Vintage Oaks Horse Farm

On Wednesday we were lucky enough to have a special guest visitor join us - Benjamin's mother!  Mrs. Kenny-Berman joined us in the afternoon to share a presentation about her family's horse farm in Pennsylvania.  The boys and I were fascinated to learn more about horses, owning and riding horses, and maintaining a farm.  A highlight was passing around the real bridle, horsehoe, and bits.  The boys asked many good questions to find out more!  We certainly appreciate Mrs. Kenny-Berman taking time out of her busy day to come all this way to share with us.  What a treat!

 

Happy Birthday!

On Tuesday we returned from Spring Break just in time to celebrate Jeshua turning 8 years old.  Happy birthday, Jeshua!  We enjoyed celebrating Jeshua's big day with cupcakes in the classroom.

 

 

Springing into Spring!

We are ready for spring...and Spring Break! 

 

 

I*DID*A*READ

It's that wonderful time of the year...March Reading Madness!!

This year, our March Reading Madness challenge takes an exciting theme --

the Iditarod Alaskan dogsled race! 

Students are reading their way across the Iditarod trail (northern route), by reading a minute for every actual mile.  All students must make it through each checkpoint to reach the finish (and there are 25 checkpoints - one for each day of the month with an average of 30 minutes of reading every day except Sunday).  

What a fun way to push ourselves with our reading, and learn some geography at the same time!



 
This challenge requires 100% class participation and completion! If all classes in the entire Lower School complete the challenge, we will earn a popcorn and movie day!
Here is how we are doing so far in 8-2:

 

 

Pi Day! (3.14)

Calvert has a tradition of celebrating Pi Day at school and honoring this "magical" number with various pi/pie related activities.  Because the official Pi Day (3/14) is only a half-day of school for us, we held the festivities a day early this year. 

 

In Eighth Age, we presented pi to 62 digits, with every student holding up a digit they personally decorated.  Here are the boys of 8-2 sharing our section of this mysterious and awesome number:

Here we are as an entire grade, sharing pi with you.

 

 8s on Pi Day from Justine Forrester on Vimeo.

 

 Next, we all gathered in the gym to recognize the Ninth and Tenth Age students who memorized the digits of pi as far as they could. 

You will be astounded by the winning results!!

 

9s

1^st Isabelle 142 digits

2^nd Lauren  106 digits

3^rd Reese     94 digits

10s

1^st Caroline 132 digits

2^nd Coco      100 digits

3^rd Ellen       81 digits

 Any Ninth or Tenth Age student who memorized at least 20 digits of pi (which was 95% of Ninth Agers and 99% of Tenth Agers) was then entered into a raffle to be picked to toss a lemon merengue pie into Head Master Holmgren's face!

 

Here are the two lucky winners enjoying their moment.  What a good sport Mr. Holmgren was!

 

Mr. Holmgren Gets "Pi-ed"! from Justine Forrester on Vimeo.

Happy Birthday!

On Thursday this week we celebrated Justin's upcoming 8th birthday with a special doughnut snack!  Happy birthday, Justin!

 

 

Extreme Travel

On Tuesday this week we enjoyed a special assembly from Ms. Krebs, the Lower School girls' P.E. teacher.  Last summer, Ms. Krebs received a Calvert School funded grant to travel to New Zealand and explore the ways in which outdoor education is implemented in their schools.  Along the way, Ms. Krebs tried out some pretty extreme activities herself!  We were amazed by the various extremely high places from which she jumped.  We are glad to have her back safe and sound, and so appreciative of her sharing her experience abroad with us.

 You can see more photos from Ms. Krebs' trip here: http://calvertgirlspe.blogspot.com/2013_08_01_archive.html