The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

14 j ii saturday dei si 002 economist sun stouffville tribune at the schools teacher of the month staff photomike barrett ventura park public school teacher sarah harris is the favourite of student kayley diamond teacher tripleblessed this year by mitchell brown staff writer its been a good year for sarah harris for starters the grade 5 teacher at ventura park public school in thornhill got married a while later the 30yearold v resident found her self expecting her first child now ms harris is ending the year as york region newspaper groups teacher of the month for december according to one of her stu dents she deserves every bit of it she just really encourages everybody said 10yearold kayley diamond explaining why she nominated her teacher for the honour and when you ask a question jjhe really replies when we have a test she asks you to try your best and then helps you after if you dont understand it i think shes a really good teacher kayleys mother mona diamond said ms harris is the first teacher her daughter has had who encourages students to push themselves she has been instrumental in developing not only kayleys aca demic skills but more importantly her selfesteem and selfconfi dence she said kayley always comes home with a smile on her face and she is always so eager to go to school that might be because the passion to teach runs in ms harris genes with two teachers as parents ms harris remembers going to school as a child to help her mother out on professional devel opment days the north york native opted for social work after she graduat ed but soon found herself drawn to teaching which she has done for the past six years five in north york and this year at ventura park she admits it hasnt always been easy there are days you go home and youre just exhausted she said but you have to love it you cant just look at it as just a job because if you do youll go insane while no one is disputing ms harris mental state there was some concern among her stu dents who feared her pregnancy meant she would leave before the school year was over but ms harris who is three months pregnant has assured them she plans to be there the whole year and is even planning to use her pregnancy to teach her 28 students valuable math skills were starting our unit on data management and graphing when we come back so were going to use my expanding waist line to graph every week she said with a laugh well see how it works ms harris will receive a gift basket from poples gifts in richmond hill wwwpop- leysgiftscom a chair massage from paradise on massage in oak ridges a 50 gift certificate from mastermind at hillcrest mall a workshop to improve com munication skills by inside out with karen armstrong and a hardcover book teacher of the year from contemporary books pub lished by mcgrawhill filled with quotes and inspiration from great teachers ms harris class will receive a pizza party courtesy of italia pizza on major mackenzie drive near bathurst street rick schie at the schools writer little moments show holiday spirit inviting aromas sweet music and the sight of glowing christmas trees are part of what makes this a wonderful time of year in more ways then one celebrating christmas has always been one of my favourite events waking up to hot chocolate and newly baked cookies then sitting around the tree exchanging gifts but the holidays are more than that i believe during this time of year people are more pleasant and more giving recently i was at markville shopping centre racking my brairi to decide on gifts for family arid friends but on this occasion the process was slightly less brutal than usual i was in a small store in search of a present for my father but the thing i had my eye on was pricey at that moment the shop owner walked up and asked if i needed a hand i said i was keen on a particular item but it was out of my price range so what did this man do he took 20 off the already markeddown price saying cus tomer satisfaction was worth more to him than a measly 20 perhaps this was just a scheme to wrap up a purchase but i think christmas gets the credit for this mans kindness this is just one of the many ways this time of year can make a per son more generous christmas is the time when people embrace each other instead of turning them away what happened for me at markville made me think i should try to do some thing for others a good deed of sorts to repay those sent my way as corny as that may sound wouldnt we all like nudges of help and encour agement along the road of life so i challenge you to do something anything to make someone maybe even a person you dont know a bit happier during this whimsical time rick schie is a student at pierre elliott trudeau high school in unionville dr h h walji optometrist hons bsc msc od fios lazy child at school or lazy eyes at work twmght into eyesight about 20 percent of individuals in any given school college or office have difficulty with learning that has nothing to do with their intelligence sight and vision are not the same thing sight is the ability to see something clearly vision is when the brain organizes the information seen and gives it meaning too often people have very good sight but they have terrible vfslbnlvxvv fibo 3fcn tfojjsfttsolftj good vision requires good eyesight efficient eye movement abilities quick focussing abilities accurate aiming skills effortless eyeteaming skills eyehand coordination visual form perception among other visual skills all these skills can be taught to maximize your vision after your sight has been declared as being perfect 2020 eye- firht in the interest of your better eye health from the practice of drhhwalji 6633 hwy 7 at ninth line 905471kes 3937 website dr waljicom email drwaljidrwaljicpm 3 yeakrow