SpArKs News
Spring 2016 Edition - Special Area Kids Newsletter
Welcome to our trimester newsletter!

SpArKs Night!
Come join us for a night of fun and learning.
When: May 16, 2016
6:00-7:30
Where: Horace Mann Elementary School
Come see your child´s art work displayed. Come listen to the beautiful voices of the chorus. Come to the library to celebrate our One School, One Book initiative. Play some Spanish games and rock out on the blacktop!
4th and 5th Grade Ads Recently the 4th and 5th graders designed advertisements for local businesses. We learned all about what makes an ad successful and then the students applied their newly learned knowledge to paper via pencils and sharpie. 20 Mann students had their advertisements showcased in the Wednesday Journal! Great job! | 1st Grade Cupcakes 1st graders recently learned about Wayne Thiebaud and his wonderful dessert paintings. Using terracotta clay, the students sculpted cupcakes and added all sorts of fun toppings!!! The students used acrylic paints to finish the cupcakes and oil pastels to create a backdrop. Who's hungry?! | WSCAE Student Art Expo 2016 On April 23, 2016, the Cheney Mansion will host the 2nd Annual West Suburban Consortium of Young Artists Expo! Come see artwork from the fifteen districts that make up the West Suburban Consortium for Academic Excellence, including OP97! For more information, visit http://wscaeartist.weebly.com/ |
4th and 5th Grade Ads
1st Grade Cupcakes
Who's hungry?!
WSCAE Student Art Expo 2016
Excellence, including OP97! For more information, visit http://wscaeartist.weebly.com/
Author Visit - Michael Hall K-2 kids got to learn all about what an author does from our visit with Michael Hall, author of Frankencrayon! | Famous Author! 3rd - 5th graders received quite a treat when Chris Grabenstein came to visit kids in grades 3-5. | Pop up Maker Space For Valentine's Day the media center became a pop up space to make pop up valentines! |
Author Visit - Michael Hall
Famous Author!
Second graders used the Mann Patent Office! The Mann Patent Office has been very busy these past few weeks approving and denying patent requests for second grade inventions! | Zootopia and Aristocats! Mann Kids received a HUGE award for our reading challenge - we got to go the movies! K-1 saw the classic Aristocats and 2-5 went to Lake Theater for a private viewing of Zootopia! It was an AWESOME day!! | A Twin Affair! Our Spring Reading Olympics team turned out to be made up of twins...get this - Lily Rose, Jacob, Nick, and Mrs. Rolfes --- all twins!! |
Second graders used the Mann Patent Office!
Zootopia and Aristocats!
One Book, One School!

Big Hearts and In the Cool of Winter February was full of music for our first and second graders. Thank you to our 1st graders for their special musical Valentine. Our second graders followed up with a winter concert featuring their musical performance of "The Mitten" by Jan Brett. Videos are available on our Music Blog :) | 25th District 97 Choral Festival Our Mann Chorus performed beautifully at our District Festival! We had the opportunity to work with composer Paul Carey who was commissioned to create our finale number. 834 singers performed at the concert! Click here to listen to the music. | Jamaica Bound and All Things Pirate! Our 4th graders are heading to Jamaica for their performance Thursday, May 12 with the story of "The Cat and the Rat". 5th graders are creating ALL THINGS PIRATE. We've pulled out our swords (yard sticks) and buckets for their performance Tuesday, May 10. |
Big Hearts and In the Cool of Winter
25th District 97 Choral Festival
Upcoming Performances - Don't miss the chance to see our children shine!!!
Tuesday, May 10 - 5th Grade "All Things Pirate"
8:20 Ms. Pryor's & Mr. Rollo's Classes
9:00 Ms. Moncatch's & Mr. Hayward's Classes
Thursday, May 12 - 4th Grade "Music of Jamaica"
8:20 Ms. Datz's & Ms. Diviacchi's Classes
9:00 Ms. Chrystall's & Ms. Germanier's Classes
Monday, May 16- 2nd Annual SpArKs Night - Special Area Kids - 6- 7:30 pm at Mann
Art - PE - Library - Spanish - Music
3rd Grade-Whitley We have learned to ask where did you go, yet we also learned how to respond. We worked on a short story about some animales. We are currently working on a different story about an estudiante loco. Please visit my blog for more information. | 4th Grade We have been having a lot of fun learning about mi amiga Maria and acting out her vida loca. However our main focus has been traveling. We learned how asked were something is and even how to order pulpo(octopus). | 5th grade Fifth graders read 5 chapters of a book called Brandon Brown wants a dog. We had a lot of fun learning about Brandon, his family and his problems. At the moment we are working on short stories. |
3rd Grade-Whitley
4th Grade
3rd-5th Homework
During this last trimester we are turning homework and classwork around! Students now have to complete one nugget of Señor Wooly every week. Ask you child to show you what this is and how it looks like. They love Señor Wooly I hope by know you have heard about some of his most famous characters like Billy la Buffanda and la chica con Las Excusas.
Please visit my blog to get up to date information about your student(s) specific learning.
3rd Grade Spanish~Ms. White, Ms. Peterson and Mr. Zander!
¡Hasta Pronto!
Ms. Domilick and Ms. Pecora's Spanish class
First Grade In first grade we learned about a unit called Invierno Permanente ~ Permanent Winter. | Animales We learned the names of popular animals that live in the artict or live in cold places. We practiced by illustrating using the application Nearpod. | Libros We used and read books to learn more about the topic and we practiced vocabulary about weather, colors, foods, type of animals, climate and places were these anilmals live. |
Animales
Sra. Aguirre will be on maternity leave for most of the 3rd trimester!
This year time is flying by in our Spanish Class. As some of you probably have heard from your little ones, señora Aguirre is expecting her first baby boy! I am already anticipating and preparing myself for how much I am going to miss seeing my students once the baby arrives, however I am going to try my best to come visit or do a virtual visit through Skype, FaceTime or Google Hangouts.
Ms. Claire Turner will be taking over as the Spanish substitute teacher. We will work together to make this transition as smooth as possible. Let me share a little about Ms. Turner, she graduated from Knox College with majors in Elementary Education and Studio Art with a minor in Spanish. She studied abroad in Barcelona, Spain at the University of Barcelona. She also spent her first year teaching on the Navajo Reservation and stayed in Arizona two more years teaching at rural schools. This is her fourth year teaching. She has experience teaching Spanish to Kindergarten through 8th grade. She loves dogs, fútbol, and art. If you need to contact Ms. Turner, please do so at: cturner2@op97.org
What an exciting time for all of us! If for any reason you need me, or would just like to check in, please continue to contact me at my school email address: laguirre@op97.org. I will try check my email as often as possible. If all goes as expected, I plan to return after May 30th.
Thank you for all your support!
Sinceramente,
Señora Aguirre
Heartland Adventure Kids-red blood cells , travel around the body picking up the oxygen in the lungs and delivering it to the brain and other organs. We learn about heart, it's chambers and valves, aorta, pace maker and coronary circulation. We measure heart rate during the workout and try to understand why and how it changes and feels. | Amusement Park-The Business World Make money running laps, spend it paying for tickets to get in just to play more, or just keep earning . All have to pay taxes! In K good enough if you can handle the bills:))) | Gymnastics- All Time Favorite Incredible talents developed in local gymnastics clubs never go by unnoticed. |
Heartland Adventure
Amusement Park-The Business World
What is coming...
Color Run for Respect Sunday April 24th, contact Sue Hoyer at shoyer@op97.org
3rd Grade Fun Run Poster contest.
1st week of May, Fitness Week with Bike to School Day and ACES black top dance on Wednesday, May 4th and Fun RunWednesday, June 8th Olympic Day
