Howling at the moon

The day before rodeo vacation is always special for Kino primary students because it’s the day of the rodeo cookout. Students stay at school until seven o’clock. Under the palo verde trees as the sun goes down they do a little square dancing and a little roping, and roast marshmallow over the bonfire. This year they also made quesadillas, ate chips and salsa, and drank some sarsaparilla. After listening to stories in the twilight, they traditionally end the night howling at the moon.   

Rodeo inspires two weeks’ worth of primary Language Arts activities before the cook out. Mary Jane says,

“We started this year by reading western stories, like The Cactus Hotel. We took a field trip to Old Tucson, and then wrote about our experiences in our journals. Our music teacher, Lisa Otey, sang western songs with us. We learned about western folklore, clothing, customs, and food.”

Libby has a collection of hats, chaps, vests, scarfs, serapes, and boots so everyone can dress up in character.

If we needed to list the academic areas touched on by these two weeks, it would go on and on: listening to and reading stories, writing in journals, lots of drawing, dancing, music, cooking, history, folklore, the desert ecology, local heritage and other cultures. But there are also ineffable and unmeasurable lessons: relating, cooperating, taking turns, enjoying each other’s company, a firmer sense of the world and one’s surroundings, a sense that school is not only a welcoming place, but a magical one as well.

As Kolton says, “This is my favorite night of the whole year.”

It’s just a typical day at Kino, riding an elephant, and going up in the rigging of a pirate’s ship.

That is, when the typical day includes a trip to the Renaissance Faire.

Author Eleanor Davis talks about Kino in an interview here.

Kino just received news that it was awarded a Youth Garden Grant. This means we will receive a gift certificate for $500 to buy gardening supplies from Home Depot as well as educational materials from the National Gardening Association.  Big thanks to the National Gardening Association, which administers the grant, and Home Depot or providing the gift certificate. Chris says he already has plans for what to buy.

It’s not a smoking marshmallow — It’s a homemade sparkler!

Using iron, aluminum, magnesium, something else (I wrote it on my hand but it’s illegible), and corn starch as a binding medium,  Heather helped students make their own home brew sparklers in science yesterday. Luckily it was a sunny day today, so they could test them outdoors.

Today was Chae Young Kim’s last day at Kino, so her homeroom had a good-bye bagel party for her this morning. Young and her family live in South Korea, but they’ve been on an extended visit to Arizona. Young has been a Kino student since winter break, fitting in immediately.

This morning her fellow homeroom members showed how much they’ve enjoyed getting to know her this year and  expressed their wish that she can return to Kino someday.

Homerooms have been talking about what we should as a special, school-wide event this spring.  Last year we all made kites, hot air balloons, and paper airplanes and spent the day flying them. Other years we’ve had parades, Yawps, and, if nothing else, Clean Up Day.

Part of the fun is just brainstorming, when one is not limited to what is possible. Here are some of the ideas students have come up with so far:

levitating Kino

We've painted the basketball court before

a gigantic, school wide Twister game

a gigantic human pyramid, using everyone

a regatta of water proof paper boats

a regatta of mechanized couches

cook a giant pancake

paint a mural on the basketball court

make a giant Rube Goldberg machine

make a giant rubber band ball

a ping-pong tournament

a harvest festival for vegetables in the greenhouse

a multi-talents show, which could even incorporate some of the above ideas.

Heather's Math

One thing about trying to capture Pajama Day in photographs is that many of us look like we’re in our pajamas on ordinary days.

And then there’s Erik:

A younger student in afternoon homeroom: “Can I wear my pajamas tomorrow?”

“It is important to go to school. You learn to make heavy things with Ed and Judy.”

Junior high students spent last week in the Chiricahuas, where they hiked, played, figured out how to work together cooking and cleaning up, and generally bonded. Heather, Chris, and Martha (Em’s and Lela’s mother) were the grown-ups along on the trip.

When they were asked about memorable parts of the trip, students answered:

Max:    We went on a bunch of hikes. We took one hike by the creek where we all had a snowball fight.

Joel:     The Chiricahuas were really beautiful.

Lela:    When it snowed. I liked the creek.

Matt: When we looked at the stars.

Patrick:  The snow! And walking. We walked a long time. And we almost got stuck in the mud with the van.

Soren:  I thought the most memorable day was when we all got in the van and drove to a place by the river. There were huge trees and snow and we had a snowball fight.

Diego:  We had a snowball fight!

Stuart:    Playing in the snow and playing in the river. [Ed: "In the river? Wasn't it freezing?] Nope.  I was wearing cowboy boots so my socks didn’t even get wet.

Em:   It was very fun. I can’t believe it snowed!

Kaelan:  It was raining, so we went outside and wished and wished that it would snow. And it did! That was pretty cool.