Sonoma Charter School

Dear Sonoma Charter Families and Friends,

This year one of our teaching focuses is on math. As a teaching team, we are taking a look at our math practice through the lens of the Common Core Standards. “The Common Core Standards (CCSS) were developed through a state led initiative to establish consistent and clear education standards for English language arts and mathematics that would better prepare students for success in college, career, and the competitive global economy. The California State Board of Education (SBE) adopted the standards on August 2, 2010.“ (CDE website)

Standards will be implemented in the 2013 -2014 school year. The math standards are much better than the current curriculum standards we use to teach in California. One of the reasons I like these new standards is their incorporation of not only curriculum content, but practice of teaching and learning as well. Below is a list of the practices in math from the CCSS.

1. Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them.
2. Reason abstractly and quantitatively.
3. Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others.
4. Model with mathematics.
5. Use appropriate tools strategically.
6. Attend to precision.
7. Look for and make use of structure.
8. Look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning.

Josh Deis, a math curriculum specialist from the Sonoma County Office of Education (SCOE) is working with us this year to look at ways to begin incorporating these practices into our teaching at Sonoma Charter School. We have begun to look at new ways to assess students using a formative assessment called MARS that was developed by the Silicon Valley Math Initiative along with UC Berkeley and the Shell Centre in Nottingham, England.
Stay tuned for more information about our pursuit in excellence in math teaching further on during the year. Meanwhile, to learn more about formative assessments and the Silicon Valley Math Initiative, go to www.svmimac.org.

Dear Sonoma Charter Families and Friends,

Happy New Year! I hope that all of you had a wonderful break with
plenty of time to enjoy friends and family during the holidays.  I enjoyed every
moment of the time I had off, except the period when I came down on Christmas
Eve with one of the many illnesses the children so readily share with us at school!
Luckily I recovered after a couple of days and was able to enjoy the rest of the
break ‘illness free.’

Jeni Spencer has been leading the charge of the Hot Lunch Program for
the past few years. She worked hard to negotiate prices with local vendors in the
days when our lunch was provided by Grandma’s Pizza, Subway, La Casa and
Sonoma Bagel. Three years ago, Jeni got a call from Revolution Foods and began
to investigate the possibility of changing our program vendor to an organization
that provided more nutritious lunches for our community.  She contacted me
in the summer and I fully supported her endeavors to change our program to
Revolution Foods, our current vendor.

First of all, Jeni is ‘retiring’ after her long stint doing an almost full time
job as a volunteer for this program. This volunteer job is more akin to a full time
job, organizing the ordering of lunches, finding volunteers to fill slots to serve
lunch each day, filling out paperwork for free and reduced lunches, overseeing
deposits of money and trying to balance the accounts related to this program.
After doing it for many years, Jeni is retiring from this position at the end of this
school year. Although we have a parent interested in taking this position next
year, we, as a school, need to make some decisions about whether to continue this
program as it currently is running at a deficit of about $3,800.

Here are some pertinent details. Currently we serve approximately
57 – 70 lunches per day. Our population is 231, so that is only 25 to 30 percent
of our students, which is very low. In addition to that, we have 55 students who
are eligible to receive either free or reduced priced lunches every day – bottom
line we have only 2 – 15 lunches being paid for at the full price. What are the
prices?  Beginning January 1st, we increased price of Hot Lunch to $4 per lunch.
Formerly it was $3.85 per lunch.  We pay Revolution Foods $3.30 per lunch in
grades K-3 and $3.60 per lunch in grades 4 – 8.

The Federal Government reimburses us $2.77 for every free lunch and
$2.37 for every reduced lunch (parents pay the .40 extra) so although we recoup
some of the dollars spent, we still take a loss on providing such lunches.  Schools
are required to provide free and reduced lunches if there is a hot lunch program.  
Thus the dilemma – continue to provide lunches and run at a loss of at least $3800
or delete the program completely. I would love feedback from the community
on this and we will put this on the agenda for both the Governing Board and PTO
meetings in February. Meanwhile, enjoy having your kids back in school!  

- Paula 

Dear Sonoma Charter Families and Friends,

Recess is an important aspect of school at Sonoma Charter.  Whether
your child is in kindergarten or eighth grade, the minutes spent playing
and socializing with other students can have an affect on academic and
personal achievement. At a time when many schools are looking at
decreasing the amount of time students spend in PE and recess, our school
believes that both of these are key to our philosophy and practice of
educating the whole child.

Our students in grades K – 3 have three recess periods per day; those in
grades 4 – 8 have two. Acting as observer and at times on yard duty, I have
the advantage of seeing how our children spend their time at recess. Chase
games of all types are a favorite in many of the grades.  I recently watched
a game of tag, sometimes referred to as ‘blob tag.’ This game begins
with one student who is “it” and as they tag other children they become
part of the blob that tags other students until all are tagged but one. That
remaining student is now ‘it’ for the next round.

Cluster one students fill their recess minutes with kick ball games,
sand box building (lots of connecting tunnels this year), playing on the
structure, as well as many games that involve imagination and fantasy.
Cluster two and three students can be seen playing all sorts of ball sports;
it isn’t unusual to see basketball, baseball, soccer and football all happen
at the same lunch recess with the students being very adept at sharing the
field to accommodate all the games. At the same recess one can see four
square, wall ball, spider tag, as well as playing on the structure.  Some
of the older students hang out in the tree house and talk. Some students
choose to read or catch up on homework at recess; often math or science is
being worked on by eighth graders.

To read more about how recess is important, see the Curriculum Corner
page in this Update.

Have a wonderful week,
Paula Hunter

Dear Sonoma Charter School Families and Friends,

Thanksgiving is a time when we give thanks for all the good that is in our lives. We are thankful for friends and family, for the bounty in our lives, for having the food set before us at our Thanksgiving feast.

I want to take this time to thank all of the families for entrusting your children to the staff at Sonoma Charter School. Thank you for your partnership with us so that we can provide a wonderful school for the children. Thank you for stepping up to volunteer in all the ways that you do, day after day, throughout the year. Thank you for helping to fill the funding gap by supporting us through fundraising and donations.

Because of your dedication and support, our cup runneth over.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Paula

Director’s Cut

Dear Sonoma Charter School Families and Friends,

Happy Halloween! As we approach both the holiday and the annual Sonoma Charter School Halloween Carnival! I wanted to acknowledge how this day is so important for the children in our school and hope that you will work with us to be sure all the children enjoy this time of the year. This event is a blast and enjoyed by so many people in our SCS community and our neighbors residing in the Springs. Come along and enjoy the fun - bring your neighbors! Remember to keep the costumes friendly for those very young kindergarteners who might be frightened by something the older kids would enjoy. Save the blood, gore and fake weapons for your jaunt into the night on Halloween. Please don’t bring any semblance of weapons to school as part of a costume. We don’t want to have to confiscate these! The children will dress up on Monday, October 31st. We will do the traditional “Monster Mash” at morning ceremony and highlight the variety of costumes. Join us!

Communication is so important between school and home. We are constantly striving to make that flow work better for all the families in our school. The PTO has a Communication Team – they work with all of us at school to be sure the messages we want to get home are communicated in a variety of ways – Wednesday folders, weekly email blasts, website, email from teachers, white board outside of the office, one-call and coffee talks are a sampling of how we strive to get the message out to all of you.

A few things we ask of you. Decide which method works for you and be sure you read what we send home or read what we have online every week. Often schools hear that families “didn’t know” or “weren’t informed.” We try our best to inform you, yet we can only put the message out there – you as a family have to receive it in the manner that works best for your family. Let us know if something we send out isn’t getting to you or if you do feel out of the loop.
Just a few tips from the Director:

• If you have an issue or a problem, please go to the source first. Classroom issue? Speak to your child’s teacher first. If after speaking with the teacher you don’t feel the problem got addressed, then make an appointment with me to talk further about the issue. If after meeting with me you don’t feel the problem got addressed, speak to one of the parent reps on our Governing Board. The goal is to solve the problem and do so in a manner that ends up with all feeling it was addressed and resolved. I do practice and believe that “It Takes a Village.” Each of us can be a part of the solution rather than a part of the problem.

• What if I need some help from those in the office or if I need to meet with the Director? The goal of both the Office Manager (Molly) and the Finance Tech (Laurie) is to work with me to administer all the aspects of running a school. Assisting families is a part of that work

• If you need Molly or Laurie to do something for you please call and make a time when you can meet with them or come in and ask a half hour before the end of your child’s day (so between 12 and 12:30 or 2:30 and 3.) This time is actually less busy and thus would allow the office staff a chance to help you out.

• I keep my own calendar, so if you want to meet with me, shoot me an email or call me on the phone. I am making myself available on Friday mornings when the coffee cart is there. I am working on a trial of “Open Office Hours” as well, but that is difficult with the many things that pop into my calendar that are driven by outside forces. Stay tuned for more on that.

Thanks for all you do to help raise healthy and happy children!

 - Paula

Director’s Cut

Dear Sonoma Charter School Families and Friends,

This week I am going to share with you a letter written by Anabel Jensen, President of Six Seconds, an Emotional Intelligence organization that has its’ roots in the Nueva School where I worked for five years. This piece talks about the passing of Mary Laycock, a wonderful mathematician who worked with children and teachers for many decades. Marilyn Burns, renowned math educator, worked with Mary and got many of her ideas as a result of this work. I am sharing this letter not because of Mary, but because of the message about children that is in this letter. If you would like more information on Six Seconds and the work they do, the link is www.6seconds.org.

Have a wonderful week.
Paula


If You Want to Know What a Child is Thinking, Watch Their Hands
“I went to a funeral last week. Mary C. Laycock was a wonderful mathematician and teacher. I worked with her at Nueva School in Hillsborough, CA and knew her for many years.

Her students adored her and her ‘Mary’s Math.’ One lesson with Mary and you would develop an insight into math that would stay with you forever. She knew how to get people to put on their mathematical eyeglasses.

She knew how to help them see everything through a mathematical lens. She had the gift to transform students’ relationship with math.

Mary emphasized the beauty of understanding the process of mathematics rather than the importance of getting the right answer. If a child offered an answer to a math problem and it was incorrect, she would tell him that he’d provided the answer to a different problem. They weren’t wrong; they were simply stating the answer to a different problem. And then she’d state that problem. Just like that.

Wherever she went she saw math. If she were on a tour of a foreign city, instead of seeing the history, she would see tessellations. Instead of finely sculpted architecture, she’d see patterns and constructs. She coaxed people put on their mathematical eyeglasses gently and creatively.

She had a sign up in her office.‘If you want to know what a child is thinking, watch their fingers.’ When Mary watched a child’s fingers, she would see they needed to sketch. Or build. Or design something.

When I watch a child’s fingers, I see they are excited or anxious or frustrated or determined. Like Mary, I want to help people put on their emotional intelligence eyeglasses. I want to help them see that emotion is in all things—and that it is everywhere and always present.

Emotional intelligence leads to richer relationships—more productive relationships. It is the lens through which we make more of our families, our communities, and ourselves. By observing, creating, and strengthening our relationships, I believe we can reach a potential barely tapped right now.

So let’s start. Put on your emotional intelligence eyeglasses. Begin watching other people’s fingers. Start seeing patterns of behavior and connection. And we can begin to transform our personal world. “