Elementary School: Raising Bakersfield

Getting in Gear: A Back To School Survival Guide

Getting in Gear:

A Back To School Survival Guide

By: Hussein Hamed, Program Manager

Sylvan Learning Center

Despite the warm temperatures and sunny skies, many students are feeling a shadow looming as back to school season creeps closer. After weeks of lazy, summer days, late nights, varying routines and minimal mental stimulation, the return to school can seem overwhelming to students of all ages.

To help parents and children get ready for the new school year, Sarah Nance, Director of Education for Sylvan Learning Center in Bakersfield offers several tips to ease the transition from the beach to the classroom and jumpstart sluggish summer brains.

STUDENTS:

For many students, the first day of school doesn’t only bring new teachers and new friends - it can also be a source of anxiety with homework assignments and tests just around the corner. Starting the school year off on the right foot can help minimize students’ stress levels throughout the year.

Get Cleaning. A dirty, cluttered room is not conducive to studying. Get organized before homework starts piling up.

· Remove seldom-worn clothing.

· Pack away belongings not used on a regular basis.

· For smaller children, label areas so they can easily see where belongings should go.

Carve Out A Homework Spot. Whether it is in your bedroom, the basement, or a family office, find an area where you can work distraction-free and claim it as your official workspace.

· Pick a place that is always available and where you feel comfortable doing schoolwork.

· Stock the area with all of the supplies and tools that are needed to complete homework.

Get Organized. Organization is key to ensure you stay on top of the requirements for each subject.

· Use separate, labeled notebooks for each class.

· Create files for each subject. The folders can hold assignments, essays, handouts and notes taken during classes.

· Purchase a planner or calendar to keep track of important dates and deadlines.

Set Educational Goals. Whether it is striving for an A in a certain subject, handing in all homework on time or preparing for tests well in advance, setting goals can help establish a routine for the new year.

· Set goals that are measurable, specific, reasonable and have personal value.

Stay On Schedule. Minimize last minute cramming or deadline mix-ups by creating a detailed school schedule.

· Include all classes, assignments and key dates, such as project deadlines and test dates. Fill in new dates as they arise.

· Schedule specific times for studying, projects and extracurricular activities. The more thorough the schedule, the more helpful it will be to you.

Know The School. If you ever feel swamped with back to school madness, ask for help. Schools assist students with transitioning from one grade to another. Meet with your guidance counselor and/or teachers. If you are still nervous, ask your mom or dad to drop you off at school on the first day of class.

Be Adventurous. Step out of your comfort zone this school year by trying new things academically and in terms of extracurricular activities.

· Try every type of class and/or activity. You never know what your strengths are until you experience as much as you can.

· Challenge yourself. If you have the opportunity, take the hardest classes - not the easiest subjects.

· Ask questions. There is nothing wrong with not always knowing the answer. Asking questions is the best way to learn!

Think Positive. Yes, going back to school means homework and early mornings. It also means reconnecting with old friends, meeting new people, resuming fun extracurricular activities, learning more about your favorite subjects and improving on your last year’s performance.

PARENTS:

While the idea of waking up at the crack of dawn to prepare lunches, fighting over appropriate school attire and regulating the amount of television watched might have you frazzled, take solace in the fact that you can play a big part in getting your children motivated and excited to tackle a new school year.

Depending on your child’s age, your role in the above-mentioned tips will vary. The following are helpful ideas to ease kids of all ages back into learning mode:

Help Your Child Discover His/Her Learning Style. Because each child is special, with different learning styles and academic needs, it is important to personalize the learning process. People learn in at least eight different ways, according to the Multiple Intelligences Theory: visually, verbally, physically, mathematically, musically, naturalistically, through group activity or through quiet thinking time. Talk to your child’s teachers about your child’s learning strengths and how best to support them.

Get Back In The Routine. Ease the transition from lazy summer days to the structure of the school year by re-establishing bedtime, mealtime, reading and homework routines. Talk with your child about the importance of structure and how routines help ensure that he is not overtired or overly anxious about schoolwork.

Develop A Family Event Calendar. One of the most helpful tools for getting organized is a family event calendar. To ease the chaos, track school programs, volunteer work and after-school activities. Family time management is essential if you are going to avoid the tumultuous frenzy of disorganization.

· Depending on your children’s ages, this calendar can be on construction paper with large squares to write in all necessary information, or it can be produced on a white board so that it is easy to revise.

· If it is color-coded by family member, you can clearly see who has an activity scheduled and when the event occurs.

· Place the calendar near the telephone, so when a friend’s mother calls to invite your child to a birthday party, you will know instantly whether it fits within your family plans.

Purchase School Supplies In Advance. Avoid the last-minute rush by purchasing supplies at least one week in advance. Take your child. She can feel excited and in control by choosing her favorite colors and designs.

Be a Cheerleader. Encourage your child to share any concerns he has about returning to school. Reinforce positive feelings by talking with your child about learning and achievement. Support his academic interests and encourage him to get involved in extracurricular activities at school.

For more educational resources for children in grades pre-K through 12, please visit http://tutoring.sylvanlearning.com or call 1-800-31-SUCCESS.

Hussein Hamed is the Program Manager at the Bakersfield Sylvan Learning Center, the leading provider of in-center and live, online tutoring at home to students of all ages, grades and skill levels. With approximately 30 years of experience and nearly 1,200 centers located throughout North America, Sylvan’s proven process and personalized methods have inspired more than 2 million students to discover the joy of learning. Sylvan's trained and certified personal instructors provide individual instruction in reading, writing, mathematics, study skills and test-prep for college entrance and state exams. Sylvan helps transform unique kids into uniquely inspired learners with the skills to do better in school and the confidence to do better in everything else. For more information, call 1-800-31-SUCCESS, contact Hussein at hussein@bakersfieldsylvan.com or visit http://tutoring.sylvanlearning.com.

Bakersfield Schools Maps

Want to make sure that your kids are getting a great education? Want to know where the public and private schools in Bakersfield are located? Want to know school rankings and test scores? There are a number of online maps and resources that will help you better understand our local schools:

The School Rankings Map allows you to view the location and rank of local public schools. The map markers are color coded by school ranking. You can also click a map marker for more information.

On Great Schools.net, you can find the Schools Map of Bakersfield. This site also allows you to view Parent reviews, test scores and more.

Where will your students go to school? What school district are you in?
Find out more on the 2008 Kern School District Map!

Heroes revealed at bank speech contest

Discovery Elementary fourth-grader Rylee Smith, Stockdale Elementary fifth-grader Tiffany Yeh and Endeavour Elementary sixth-grader Andrew Beard emerged as Bank of America Essay and Speech Contest winners among 29 of the best essayist-speakers who competed in the annual event held May 8 at University Square in Bakersfield. Each convinced the judges they should be their grade level champion by delivering a three-to-five minute speech from an essay they had previously written on the topic, “Who Is Your Modern Day Hero.”

Approximately 600 Kern County students had written classroom essays on the topic. Each county English and language arts region could nominate only one classroom essay per grade level. The top 29 essayists, as determined by a panel of judges from the Kern County Superintendent of Schools’ (KCSOS) Curriculum, Instruction and Accountability department, were picked to compete in the speech portion of the contest. Bank of America’s South Sierra Valley Market and KCSOS sponsor the competition, which awards savings bonds in the amounts of $100 for first place, $75 for second and $50 for third.

Smith said priest, Father Craig Harrison, was her hero. A man who Smith characterized as “conducting at least eight funerals a week and at each one he finds a unique way to touch each person and ease their pain. He even adopted seven children when no one else would look after them,” Smith said.

Yeh said she picked President Ronald Reagan because, “He grew the economy and ended the Cold War. President Reagan signed the treaty to eliminate all intermediate nuclear missiles, and he told Soviet President Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall. Two years later it was torn down giving the East German people their freedom. He made our country stronger, prouder and greater than ever before, and that is why he is my hero.”

Beard picked Pope John Paul II as his hero. As Beard put it, “He was a man of peace who brought hope to all.” Beard talked of the pope as being the first to visit a Jewish synagogue in his efforts to unite all people, and how through his own life he “embraced suffering, regarding it as a gift.” The sixth-grade winner pointed out that the Pope even had love for the gunman who tried to assassinate him. Beard ended by saying, “He brought the power of love to a troubled world.”

Discovery Elementary sixth-grader Annie Bardet created some other drama. Bardet finished second in her grade level, narrowly missing out on becoming a winner in every category for every year she competed, having previously won as a fourth and fifth-grader. Other second place finishers were Columbia Elementary fifth-grader Madelynne Heiss, and Reagan School fourth-grader Manooshree Patel. Earning third place honors were Columbia Elementary fourth-grader Johnathon Cordova, Thorner School fifth-grader Annie Murrell and Thorner School sixth grader Jaci Victoria Brandolini.

2008 Bank of America Essay/Speech Contest Finalists

4th Grade
1st — Rylee Smith, Discovery Elementary

2nd — Manooshree Patel, Reagan School

3rd — Johnathon Cordova, Columbia Elementary

5th Grade
1st — Tiffany Yeh, Stockdale Elementary

2nd — Madelynne Heiss, Columbia Elementary

3rd — Annie Murrell, Thorner School

6th Grade
1st — Andrew Beard, Endeavour Elementary

2nd — Annie Bardet, Discovery Elementary

3rd — Jaci Victoria Brandolini, Thorner School

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Source: Bakersfield.com, May 9, 2008

And the nominees for Teacher of the Year are ...

The following teachers were recognized for their dedication and excellence at the 13th annual Teacher of the Year awards night:

Elvira Acosta, Garces Memorial High

Patrick Arvizu, Arvin High

Craig Austin, Centennial High

Sandra Bolen, Kern Valley High

David Braun, South High

Jose Castro, Liberty High

Thelma Chapman, Bakersfield High

Noelle Combs, East High

Richard Des Lauriers, North High

Elaine Dorlis, Thompson Junior High

Jamie Fast, Stockdale High

Jonathan Freehling, Washington Middle School

Susan Gay, Curran Middle School

Daniel Halbur, Foothill High

Brenda Hallum, Warren Junior High

Linda Jones, Tevis Junior High

Douglas Kelley, Frontier High

Shane Koerner, Sierra Middle School

Tina Kwon, West High

Amy Luther, Stonecreek Junior High

Kimberly McCalla, Chipman Junior High

Mike Nicholos, Shafter High

Jack Oliver, Ridgeview High

Jackie Phillips, Regional Occupational Center

Darren Willis, Highland High

Six $500 Humanitarian mini-grants were awarded to local organizations to benefit local youth:

Junior Achievement, East High

Self-Esteem Council, Team Mentoring

Bakersfield Homeless Center, Champ Camp

Bakersfield Museum of Art, Artworks

Camp KEEP, Ocean Listening Center

Bike Bakersfield, Bicycle Safety Program

Five local students were awarded $2,000 renewable scholarships for their scholastic achievement and community service:

Brant Bonetti, Bakersfield High

Viet Nguyen, UC Riverside

Andia Heydari, UCLA

Cori Tucker, UCLA

Jessie Simonson, Vanguard University

Two high school seniors were awarded $1,000 scholarships from the Owen McCarthy Foundation:

Justin Koh, Stockdale High

Gabriel Guimte, Golden Valley High

A one-room school district

Drive 40 minutes north of Bakersfield up windy roads that carve a path through oil fields, honey-colored hills and cattle ranches, and you will come upon a quiet pocket of California living, a trip to another time.

Woody’s approximately 200 residents are served by a fire station, community hall, post office and Kern County’s (and on some days California’s) smallest school district, its teacher said.

Sherry Eggleston is the lone teacher at the K-8, one-room, Blake School. The only school in the Blake Elementary School District has three first-graders, three second-graders and a fifth-grader.

“It’s just like ‘Little House on the Prairie,’” said Eggleston, who, having been at Blake for one year, still laughs at the old-fashioned hand bell she rings to call the students back from recess.

This small school tucked between ranches is, in some ways, similar to other public schools.

A walk around the room reveals posters of verbs and math problems. Seven desks sit in rows, books line shelves and computers offer interactive lessons.

Out back is a basketball court and blacktop where, with pink chalk, first-graders Samantha Nielsen, McKenzie Branum and Kaitlyn Lagas practiced their spelling words.

At a kidney-shaped table, second-graders David Oakes, Bryan Garcia and Michaela Lagas, as well as fifth-grader Erik Garcia, glued beans to white paper in the shape of flowers and clouds.

But here’s where a lot of the similarities end and the unique situation that is Blake begins.

INSIDE A ONE-ROOM SCHOOL

The school, two connected portables that form one big room, sits on a patch of land next to the original one-room school that was moved to Main Street from its original site on Blue Mountain, said Erin Rogers, the district’s part-time secretary.

The original school with red wood siding and white trimmed windows was built in 1870 and doesn’t meet earthquake code, so classes are held in the portable. The classic building serves instead as the library, art center, secretary’s office and occasional lunch room if the weather is too poor to eat in the “cafeteria” — about half a dozen green picnic tables beneath shade trees.

Eggleston’s training at Cal State Bakersfield didn’t entirely prepare her for the quirks of a one-room school house.

Woody moves at its own pace so attendance and tardiness sometimes aren’t priorities, Eggleston joked. A lesson can fall by the wayside if one student is absent.

And with lesson plans for three grades, lectures are rare, she said. Most of the time, she and her teacher’s aide and parent, Jennie Lagas, work with students one-on-one.

The parents appreciate the personal attention Blake offers.

Bertha Garcia, who has lived in Woody for eight years, said through her son Erik: “She likes it because there’s less students and we can get better grades. The teacher here is very nice and she gives us a good education.”

“They just get a lot of attention and the kids are all really close,” said David Oakes, who trains horses.

But small schools have to make concessions.

There are no organized sports, so Eggleston takes the children on at least one field trip each month. They ride in Eggleston’s and Rogers’ cars because there are no busses. This year the children stepped onto a whaling ship and did the chicken dance at a Condors hockey game.

And there’s only one part-time custodian, so the students must clean up after themselves.

There’s no trash pickup either, so on “dump day” students help Rogers load up her truck with the week’s garbage, which she takes to the dump.

And in place of a music program, Rogers’ daughter comes once a week to teach the students to play instruments such as recorders and hand bells.

SIZE MATTERS

On the administrative side, Rogers, who started working with the district this school year, realized size sometimes doesn’t matter.

The district has to fill out as much state and federal paperwork as the big districts.

And at one point the school had one eighth-grader, which qualified Blake to receive $10,000, the amount given to bigger districts, for a program called Safe Schools. The program is meant to curb violence and gang activity and can be spent on things such as cameras and monitors.

“Our biggest issues are safety elements,” she said laughing. “For us, that’s: ‘If you see a snake, don’t pick it up. If there’s cattle on the road, stay to the side.’” The money was useless to them, she said.

For all its quirks, Blake has provided a sort of utopian experience in a school without bullying or gangs. ‘Say no to drugs’ week has little meaning for students here, Eggleston said.

But many of Blake’s students, some of whom will spend nine years there, will eventually go down the hill to Bakersfield’s North High where Eggleston worries the students will be “blown away.”

But Samantha’s mom, Betsy Carver, the school’s part-time custodian, is prepared for the transition her daughter will face about eight years down the road.

“That has to be a parent responsibility,” Carver said. “You have to educate them at home as well. ... It might be a culture shock but that’s life.”

Next year the school will add two kindergartners, siblings of the Lagas sisters and the Garcia brothers.

But as the school with high teacher turnover has experienced many times before, Eggleston will not be there. She’s accepted another unique teaching opportunity, this time in Kabul, Afghanistan.

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