Town Center Tidbits : 'Tis the Season. . .

'Tis the season to be comfy and cozy! At least that is our wish for you the next two weeks before our break! We will be having special treats each day for all of you as we celebrate with "A Comfy, Cozy Christmas at TCE"!

To celebrate starting with Monday - Day 1: Everyone loves to be comfy at school. . .so let's wear jeans/sweats for these next 10 days together! Please see each day below for which we will wear this week!

Week of: Dec. 4th-8th, 2017

Monday- Jeans/Sweats Day!
STEM Planning 4th and 5th - Kristan's Room

Drama Club Performance - 2:00pm - Cafeteria (for those who have specials during this time, our specials teachers will help with sitting with kiddos or you are welcome to stay and watch as well!)

Tuesday - Jeans/Sweats Day!
STEM Planning 2nd and 3rd - Kristan's Room

Wednesday - Jeans Day with nice shirt!
Ohio Tour Group - AM

Faculty Meeting - 3:15 - Library

Thursday - Jeans/Sweats Day!
STEM Planning Kinder and 1st - Kristan's Room

Dallas Symphony (K-2: 9:30AM) (3rd-5th: 10:15AM) - Gym (for those who have specials during this time, our specials teachers will help with sitting with kiddos or you are welcome to stay and watch as well!)

GTC Committee Meeting - 3:15

Friday - Jeans Day and something festive!
CISD Holiday Open House - Admin. Bldg. - all day

Jingle Bell Run

Therapy Dogs

TCE Christmas Party - Kristan's House - 5:00pm

Important Reminders

CISD Holiday Open House

Please make sure that you find time to go visit the admin. building this Friday for the holiday open house!
See the following info from the district:
You do NOT want to miss this year's Holiday Open House. It is going to be better than ever. This year we will be collecting children's books to donate to Children's Health. Let's help them this holiday season "To make a life better for children". Wear festive clothing- be whimsical, whovilacious and colorful! Best dressed in them attire will be the "Holiday Cheer Meister".

TCE Christmas Party
We hope everyone can make it to the party this Friday. This is always such a fun time to celebrate with one another and please feel free to bring your spouse or significant other! We love to get everyone together during this holiday season! I am attaching a sign-up for food and remember to feel free to BYOB any beverages you would like besides water/soft drinks.
Click here for sign-up!

Ohio Tour Group
Just a reminder that we will have a group coming all the way from Ohio this week to tour TCE. Team leaders, please make sure and email me what your grade level will be focusing on and please have a variety of subjects being showcased since this group is traveling such a long way! Thank you ahead of time for opening up your classrooms for the group!

Cultural Plunge
Keep in the back of your mind some ideas you may have for your cultural plunge this year. You can go back and look at the past blog post or discuss with other TCE members to think about what you might choose to do!

Book Study

As we continue growing together as a campus through our professional learning community, we will start reading about how we can also work on growing and connecting with other educators around the world. Our book this year, What Connected Educators Do Differently, will help us in our learning journey of establishing, guiding, building and sustaining a professional learning network.
If you could please read the areas in the book called Connectors 1, 2, and 3 by December 6th. That should take you through the intro all the way to page 44. Then we will begin some face to face discussion/online discussion as a campus.

"Who made you happy this week?"

Shout Out Your Happiness!

To the mystery person who brought me a sonic drink on Thursday, THANK YOU! What a great way to start my day :) Ashlin

Kristan, Thank you for helping my class with the spelling bee! Couldn’t have done it without you! – Renee

Tina- Thank you SO MUCH for ALL of your help on Wednesday! Thank you for showing me so much grace and patience!! And Megan, thank you for letting us steal Tina when I couldn't get anything to work right in the library:) You are both the best! :) Courtney

Lori! Thank you for leading our mentor meetings! Your wisdom is very much appreciated! :)

Marly! Thank you so much for the support you have given me. I am lucky to collaborate with a teacher like you! Love, Schuyler

Dianne! I have no words to explain how awesome you are. Love, Schuyler

Jenna! It is such a pleasure getting to collaborate with you! I am learning more and more each day, and I thank you for being a part of it! Love, Schuyler

Kristan--Thank you for always being willing to step in and support anytime you are needed! I appreciate you so much as a teammate and friend! Tina

Lisa Hansen, you absolutely saved my Wednesday. I have no words for how hard core you came through. Thank you one million! -Erin Naughton

Lori, Thank you for creating an amazing unit with the Jan Brett books!!! It’s such a fun way for our little ones to learn and especially at this time of the year!! As always, I think you’re a master teacher! I love you, Lori!!!! Julie

Kristan-thank you for creating all new passwords so that our learners could access istation at home! You are the best! - Heather J.

Thank you so much Lisa for holding down the fort while we were gone at TAGT and for making the team T-shirts and keeping the GT room SPOTLESS. You are truly amazing! We love you! Kate and Candace

Tracy- thank you for the yummy turkey noodle soup (complete with longhorn pasta!). I love it when you feed me! - Heather J.

Lisa and Kate I really would not survive robotics without you! Thank you for keeping me sane! Love Candace

Morgan, Heather, Marly, and Jenna THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!! I do not think I could have gotten through this month without you all. Thank you so much for being so patient with me while I have been out at conferences. You all are rockstars!!

Kristan, Marly, and Lisa thank you for taking care of KTEX and keeping it running while I was gone. I truly appreciate it.

Catherine- THANK YOU for your help with learner google sites and QR codes!! We LOVE you! - Heather and Tracy

Courtney - Thank you so much for putting up the big tree in the front and setting up "Lion Dan" to come and talk to our kids about the Giving Tree! We appreciate your hard work to make this a meaningful experience for our kids! - First Grade Team

Marie-It makes me happy how willing you share technology information and tricks with me that help our learners be more successful in the classroom-Anne

Thank you Mike, Patrick and Beth for a great STEM planning day! I appreciate the way in which you looked at ways to help our whole school with lesson design and technologies! Love your passion! - Angie

Thank you to our coaches for working with our specials teachers and for preparing to work with our teams this next week! You are doing such a fabulous job reaching out to teams and trying new ideas for learning! Much appreciated!! - Angie

Kristan, Thank you , thank you and thank you for helping K3 and K4 with I station tests!!! You are wonderful and I appreciate your help very, very much!!!!

Annelise Thank you for always making time to discuss and problem solve with me, I know you have so many things going on but you are always so gracious to make time. Lisa

Lisa, Thank you for helping my little ones with the iStation test today!!!! It was very nice of you to help me spread them out!!!!! Love you!!! Julie

Lisa H. You amaze me! Your work with the Robotics team this week has been crazy. Display boards, chants, editing, crowd control and shirts. You are like the Energizer bunny! Kristan

Teachers - It was great sitting in on RTI and hearing how well you know your learners. Keep up the good work! Kristan

Thank you Sue for getting our TCE MAT team prepared for emergencies! Loved the way you had the demo ready to go and thank you for always thinking of ways we can improve as a campus! - Angie

Kelly Spears - Thank you for not filming my scare moment! Watch your back! Kristan

Mary - Thank you for always keeping our team organized! You rock! Kristan

Annelise, Thank you for helping our shelter drill to go smoothly and for finding new ways that can help the campus as we practice being safe! Appreciate you and Kasey Kemp for getting our maps done and ready to go as well! - Angie

Thank you to all our educators who took part in our first cultural celebration committee meeting! Excited about our beginning plans for this fun event our campus will have this year! - Angie

Annelise and Kelly - If laughter could burn calories we would be skinny girls. Kristan

Diane, Schuyler, Kelly, Renee-Thanks for all the communication and concern for our learner. The collaboration is awesome! Anne

Kristan THANK YOU for all your help with the robotics team! It was so helpful having an extra pair of hands to organize shirts and to proof read their projects! You truly are wonderful! Lisa

Thank you Lisa for all of your help with our robotics kiddos while Kate and Candace were out! Your time was greatly appreciated!! - Angie

Thank you Patrick for getting our Tonal Texans ready to perform this Saturday! Love that you are getting our kiddos out and about performing! They were fabulous!! - Angie

Dianne, thank you for letting me borrow you this morning to give feedback to our Region 10 consultants! Appreciate you!! - Angie

Click here to give a happy shout out!

December Birthdays

Marly Natherson - 26th

Erin Cameron - 27th

Candace Coffee - 28th

STEM Holiday Design Challenges
As we head into these last two weeks before break, you might want to think about tying a few fun filled, hands-on activities with the holidays related to STEM! I know there are many more out there, but here are a few!