Earth Day at Saklan

On Thursday, Saklan students celebrated Earth Day with the help of some animal friends! A petting zoo was set up right on campus, and each class took a turn getting to know the animals.

While the bunnies might have been the biggest hit amongst the students, there were also ducks, pigs, and goats for the students to pet and feed. We were so impressed with how gentle all of the students were with the animals, and how patient all of animals were with the students!

A huge thank you to Ms. O for organizing this special Earth Day treat!

Outside of the petting zoo, some classes incorporated Earth Day into their daily learning. In Kindergarten, students learned about different behaviors that can make our Earth “happy” or “sad.”

In Ms. Ashley’s fourth grade class, students celebrated Earth Day by reading poems they had written for the occasion.

We love to see all our students learning how to care for and protect our Earth and all the organisms who live here!

#SaklanCompassionate

Fifth Grade Spanish Menus

In Spanish class, the fifth graders are working with Maestra Padilla to learn about food and beverages for breakfast (desayuno) and lunch (almuerzo).

The students started their work by designing their own menu full of their favorite foods, including desserts. As they created their menus, students learned food vocabulary words and created a personalized product to use to order food in a “restaurant.”

The next step was to provide students with authentic opportunities to use the Spanish language and expand their speaking skills. Students engaged in a role play set in a restaurant, where they took on the roles of waiters and customers. While acting as the customers, students could order food items off of their custom menus, as if they were in a restaurant designed just for them!

Take a peek at the lesson by watching the videos below!

Hana, Eleanor, and Kori
Lilia, Lilah, and Hailey

#SaklanAcademic

Musical Nature Walk

This week, Ms. Chaffey took the first graders to the trail behind campus, and led them on a musical nature walk! The class got to spend time in quiet observation of the sounds we can hear in the world around us.

After quietly walking down the trail, Ms. Chaffey would find a spot for the class to pause, and instructed the students to sit there for a few minutes in silence, listening to the sounds around them. Some of the sounds would be from animals or silent forces in nature, while others came from humans.

The first graders drew what they heard, including birds singing, people talking, and wind blowing. One imaginative first grader heard a “unicorn Pegasus,” while another explained that his “really good hearing” allowed him to hear the sound of the plants growing!

It was a perfect day to connect with nature!

#SaklanInNature

Hoot Owl Volcanoes

After learning all about the volcanoes that exist on Earth, Mars, and Venus, the Hoot Owls in Ms. Traci’s class decided they wanted to learn more about volcanoes in general. Before they started their exploration of the topic, Ms. Traci asked the students what they already knew:

“They erupt lava.”
“When a volcano erupts and goes in the ocean it turns to stone.”
“You can’t go inside a volcano because they are hot.”
“You don’t want to run to a volcano because you might bump your head.”

The Hoot Owls read some non-fiction books about volcanoes, and then set out to build their own volcano out of paper mache. They also built an entire city to around the base of the volcano, including a zoo, candy store, and toy store.

When it was time to make the volcano erupt, the students made predictions as to what would happen:

“I think it’s going to explode with white and orange lava coming out of the top and it’s going to hit the city and at the other side there is going to be a puddle of lava.”

“Here’s the hot lava down here and the little blue stuff are houses down here. And their grass got burnt by the hot lava.

“I think maybe it will explode and it will slip off the table and go into cement and then onto the wood chips and sink, sink, sink.”

Using baking soda and vinegar, the Hoot Owls made the volcano erupt four times! The city remained mostly safe until the fourth eruption, when the candy shop suffered minor damages.

#SaklanHandsOn

Eighth Grade Field Experience

Following the successful sixth and seventh grade trips, the eighth graders will take their turn at Challenge Sonoma on Tuesday, April 27. Ms. Cashen, Ms. Kim, and Mr. O’Connell will be joining the students for the day.

Finding opportunities to take students off campus this year has been difficult, and it has been so fun to finally be able to give the middle school students a field experience to enjoy. The day will be filled with opportunities for collaboration, team-building, and all-grade bonding.

Thank you to the eighth grade parents for your support, and to the middle school faculty for their commitment to making this happen for the students!

#SaklanFieldExperience

Head’s Corner

If These Dollar Store Buckets Could Talk

Right now, outside of the main office, there are five plastic buckets. They seem unassuming at first, but upon closer inspection, they have a lot to say about the motivation and determination of the sixth grade class.

If these dollar store buckets could talk, they would tell you how thoughtfully students researched their chosen endangered species, learning about its environment, the threats to its existence, what it needs to survive.

They would brag about the creativity of each group, the excitement that went into decorating the buckets and garnering support for each animal.

They would regale you with examples of Ms. O’s passion and commitment, as she guides students through this work for another year.

Through the muffled sound of loose change mixing with dollar bills, the buckets would marvel at the generosity of the Saklan community, and the thrill students of all ages have gotten from selecting their favorite animal and donating money toward its cause.

If they had a spare moments, these buckets would deliver an eloquent lecture on what it takes to build–and keep– a school culture of creativity, compassion, and courage.

I have passed by these buckets every day for the past week, and so far, I haven’t heard them say a word. But I know if they could talk, they would remind me–and all of us–how lucky we are.

#SaklanCompassion

Save the Date for Spring Musicals!

A sure sign–and sound–of Spring at Saklan? Musical rehearsals! Saklan students in fourth-eighth grades have been hard at work preparing for their upcoming musical performances. Like everything, musicals this year will be done differently than in the past, but the hard work and dedication that goes into them remains the same!

The Saklan fourth and fifth graders are busy rehearsing for “Seussical Kids,” which they will perform on Friday, May 28, at 11 a.m. Meanwhile, the seventh and eighth grade classes are working on creating a film version of the Stephen Sondheim classic, “Into the Woods.” Their final movie will be shown on campus on Thursday, June 3, with a simultaneous live stream for at-home audiences. A short, filmed edition of “Guys and Dolls” as performed by the Saklan sixth grade, will be released as well.

More details will be forthcoming on how parents can experience each performance, but we hope you’ll join us in lending your support to each Saklan performer, and extending deep thanks and appreciation to Ms. Chaffey for making the musicals happen no matter what!

#SaklanCreative

Sea Star Dissection

As part of the 7th grade biology unit on animals, the class looked at different phylum found within a particular kingdom. The students talked with Ms. O about the different characteristics and important adaptations each animal has for survival.

As part of the lesson, students take part in multiple dissections in order to learn and compare the anatomies of common organisms. So far in their study of invertebrates, the class has dissected a squid (part of the mollusk phylum), a worm (the annelid phylum) and, this week, a sea start (a member of the echinoderm phylum).

Each organism has a different circulatory system, number of hearts, different sequence of body parts, and some have no brain at all! These dissections are a hands-on way students have been able to see the diversity of all life!

#SaklanAcademic

Saklan’s Budding Botanists

The Saklan second graders have been turning a scientific eye to the plant world! They started by learning all about seeds, including studying the lifecycle of a plant and what seeds need to grow, and cutting open different fruits and vegetables to see what seeds were inside.

Then, the students were put in charge of planting their own bean seeds. Fortunately, the second grade classroom has a sunny window sill, and the second graders got to watch as their seeds sprouted and grew. Each day, they had the opportunity to measure their plant, and track its progress in their plant journals.

Now that they’ve gotten big enough, each student will get to take their plant home and continue to make observations to make its growth and other changes over time.

#SaklanHandsOn

Seventh Grade Takes a Turn at Challenge Sonoma

This week, the sixth grade class hit the road for a field experience at Challenge Sonoma! Next week, it’s the seventh grade classes’s turn!

Like the sixth graders did, the seventh grade class will spend the day participating in a ropes course challenge and other activities that will require them to communicate and work together in order to be successful.

Opportunities for field experiences off-campus have been rare this year, which is why we are so excited by the success of the sixth grade trip, and can’t wait to offer the same fun day to the seventh graders.

If you have any questions, please email Vickie Obenchain at vobenchain@saklan.org  or Kim Parks at kparks@saklan.org.

#SaklanFieldExperience