event for families, teachers, staff, and the community.  There will be challenging games, great prizes, and fantastic food!

Thank you to all the wonderful folks who have committed to volunteering their time to help make the carnival great!  There is still space available if you feel called to help out.  Just stop by the Volunteer Table in the Media Center at any time or see someone in the school office.  We'll find a place for you!!  We especially need people for the afternoon shift, 12:00-2:00!

Also, a big thank you to everyone for their donations to our Bottle Blast, Book Walk, Snack Track, Adopt-a-Pet, and candy for the games!  Thank you to our Raffle Donors too!  Thanks to you it's going to be an exciting Raffle!!

We can't wait to share our excitement with families and friends!  Yay, Carver!

The Carver Carnival is our biggest fund-raiser of the year.  We all enjoy attending, playing games, eating popcorn, adopting "pets", and winning raffle prizes!  However, the carnival couldn't happen without amazing volunteers.  If you've volunteered in the past, you how fun and rewarding it is to see all the families having such a good time.  If you've never volunteered, this should be your year to start!  It is soooo easy to lend your time and talent.  And it is sooo appreciated by everyone!  There are many ways to get involved.  You can fill out and send back the form that was sent home in your child's Panda Folder or you can call Vickie at 612-986-4143 or PJ at 612-986-4147.  They would love to hear from you!  All you have to say is SIGN ME UP!

The PTO would like to thank the Special Services and Learning Services teachers for presenting at the meeting this month.  So Thank You, Chris Roeske-McMillen, Julie Oelrich, Mary Gibson, Char Morey, and Sue Babcock for sharing with us how you work with your students on reading!

I'd like to share a couple of things I learned.  If you already knew this stuff, bear with me!

The first was mentioned by Chris.  She said she tells the kids that "reading is listening with your eyes and writing is talking with a pencil". 

The second thing is that parents should continue to read out loud to their kids, especially if they are struggling with reading.  If a parent is reading out loud at a slightly higher reading level than the child's normal reading level, the child is usually still able to comprehend.  The parent is modeling how reading sounds, and the child can hear and learn phrasing.  And it's a great way to work on comprehension when you have a child who is hesitant or unable to talk about what they are reading!

I hope I said that right.  If not, feel free to email a correction! 

Welcome to our brand-new PTO website!  We hope that this website will serve as a well-spring of information for parents about school events, fundraisers, volunteer opportunities, and more.  Since it is new, there may not be a lot of information right off the bat.  But we would LOVE to hear your feedback!  Tell us what you'd like to see on here, things you are interested in knowing about.  We'd love to have this blog be a communication tool for parents and the PTO.  Of course, PTO meetings are the best way to find out what's going on and to share your ideas, but we know many parents have extremely busy schedules.  So blog a response, send an email, or come to a meeting and help us make this a useful site for parents, teachers, and community!