At the end of January, The Harker School had a pajama and book assembly at which pairs of pajamas and books were donated to The Pajama Program, who will give them to children living in shelters in the San Jose area.
Before the assembly started, friendship and caring among the Harker students was emphasized by a visit between the Eagle Buddies. Each grade 3 student is matched with a grade 10 “buddy,” and on this occasion, the buddies spent nearly half an hour before the assembly talking and catching up with each other.
The rest of the lower school students then filed in for the assembly. Pallie Zambrano from The Pajama Program came to pick up the donations – 425 pairs of pajamas and 475 books in all – and explained the importance of them, and what they mean for children living in shelters. She told students that Harker has donated more than 1800 pairs of pajamas over the last five years. Following her talk, Butch Keller, upper school division head, performed a lively reading of the book “The Spiffiest Giant in Town,” a story about a giant who gives his clothes to those in need.
The assembly finished off with all the students reading. The Eagle Buddies paired up again for the grade 10 buddies to read to their grade 3 buddies.
Joe Connolly, dean of students K-5, said the event was “lots of fun. It was special to see the interaction between the big buddies and little buddies. The 3rd graders look forward to the times they get to spend with their big buddies. They were so excited all week and they told me they had a great time.”
Members of the grade 6 choir “Dynamics” traveled to the lower school on Jan. 13 to present interested fourth and fifth graders with a taste of what to expect in middle school, and to drum up interest in taking the choir elective. The sixth graders, dressed in their bright blue Dynamics shirts, worked with the lower school students on tongue twisters with choreography to better enunciate while singing. The middle school students also performed a choreographed song, with the younger students dancing and singing along with them.
While grade 4 and 5 is a more traditional choir, Dynamics is a very high energy show choir, bearing some similarities to musical numbers on the television show “Glee.” “Every year I have sixth graders coming to me saying they wished they had signed up for choir, but they did not realize it was going to be so much fun,” said the group’s director, Roxann Hagemeyer. Based on the energy and laughter seen on Jan. 13, that may not be a problem next year.
On Dec. 10, four lucky Harker students enjoyed a whirlwind day in San Francisco with two of their favorite teachers. The grade 5 students, Arushee Bhoja, Devanshi Mehta, Nikhil Dharmaraj and Ayush Pancholy, won the trip at the Harker Family & Alumni Picnic auction on Oct. 9, where fun and silly teacher packages are auctioned off every year.
Accompanied by teachers Pat Walsh and Kate Shanahan, the excited students rode a cable car, visited AT&T park, North Beach and Chinatown, where the fortune cookie factory was deemed “awesome.” Said Shanahan, “The kids got a special kick out of where we stopped for dessert on the way home – a famous drive-through convenience store in South San Francisco!”
All in all, it was a fantastic day, full of memories and laughter.
On Jan. 20, the lower school celebrated the success of this year’s pajama donation program and book drive with a special assembly, during which all the students wore pajamas. This year, 425 pairs of pajamas and 475 books were donated to families in need. Pallie Zambrano, co-president of the Northern California chapter of the Pajama Program, congratulated the students on their accomplishment, noting that in the last five years, Harker has donated more than 1,800 pairs of pajamas.
The assembly also had some special visitors from the upper school, as grade 10 students visited their grade 3 friends in the Eagle Buddies program. The sophomores, also wearing pajamas, sat down with their third grade friends, and each pair or group read a book that the grade 3 student chose for the assembly.
Butch Keller, upper school head, then read to the students a book call “The Spiffiest Giant in Town,” which fittingly enough tells the story of a giant who offers his clothes to those in need.
Grade 5 mathematics teacher Pat Walsh arranged to spend the day at Menlo School in Atherton, observing the the grade 6-8 math classes. In addition to seeing some “excellent teachers,” as Walsh said, and getting inspiration for some ideas he nows plans to implement in his own classroom, Walsh spent a period with his former student – now a teacher herself at Menlo School – Jennifer Gray Glasser, who attended Harker through grade 6, Walsh estimated. Not only was Glasser his student, but her mother, Peggy Gray, was an administrator at Harker for a few years back in the ’80s, Walsh said.
The class Walsh sat in on was of grade 7 students, who he described as “captivated.” He went on to say, “It almost brought tears to my eyes watching my former student lead her kids through a beautifully designed lesson.” He also noted that Glasser will be taking over next year as Menlo’s middle school director.
The Harker School’s lower school has two teams of grade 3 students competing in First Lego League (FLL) this year. FLL comes out with a new challenge every September based on a real-world topic involving science, and each challenge has three parts: the Robot Game, the Project and the FLL Core Values (which center around teamwork and gracious professionalism). In September 2011, the Food Factor Challenge was announced, and students at the lower school formed two teams (which can each have up to 10 students), named Robo Creators and Mindstorm Mastermind.
The project these two teams are exploring this year is food safety; they must investigate their food and find one way to improve its safe delivery to them. Recent scares around food safety, including the Listeria contamination in cantaloupes that led to 15 deaths in the U.S., were front and center for the two teams in early October, as they visited the Elkus Farm in Half Moon Bay.
The teams were exposed to organic farming techniques, food safety issues around animals and livestock and possible cross contamination sources in mixed environments. In addition to some serious discussions on food safety the kids had tremendous fun feeding chickens, goats, horses and numerous animals on this trip. As more than two thirds of the U.S. food supply comes from non-local and even international sources, better understanding and insights into these solutions via research from more than 200,000 children in 55 countries around the world in this year’s FLL competition will hopefully prove invaluable to this effort. FLL also hopes the project exposes students to new areas of science and technology, and introduces them to career options they never would have thought about.
Starting with a scrimmage in late October, the Robot Game portion of the challenge really got underway. To participate in the Robot Game, teams must program an autonomous robot to score points on a themed playing field. The lower school’s two teams were split into two different tournaments so that they don’t compete against each other. On a weekend in mid-November, Mindstorm Masterminds spent a full day at their regional qualifier tournament. According to team coach Jyoti Baid, “they had an amazing time,” and walked away as champions. They’ll now go on to compete at the state level. Part of their qualifying tournament involved a closed-door interview about the robot’s design. Baid says the students “walked in, promptly set up their gear, did a great job with the interview questions and behaved extremely professionally as a team.” By the end of the event, the head judge had announced that Mindstorm Masterminds was at the top of each category. They also ranked in the top four at the tournament for their robot’s design.
The following weekend, Robo Creators competed at St. Lawrence with an equally impressive performance, moving them to the state level competition as well. They had strong performances across all key areas, with the support of team coaches Jijen Vazhaeparambil, Gayatri Moorthy and Merwyn (Merv) Andrade. Andrade said the students had a “great day” competing. The team additionally won top honors from among the 15 teams competing for their innnovative research work on what they call a “Nitro Cabinet” to extend shelf life and prevent contamination of cherries.
Both teams will compete at the state level this month.
In mid-November, lower school teacher Jeannette Bhatia had Jan Pitcher, a local artist and author, come to her grade 3 science classes to share her Endangered Animals series, a printed series featuring endangered and extinct animals.
After talking to the class about endangered animals, a presentation that included the importance of recycling, Pitcher had the students do an art project. Following her presentation, students “each began researching an animal of their choice that lives in the United States,” said Bhatia. “Each child writes a summary about his or her animal and will later make a drawing of it. All of the written pieces and artwork are uploaded to Blurb, a website that will put all of the elements into an electronic book. Hard copies will be sent to some of our sister schools, and they will also be available for purchase.“
Pitcher’s impact on the class and their interest in endangered animals can be seen in letters students wrote to her afterwards. “You make me think about how every animal counts, and what we can do to help them,” said Andy Lee. Another student agreed, saying, “I did not realize how dangerous one plastic bag is.”
The students were excited to begin their research, partly, Bhatia thinks, because Pitcher’s presentation “was both inspiring and motivating.”
By Melinda Gonzales
Tandy Aye, parent of Emmett Chung, grade 1, put on a Chinese New Year party for Rita Stone’s homeroom in mid-January. The celebration included decorations, crafts, stories explaining the traditions of Chinese New Year and Chinese snacks including Clementines representing good luck and long life, pineapple cake and sesame crunch. The children also each received a traditional hongbao, or red envelope, containing chocolate coins and candy at the end of the party. “It was perfect, start to finish, and definitely enjoyed by all, including me!” said Stone.
In mid-December, The Harker School’s lower school completed a service project that resulted in presents under the trees of many families who would not have otherwise been able to afford them. Joe Connolly, the dean of students K-5, said that while the massive toy drive at the lower school was a grade 4 service project, most of the lower school families donated a toy.
Grade 4 students went above and beyond by not only donating toys, but also counting the toys and loading them up for delivery. At the end of the project, 809 toys were delivered to Sacred Heart Community Services (SHCS) in San Jose.
As Connolly said in an email to lower school families, “The volunteers at SHCS were thrilled with the donation. Your donations went a long way towards helping them reach their goal of making sure that every child has a toy to enjoy.” Including Harker’s donation, more than 16,000 toys were donated, then set up and organized like a toy store for parents of children in need to choose from, resulting in a very merry Christmas day.
On Dec. 13, with winter break nearing, lower school families filled the Bucknall Theater for the grade 1 holiday show. Titled “The Search for Old Man Winter,” the show featured students from every grade 1 homeroom singing holiday tunes such as “Old Man Winter,” “A Chubby Little Snowman,” “Take Me Back to Toyland” and “Winter Wonderland.” In between songs, groups of students narrated the show, and Joe Connolly, lower school dean of students, guest-starred as Old Man Winter.
The show was wonderfully directed by performing arts teacher Kellie Binney, with superb technical direction by technical theater teacher Danny Dunn. Accompanists Paul Woodruff and his wife, Toni, again provided great musical backing to the student singers.
After the show, with the spirit of the season fresh in their minds, families gathered in the lobby to socialize and enjoy holiday treats.