newsletter for p arents, stu
Community Spring 2014 Inside this issue:
Community in the Classroom Auction Grandparent and Special Friend Day and more‌
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spring 2014 Contents
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Community in the classroom
3 Community by Laura Hange and Jenna Spadoni 4 Aeronautics and Collaboration by Randy Hollinger 5-6 Partnerships by Heather Law
Engaging with our community
7-8 Author visits, Guests on Campus, Virtual Community 9-10 Open Window School Auction, 2014 11-12 Grandparent and Special Friend Day Open Window School in the community
13 Teachers’ Summer 14 Alumni Scene
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A Letter from the Head of School Dear Friends of Open Window School, “When your child attends Open Window, you are not just sending your child to school, you are joining a community.” These words are part of every admissions conversation with prospective families as we help them understand the culture of our school. Community is an important concept in independent schools, as we draw our families from many locations rather than the more limited neighborhood community of a public school. Our Open Window community is founded not upon geography, but rather a shared commitment to the education of our children and the mission of our school.
This issue of The View celebrates community-building throughout the 2013-14 school year. Community starts in the classrooms where students work collaboratively, learn from each other, and build essential social and emotional skills. We were pleased to have many guests, authors, and experts visit campus this year, including Jim Bisenius who worked with older students on ways that can help build stronger, more positive social relationships. Teachers have increasingly reached beyond our walls to bring wider learning opportunities to our children. Community partnerships have always been an essential element of our middle school program, and this year students visited science labs, solid waste facilities, learned stage combat, and ate Dim Sum together, all part of establishing a global perspective of community and our role in it. From skyping with students in China to following severe weather in the Midwest, we have used technology to expand our concept of community worldwide. More and more Open Window students participate in activities such as athletics, chess, debate, and robotics that broaden their learning community to a statewide and even national basis. Open Window is also committed to serving both our civic community and being a leader in the network of fellow independent schools. Open Window families participated in community service this year through our Positive Impact Project, refurbishing and maintaining trails at Lewis Creek Park, volunteering at various community organizations, and painting murals that will be on display at Metro bus stops. A new middle school service group organized a talent show that raised over $2,000 toward the construction of schools in Africa. Open Window staff members are leaders in the Northwest Association of Independent Schools (NWAIS), serving on leadership committees, accreditation teams, and as part of inter-school collaborative teams. The heart of our community will always be our families. Even though classes dismiss at 3:15, sunny days always see our children playing on playgrounds and parents connecting with each other throughout the late afternoon. Grandparent and Special Friend Days recognize the contributions of adults who play such a meaningful role in the lives of our students. A strong tradition of volunteerism, stewarded by the Parent Association, enhances our spirit of community and expands learning opportunities for students. The commitment of our community is also seen in a strong tradition of philanthropy. Open Window set records in Annual Fund giving as well as achieving an Auction Fund-A-Wish that has transformed the gymnasium into a far superior venue for highlighting our children’s athletic, dramatic, and musical talents. We are especially grateful to our grandparents, who tripled their support of the Annual Fund this year. Thank you for being part of our community! Although the 2013-2014 school year has come to a close, we are hard at work planning for next year. Learning doesn’t stop during the summer as our campus will be filled with summer campers and our faculty will be participating in a variety of professional development activities. It will not be long before we welcome back our students for another great school year.
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Sincerely,
Jeff Stroebel, Head of School
Community in the classroom
Town of River Hills Below: Town Tour
Communities Snoqualmie Mayor Larson runs a mock city council
By Laura Hange and Jenna Spadoni, Second Grade Teachers
Left: Happy Hollow’s Mayor Steve Far right: Trip to Issaquah Train Depot
In second grade, our social studies curriculum involved a year-round focus on types of communities and how people work together as a group. We began the year by expanding the students’ understanding of this topic through a study of our school. In order to learn about the different roles represented in the Open Window School community, we asked our students to pair up and interview various staff members around campus. This led to some wonderful discussions and discoveries about how we all work together and contribute toward a common goal. Ann Berner Counsell presented a comprehensive history of Open Window from our beginning as a preschool to our present day K-8 campus. Our students applied this knowledge to create a classroom timeline of important events in our school’s history. Then, we turned our focus to the history of our local community. The second graders visited the Gilman Town Hall and Issaquah Train Depot Museums, where they saw artifacts and photos depicting life and important community jobs in “the olden days.” During our Democracy in Action unit, each second grade classroom designed a community mural. The students loved inventing unique characters and role-playing ways in which their characters helped the community. One such role was that of mayor. In order to help the students understand how a mayor runs a city, we invited Matt Larson, the mayor of Snoqualmie to our school. Mayor Larson created a dynamic presentation in which students acted as city council members and worked together to make decisions about an imaginary town. After this visit, each class elected a mayor to represent their classroom’s community. When problems arose in our towns, the mayor organized city council groups to determine what plan of action was best. Through this process, students experienced the rights and responsibilities of citizens and became invested in shaping the community’s future. Our culminating event was a “Town Tour”, where students shared important aspects of their characters and murals with their families and other Open Window classes. We hope that these activities help motivate our young citizens to contribute to their communities in positive ways.
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and
Aeronautics
Collaboration “Wallikabooya Airlines will be our name then!” exclaimed a third grade student.
By Randy Hollinger, Lower School Science Teacher
“ Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.” Benjamin Franklin
What a great ride it was to be part of the learning process with our third graders during their engineering unit with a focus on aeronautics. Watching real world learning happen right before you is an experience hard to describe. The initial purpose of the lesson was to meet our engineering standards in a realistic and fun way. Each of the two third grade classes represented a company. Companies were comprised of teams of three that worked together to create the best paper airplane for a competition involving the furthest flight, longest flight, and most creative. However, results of the competition were only a very small part of the learning. In each group, there was a CEO in charge, a pilot responsible for test flights, and an engineer who did most of the designing and building of the planes. Each had an important role to fill and the group could not meet goals without the participation of each member. Their dependence on one another and the need to solve problems encouraged the groups to be in a real world business and engineering scenario. Observing students solving problems ranging from aircraft design issues, disagreements over the company logo, to how to divide responsibility among each other in a fair way, was the most meaningful part of the project. These became the true lessons for the students, while the aeronautics and engineering content was simply the catalyst. I look forward to future lessons that introduce content in a way that allows students to be in that “comfortable struggle” with real life issues. These sorts of experiences help the learning stick and provide students with skills that they will certainly use in our quickly changing world. Left: UPS pilot Dieter Krumplemann visited third graders to discuss flying, planes, and aeronautics.
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Our students participated in Day of Service last fall — fifth and sixth grade got the opportunity to help sort food at Northwest Harvest.
Partnerships by Heather Law, Middle School Program Support Assistant
Above: One of the highlights for the year is the Camp Seymour overnight for seventh and eighth grade students. They complete the high ropes course, canoe, and explore the beautiful Pacific Northwest while building a strong community within their grade.
Above: Fifth grade traveled to the University of Washington and learned about the cutting edge research being done on the brain — and got to hold an actual human brain.
Partnerships are a key element in our Middle School experience. They give our students the chance to give back to the community and put their classroom learning into context in the real world — and have a great time doing it! For most of the experiences, teachers find opportunities to enhance and connect to their curriculum, and the Partnership Committee makes it happen. Many of the organizations we work with have partnered with Open Window School for several years, and love seeing our kids again. That’s the wonderful part of partnerships — as we deepen our connection with these organizations, they get to know our program better and can tailor the visit to make sure our students learn and experience as much as possible. Left: At the Institute for Systems Biology, the eighth grade had a behindthe-scenes look at how biologists and researchers conduct experiments and analyze data in the real world. Right: Fifth grade students built their own propellers and took a boat ride at the Center for Wooden Boats, located on the shore of Lake Union in downtown Seattle. Learning about the importance of boats in Seattle’s history and how they work was a blast!
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In addition to the photos here, students saw live performances of Much Ado About Nothing and The Hobbit: The Musical, volunteered at Food Lifeline, Operation Sack Lunch, and Eastside Baby Corner, and tried food at Ethiopian, Dim Sum, and Puerto Rican restaurants. Classes went to the Experience Music Project, The Gates Foundation, and the Seattle NOAA office. They toured churches, synagogues, and temples, and pushed themselves at Parkour Visions and the School of Acrobatics and New Circus Arts. We went to Mt. St. Helens, the Seattle Art Museum, and the UW Planetarium. Guest teachers ranged from spoken word poetry artists to stage combat experts to voice coaches. In total, our students went on 61 amazing adventures and have grown in countless ways thanks to our partnerships.
Above: Seventh grade students went to Mercer Slough Environmental Education Outreach Center to participate in their WetLab Academy Program, in preparation for their Salish Sea Hallmark Trip.
Left: Sixth grade visited the Seattle Architecture Foundation in preparation for their Dream House Projects. They built models and worked in teams to design parks.
Below, right: As part of UW Math Day, the eighth grade students got to meet researchers and graduate students at the University of Washington, hear about their research, and try out some very cool technology.
Right: At the Pacific Science Center’s Life Science Research Weekend, students got a chance to put their science curriculum into practice by talking with scientists from all over the city about their research and their careers. Left: One of the very first trips this year was to the Bellevue Ropes Course — students bonded in their advisory groups over the difficult and thoughtprovoking challenges. They had to work as a team and learn how to communicate in order to accomplish their goal. Right: In preparation for their Salish Sea Hallmark Trip adventure, the seventh grade took to Elliott Bay in the Adventuress, a wooden sailboat. They learned to navigate, hoist sails, and work together to sail the Bay, all while conducting scientific research.
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engaging with OUR COMMUNITY
guests on campus
Above: Farmer Sarah from Oxbow Farm visited kindergarten to talk about seeds. Left: We had a very special guest travel all the way from Uganda — Phiona Mutesi, a teenage chess prodigy. She discussed her love of the game and provided inspiration for everyone who heard her speak. Right: In the fall, we hosted a similarly missioned Evergreen School for a day of in-service and collaboration. Below: When middle school students returned from their annual hallmark trips, a drum helped reconnect the group with a unifying beat led by Maketa Wilborn.
In addition to the many esteemed authors who visited us this year, we were honored to welcome community members to campus from nearby and faraway.
Above: KOMO 4 Meteorologist Lisa Van Cise spoke to second graders about weather forecasting, inviting students to do a forecast for the class.
Above: Students in third through fifth grades had the chance to learn bully-proofing techniques with the guidance of Jim Bisenius, who came in from the Midwest.
Above: We had many parents visit classrooms to share their expertise in everything from photography to Japanese cultural traditions to intellectual property rights.
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Above: This spring Ms. Gifford, our advanced technology teacher, invited fellow technology teachers to a Makerspace Meetup on campus to share ideas on Makerspaces.
VIRTUAL COMMUNITY With technology, community has no boundaries, opening interactive doors to other cultures and learning experiences that were once only possible through a book. Students spoke with experts across the country and peers across the ocean, increasing both knowledge and global awareness. Here are a few examples of our virtual community. Randy Hollinger, Lower School Science Teacher In collaboration with fourth grade teachers, Ms. Mahoney and Ms. Scott, fourth graders had weekly Skypes with another fourth grade class in Wisconsin. Fourth graders also had a chance to skype with a Yellowstone Park Ranger during a unit on volcanos. Working with first grade teachers, Ms. Stearns and Ms. Rawson, Mr. Hollinger arranged for first graders to skype with Dr. G.B Edwards, spider biologist. Ms. Iverson & Mr. McCullough, Third Grade Teachers During a weather unit, third graders went on a virtual field trip learning about severe weather during a real time Weather Channel video cast. There were opportunities to submit questions. Adrienne Gifford, Advanced Technology Teacher Seventh grade winning App Team in Ms. Gifford’s Advanced Tech Lab, as part of an award package from the Verizon Innovative App Challenge, participated in a virtual STEM event which provided an opportunity for students to meet experts working in technology fields and to ask them questions about their education, background experiences, current projects, and how they apply STEM principles and practices in their daily activities.
author visits Author visits are incredibly enriching, allowing us to go beyond the printed page to ask questions of people whose works we admire, and offering inspiring glimpses into the processes of research and creative writing. This school year we welcomed four wonderful authors from far-flung corners of the country — and our own backyard! David Schwartz wowed students with fun math and science facts, Christine Gross-Loh shared parenting lessons from different cultures, Carmen Agra Deedy’s Southern and Cuban tales made us roar with laughter, and Brian Crawford opened our eyes to the sorrows of Rwanda.
Ms. Russell. Seventh Grade Humanities Teacher Seventh graders skyped with teens from Delhi and Shanghai. In addition, they visited with a Botswanan DJ living in Nanjing and students of an Akanksha center in India. The Akanksha Foundation is a “non-profit organization with a mission to provide children from low-income communities with a high-quality education, enabling them to maximize their potential and transform their lives.” (akanksha.org) The Skype, however, with the most impact this year was with Elizabeth Mhangami, founder of Vanavevhu, an organization in Zimbabwe that supports child “head of households.” Most of these children have lost their parents to AIDS and are left to raise their siblings and support the family. Seventh graders interviewed her for over an hour. The interview culminated in a student asking about the first thing she does when kids come to the program for job training? Elizabeth replied, “Feed them. After that, we help them remember how to be a kid.”
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2014 Auction
BIG NIGHT By Angie Hurlock & Allison O’Mahony Wong | Photos by Peter Wong
Newcastle, WA: Hats were big, bids were big, and hearts were big on March 8 at the Open Window School Auction. Afterward, everyone could not have been happier with the way the night ended. “What an amazing night!” said Allison O’Mahony Wong, co-parent liaison of the Auction, who with fellow parent Angie Hurlock, worked in concert with the calm expertise of Ann Berner Counsell, Director of Development, and Lindsay Sullivan, to lead the event. Parents, faculty, and staff dressed up to the theme of OWS Trifecta, which included Kentucky Derby-style hats, bowties, and gorgeous spring attire.
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Highlights of the evening included: Happy bidders The live auction included a free song from two-time Grammy winner Dave Dederer of the band “Presidents of the United States.” Dederer donated his musical expertise to the winning bidder, for any future party or event. Bidding came fast and furious for this item, which included Dederer throwing in free guitar lessons for the winner.
fund-a-wish
Other fundraising excitement included a Headsor-Tails game, which had the entire group of partygoers on their feet and holding their heads or, um, tails throughout the fun. The winner of this game was given a trip to the local horseracing venue, Emerald Downs. Fund-A-Wish More than $90,000 was donated by auctiongoers to upgrade Roper Gymnasium into a higher-level performance and athletic arena. Upgrades include new lighting, a projection system, a traverse climbing wall, scoreboard, and sound system, most of which should be completed by the end of summer.
Improved lighting and sound for our stage in the gym
VIP reception Many auction-goers purchased a VIP ticket to ensure a 30-minute head start on the silent Auction bidding, including teacher experiences and a special Bunko party, and a unique champagne reception with Head of School Jeff Stroebel. Despite the pouring rain, lights twinkled and conversation sparkled in the tent as many bid on the 160 silent auction items.
Dessert Dash Let the race begin! Auctiongoers pooled their cash to bid, table to table, for an amazing array of 24 desserts that included tempting treats from Tom Douglas’ coconut cream pie to Top Pot doughnuts. The top bidders got first choice of the many cakes, tarts and pies, but there were plenty to tempt everyone in the room.
New Scoreboard
Screen
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Grandparent and Special Friend Day
Every spring, Open Window students have a chance to invite a grandparent or special friend to be a guest on campus for a morning of food, performances, and classroom activities. This year, visitors arrived to a beautifully decorated gym with hospitality provided by parent, Serap Whitmer. Muffins, pastries, and fruit were piled high on platters under a tree of photos representing kids from every class. The performances included a wonderful recorder concert and three piano solos led by music teacher Ms. Arends. The finale was a wellchoreographed and humorous dance by Chelsea and Trudy Inagawa.
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When guests arrived in classrooms, they were met by welcoming students and led in activities from math puzzlers to teaching stations such as, How to Make a Lanyard (everyone loves a good keychain). The morning was filled with a youthful exuberance, clearly a winner for all.
from a kindergarten perspective
T.J.: “I invited my Grandma and my Nana and my favorite part was getting the book about what we do in the morning, afternoon, and evening.”
Nora: “My favorite part of Grandparent & Special Friend Day was riding to school with grandma.”
Felicity: “My special friends were Ms. Lucas and Ms. Brown (Lower School Head). I really liked taking my special friends on a tour.”
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open window school in the community
Bus Murals
Teachers’ Summer As we move into summer, teachers have packed up classrooms and are gradually shifting into summer gear. Though summers for teachers are a great time to recalibrate before the start of a new year, it is also a time for professional development and personal growth. It is not like Las Vegas for teachers, what happens outside the classroom does not stay outside the classroom. Whether attending workshops, traveling, writing a novel, planting a garden, or collaborating with other innovative teachers in the community; teachers are filling their metaphorical pitchers with the magic that makes them extraordinary in the classroom. The following is a list of some of the enriching activities teachers will be doing this summer: • Eighth Grade Humanities Teacher Corey Paulson was accepted into the iCivics Institute, which takes place at the U.S. District Court, Seattle — based on the iCivics program initiated by Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, this program includes courtroom visits, sessions with judges and legal professionals, and interaction with fellow educators. • Third Grade Teachers Emily Iverson and Ian McCullough were accepted into the Design Thinking Institute which takes place at Nueva School in the Bay Area. They will join teachers from around the world at Nueva’s renowned Innovation Lab, created in partnership with IDEO and Stanford’s d.school, to learn about creating hands-on, project-based, thinking curricula. • Middle School Technology Teacher Adrienne Gifford and K-8 Art Teacher Gretchen Leggitt will attend a Design, Do, Discover Makerspace workshop at Catilleja School in Palo Alto, California in June. Their focus will be on integrating digital fabrication, making, and physical computing projects into the daily life of the K-8 school. • Kindergarten Teachers Sarah Geddis and Trudy Tauscheck will attend a literacy workshop called The Daily Five and Café in Tacoma in June. • Librarian Laura Simeon, Lower School Science Teacher Randy Hollinger, Kindergarten Teachers Sarah Geddis and Trudy Tauscheck, and Third Grade Teachers Emily Iverson and Ian McCullough have been awarded Open Window School Summer Innovation Grants to work on a variety of projects that support New Models of Learning and Innovation. • Many teachers look forward to dedicating a week to the Open Window Summer Program, where teaching is nothing but fun and games, in classes like, The Science of Gross Things or Crime Fighting Superheroes.
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As part of a project with the Positive Impact Project (PiP), a parent led group that provides our students and families opportunities to contribute to our greater community, students were invited to submit mural design entries for bus stops in the Bellevue area. The lower school mural was designed by fourth grader Lillian Lin and the middle school mural by seventh grader Jack Mandelkorn. There were many hands involved in the completion of the artwork under the guidance of art teacher Gretchen Leggitt. The result is a little piece of Open Window School to brighten up the days of Metro bus riders in the Bellevue community.
alumni scene Spring Alumni Event | May 10, 2014 Around 40 people arrived on campus for the Spring Alumni Event. Alumni students, Open Window 2014 eighth graders, and families enjoyed homemade ice cream sandwiches and root beer floats from the Street Treats food truck while catching up. Head of School Jeff Stroebel and Middle School Head Mike Montgomery also attended and congratulated the high school graduating class of 2014. This is a special class of alumni. A plaque commemorating this first graduating class of eighth graders hangs in the Robinson Hall Commons. Grads shared their college plans for the fall. In addition, two lucky winners won a raffle for gift cards and students enjoyed the photo booth, but not more than Mr. Montgomery!
The following are colleges & universities students will be attending in the fall: ASU, Carleton, Colorado College, CU Boulder, Georgia Tech, Gettysburg College, Harvey Mudd, Johns Hopkins, Lewis & Clark, Macalester, MIT, Notre Dame, Princeton, Santa Clara, Tufts, University of Maryland, USC, USD, and UW.
High school Graduating Class of
2014
Keep in touch and find out about alumni events on Facebook.
Left to Right: Jani Adcock, Jenn Havens, Michael Morikubo, Tyler Lebovic, Maura Redmond, Zander Gosanko, Matthew Kennedy, and Brad Klustner
Search for group, Open Window School Alumni, and ask to join, or email updates to alumni@ows.org. open window school | the view | spring 2014 | page 14
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newsletter for p arents, stu
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paren t
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Spring 2014 Editor:
Carolyn Lucas Communications Associate Contributors:
Jeff Stroebel Head of School
Laura Hange & Jenna Spadoni Second Grade Teachers
Randy Hollinger Lower School Science Teacher
Heather Law Middle School Program Support Assistant
Laura Simeon Learning Commons Director & Diversity Coordinator
Angie Hurlock & Allison O’Mahony Wong Auction Co-parent Liaisons Photos:
Peter Wong Eugenie Lemerle Open Window School families Faculty & Staff design:
Christa Fleming
20142015
Major Breaks Calendar
July 7-August 8
Open Window School Summer Program
September 2
First Day of School!
November 24-28
Thanksgiving Break
December 22-January 2 Winter Break February 16-23
Mid-Winter Break
April 6-10
Spring Break
June 11
Graduation
June 12
Last Day of School
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