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Happy weekend -
It's often hard during the week, with all the messages about calendar items and event reminders coming and going, to share the many wonderful Swain stories we experience each day.
Some of these make their way to our Facebook page, "News" section of our website, and/or our online photo gallery, "SmugMug". We encourage you to visit them often.
And we hope you enjoy this new communication, which we will send during the 'downtime' of the weekend - with the hope that you can spend a few minutes on this "highlight reel" of the previous week or two.
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Learning about Ghana
 Our school is pairing global awareness with a study of Peace symbols around the world. In Rogers' Commons we have three Peace Trees on the wall that the students will be involved in covering with diverse Peace symbols throughout this year.
Mrs. Aker and Mrs. Johnson's Prekinder-garten class is fortunate to have a mother who grew up in Ghana - Lorraine Frazer, Mom of Jade-Alexis. She prepared a wonderfully age-appropriate talk to share with the class and their fourth grade buddies about Ghana and African Adinkra symbols. She focused on the symbol called Mpatapo, representing reconciliation and peace. READ MORE...
iPad Demonstration
 Tiling. Khan Academy. Educreations. Fifth graders have a new set of resources on their iPads for math, spelling, art, language, and social studies classes, which they demonstrated on Wednesday morning.
After they gave short demo's of several app's (or programs), visitors could go to different stations for a one-on-one trial. The adults had one word for the iPads and the ways in which the students are using them: "Cool!" Peggy and Noel share a project they did in Art Class, and then replicated on their iPads with Pic Collage.
Sneak Peek
 Middle school actors and crew have been working hard the past few weeks - amid school closings and phantom snowstorms - to bring A Midsummer Night's Dream to the Swain stage. On Wednesday they gave us a preview of the show they presented this weekend, under the direction of theatre teacher Lindsay Quinn. From left, Mary (Helena), Ben (Demetrius) and Mia (Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazon). Click on the picture for more photos - we'll post the performance photos soon!
Mad Science
A n annual favorite is when Jake Fotopoulos (pictured far left, Dad of Calista '18 and Fiona '21) brings his Liquid Nitrogen demonstration to Swain.
He froze a hot dog, banana and ball in front of a spell-bound crowd - at the end of the demonstration he took milk, eggs, sugar and other ingredients and made them into ice cream. A fun snack, made instantly in front of our students' eyes! Click on the photo for more pictures in Mrs. McClary and Miss Zataveski's SmugMug gallery.
Helping in the community
 Students in sixth-eighth grades had the opportunity to go to four different organiza-tions out in the community, to lend assistance and support to their programs. It's a day to help, but to also reflect on what community service is - for the one giving it, and what it means for the recipient.
Above: Sebas - one of our three Guatemalan ambassadors - had his first experience doing community service at the Northampton Food Bank. He, fellow ambassador Karen, and Danny and Sam were given special recognition at the Middle School Town Meeting for their contributions to Community Service Day.
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Alumni News...
Did you receive your copy of Swain Matters in the mail this past week? If so we hope you noticed our expanded "Alumni News" section - if not, reply here and we'll be glad to add you to our mailing list.
We've also launched an expanded Alumni section on our Swain website, including profiles of three Swain graduates: Amy Inlander Minniti '95, Ivano Ventresca '00, and Alec Talsania '09. You may also enjoy the reflections by four families of Class of 2012 grads - our newest alumni! (The Alumni News pages from Swain Matters are also posted in this website section.)
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