Monthly Archives: April 2018

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Otter Class News: Time to Grow

  By joremland • April 29, 2018

Calendar Highlights

Thursday and Friday, May 10-11             Spring Musical SPAMALOT

The Otter Class is not in this show, but if you’re curious about the amazing things our middle school students do, this is a good way to find out (while having a fun evening with other Quest families).  Click here for more information or here for tickets.

Tuesday, May 15 8:30 – 9:30 am               Volunteer Appreciation Coffee

Thank you volunteers!!

Friday, May 18, 3:30 – 5:15ish                    Otter Class Movie and Pizza Party

Friday, May 25, 12:00 noon dismissal     Last Day of School (NO AFTER CARE)

Thanks for your inquiries about plans for the last day of school.  They are in the works.  Details forthcoming.

Curriculum Update

For the past couple of weeks, we have been dipping our feet into two closely related topics.  As spring has finally seemed to arrive, we have been studying botany and entomology.

Entomology

 Last winter, for the holidays, Mrs Linstromberg gifted to our class an ant farm (thank you, Mrs. Linstromberg!).  The insect company needed to wait until the weather was warm enough to ship ants to us, and we received them 12 days ago.  We put them into their habitat and have been observing and sketching their progress almost daily. Check out our wall of observations next to the climber!

By coincidence, one of our students taught us about caterpillars and butterflies as a My Special Day presentation (more about Special Day presentations below), and brought in living caterpillars for us to observe!  We have several daily sketches of these amazing creatures transforming — we’ll find a gallery space for those at the beginning of next week.

 

 

Botany/Gardens

So far, students have:

  • brainstormed a list of plants to plant in the garden (divergent thinking)  
  • visited West Campus and sketched the gardens, looking to see if they are ready for planting (observational sketching)
  • created a collage garden plan using cut-outs from Johnny’s Seed Catalog, and writing as many plant names (fine motor skills and authentically meaningful writing)
  • planted several types of seeds from their plan indoors, including watermelon, cantaloupe, corn, carrots, peas, and pumpkin.  So many more to come! (authentic work)
  • sketched the progress of those seeds (no signs of germination yet…patience, patience…)
  • sketched seeds and learned about the internal parts of seeds (seed coat, cotyledon, embryo)

In the week ahead, students will:

  • continue indoor planting
  • continue tracking the changes in our ant farm, butterfly habitat and botany lab through observational sketching
  • create at least one experiment
  • sketch flowers with their internal parts
  • dissect seeds and sketch the internal parts
  • dissect flowers and laid out the parts, and learn the names and functions of sepals, petals, anthers, stamens, and ovaries

Whoa, that’s a lot…maybe we won’t get to all of that!  Especially because we also have StarLab — our in-school planetarium show — this week!

Next post…My Special Day update…!

 

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Thank you, Elders

  By joremland • April 27, 2018

Thanks to everyone who was able to visit for this wonderful event.  Thank you, Grandparents and Special Friends!  It was a truly amazing morning.  

I am deeply grateful to have a job where I get to witness such mutual joy being shared as filled the classroom today.  Extra thanks to you family members, family friends, and neighbors who took your youngster’s friend(s) under your wing.  It was beautiful to see the way you ensured that all of the children in your vicinity received your care, interest, and guidance.*  Special thanks also go out to Marlyn Brouder for her volunteer time assisting with the event.

On the protected images page, you can see the footage of your children’s G&SF Day performance (and photo’s too — I did my best to get everyone and I’m sorry, I know that I did not end up with a picture of everyone).   

Of course there’s a great deal of “unseen” hidden in such a performance.  It’s not possible for words to fully describe music or the emotions showing on the faces of children performing…but it’s fun to try!  During the concert, in the faces of your children I saw excitement, nervousness, joy, playfulness, concern, elation, courage, bewilderment, pride, satisfaction, fulfillment, happiness and more.

The effort your children invested in this performance was, in part, learning the songs.  To be honest, that came to them fairly easily.  At a deeper level, they learned performance skills like walking confidently, using a “singing” voice, facing a large room filled with large people, smiling, taking a bow in gratitude for the applause and knowing that they have gifts to share with the world and giving those gifts with joy.

Thanks again, everyone!

— Jeff Oremland

 

*I saw such engagement today that I want to make a sure that I to remind everyone who attended that our classroom is open to you.  I talked about stories today and I deeply believe every word — our stories connect us.  So, if any of you would like to come to the Otter class to tell a story, please let me know and we’ll arrange it.  Sometimes we think we have no stories worth sharing, but I’m always impressed by the way children latch on to seemingly simple ones — how you met your spouse, how you came to America, your first job, what it was like when TV was a new thing, which teachers you liked (or not!) and why, that time you got in trouble (oh, that never happened!).  The best way to reach me is email (jeff.oremland@questacademy.org), but you can also call me at school, (847) 202-8035.