Klahanie School May 2023 Newsletter

Klahanie School

May 2023 Newsletter

I’m not saying we need to save the trees. I’m saying that we need to not overlook their capacity to save us. Put it in your yard and watch it for a while. And pick it carefully because it’s hard to get a tree going. You know if every seed turned into a plant, we’d be living in a very different world. So choose well and open your eyes to give it everything.

Hope Jahren, NPR interview April 29th, 2016 “Lab Girl”

May 2023 Curriculum Topics

Intersession days, no class sessions May 15-May 26th for teacher inservice and education days. Any content we do not get to complete in May, we will roll into June studies.

Harry Belafonte: the incredible work of service in activism for equity and civil rights as well as musician and actor. Calypso music and the Caribbean islands. Harry Belafonte | RFK Human Rights Harry Belafonte, Actor and Activist | National Museum of African American History and Culture , Harry Belafonte – Day-O (The Banana Boat Song) (Live) Harry Belafonte – Jump In The Line Shake, Senora [1961] Muppet Songs: Harry Belafonte – Day-O (Banana Boat Song) Classic Sesame Street: Harry Belafonte sings “Moyet” The Muppet Show: Harry Belafonte & Animal (Percussion Duet)
Kiyoshi Kuromiya Kiyoshi Kuromiya | Legacy Project Chicago

From the Zinn Education Project: On April 26, 1968, as an architecture student at the University of Pennsylvania, Kiyoshi Kuromiya and some friends held a demonstration against the use of napalm in Vietnam by announcing that a dog would be burned alive with napalm in front of the university library. Thousands turned up to protest, only to be handed a leaflet reading:

“Congratulations on your anti-napalm protest. You saved the life of a dog. Now, how about saving the lives of tens of thousands of people in Vietnam.”

Born in the Heart Mountain, Wyoming incarceration camp in 1943, Kiyoshi Kuromiya (May 9, 1943 – May 10, 2000) was a lifelong activist participating in several movements including the Black Freedom Struggle, the movement against the Vietnam War, the gay rights and later queer liberation movements, and AIDS/HIV advocacy.

Kuromiya spent the spring and summer of 1965 in the South fighting for civil rights, and became friends with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. When King was assassinated, Kuromiya helped take care of the King children.

Kuromiya participated with the Gay Pioneers in the first organized gay and lesbian civil rights demonstrations, “the Annual Reminders,” held at Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell each Fourth of July from 1965 to 1969. He was one of the founders of Gay Liberation Front-Philadelphia and served as an openly gay delegate to the Black Panther Convention that endorsed the gay liberation struggle. Diagnosed with AIDS in 1989, Kuromiya became a self-taught expert on the disease, operating under the mantra “information is power.” He founded the Critical Path Project, which provided resources to people living with HIV and AIDS, including a newsletter, a library, and a 24-hour phone line.

Learn more about Kuromiya from “You Should Know This Gay Asian-American Civil Rights, Anti-War, and HIV/AIDS Activist” by Juan Michael Porter II and from this remembrance video by friend Alfredo Sosa: KIYOSHI on Vimeo

Sock puppets & large puppet projects: starting to form stage design/ props, write scripts and acting. Please donate clean mismatched socks or socks with holes and other old clothing we can turn into multi-textile puppets.
Murals and Throw painting introduction. We use murals to begin forming our class Story boards that will have symbols of our time together in animals and images. These will be in front of the garage door to appreciate.
- Please dress kids in clothes you do not care about getting dirty or stained in the months of May, June and July.
Woodworking continues and dive in with tools.
Bumblebees, Mason bees with an all bee study
Botany up close: Using our classroom microscope (and sanitized in between each child’s use), we will scientifically honor the life growing around us. Both classes will get to use this tool in our downstairs class.
Phytoplankton3 Amazing Things About Phytoplankton
- Dr. Tag Gornall, we will be honored and to welcome as a special guest, one of the world’s foremost Marine Mammal Veterinarians. He worked with the heart and diving studies of Namu, the first orca in captivity. He worked with sea otters during the Exxon-Valdez oil spill and has helped design aquariums around the world.
- He has been the consulting veterinarian for the Seattle Aquarium, Pt. Defiance Aquarium, Woodland Park Zoo, and other national and international aquariums. He has had an amazing life and career. I now have a new passion for phytoplankton:)
Guinea Pig care: more intricate focus on care of animals in our domesticated opportunities and Pepper being our gentle and patient, kind classroom friend.
Environment deep cleans–mopping, soaping scrubbing of classroom spaces and tools inside and outside.
Marine Life Exploration: naming of shells and local seaweed and water plant and animal life. We begin clear conversations about beach awareness and marine life etiquette.
The Earth:
- Parts of the Earth
- Volcanoes and class science experiments!
- Cloud-Rivers of the Amazon Rain Forests: https://ideas.ted.com/this-airborne-river-may-be-the-largest-river-on-earth/ Think of the Amazon as equivalent to 50,000 power plants.
Introduction to Teamwork through jump roping, climbing, clapping-drumming, story spoken word and rhyming add-on games.
Serving Tea to Friends: harvesting herbs from the garden to invite and serve tea to a friend and Salad making from the garden
Continuing the gift of Listening awareness and practice in friendship conflict resolutions. Using the listening and observation tools in our tool belts to make the play longer by being kind and listening, children learn and practice bravely listening and speaking about the uncomfortable moments to find amends to resolution and collaboration to consent and longer play. We practice the period needed for a “plop down to listen” and be present, acknowledging what feelings and facts are being shared. And finally, and finding a trusting solution for the present and next time.

Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force. The friends who listen to us are the ones we move toward. When we are listened to, it creates us, makes us unfold and expand.

– Karl Menninger

May and June Specialist Visits & Thank you:
- Katie Simpson: Koko focus and baby chick visit
- Dr. Tag Gornall, one of the world’s foremost Marine Mammal Veterinarians
- Collin Veestran: DOVE Specialist / focus on Race discussions
- Toby Leibowitz: Flower Arranging-Bouquets for Senior Center

Reminders, Thank-Yous, Dates to Save

Intersession days, no class sessions May 15-May 26th for teacher inservice and education days.
No Class Memorial Day
Tie Dying: Please help this June! Thank you India Helena Alarcon, please contact her to help create a fun day for the kids June 7th!
Conferences Please feel free to come early and walk the garden, peek in the upper toddler classroom. Conferences will be held in the 3-6yr lower classroom. Conferences are for guardians only on Monday May 8, Wednesday May 10, Thursday 11.
2023 PIE AUCTION SCHOLARSHIP FUNDRAISER: Please help organize! Please contact Ellen Weir and Meghan McAuliffe for details. The school scholarships are fed by these fundraiser earnings. Klahanie School enrolls all economic varieties when seeking to be here, which means scholarships are always active and some years increased in need.
Community Messaging for our School: Thank you for sharing with the community that we enroll students from all geographic locations-on and off island, and admit families of (DEI) Diversity Equity and Inclusion foundation and welcome warmly all economic, cultural and ethnic backgrounds.
Enrollment and Spots Open, thank you for referring neighbors and family. Siblings encouraged and we have a sibling discount as well as collaboration of what can work for young families in schooling and commutes.
Please start carpooling! Keep finding ways to support each other through spring and summer.

April 2023 Reflection

Our class has leaped into the spring with enthusiasm and creativity in imaginative play and classroom material exploration as well as amazing recycling and earth conscious exploration through our own choices. The garden has taken new shape and inspired creativity in exploring play in the space as well as respect for the garden; hosting habitat to many insects (we have created Insect Hotels), arachnids, earthworms, beetles, garden snakes and birds. We began planting seeds and discussion of plant life cycle and plant care. With the increase of imaginative role-playing during garden time we will be introducing more performance encouragement on the garden stage and movement to theater moments and ideas of puppet shows. The swing area and obstacle course, and have offered many opportunities for hand and arm strengthening as well as balance and imaginative play.

2022-2023 Klahanie School Year Round Calendar: please take note of summer ending dates. Graduation is a graduation and closure of the school year at Klahanie School where we honor all the children graduating and a conscious, celebration ending to the amazing school year. Details will be sent in your July newsletter.

2022-23 Klahanie School Calendar All Classes.pdf

2023-2024 Klahanie School Year Round Calendar:

2023-2024 Klahanie School Calendar All Classes – 2020-21 Klahanie School Calendar.pdf

Butterfly Song

Ten little eggs all in a mound.

Out they will crawl, crawling around.

And then they will sleep and we know why, out they emerge as butterflies.

Butterfly, butterfly what lovely wings.

Flutter by, flutter by how my heart sings.

Butterfly, butterfly I’d like to know, when it rains, when it rains where do you go?

Niche In Nature

I’ve got a Niche in nature, no matter what you say.