Monica Ros School

Dress Rehearsal at 10:30am
Musical and Potluck at 5:30pm

Blue Room News
March 29, 2010

Dear Blue Room Families,

We are deep into our study of dinosaurs and loving every minute of it. We are learning dinosaur names, what they ate, and when they lived. We have correlated the bones in our bodies with fossils from dinosaur bones. We have made “authentic” Tyrannosaurus Rex teeth and have also made our own fossils. We will be measuring dinosaur sizes with a 100 foot tape measure! The Blue Roomers were astonished to learn that a Tyrannosaurus Rex would completely fill both rooms in our classroom and is twice as tall as our Blue Room ceiling! We will be talking about paleontologists and how they look for fossils. The Blue Roomers are looking forward to sharing their knowledge with you at the Science Fair!

Monica Ros Science Fair is Wednesday, March 31st in the evening from 5:30 to 6:30. Please try to attend. This is a wonderful chance for your child to show you what they have been learning in our classroom. You can also visit all the other Monica Ros classrooms and see what they are doing. The kindergarten will be displaying their newly learned knowledge about chickens and egg hatching. The older grade schoolers discuss and display their individual science projects.

We want to extend a huge “Thank you” to those of you that worked on our two beautiful art auction projects! Gamyn del Nagro created the lovely Blue Room quilt with every child’s self portrait and the most amazing coordinating fabrics. Because there was only one quilt that could go home from the auction we will put a quilt photo in your child’s end of the year journal along with their own self portrait that went on the quilt. The amazing Blue Room Children Alphabet Poster was available as a framed poster at the auction but it is also available as an unframed poster on the Monica Ros Online Auction site which can be reached from www.monicaros.org. Thank you to Tami Winbury, Bridget Fabbian and Bridget’s mom; Olga Moll for the fabulous poster idea and all the hard work they put into it!

Again, thank you to Kara Hooper for setting up Scholastic Book ordering online! It is so easy to order now! If you have questions please ask us!

Spring Break is April 5th through 9th! Have a great vacation! Please take note that there is DAYCARE only until 1:45pm on April 2nd!!!

Thank you for your wonderful children!

January 7, 2010

Dear Blue Room Families,

Welcome back to school! We hope you all had a wonderful holiday and a Happy New Year! The Blue Room children were so happy to be back at school to see their friends, teachers and classroom.

We are excited to welcome Karis to the Blue Room, her sister Ava to first grade and their mom, Roya. We are so happy to have them join our Monica Ros family. Please add their address to your parent handbook:

Next Tuesday, January 12 from 5:30 to 6:30 we will be hosting “A day in the Life” at Monica Ros School. This evening gives you an opportunity to visit the Blue Room (from 5:30 to 6:00) and experience a portion of a school day just like your child. At 6:00 you will visit the classroom that your child will be going to next school year. Your child will be your Blue Room guide so please bring them with you!

January 29th is Founder’s Day. This would be Monica Ros’ 109th birthday! Parents, family and friends are invited to enjoy this wonderful whole school assembly which takes place on the black top. If your child does not attend school on Friday, please join us in the classroom at 9:45. Each class presents a song or a poem in honor of Mrs. Ros and then we have some birthday cake. It is a great show and one of the only times you can see the whole school in action. This is also the final day of the Monica Ros Art Gallery in Meyer Hall. (Your child will have art displayed.)

January promises to be a busy month. Please save these dates:

January 12th Tuesday 5:30 to 6:30 A Day In the Life

January 18th Monday – No school Martin Luther King Jr. Day

January 27th through January 29th Art Gallery open

January 29th – Friday 10:00 a.m. Founder’s Day

Please remember to park on the street or in an actual parking spot during drop off and pick up if you walk in the gate even if it is for just a moment.

Scholastic Book orders will be due back on January 15th! Thanks, Kara!

Sincerely, Diana and Nancy

September Blue Room News

Dear Parents.

Welcome to school. Our first few weeks have gone wonderfully! Your children are learning so much: how to be a good friend, the bike rules, Blue Room routines, and cleaning up after they play to name just a few. They do love to play! We have a strong contingency of block builders, sand diggers, puzzle doers, kitties, imaginary families and stick horse riders! Imaginary play helps develop social skills that lead to success later in life. We have had Spanish with Senorita Carlson and dance classes with Mrs. Hamann. We are creating our classroom rainbow as we learn about colors, color mixing and shapes.

When the weather was so incredibly hot we purchased an Arrowhead water bottle for each child. These water bottles were filled as needed. We now have a break from the heat but we would appreciate it if you could provide a water bottle for your child that can be sent home, cleaned and brought back to school the next week. We are encouraging the children to drink water daily and having a water bottle has helped immensely.

There have been many children coughing in our classroom. We have been teaching them to cough into the crook of their arm instead of their hands or into the air. We are washing our hands regularly and using tissues as needed. If your child is sick, please allow them that extra day at home before returning to school.

Attached is our first Scholastic book orders. They are a wonderful way to increase your home library at very little cost. Thank you so much to Kara_Hooper for volunteering to take care of the book orders for us!

If you ever have any questions please ask!

April 20, 2009

April Blue Room Newsletter
Dear Blue Room Parents,
Can you believe how time is flying??? We have six weeks of school left! The Blue Room children are so busy, happy and content that we don’t want it to ever end! They are busy building, writing, drawing, doing puzzles, exploring all the science in our classroom and working hard at being good friends to each other. It is a wonderful!

Dinosaurs have once again become extinct in the Blue Room. We are still busy hammering, chiseling and brushing at the dinosaur “fossil”. The Blue Room Paleontologists will continue the excavation until we recover the fossil from its “Jurassic rock”. The Blue Roomers were very enthusiastic dinosaur learners and to extend our study we learned about volcanoes after we returned from spring break.

For the rest of the school year we will be exploring the world of nature. We will be learning about interesting reptiles, snails, bugs including crickets, millipedes and pill bugs. We are hoping to observe life cycles in action with both frogs and silkworms. We will empty our worm box and observe the red wiggler worms that we have been feeding all year. Mrs. Luboff’s ball pythons will come back for another visit. If your child has something from nature that would be of interest we would love to see it.

We are quite excited about our field trip this Wednesday, April 22. Thank you, those of you that have already let us know that you can drive! Many permission slips are still missing. If for some reason your child’s slip did not get home we have extras. Please send your child with a water bottle and an ice pack in their lunch because it may be very hot! Also, please send your child to school with a good application of sunscreen on.

The Blue Room Musical (aka the class play) has been scheduled for Wednesday, May 20th at 5:30. We are hoping the early evening time will make it easier for parents to come; siblings, grandparents and other important people in your child’s life are also invited. We hope every Blue Room child will be able to be here that evening because it is such a great experience to perform in front of a wonderful and loving audience! We will have a potluck style party after the play. Look for a sign up sheet for setup, clean up, food and paper goods coming soon We will keep you posted as it all comes together!

We are sending home several Scholastic book orders with this newsletter. Thank you to Aly_Grigsby for volunteering again to take care of the whole ordering process for us!

If you have questions about anything please ask us!

Fondly, Mrs. Luboff and Mrs. Klimbal

February 9, 2009

Dear Blue Room Families,

We hope all the Blue Roomers are snuggling and cuddling with their very special quilts. If you missed the beautiful display in the Art Gallery in Meyer Hall, we do have the posters that document the historic month of “How we made 19 quilts with 19 children in 21 days” hanging in our classroom for everyone to enjoy. Thank you to Mrs. Swan for sewing the quilts together, Ella and Ashlyn’s Gram, Robin, for tying the quilts with the children, Mrs. Coleman for her advice and Mrs. Hardenbergh for her support.

We would like to welcome a new family to Monica Ros School! Lorenzo has joined the Blue Room and his brother, Gino, has joined the Green Room. Lorenzo will come to school on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. They just moved to Ojai from the Seattle area!

Our Valentine’s Day Party will be held on February, 13th after lunchtime. Thank you to Tonya_Peralta and Rachelle_Giuliani for planning the festivities! If your child does not come to school on Friday they may join us. See the other side for our Valentine list and more information.

Thank you to Ally_Grigsby for doing the Scholastic book order for us. Thank you to Kara_Hooper for coordinating our classroom art auction project and Rachelle_Giuliani for putting together the classroom art basket for the auction.

Fondly yours, Mrs. Klimbal and Mrs. Luboff

Dates of Importance:
February 16 – 20 No School “Presidents Week Holiday”
March 1 Monica Ros Family Hike
March 7 Monica Ros Art Auction, Adults only

January 8, 2009

Dear Blue Room Families,

Welcome back to school! We hope you all had a wonderful holiday and a Happy New Year! The Blue Room children were so happy to be back at school to see their friends, teachers and classroom.

January is Arts Month at Monica Ros School. In keeping with our Western theme we are going to explore the process of making a quilt. The children will enhance their math and literature skills as they pattern with quilt games, color quilt squares and patterns and listen to heartwarming quilt stories. Each Blue Room child will create their own small quilt which will be displayed at the Monica Ros School Art Gallery on Thursday January 29th and Friday January 30th in Meyer Hall. The art gallery is held in conjunction with Founder’s Day on January 30th.

The Blue Room is filled with pets to love and care for. The Blue Roomers have been busy walking, feeding and cuddling the puppies and kitties that filled the house keeping area over the vacation. Everyone is eager to share the stories of their pets and we will do a fun journal page about pets. Mrs. Luboff’s snakes “Monty” and “Jaws” will be coming to “play” with the Blue Roomers and we will invite other pets to come visit.

We have had some visitors in the Blue Room from time to time which your child may tell you about. Students from Thacher School volunteer to come to Monica Ros School to play and work with students on a weekly basis and we have been lucky enough to have two great students join us this year. Also Monica Ros Alumni and former Blue Roomer, Elizabeth S has been joining our classroom every Tuesday afternoon much to our enjoyment!

Thank you for sharing your children with us!

Fondly, Diana and Nancy

This just in!!! Amy from the Humane Society will be coming to the Blue Room Friday, January 16th at 11:30 to share some animals and pet education with us! All Blue Roomers are welcome!

P.S. Please return Scholastic Book Orders by Friday, January 16th! Scholastic books are a great way to expand your home library!