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APRIL/MAY 2016 CALENDAR  
   
  • Thursday, April 28th: Spring Photo Day: Pacific & Taylor campuses have a 9am start; Encinal campus has a 2pm start
  • Monday, May 2nd - Friday, May 6th: Teacher Appreciation Week
  • Tuesday, May 3rd: South America Cultural Unit begins
  • Thursday, May 12th 2:30pm: Minimum Day NO DAYCARE
  • Friday, May 13th: Grandparent's Tea: Taylor Campus: 8:45am-9:45am; Pacific Campus: 10:15am-11:15am; Encinal Campus 11:45am-12:45pm
Our Schools
In This Issue
:: Pacific Campus
:: Taylor Campus
:: Encinal Campus
:: MESA
:: Music with Mr. Steve
From Cindy's Desk


Dear Parents, 

I am giving up my editorial space to allow for a short thank you and article about the teacher who attended the AMS Conference due to your generosity.
 
Thank you so much to all the families that donated a total of $1,136.00 and an airline flight to the American Montessori Conference.  Porshia Lewis was able to attend this year.  The monies raised were able to send Porshia to the conference and purchase some materials for the classroom.  Porshia recently shared information from a few of the classes she attended there with the entire TCU and MESA staff.

Here is a synopsis from a couple of the workshops Porshia attended:

 "A Montessori Approach for Infants & Toddlers with Special Needs," presented by Patricia Picchetti. The speaker shared 3 stories about why parents seek out Montessori for their child with special needs (which applies to all parents really).  Parents look for the responsiveness of teachers with children: the way Montessori teachers see each child as an individual, respect the children and are more aware of the observant child.  Several teachers pointed out that the Montessori approach grew out of working with children with special needs.

And from the seminar entitled, "American Injustice: Mercy, Humanity and Making a Difference," presented by Bryan Stevenson: How do we change the world? By changing our proximity: getting out of our comfort-zone, change the narrative: (a) Fear has to change, (b) Don't feed into the news and what society wants you to believe, protecting our hopefulness: "Justice prevails were hopefulness exists" and with a willingness to do uncomfortable things. This presenter pointed out how much influence teachers have and can change the world.  Also, how forming relationship can be a key part of working effectively to help children who have experienced trauma.  He also included a video about helping children who have experienced trauma.

Another course, "Thriving Together with Emotional Intelligence" assisted teachers in learning how to deal with anger in the classroom (even their own): modeling is key, no intimacy without vulnerability (Mitchell Adler), be more mindful, be prepared and have an open/absorbent mind. They discussed: What are emotions? Emotions represent mental states that arise spontaneously, rather than through conscious effort and are often accompanied by physiological changes. The basic emotions are: Mad (unfair or unjust), Sad (experience of something loss), Glad (including the following components: vacation or pleasure, engagement and meaning & purpose: complex carbohydrates). Teachers talked about how these play out in their classroom and did a standing exercise talking about whether or not it was okay for teachers to feel mad in the classroom, creating a personal mission statement and valuing their own self-care.

 "Bringing Montessori Home: A Parent Development Course on Practical Life" had some materials that will be a good resource for parents at home.  We will place those resources in your parent folders soon.

Thank you again for supporting the teachers and conference.  The 2017 conference is in San Diego, which is close enough that our goal is to send 100% of the staff!   


Peace,

Cindy
PACIFIC CAMPUS 

Toddler 1 Class
Ms. Verise & Ms. Merle
 
Dear Toddler 1 Parents,

This month the children are learning so many new and wonderful things about the continent of Australia. They enjoy learning about animals such as the kangaroo, crocodile, dingo, Tasmanian devil, kookaburra and koala. The children are creating a beautiful mural of the Great Barrier Reef, the largest corral reef in the world. You can watch it come to life in the Cultural Room. The children are also learning about the indigenous tribes of Australia.

We are concentrating on the letter sounds for z, u and q this month. The students are practicing writing their own names free hand. I am seeing great improvements for such little ones.

We have been doing extensions with the red rods and number rods such as making a maze using the red rods and the number rods. In the process, the children have discovered that there is a specific red rod that matches the size of a specific number rod. 

The children continue to practice their skills of Grace & Courtesy in preparation for the Grandparent's Tea. They are also getting their invitations ready to mail to their guests.

Thank you to Laura Landgraff for arranging the Zoomobile Visit during Spirit Week. What fun!

Thank you,
Ms. Verise & Ms. Merle

Pre-Primary Class
Ms. Mari & Ms. Zoe 
   
Dear Pre-Primary Families,

We celebrated Montessori education week by learning about who Maria Montessori was and why she is so important to us. We learned that our school has special materials and ideas that make our school very unique. We looked around at our classroom and took notice to the Montessori materials that we see in Montessori classrooms throughout the world.

We had a another wonderful music presentation from Steve Slater and his friend Jason, who brought in a very cool electric guitar. We learned that the electric guitar uses a pickup to change the vibration of its strings when they are plucked. We all enjoyed the different sounds that the guitar made and the way that it could be very loud. The children especially enjoyed hearing the different styles of music that can be played with it and getting a chance to pluck the strings themselves.

We had a fun trip to Twirl! We were delighted with a concert from the Dilly Dallies on site. The children got to sing and dance along during an up close and fun concert with the duo. They all really enjoyed playing in the fun, creative play spaces there. They got to be cooks, astronauts, engineers, and artists.

We have begun our unit on plants and we are learning about the specific parts of a plant and what each part does. The children looked at and learned about the root and its functions. We look forward to learning more about the rest of the parts of the plant and their specific functions.

Classroom Needs:
We are looking for someone to get a new filter for our fish tank and a radio with aux input and CD player functions. 

We are also looking for parents to help us with set up and clean up for our Tea Party.

Thank you,
Ms. Mari and Ms. Zoe
TAYLOR CAMPUS
  
Toddler 2 Class 
Ms. Porshia & Ms. Sara 
     
Dear Toddler Parents, 

We would like to start by saying good-bye to Camille Vallin. Though she has been here a short while, everyone loves and adores her and she will be missed. Her last day is April 29th, so please make sure to say your good-byes prior to that time.

We did an informative presentation of the land and water forms of an Island and the bay. We were happily surprised to learn that the children already knew that Alameda is an island! 

This month we have been studying the continent of Australia. We discussed both familiar and new Australian animals, such as kangaroos, koala, dingo, platypus and wallaby. The students really enjoyed singing the old folk song and dance, "Highway Number One." In this song, the children name various places in Australia and follow the direction of the singer. Students made Australian flags and traced the map of Australia.

We love art and the children had a great time this month, painting bird houses, creating kangaroo tails out of stocking, and dipping their feet into paint to make foot prints!

We introduced the Sensorial material Rough and Smooth Boards this month and the students also practiced Grace and Courtesy skills in preparation of the Grandparent's Tea. The students are helping to prepare their own snack and learn by pretending to cut various food items. The flour shifting work is a favorite job and the children love the clicking sound it makes when you turn the handle.

The children walked to the post office to mail off their Grandparent's Tea invitations and toured the post office room. We also visited the popular pig "Bosco" who has a fenced play space right near school on the corner of Haight Street.

The book of the month is "The Shape of My Heart," by Mark Sperring and Alys Paterson. Children continue to review letter sounds, word building and writing their letters and numbers. They are learning to count to 100 and we are also reviewing the numbers 1-77 in sequence. Some children have even begun skip counting!
 
The students love to eat and really enjoyed preparing and eating crepes, french fries, and fairy bread (traditional Australian snacks for kids).

We would like to send out a big "Thank you!" to Jeannie Ballaci for donating material for our art projects, the Harrison family for donating outdoor plants and helping to fix broken materials in our classroom, the Guzman family for their donation of hooks, the del Rosario family for their fruit donation and the Solarz, Vallin, Malick-Rich, and Harrison family for donating ingredients for our many and various cooking projects. Thank you!

Thank you,  
Ms. Porshia & Ms. Sara  
 
Primary 3 Class 
Ms. Nina, Ms. Nicole & Ms. Jazmin,
  
Dear Primary 3 families,

It's officially Spring! The Primary 3 class completed a wonderful planting work with Mr. David Cody. They planted seeds of the Dwarf Teddy Bear Sunflower. Everyone is so happy to check it's growth daily and proud to see that their plants are already sprouting. This activity is good hands on experience in the botany curriculum. 

Speaking of curriculum, let's talk about zoology. The Primary 3 children and families had a fun and adventurous time visiting the Oakland Zoo! We saw giraffes, elephants, tigers, hyenas, sun bears and so much more! Children even had the opportunity to pet some goats and sheep! Because we are talking about the continent of Australia for our cultural unit for this month, we had a special train ride to Wild Australia! (courtesy of Mr. Darnell Bussey, thank you so much!) We saw Wallaroos and Emus that walked right beside our train! Thank you so much to the Bussey, Siv, Biggs, Tomasulo, Thong, Rodgers, Hu, Sadauskas and Wilds families for supporting us and making this fun field trip possible. You are all wonderful!

As part of the Australian unit, we are talking about the Great Barrier reef and the animals that can be found there. The children are making their own dioramas of this reef using old shoe boxes. Everyone is so excited to finish and see the outcome of their individual projects. 

The children are continuing to learn about taking care of their environment by making sure the classroom is in order, washing the lunch tables everyday and the importance of helping each other. We are also continuing to learn and practice Grace & Courtesy skills by practicing role playing for different situations and putting our new skills into action. The children are also enjoying a new outside work, shell washing. 

The students are creating various designs using Sensorial materials and doing extensions with the brown prisms and pink cubes, colored cylinders and knob cylinders. Of course, they still enjoy making their own 3D of the geometric solids by cutting some colored papers and taping it together. They are so creative! 

We continue to learn about the decimal system using the bead frame, golden beads and stamp game. Some children are also learning to skip count using the colored beads. We have a new important lesson which is the clock work. The children are learning how to tell time in hourly increments. 

Students are learning a new set of letter sounds: "q, w and j". The children likes to match the objects to it's initial letter sound and learn more words using the picture booklet for each letter sound. We are continuing to learn about word building using the moveable alphabet and picture cards. Some children are also learning about sentence building by writing a letter to their friends and families or simply practicing writing the sentences using the pink series and blue series. Some children have started learning about nouns and identifying the nouns in a sentence by drawing a black triangle on top of it.

A special science experiment this was inflating a balloon with baking soda and vinegar. We talked about the chemical reaction behind it and learned a big word "carbon dioxide" in the process. Everyone had fun and is excited to take home their self inflated balloons. 

Thank you, 
Ms. Nina, Ms. Nicole and Ms. Jazmin 
ENCINAL CAMPUS 
  
Primary 1 Class
Ms. Alondra & Ms. Kwang  
    
Dear Primary 1 Parents, 

We have had a busy month and several new students have joined our class.  A big welcome to Benjamin and Andrew Will, Grey Shimek, Jett Lash, and Colette Tanasse.  We are currently focusing on the continent of Australia and will soon focus on the continent of South America, if you have items or books related to either Australia or South America please share them with our class. 
 
In addition to discussing the continent of Australia this month, we will soon begin studying insects. Our insect journey will commence during Spirit Week with one of my favorites, the butterfly. Check out our new butterfly works and visit with our resident painted lady caterpillars as students watch their extraordinary metamorphoses unfold in front of their very eyes.
 
P1 students recently created invitations and walked to our local post office to mail them for our upcoming "Grandparents Tea" on Friday, May 13th.  During our visit, students discovered the important role the post office serves within the community.
 
By popular demand in mid May we will begin a unit on dinosaurs. A field trip is scheduled for Thursday, May 26th to the University of California Museum of Paleontology at Berkeley. Parent participation is greatly appreciated, as we will need drivers for the field trip.  All hands on deck the more the merrier for this event. 
 
Ms Kwang began gardening with students.  They planted sunflowers and carrots and we all continue to marvel at how fast they are growing.  Students are leaning the parts of the plants and all pitch in to water and care for them.
 
Thank you again to the Cameron Family for providing delicious home baked muffins, yogurt, and kinetic sand. Ta (Australian for Thank-you) to the Elzinga family for the koala keepsakes, postcards, and Australia books that you so graciously shared with our class.  P1's wish list is posted above the sign-in.  Ms. Kwang and I are so grateful for your support and participation.  The Families of P1 Rock!  We cannot thank you enough. 
 
It is not too late to set up a reading date with our class.  Dimple Patel will soon begin working our art portfolios.  Marion Sigg has already agreed to lend her support.  We could use additional help for this project.  Please let me know if you can lend a hand.  

Thank you,
Ms. Alondra & Ms. Kwang 
 
Primary 2 Class - Spanish
Ms. Isabella 
 
Dear Primary 2 Parents,

We ended our farm unit with the wonderful animal, the horse ("el caballo"). The children learned about its body parts and what biological classification it belongs to. Consequently, the children have a clear understanding about the concept of the characteristics of a mammal, all in Spanish! 
We also had great fun with a horse art project of a multi-color relief printmaking.

The children learned botanical concepts about the seed and its parts ("la semilla"). They planted a pinto bean seed and they are following the cycle by watching the seed turn into a plant ("la planta"). In this way, they learned about the parts of the plant and how to take care of it.  

The continent for this month's cultural unit is Australia. We highlighted some principal ideas, such as the fact that the seasons there are opposite of ours, that about a quarter of the world's wool comes from there and that more poisonous animals live in Australia than in any other place! We also learned about Marsupials like kangaroos, wallabies, koala bear, possums and wombats.

For their Spanish vocabulary, they learned the Spanish words for directions:  up, down, right, left, in front and in the back. We played a movement game at circle time called, "Up, down, right, left, turn."

We have been working the Spanish words for various family members and the verb: "to have". They can now say three or four Spanish words in a sentence. The students are also enjoying braiding a bracelet of seven colors and attaching a button at the end. We are practicing for the Grandparent's Tea doing "Grace and Courtesy" as the children learn the importance of respect by listening and looking into the eyes of a person when they are talking to us.

Thank you,
Ms. Isabel 
MESA 

Ms. Fatma & Mr. Maharaj
 
Dear MESA Parents,

Children are continuing their working on Practical Life stitching and we have begun to see some finished products. They are also busy creating props for the play and practicing for the end of year show.

We introduced Geometry and the students are learning the names of various geometric shapes. They are working on multiplication with the bead bars, and the checkerboard for the older students.

Everyone is interested in learning about parts of the leaves, plants, fish and horses. The older students are also studying the many various types of leaves and their characteristics.
 
As part of this month's cultural unit, we are studying the map of Australia and the types of animals that can be found there. Thank you to parent, Paul Liotsakis who presented on how to reuse, recycle and reduce the resources that we have in our environment. He showed us some of his own work in an effort to develop awareness for these concepts with our students. Children had a chance to ask lots of questions and to share ideas. 

We are learning about different land and water forms, such as a gulf, strait, cape, lake, archipelago, system of lakes and peninsula. This is a great introduction to our Friday (4/22) visit to the beach and Visitor Center at Crab Cove. There,we will be given a presentation on "Creatures of the Bay."

We introduced the concept of family nouns to all of the students, and concepts in grammar like conjunctions and interjection (for older students). All of the students continue to improve their understanding of punctuation.  

the children are practicing many new songs and their different roles in the "Alice in Wonderland" play. They are also practicing ukuleles, violin and piano. Please help your child to practice these songs daily to be able to memorize them for the end of year show.
 
Strawberry Fields Forever - The Beatles (I couldn't find the actual song on You Tube, this a Beatles cover band playing it)
Up to the 2 minute mark:

 
Time Of Your Life  by Green Day:
 
and Rock Around The Clock by Bill Haley:
 
We would like to send out our "Special Thank You!" to Anna Bach-y-Rita, Paul Liotsakis, Sheri Smith, Carrie Henrichs and Steve Slater for all they have done. We need [arent volunteers to help draw, paint and make props with the students for the play.


Donation Request:
  • Towels for cleaning the class
  • White Velcro
  • 2 big fans for the room
Thank you,
Ms. Fatma and Mr. Maharaj
Music with Mr. Steve
     


The MESA class is learning so much music. They have 4 songs to learn for our "Alice In Wonderland" performance, including a choreographed dance to "Rock Around The Clock." They are learning how to fine tune both their ukuleles and their vocal lines on "I'd Like To Teach The World To Sing." 

The music demo at all campuses this month was electric guitar. Jason Countryman brought in a solid body guitar and a hollow body guitar, along with his pedal board and amp. He showed the students several various sounds that can be created with the electric guitar using all the different "stomp boxes" on his pedal board. He played a solo arrangement of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," and I accompanied him on "My Favorite Things." Then we rocked out to "Rock Around The Clock." What fun!
   
Thanks,
Steve
www.stevesdrum.com 
More Cute Photos
Spirit Week, Field Trips & Special Events


 
ANNOUNCEMENTS


Sending out several really BIG "Thank you!" to:
***Charlie Johnston for putting together a beautiful and fully functioning aquarium for the MESA classroom. 
***Sarah Cameron for helping with the Lifetouch order forms!
***Athena Zhang for helping with various project around the Encinal campus!
***All of the amazing parents who helped on Community Building Day. That was one of the most wonderful Community Building Days we have ever had.  It was well organized, well executed, nothing left out, so positive. Thank you to David Cody for your leadership, vision, willingness, connection and follow through. You all made it such a great day!  The music playing outside, children participating.
***James Ooey for painting the Taylor campus's Teacher's Lounge bathroom.
***Michelle DeVito for stepping into the Cultural Committee Chair position last minute.
***Celina Kamler for organizing the Book Drive and to all of the amazing parents who donated 57 books total! Yay!

  Thank you all!
Spring Photo Day this Thursday:
If your child is not enrolled on the weekday the photographer is scheduled for your campus, you may bring him or her at the scheduled time to campus and stay with your child until the pictures (including group picture) are completed. 
Encinal parents: if you normally pick up your child at2:30 pm, be advised that the pictures may take longer. Please let us know if you are not able to wait or pick up your child later on that day, so that we can plan who needs to be ready for pick up by 2:30 pm. Taking the class picture may take longer than 2:30 pm.
  
Committee Lists Posted: 
Please look over your information on the committee lists on the bulletin board.  Is all the information correct? Are you on the right committee list?  Please let us know what needs to get corrected.  We have left any duplication for you to confirm your chosen committee by crossing out the other listing.  Thank you!

Summer Camp Enrollment! 
Our Summer program brochure is now available.  Printed copies are in your parent folder. You can also download a copy from the website at http://thechildunique.org/forms  

Volunteer for the pre-Grandparents Tea preparation May 12
th:
 Volunteer opportunity for Grandparents Tea: making sandwiches for the tea - sign up on the bulletin board or see Sheri Smith at momofmica@yahoo.com and Brina Siv to find out how to help.

Don't forget to put your RSVP's for the Tea on the bulletin board by this Friday!

We will also need people to help move furniture - see Joshua Abraham (jabraham@alumni.virginia.edu) to help out.

We also would love any donations of sugar bowls, creamer server and spoons for the event.

TCU Alumni Teacher shares something cute: article  
Other Volunteer Opportunities: 
Fundraiser dinner: We will need parent volunteers to help in conjunction with Spring Performance - see Shawnee Keck (sbkeck@hotmail.com) to find out how to help.

Tech Recycling: We need someone to take some old CPU's to be recycled.   Contact the Taylor Office.

Help spruce up the Encinal Campus!  
If you are interested in helping with gardening (the front garden needs some TLC), please contact David Cody at david@upisf.com 

Carpentry projects, contact Tristan Flores at tflores777@gmail.com  
The staff lounge needs the bulletin board replaced, and the remounting of items in the bathroom after painting. Please contact Tristan Flores at tflores777@gmail.com if you can help.
Help with the Closing Ceremony!

Closing Ceremony in June is an important day for all our students.  We need parent volunteers to help buy materials and create washcloths, student portfolios, necklaces and certificates for the Closing Ceremony. You will be working with the Unique Collective, room parents and teachers. 
Please contact Joshua Abraham at jabraham@alumni.virginia.edu if you can help.   

Other: We need someone to research a new refrigerator for Encinal campus.  Please contact Joshua at:jabraham@alumni.virginia.edu  

Donation Requests:
*Do you have a large (4x6) rug you can donate?  Contact the office!
*We need research to find some engineered wood tiles to complete a project at Encinal. Contact Cindy if you can research it asap.
*Our storage unit needs several (6-7) new shelving with shelves that can hold large plastic bins, ~ 20 inches tall and 20 inches wide. 
* A photocopier for the Taylor office is needed.
 
Painting 
We need someone to volunteer to be the Painting Committee Chair for the remainder of the school year.  Please let the office know if you can help out, we really appreciate it and the Taylor Toddler Classroom needs some repainting!  Please contact the office to help with this project.

Thank you!
The Child Unique Montessori School & The Montessori Elementary School of Alameda (MESA)

Main Office:
2226 Encinal St./Alameda/CA 94501
(510) 521- 9227 /
(510) 521-9246 fax

Taylor Office:
1400 6th St./Alameda/CA 94501
(510)521-0595

thechildunique@yahoo.com