Category: Third Grade

Snow

During the month of January, snow is a common theme in many conversations and lessons on campus. 

In science, the third graders learned about why some animals hibernate in the winter. For these animals, the snow and frozen tundra makes finding food difficult. To preserve energy, they spend the winter in a dormant state, or hibernate.

The third graders also created fabulous snowpeople! They focused on perspective “from a worm’s eye view” and used a variety of mediums, including pastels, crayons, sharpies and watercolors, to achieve their desired look. The students took their time, thinking about what a worm’s perspective would look like, adding details to give their snow person a personality, and a background to paint a more vivid picture of who their snow person is and where they live.

Our Kindergarteners were lucky enough to touch, feel and build with real snow this week as well. They donned mittens and built snowpeople and snowballs right here in Moraga!

#SaklanCreative #SaklanHandsOn

Willy Wonka KIDS

The school musical seems to be such an integral part of American classrooms, like a rite of passage. Performances are exciting, and costumes, microphones, and sets create a kind of magic for kids. Behind all that magic and excitement, there is real work, focus, and critical thinking that transfers to other school subjects and the real world as well.

Students begin with a focus on music, reading notes and decoding symbols, then pairing those symbols with words to give meaning. They pair those words and symbols with physical action, and so the act of learning how to sing and dance lights up the entire brain! Take that, and add in awareness of other people on stage, the need to work together to move set pieces quickly, quietly, and safely, and that school musical becomes the perfect project for fostering creative thinking, compassionate social interactions, and courageous moments of risk taking and working through fears.

Thank you to everyone who made our Lower School’s recent production of Willy Wonka KIDS into that project.

#SaklanCreative #SaklanCompassionate #SaklanCourageous

Array City

The third graders have been learning about multiplication and the variety of ways it can be represented. One way to model multiplication is with arrays. An array is an arrangement of objects in rows and columns; the rows represent the number of groups, while the columns represent the number in each group. The visual that an array creates helps students to better understand the concept of multiplication.

The third graders combined math and art to create an Array City. The buildings have windows aglow in a night skyline.

When you look for them, you can find arrays all around!

#SaklanAcademic #SaklanHandsOn

Balloons Over Broadway

On Thursday, the third graders combined social studies and STEM standards together while working on a fun project. First, the class read a biography about Tony Sarg, known as the father of modern puppetry and the inventor of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade balloons. Then students designed their own parade balloons, as well as a device to hold the balloons high up in the air. It took some trial and error to get the devices to work, but the students persevered!

Check out their creative balloon designs below.

With their balloons complete, the third graders paraded around the school yard. The Hoot Owls and Owlets were excited to watch the parade and see the third grade creations!

#SaklanCreative

Learning Buddies

Last Friday, our Kindergarten and 1st grade students were delighted to find out who their 3rd or 4th grade learning buddy is for the year. For their first buddies meeting, the students played a get-to-know-you game and then spent time reading together.

The big buddies marvelously modeled good reading behaviors by reading with expression and fluency for their little buddies, and then were honored to listen to their little buddies read too. The Kindergarten, first, third and fourth grade students thoroughly enjoyed getting to know their learning buddies, are already asking when they get to meet with their buddies again!

Learning buddies are a purposeful way to encourage cross-grade friendships, help the older buddies develop a sense of responsibility and practice mentorship, and make learning fun!

#SaklanCommunity

Visiting Moraga Gardens Farm

During September and the first week of October, the Hoot Owls, Owlets, first graders, second graders, third graders and fourth graders took their first field experience of the year to Moraga Gardens Farm! Ms. Meredith led each of the classes on the two-block walk to the farm, and then on a tour of the community garden. The garden was filled with eggplants, cucumbers, kale, apples, pears, tomatoes, and much more.

During the tours, students learned that fruits and vegetables grow from flowers after being pollinated. They saw the difference between seasonal trees, such as a peach tree (summer) and persimmon tree (fall). The children saw how vines grow by attaching their tendrils to other structures and plants, and how plants defend themselves from predators. They went inside the greenhouse, heard the bees buzzing in their hives, and got to sample some of the garden’s produce. Lastly, the students were invited to feed and pet the chickens.

The students all had a great time in the garden. Thank you, Ms. Meredith, for leading these interactive, engaging field experiences!

#SaklanFieldExperience

Meet Our Specialists

Drumming Teacher: Isaac Narell

Mr. Isaac has been with The Saklan School since 2014 and has added tremendous value to our Music program. Although he has many talents, including arranging and playing multiple instruments, this year Mr. Isaac is teaching drumming to the third through fifth graders and a Learning by Doing (LBD) class for middle school students.

Mr. Isaac teaches traditional West African drumming from the Anlo-Ewe speaking people of Ghana, Togo and Benin. The drums used by our students were handmade for The Saklan School from Ghana. We are so lucky and grateful to have Isaac here to share his knowledge and help fill our community with rhythm!

#SaklanWellRounded #SaklanCreative

Enrichment Classes

We are thrilled to announce that The Saklan School will be bringing back after school enrichment classes for the 21-22 school year. For the fall session the following classes will be available:

Classes begin the week of September 13th, and have limited space available. If you are interested in signing your child up for one of the above classes, please click on the class name for additional information about the class and sign up options.

Saklan will also have enrichment opportunities for our Preschool and Pre-K friends that will be announced in the coming weeks. Our youngest students take a little more time to settle into the routines of coming to school, so we want to give them additional time before we introduce new classes into their day.

#SaklanHandsOn