Please watch for the field trip permission slip coming home early next week. The Coast trip from March 20-22 is a go. We still have room for one more parent volunteer... The cost for the trip will be $45 per student, including housing, meals, and activities (sandboarding!). No student who wants to participate will be excluded because of financial restrictions. Please contact Kayla in the office for more information about financial support.
Our June Adventure Trip to the Redwoods is coming up quick. The estimated cost for the Adventure Trip will be $150-$200 per student for the week. (Total cost: $3,000-$4000.) We really need a parent volunteer to lead our fundraising efforts. HELP!
School work is getting exciting around here: the UO scientists are coming back in a couple week to help the students develop and design their project plans for the UO Science/Invention Fair. We've got Puppet Shows in production. Our Essential Inventions Presentations are starting next week... We're digging deeper with our work these days. This is the good stuff.
Please volunteer to work with these fantastic kids. Trips during the week are hard, I know. The Science/Invention Fair Projects would be a good place to pitch in. Once we get our projects rolling, I'll let you know what we're up to, so you can find a niche. Every Monday we work outside from 1:30-3pm at Tugman and in the campus garden. As the weather gets better, we'll be spending even more time working outdoors--probably Wednesday afternoons.
Our kids need adult mentors to laugh and work with them. (Now in their life more than ever.) Remember, each family has committed to volunteering at least 40 hours a year to support the school. It's your support that makes Ridgeline such a Resource-Rich learning environment. HELP!
See you at the Ukulele Concert (aka DDD Spaghetti Dinner) this Friday at 6:15pm, Jon and Carrie
Lots of fun and learning in the works! We also have a bunch of fun ways for you to log your 40 Volunteer Hours coming up. (Please remember to log them when you work them. You can log them in the office, when you check in, or online atVolunteer Time Tracker.)
IMPORTANT: Please return your Re-enrollment Forms for next year ASAP. Also, your student should have brought home a "Computer User Agreement" form for you and your student to review and sign. Please take the time to look it over with your student and talk about what "Appropriate Use" means and why.
Scientists (Graduate Students) from the University of Oregon joined us in the classroom Wednesday morning to help us kickstart our projects for the 2012 Science and Invention Fair happening at the UO this year. Check it out: http://oco.uoregon.edu/spice. We are excited to be part of this program. The UO Scientists will be back twice more between now and the end of April to help our students along towards success. We would love some parent help mentoring our students' efforts.
Friday Morning, February 17, a group from Alaska is joining us for an all-school assembly with a sled-team of Huskies! Really!
Our first "Kids' Night In" fundraiser is this Friday, February 17. Over 20 kids have signed up to have fun with our Middle School Crew. Our next events are on March 9, April 20, and May 18. We could really use some parent support with these fundraisers for the Adventure Trip in June. Our staff members (Jon and Carrie) are not paid extra to run these after-hours events (or for the trips they support). We sincerely need your energy-input to keep these Program Highlights happening.
Our first Ukulele Performance is at the DDD Spaghetti Dinner on Friday, February 24. We'll be taking the stage at 6:30. Please have your student at the Ridgeline Upper Gym by 6:15pm to tune up and get ready. We will be done by 7:00pm.
Thank you Karen Fabiano and Bethany Calhoon for volunteering to join us on the camping trip to Honeyman from March 20-22. I know the middle of the week is a tough commitment. It'll be worth it! We've got room for one more parent--Dads?!
Every Monday from here on out, we will be working in the Garden at school and/or Tugman Park from 1:30-3:00. Please be sure your student dresses appropriately. If you'd like to work and laugh with us, drop in! Please be here by 1:15 if you'd like to join us.
Have a terrific long weekend (no school Monday, Feb 20).
It's impossible for me to believe that we're already halfway through the school year, but it's true. There is no school Friday, January 27, or Monday, January 30. There is, however, plenty of project work for your students to do over the long weekend. Please encourage them to keep on top of things. Or catch up! I won't print grade reports until Sunday, so they have until midnight, Saturday, to get their work turned in, if they want it to show up on their grade report that will go home on Tuesday.
Our Inventions Projects are still morphing into being. Students are figuring out pretty quickly (using the Deep and Complex Thinking note-taking templates) that they have to choose an invention with some significance to make a project out of it. Please help your student focus on clearly articulating the IMPORTANCE of the invention they've chosen for their project. This is where most of them are struggling: How did this thing, this idea change the course of human history? I love helping them struggle through this. Once they can boil it down to a single sentence, the rest of their project will be a breeze.
Only one BIG announcement this week: We're going back up into the old-growth canopy! I locked down May 3rd today for this amazing field trip. We'll spend the day out at Blue River learning about the old-growth forest and tromping around in the woods. We're going to forego the overnight option and save our energy and money for the Adventure Trip in June. We'll need volunteers to drive out there (about an hour east).
Here are some absolutely essential up-coming dates (Mark/Double-check your calendar!): February 17--"Kids' Night In" 5:30-8:30pm Fundraiser hosted by the Middle School. March 9--"Kids' Night In" 5:30-8:30pm Fundraiser hosted by the Middle School. March 20-22--Florence Coast trip. Honeyman Park. $50 per student. (Permission slip coming soon.) April 20--"Kids' Night In" 5:30-8:30pm Fundraiser hosted by the Middle School. May 3--Canopy Connections 8:30am-3:15pm All day field trip to old-growth forest. May 18--"Kids' Night In" 5:30-8:30pm Fundraiser hosted by the Middle School. June 7--8th Grade Graduation. 6-8 pm. June 11-15--Adventure Trip! TBD Have a fun-filled (long) weekend!
THIS JUST IN! Before I even start the weekly letter, please note: MONDAY, January 23, we will be doing community service work down at Tugman Park for close to 2 hours in the afternoon. PLEASE REMIND/SUPPORT YOUR STUDENT TO DRESS FOR THE WEATHER! If conditions are ridiculous, we won't go, of course, but rain won't be a deterrent. -------------------------------------- Dear Middle School Family,
We're back in full swing this week!
We started our 'Essential Inventions' projects this week, and we're hard at work on developing our primitive societies in our BANDS project. We're working on understanding where the impetus for 'government' comes from. Our current social complexity didn't happen in an instant. Our basic, real human needs are still very basic, very simple. Right? This is good, rich, fertile ground...
Friday Electives are going great. Kids are cooking, felting, and focusing their bodies' physical energy in appropriate ways. We all love Fridays.
Oregon Battle of the Books has come to Ridgeline. Alaniya Patton and Jon are joining forces to coach our 6-8 grade team to love books! It's not required, but many students have signed up. This is our first year participating in this exciting state-wide, nationwide event. Check it out: http://www.battleofthebooks.org/
MARK YOUR CALENDAR: Tuesday-Thursday, March 20-22: COAST TRIP
We've decided to go to Honeyman Park in Florence for the Spring coast trip. We'll leave school at 9 am on Tuesday, March 20, and return to school on Thursday, March 22 in time for 3:15 pick-up. The cost per student is going to be $50 for two nights lodging, seven meals, snacks, and fun and learning. Partial scholarships will be available. Please contact Jon for more information.
We will need at least one male and one female adult chaperone to join us on this trip who can stay for the duration. We also need to be able to transport up to 20 kids. Jon can take 4; Carrie can take 6. If you're willing to drive kids out on Tuesday and/or pick up kids on Thursday, you could potentially save the trip. Let me know!
Friday, February 24, 6-8pm: Spaghetti Dinner/Ukulele Perfomance! This should be a blast. It's a kick off for our Direct Donation Drive. Our Ukulele group (the whole Middle School!) will be performing our first gig.
Monday-Friday, June 11-15: Middle School Adventure Trip The Middle School has also committed to hosting school-wide "Kids' Night In" events in February, March, April, and May for up to 50 Ridgeline Students (and their siblings, ages 4 and up--no diapers!). The middle school students will plan a fun-filled evening for our youngsters to hang out and play together. Participants' parents are not required to attend.
These Themed Kid Fun nights will be an on-going fundraiser for our Adventure Trip June 11-15. More details to come. We just wanted to let you know these Friday nights are coming. They'll be one Friday a month from 6-9pm.
More Dates: We've got a puppet show coming in on Monday, January 23, and Alaskan Huskies on February 17. We start volunteer work in Tugman Park and Amazon Creek in February. Big stuff on the horizon.
The semester ends next Friday. I'll send home a printed copy of your student's Jupiter Grades report so far this year. I'll also send home a mid-term reflection report written by your student on the 16 Habits of Mind.
The sleepover last Thursday was a blast. We made our own pizzas for dinner and cooked pancakes in the morning. We played games and danced our adolescent hearts out! Best yet: we cleaned it all up and got the kitchen sanitized for whoever came next. Thanks again to Karen Cross and Leanne Collis for spending the night with us, and to Cherri Rose for doing the shopping!
Every one of our students has earned their Food Handler's License. Thanks to those of you who sent in $10 to pay for your student's license. We have to pay for them by credit card. (I still have to interface with our book-keeper to finish up the transaction.) If you haven't sent in the $10, you can have your student log in at home and pay for the license with your own credit card. If you do, please print your students Food Handler's Card and send it to school so we have it on file.
We started Ballroom Dance in P.E. on Tuesday. Laura and Robert Taylor have been teaching ballroom dancing for over 25 years and have volunteered to bring the JOY! of dancing to our school. They are a kick! George and Jon are both taking extra lessons to help support the longevity of this program (and add some comic relief!). We'll be ballroom dancing for PE every Tuesday for the next many weeks.
Speaking of JOY! Ukuleles! have taken over the Middle School. We play together every morning for the first 30 minutes. Students practice songs every lunch period, and students are creating Personal Action Projects to carve out more time in their day to practice. Help! I need some music-minded volunteers to take this to the next level. Some percussion would sauce things right up...
We will continue to work hard in the garden until all the leaf mulch is moved. Please send your students to school dressed to work outdoors in this cold weather.
Electives start again this Friday. Thanks Karen Hewett for teaching the cooking class. Carrie will continue to teach the Textiles class. Jon will join Karen Fabiano to lead a hiking/running elective. We're still working out the (small) costs to help cover the cost of materials for the cooking and textiles classes. I'll let you know as soon as we have it settled.
We're looking at making a trip to the Coast (Newport) the week before Spring Break (March 20-23). We'll need transportation support for 13 students and at least 3 parent chaperones to make it happen... Mark your calendar (and take a few days off and join us!). Let me know ASAP if you'd like to come with us. We plan to stay in yurts (Not tents! Burr!)
As always, please don't hesitate to contact me with any questions. I love to hear from you.
We're back! This is going to be an action-packed week, so I wanted to prepare you ahead of time.
We'll be doing more community-building work this week to get us all back into the groove (much like how we started the school year). Please be sure your student is dressed for Action! and brings a hearty lunch and snack.
Thursday night is the Middle School Sleepover! (slash Roller Skating slash Dance Party?!) Permission slips were sent home over the break and are DUE WEDNESDAY! Please send them in with your students along with $10 for food and snacks. Thank you Cherri Rose, Leanne Collis, and Karen Cross for volunteering to help make it happen!
We will be working in the school garden for about an hour each day this week, cleaning up and transferring the mountain of leaves to the garden beds.
Friday, students will take the test for their Food Handlers' Cards. It's pretty exciting. Once we have these in hand, we can use the school's certified kitchen to produce and sell food. The Food Handlers' Cards cost $10 and are good for 3 years. Please send in a check or cash this week to cover the cost of your student's card.
Electives start next Friday. Right now, we will continue to offer the Textiles elective with an optional pull-out for a half hour ukulele lesson. Karen Hewitt will teach a cooking class. Leanne Collis has offered to teach a crafty class. We're still trying to work out the details for an 'active' elective. It's not too late to join in the fun!
I can't get over what a gift this school year has been. When I was in middle school, my family lived out in the boonies on Whidbey Island, Washington. I HATED staying home sick. Missing my friends was more miserable than whichever pains my body was racked with. I'm happy to report that I feel exactly the same way now as I did then. Your children are a delight to work and grow with. I'm sincerely going to miss them over Winter Break.
We're wrapping up another (short) grading Cycle this week in time for the Break. I will get all the grading done by this weekend. The students have their work routine pretty much dialed in at this point. Thanks for your support at home. Please keep it up! Our State Benchmark tests this week showed positive growth across the board. Especially in Math.
There's no Official Homework for Winter Break, but please encourage your student to read daily, and please encourage them to log onto the Khan Academy website to maintain and hone their math skills.
SUPPORT REQUESTS:
1. JANUARY 5 SLEEPOVER? The kids want a welcome back sleepover at school on Thursday, January 5. We need 2 parent volunteers to make it happen. It will cost $10 per student. We'll provide dinner and breakfast and movie snacks. I especially need a "Food Handler" volunteer to pull the meals together if we're going to make it happen. Please e-mail me ASAP! I'll be in touch over Break with the details.
2. Oregon Battle of the Books! We're enrolled! And we've got some amazing readers. We need a parent coach to organize our team of volunteer readers, and we need the books! This is a super fun, highly motivating program. We could make it an elective... Or after school... We're flexible. This is one of those volunteer opportunities that only comes up once in a lifetime. I'm not kidding. You'll love it!
We also need help buying the books for our team. (This would also make a great reading list over the break!)
Here they are: All the Broken Pieces by Ann E. Burg The Circuit: Stories From the Life of a Migrant Child by Francisco Jiménez Cracker!: The Best Dog in Vietnam by Cynthia Kadohata Cuba 15 by Nancy Osa Football Genius by Tim Green Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life by Wendy Mass The Kingdom Keepers by Ridley Pearson Leven Thumps and the Gateway to Foo by Obert Skye Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld NERDS: National Espionage, Rescue, and Defense Society by Michael Buckley Red Kayak by Priscilla Cummings Scat by Carl Hiaasen Stolen Children by Peg Kehret Tiger by Jeff Stone When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead The White Giraffe by Lauren St. John
Please enjoy your time together this Winter Break. Cheers!
1. READ-A-THON! is going strong? I haven't received any reading logs yet. We're tying ribbons on the fence for every 30 minutes the kids read. If we get enough ribbons tied to the fence, maybe we can block the arctic wind rolling through the classroom!
2. BOOK EXCHANGE! Bring in age-appropriate books for the book exchange!
3. Last chance to get your Christmas tree is this week. Saturday: U-Cut out at the farm. Sunday: pick out a tree at Ridgeline's front parking lot.
4. FOOD DRIVE: Bring in non-perishable foods for our Joy of Sharing Food Drive and Food for Lane County Food Drive.
5. ELECTIVES are not going to happen after Winter Break if we don't have some volunteers. Friday Mornings: 10-11:45. You name it!
WHAT'S HAPPENING: We're hitting the groove. Our access-skills work is going strong. (Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic are still the foundation!)
Now that these systems are settling into place, we're opening up our 'higher order' pursuits. We are in our second week in BANDS (a 'tribal' role-playing simulation the students and I are creating from scratch!). Students worked out their basic, hand to mouth survival needs in their bio-region last week.
This week the BANDS are sorting out their Cultural Identity. One student came to me on Wednesday and asked, "Can each of us just make up our own Cultural Identity for the group? We don't agree about anything." Short answer: "No." It's working! I'm amazed at how completely the students are embracing this simulation.
We're working hard on our writing. I'll admit right up front that I'm being a stickler about grading these Assertive Sentences (please see the criteria in Jupiter Grades). Please know that every student in the class knows that I am eager to sit down and work on their (just) three assertive sentences a day with them. All they have to do is ask. We've done class lessons, but 'one on one' is where I can make a difference.
Writing an argumentative assertion is the foundation for essay writing. It has to be clear and to the point. They have to NEED to back up what they're asserting. We're getting better, but it's slow going. One thought at a time, well explained... This is all in preparation for their essay about "Little Tree" next week.
I'll close by saying that I am GIDDY about our Ukulele Mornings. Despite all initial resistance, the students have embraced these 30 minutes in the morning completely. Students are practicing at lunch and begging for more songs to learn. Students are taking ukes home to practice. Ukulele Mornings are here to stay, as long as I'm here.
If your student is begging for an uke for Christmas, I'd recommend a Concert sized uke. Amazon.com has some good deals right now. Makala, Kala, Lanikai, and Cordoba(!) are all good introductory brands between $35 and $100. Sopranos are a little cheaper, but the Concerts sound more like an instrument, less like a toy. Sound is more important than flashy looks, where instruments are concerned. I play a Tenor because of the deeper, richer sound and the longer scale (more notes to play)...
Have a great weekend (last short one for a while...)
It's hard to believe we're already running up against Winter Break. The next three weeks are going to be full of challenging fun. Please feed your students well and keep them healthy! We're doing a lot of experiential small group work in class this Cycle that can't be replicated with a worksheet. Their classmates are counting on them to be here!
Math is going great! The kids are all struggling! Which is exactly what they should be doing. If it's easy, they aren't learning. Please encourage them to do their math work at school where Carrie and I (and their peers) can help them if they get frazzled.
The Biography Videos turned out well. This is a powerful step in our writing curriculum. The more the students have to read their writing, the better. They BEGGED me to make this a live presentation (so they could wing it). Not a chance. I wanted them to wrestle with their scripts until they sounded right when they read them. Writing is just speaking "write". It's harder than math, by miles. We'll get there. We'll be doing a lot of scripted work this year.
We started our 'Bands' Simulation last week. We divvied up Eugene into: Wetlands, Grasslands, Oak Savannah, Forest, and Riverlands. The kids have been divided into groups, Bands, of 4. As far as the students are concerned (for this project, for now) their Band of four are the only humans in existence in Eugene before any human technology existed. Our Driving Question for this long-term project is: What does it take to survive? We're going to grow their experience week by week through these seasons. My Hidden (long-term) Agenda: Where does the need for "Government" (Social Organization) come from?
Our textbook-based approach to Physical Science has not been going well. I feel like the textbook is actually hindering the students' interest and engagement in this exciting, fun, and highly 'experiment-able' branch of Science. We're ditching the textbook! We're going to shift to a more hands-on approach to understanding. We're going to slow down and really dig in, here--especially where the Scientific Process is concerned. Please let me know if you'd like to volunteer to help us get our Science on!
Ukuleles are being strummed every morning (and being picked up and practiced at lunch time!). We may not have Spanish this year, but we're building Music into our everyday. If you happen to have an uke lying around the house un-strummed that you'd like to donate to our efforts, we could sure use it! Right now, we've got 7 ukes we received from a grant by the Ukes for Schools program. We just got another grant from Selco Credit Union to pay for strings, stands, and tuners. Music is an absolutely fundamental, universal human experience (and a whole lot of fun).
Please be sure to check in with your student every Monday evening about where their grades are (look at JupiterGrades together!), and what their work plan for the week is. Your Insistence! on this check-in could make all the difference, (especially if your student is wavering). They want you to care about how they're doing in school.
This phase of Electives come to a close on December 16. If you'd like to lead an elective starting in January, let me know! The kids need some more adults to rock their brains!
I can't tell you how grateful we are to participate in all this learning and laughter.
We are wrapping up another Grading Cycle this week. Students are finishing a couple of big projects (mainly their Biography Videos and their "This I Believe" Essays). The two projects dovetail rather nicely. Their Biography videos required them to research and celebrate an American Hero, and explain why their actions are still important to us today. Their Essays required them to explore where their personal values come from, how they've been formed, and why they're important.
Our Heroes' Journey is afoot!
Remember: This is Character Education. These kids are making BIG decisions this year about who their Independent Selves will be. Please help me lift (and hold) the bar for them at every opportunity. Muscles (including brain muscles!) have to strain in order to grow.
We're steadily working in the Garden on Wednesday mornings from 11-12. If you have time to come out and help us, that would be great! The whole school could use it! (and it would mean that I could take more kids out into the garden).
We'll soon start our weekly work again with the City of Eugene's Stream Team to support native habitat restoration. More about that as details unfold.
All our students who completed the class requirements are now First Aid Certified. Thanks to Cyndy Meno for leading this fun and useful! class.
This week, Carrie and I are starting our Food Handler's Certification class. If you're interested in helping our students come up with Homemade Food Fundraisers, now would be a great time to check in! What a great opportunity to put some Algebra to work in the real world!
Ridgeline's Read-a-thon Kick-Off event is this Friday, November 18, at Barnes and Noble from 6-7:45pm. The Middle School is putting together poetry magnet boards this week, using our Personal Dictionary words. Help! if you can, cutting and pasting these things onto refrigerator magnets. If you have any of those cheezy ad magnets laying around (like on the front of your phone book), send them in! We're appropriating them for creative purposes!
Stone Soup is November 23. We're in the soup line at 1pm. Please bring in vegetables for chopping on November 22. We need everything! (except mushrooms). We also need large pots! knives! cutting boards! Please bring them in on the 22nd and help us chop it up!
So much great stuff going on! Best, Jon and Carrie
