Pacifica Wednesday Weekly

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May 17, 2006

Important Calendar Dates

If you have items to add to the calendar, please e-mail the date and time along with a description to calendar@pacificaschool.org

IT'S HERE ... SPRING FESTIVAL THIS SATURDAY MAY 20!

From 11am to 3:00pm this Saturday, school will be the location for Taste of Pacifica, our annual Spring Festival. The carnival like atmosphere, featuring both a live and silent auction, will be emceed by former radio personality, our own Pacifica dad, AJ Lentini. Two massive, inflatable bouncies and an old fashioned dunk tank will be the source of amusement for the kids, while adults and teens will move it and groove it to the sounds of some of Pacifica's favorite performers, including our own Gabe! Student and family booths will feature items for sale, along with games and activities sure to keep you busy all afternoon long. Don't forget to stop by the food court and taste the delicious offerings, provided by Pacifica parents and students.  Buy your raffle tickets early - the give-aways are great! Best of all, it's a day to benefit Pacifica - so it's a carnival where everyone wins. See you Saturday, eleven a.m.!

SPRING FESTIVAL STILL NEEDS VOLUNTEERS
We're looking for people to work the ticket sales table and people to monitor the silent auction. Please contact fundraising@pacificaschool.org if you can help!

Finance Committee Meetings Scheduled Every Thursday

The Finance Committee will be meeting each Thursday from 1:00-2:00 p.m. starting on May 18 and continuing through the end of the school year.  The agenda for each meeting will be:

1.  Development of 2006-2007 Budget and Cash Flow

2.  Review of 2005-2006 Budget and Cash Flow (as needed)

Please join us if you are interested in learning more about how Pacifica's great programs are funded and how the school's finances are administered.

Policy Development Meeting

We will be continuing our Policy Development Dialog on Monday, May 22 at 3:15pm. All community members are welcome and encouraged to attend. We will be discussing policies around toys/items from home and field trips. In case you didn’t see the previous article, here is the background:

Janette will write recommendations for new or revised policies on the basis of input received as a result of this dialog. The drafts will be distributed to the community on Wednesday, May 24 and formally proposed to the Council on Tuesday, May 30th. All community members are welcome and encouraged to attend the Council meeting and take part in the discussions.

    Our current “toys from home” policy is: Pacifica Community Charter asks that toys not be brought from home. Pacifica provides many developmentally appropriate educational materials, which are available to all children. If a child wishes to make a special plan to bring an item from home, please arrange this with the teacher one day prior. If you have any questions regarding the specific limits of your child’s classroom regarding the sharing of items, please clarify with your child’s teacher.

Any toy that resembles a weapon in any fashion is NOT allowed. A transitional item such as a soft stuffed animal or beanie baby is okay. Some children prefer a “pocket toy;” please discuss this with your child’s teacher. Please know that Pacifica cannot be responsible for any loss or damage to any items from home.

We have been flexible about enforcing this limit. Unfortunately, we have been increasingly dealing with students using toys from home during class, losing them, having them damaged, etc. As a result, we are going back to a tight enforcement. Should there be any changes or exceptions?

We consider iPods, MP3 players, electronic games, fantasy card decks and similar items to be toys.

    We want to create a formal field trip policy. A few of our current field trip guidelines are:

• Field trips are an integral part of our curriculum and will always be tied to current projects/learning goals (with very rare exceptions)

• No child will miss a field trip due to inability to pay for it.

• Permission slips

  • Notice and permission slips out a week in advance  – ideally in prior week’s Wednesday Weekly

  • Contact parent/guardian the day before trip if permission slip is not turned in

  • Need permission slip for ANY trip not previously noticed to parents (with date, time, location, transportation,etc.) unless it is a truly spontaneous walking trip (eg. to see something you noticed on the way to school…house construction…)

• Drivers/Chaperones

  • 06-07 – will require proof of certain level of insurance from ALL field trip drivers

  • Confirm drivers/chaperones day before trip

  • Give parents verbal and written guidelines about how to support the field trip

  • Everyone gets maps and general info

  • Everyone follows the same route

  • Chaperones don’t stop and get refreshments for themselves or students

  • One child per seat belt/No student with airbag (new research puts the safe age at 15) – even if it is the driver’s child

• Supervision

  • Minimum of 1:8 ratio

  • Students must always be under the direct supervision of a staff member or chaperone

  • No student ever goes into a building/store/etc. unsupervised

  • If students will be in the water (ocean, pool, pond, etc.), the ratios becomes 1:4 and tremendous clarity around safety and supervision is needed (including lifeguards, depth limits, etc. – meet with Director before going)

CLASSROOM UPDATES 

Stephanie’s Class

Hooray for our first official SEER (environmental grant) lesson held today! 

All semester long we’ve been studying atoms, elements, matter, taking hikes, making observations and drawing and reflecting on various organisms in our nature journals. This week it all came together with a formal discussion about living systems and their components. This ignited a lively debate about “What exactly is life?” which we will continue to build on for the rest of the year. In addition, we will be visiting Legoland next week to attend a robotics workshop which will gear us up to the launching of our robotics program (also courtesy of a grant—Thank you, Cheryl!!) 

Sascha’s Class

This week we are taking a closer look at the resources we use daily. We will be computing our daily use of water, and learning about landfills. Alongside these lessons, we will be working with percentages and fractions. We are putting the final touches on our ipod-themed auction basket…please contribute to the basket fund if you are able. Later in the week we will start preparations for a puppet show, “Trouble in the Henhouse.” Explorations start up on Thursday… Matthew and L.G. are sponsoring a course in the guitar techniques of Metallica, and Iliana and Julius are helping to lead the cooking exploration. See you at the Fair! 

Fire Breathing Phoenixes’ K/1 Class

Our birthday basket box is full of fun and fanciful items for the lucky person who wins this at this Saturday’s silent auction. Thank you to all for contributing so quickly!! I look forward to seeing everyone there.  The children who participated in our dance workshops at school should listen for announcements on the day of the fair for an opportunity to perform.   

This week we revisit the theme of paper. We begin by reviewing the many uses of paper and the things we ’ve made out of paper in class. Our paper constructions so far have included cups, envelopes, boxes, hats and baskets. If you have other ideas to contribute we’d be happy to include them. We continue now looking at the structure of paper, how different types react to water, folding and glue. Culminating lessons will include a paper mache project and papermaking.  We will visit the other classes to assess their use of paper and if they are in need of a recycling system that we can help create for them. I am hoping to have a classroom visit from an expert scrapbooking volunteer who can teach the children some of the creative paper cutting techniques. If you know of anyone that may be interested please leave me note or give me a call as soon as possible!   

A couple of weeks ago an instructor from My Gym, a children’s fitness venue, came and led a sample class. The children were challenged to exercise in fun and interesting ways.  They learned a little about relay races and doing handstands as well.  My Gym has donated some items to our silent auction. 

We have a few more weeks with Innerkids. At our next parent evening I and other parents will share some of the activities we have been doing in that program. Our next parent evening is scheduled for Thursday, June 1st at 6 pm. I hope all can attend. Please put any suggested topics in my mailbox in the office. Please feel free to make anonymous suggestions at anytime in my office box as well. This is a good time to review a little and look at learning goals for the summer. Our parent evenings are a great time for sharing ideas and strategies with each other.   

Recently the children under the careful guidance of Wisteria, our support teacher, began taking apart a bicycle. This is a very popular project and the children are learning a lot. The participants learn about the use and care of the tools, they exercise their fine and gross motor coordination, discover the value in teamwork and learn the vocabulary for the bicycle parts. We will continue by sorting and labeling the bicycle parts. Because of the enthusiasm for this work I contacted a volunteer organization called Bicycle Kitchen to see what the possibilities were to extend this project with outside input. SPECIAL REQUEST: We need more pliers and wrenches for small size (1/4”) bolts and nuts. Please donate any extra tools that you may have. 

Currently we have two fieldtrips planned. Coming up in one week, Wed - May 24th, is the bus trip to Topanga Canyon State Park. Fieldtrip forms are in your boxes and I always leave extra copies on our bulletin board outside the class for your convenience. The procedure as always is to fill it out and deliver to the envelopes just inside the classroom door. This time there will be two envelopes one for slips and one for money. Each will have a roster list so you can cross your name off. Thank you for helping keep the paperwork organized for fieldtrips! 

FYI: Our other fieldtrip date is Wed., June 7th, to Leo Carillo State Park. 

Our bulletin display outside the classroom is for posting any fieldtrip photos you may have in your digital storage. Please contribute as soon as you can so we can have a visual display of our year’s trips.

John Robin’s Class (Schwa)

This week Group 6, now known as "Schwa", has been busy taking the Standardized Tests required by the government. While many of us experience mixed feelings about this means of evaluation, we are making the most of it. We have been learning all about the Periodic Table, how stars are formed, and everything in between. We have also gotten to work on our Seer project with an experiment that utilizes the dipolar molecules of water--in the form of seeing how many droplets we can collect on the head and tail sides of pennies. In other news, the kids are excited to begin their third round of Explorations this year and John-Robin and Melinda are excited to head up our Explorations: Yearbook, and Acting/Improv respectively.

We are also grateful to all our helper parents--you really make a difference--Thank You!

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