Friday, March 31, 2017

The Truth About Space

The truth about space

Every few months, the second grade hosts a "publishing party" where the authors share their work with a diverse audience from the SWS community in order to get feedback as they find their voice. Also there's juice and cookies.

This time around the focus was on non-fiction and so Nora decided to share her vast knowledge of space (or "spae"), with a focus on our solar system. It's actually a pretty comprehensive overview, though her website intended to give your more information on global warming isn't currently operational -- we'll let you know once she gets that link up and running. 

We hope you like it!

(To view the chapters, please click here.)

Friday, March 10, 2017

I have a dream...

I Have a Dream - 2017
My biggest regret when we decided to move Owen from Watkins to SWS for the third grade was that it meant Owen wouldn't be able to participate in the longstanding Watkins' tradition of the fifth grade reciting Dr. Martin Luther Kings's, "I Have a Dream" speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. I'd watched videos of previous classes and always teared up, so knowing that Owen would miss out on the that experience made leaving the Cluster extra bittersweet. Little did I know then, but the teacher behind the tradition, Amy Wertheimer, would eventually join SWS's faculty and continue the tradition at SWS. Sometimes the universe throws us a bone.

So on a cold Friday March afternoon, the rain/sleet paused for a few hours during which the fifth grade classes of SWS, Logan Montessori and Ludlow-Taylor joined together to relive a piece of history. There is something incredibly powerful about seeing a diverse bunch of 10 and 11 year olds recite those words. And in times like these, where it feels like a new injustice is reported each day, being reminded of those words seemed all the more important.

Thank you to everyone involved that allowed us to share this moment. Let freedom ring.

(To see all of our, and some others' pictures we copied, please click here).

Wednesday, March 08, 2017

Trondheim

Norway

I'm not sure when I'll be able to travel internationally again for work on climate issues, but I did manage to attend this March the workshop in Trondheim that I helped to organize.  What was really exciting about this trip is that I was able to convince Nabeel to leave his Silicon Valley VC world for a few days to join me in Trondheim to talk about how the autonomous vehicle future he's involved in can impact the climate, and give us some good ideas about how to capture this possible future in our models.

The conference was great, and we had most of a day to explore Trondheim before it started on Sunday night (and that was probably more than enough time to see all the sights you really need to see in Trondheim during the winter ;-)  We saw the quintessential view along the river and the old bridge; the northernmost medieval cathedral in the world; the statue of King Olaf Tryggvason who 'slayed Thor' bringing Christianity to Norway (but we later learned was in turn killed by a bunch of Thor loving farmers); we climbed up the icy battlements of the Kristiansten Fortress; we wandered the streets of Trondheim; and we warmed up with hot chocolate and waffles.  All told it was a wonderful few days in Norway.

Norway

(click here for all the pictures)
(click here for Nabeel's pictures)