The second graders have been working on their Dinosaur and Fossil Unit this month. The students have read many stories about dinosaurs and how fossils are formed.
They have worked on comprehension worksheets and vocabulary, written creative essays about what would happen if the dinosaurs came back, and did a measuring activity comparing themselves to a T. rex. They also searched for fossils in chocolate chip cookies! Lastly they drew a dinosaur scene and painted it with watercolors for their unit folder cover.
The Saklan Middle School Choir performed the National Anthem at a commemorative service on the 16th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Organized by the Moraga Chamber of Commerce and Moraga Orinda Professional Fire Fighters Association.
The Head Search Committee invites you to meet one of our finalists next week.
Parent Meetings will be held:
Thursday, September 21 from 5:00 – 5:45PM
Friday, September 22 from 9:00 – 10:00AM
At Willow Spring Church
The meetings are open to current parents, former parents, grandparents, and former board members. Our finalist will give a brief introduction and open it up to questions. This is great opportunity for our community to get to know each finalist. Details and the dates of other visits are available here.
Join us for the Walnut Creek Twilight Parade that is on Saturday, September 16th. We’ll be marching and performing our new Cheers! The parade starts at 6:00PM and the whole family is welcome to walk. If you don’t know the cheers, don’t worry. Cards with the words will be distributed at the start of the parade route.
We’ll meet up at 5:30PM to distribute t-shirts and line up. Next week, when Parade Coordinators notify us of our parade position, we’ll announce the meeting location.
Once again, we will have a booth at the Moraga Pear & Wine Festival. The event takes place in the Moraga Commons Park on Saturday, September 23 from 11:00 – 4:00.
This year, there’s something new and we’ll be a part of it! “Moraga Gets Chalked” is being sponsored by the Moraga Chamber of Commerce and the Town of Moraga’s Art in Public Spaces Committee. The goal is to draw a magical place including one of the sculptures from town. There is a writing component as well. Our fearless Art Teacher, Ms. Natalie Palms, will be coordinating our team. The Chalk Contest will be held on the basketball court. Artists begin at 11:00 and end at 2:00. Please stop by our booth and cheer on our artists!
If your middle schooler would like to earn community service hours assisting with our booth, please have them contact our Director of Marketing, Christine Kuckuk at marketing@saklan.org.
The Saklan School Night at the Oracle Arena Monday, November 6 at 7:30PM
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Bring your family and friends out to The Saklan School Night and cheer on your 2017 NBA Champions as they take on the Miami Heat.
All fans in attendance will receive a 2017 NBA Championship Replica Mini Trophy!
All participants (14 and under) will be entered into a raffle to stand on the court during the National Anthem!
Driving to the arena? Visit warriors.com/expresspark to purchase your parking pass today and save.
At today’s Flag, two of our Middle School Advisory groups shared the cheers that they had created while they were on the Advance. These were clearly full of the creative spirit and enthusiasm that is a trade mark of our Middle School program, and I commend Kim Parks, Saul Zippin, Vickie Obenchain and Grace Chaffey who are our Advisors this year.
The first theme for our school-wide social emotional learning program at Saklan will be Self-Regulation. A common definition of self-regulation and how it applies to education is, “self-regulation is not a mental ability or an academic performance skill; rather it is the self-directive process by which learners transform their mental abilities into academic skills.” In an article on self-regulation by Joan and Greg Cook, authors of Child Development Principles and Practice, they maintain that:
“One of the most important skills that we develop in childhood is the ability to control aspects of the self. Without this ability we would have great difficulty accomplishing anything, regardless of how good we might feel about ourselves! Self-regulation is the ability to monitor and control our own behavior, emotions, or thoughts, altering them in accordance with the demands of the situation. It includes the abilities to inhibit first responses, to resist interference from irrelevant stimulation, and to persist on relevant tasks even when we don’t enjoy them.”
Our teachers will be addressing this theme in the next month in a variety of different ways. For example, our 7th graders with Miss O will be discussing emotional self-regulation. They will identify various Zones of Regulation, (e.g. Yellow Zone includes frustration, worry, silliness, anxiety and excitement) and find tools to help with self-regulation. Please regularly ask you children what they have been doing around this topic and don’t hesitate to share with me or your teachers.
During this academic year, we will be introducing a number of topics and each will be the central focus of the Family Group sessions when they meet. Here is a schedule of the topics we will be working on this year:
Family Group Session No. 1 – Sept. 26 – Self-Regulation
Family Group Session No. 2 – Nov. 6 – Perseverance
Family Group Session No. 3 – Feb. 9 – Empathy
Family Group Session No. 4 – March 7 – Respect
Family Group Session No. 5 – April 20 – Responsibility
Family Group Session No. 6 – June 4 – Cooperation
Please remember that our Middle School Back to School Night is coming up next Thursday at 6:00PM. Also, don’t miss next week’s Flag, where student candidates will be giving speeches for the upcoming student council elections.
This summer, Saklan purchased new iPads for the lower school. The students use the IXL Learning site to practice math, language arts, science, and social studies online. The students love the interactive problems. It’s a fun way of learning.
Here are some highlights from the EF Tours Leadership Summit in Milan, Italy: The Future of Food. Our students heard from truly inspiring speakers as they navigated the problems in the food system. They paired up with other students from around the US and the world, to problem solve and make prototypes of solutions, and learned new perspectives from others around the world. It was an amazing experience.
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FRIDAY BLOG 
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