Dear Friends, 
One week plus 2 days in!
I saw many families walking the school grounds, mostly distancing themselves from others. The gardens are a quiet blessing, a way station. The sidewalks themselves are becoming thoroughfares for people desperate to be outside. Take care.
I have been working on repairing the cold frames and raised beds, fixing fencing and tidying up the sheds.
Sooner or later we will be back to school and I hope the gardens will be in great shape.  If anyone would like to take up one of the many garden tasks, for solitary meditation, let me know. We need post hole diggers, pruners, debris picker-uppers, compost haulers. Let me know and I'll set you up.
It IS Spring. And if you walk the neighborhood streets you will already see flowers up and in bloom:
Narcissus, snowdrops, crocuses, etc. All these welcome dollops of color come from Europe and tend to be common and the first things up. But our garden is a haven for our own rare, native spring flowers. I thought it might be a good solitary activity for child and parent, sketch book or journal in hand, to search for, greet, and introduce yourself to each species as they unfurl. I will tell you what to look for, and their names. You search and draw and date and label.
I will tell you the first native that will flower (I think) 
Yellow Violet (funny name, like red blue)
Its science name is : Viola pubescens

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​Once it starts to bloom, you will find hundreds of them. You have to get down low and look very closely. The are gorgeous.  Most of our spring ephemeral wildflowers are woodland species. So look for them under the oaks. Please don't cross fence lines because many plants are starting to poke their heads up right now, and will be damaged if stepped on. 

I will try to lead you to other wildflowers as they appear. Maybe one a day, or one every other day.
If I see you in the garden, I will leave you to your own space, but  I will wave you a welcome.

Mr. Leki

Dear Friends, 
I've attached the collective poems of our three 7th grade classes, based on phrases they developed during their winter trip to describe the City,Sky, Lake and Shore. They are very powerful and evocative. Read them out loud over dinner!
We have finished the Winter Field Ecology Trips! Yes! No cancellations! No postponements. Yes!
Iv'e spend a good amount of time reading (with treasured volunteers) and responding to Mighty Acorns journals. We have finished 3 of 7 classrooms. It is fun and rewarding work that I hope to finish before the weather turns irresistible.
If you would like to help, come on any day next week, from drop off until 10:30. Or after 1:00.
I hope to start bringing classes out to the garden soon, and Wednesday evening community workdays will start next Wednesday (March 18) at 5:00 pm.
With Gratitude for your help and support,
Mr. Leki

Montrose Point 302
Montrose Point 305
Montrose Point 309

Dear Friends, 
This week will be mostly spent reading and responding to Mighty Acorn Journals and preparing trip maps for the 6th grade River tour. 
I will provide some very good coffee and tea for anyone that would like to work on these in the mornings this week.  It will be fun.

Also, if you are interested in learning about native ecology and prescription burns:

Riverbank Neighbors and Waters School Gardens will be presenting a workshop:

"Managing Native Gardens in the City: learn how certified crews conduct controlled, permitted burns of small gardens in Chicago."  

Thursday, February 27, 2020
Sulzer Regional Library
6:00 - 8:00

Presentations, Video, and Roundtable 
to share information about this invaluable tool.

Mr. Leki

​Dear Friends, 
With your help, we plowed through our winter field ecology schedule, snowy, mucky, windy, rainy: we did it. It feel so good!

It means winter is waning, 
and spring is nigh!
Gardens, and buds, and returning birds, and sunlight!

So, Wednesday, February 19, 2020,
Room 207, 5th Grade, will finish off our work and adventures in sauganash for this season. We will be cutting brush and piling it up to be burned on a coming Sunday morning (to be announced). Join us! Bus leaves at 9:30. Briefing at 9:30. Back by 12:30.
Wear Boots!!

Mr. Leki

​Dear Friends,
Three Field ecology Sojourns this week:
Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2020, 2nd Grade Room 204 will walk to the Riverbank at Berteau to see what they can see, practice journaling and moving stealthily through the  world. Last week we saw a hawk, a gull, woodpeckers, cardinals, junkos, squirrels, goldeneyes, mallards and what we that was a Great Blue Heron but turned out to be two greyish plastic bags caught on branches by the toe of the river.  Please join us. We leave at 8:30 and return by 10:30!

On Wednesday Feb. 12, Room 201, 3rd grade will have their first brush cutting experience at Sauganash. It has been challenging, with great quantities of snow and mud and puddled water making a mess of everything. It was, an experience. And the kids did great and important work with very professional and sharp tools. 
We leave at 9:30 and are back for lunch by 12:30. Come early for a briefing and coffee.

On Thursday, Feb 13, 5th grade, Room 209 Mighty Acorns venture into adventure. The theme of their visit is population dynamics and the effect of unrestrained growth of deer populations. If you join us, you will no doubt get to see some of them. Leave at 9:00. Back at 12:30.

On Friday, Feb. 14, a group organized by the new Sustainability Chief at the BOE will visit Waters to have a look around our beautiful school to get ideas about how to expand composting, recycling and resource conservation to ALL CPS schools.  Feather in out collective hat on Love Day.

Friends of the River's Student Congress is coming up (Saturday Feb. 29.) Our choir and I will be singing there and doing river song workshops. It is a fun and informative way to spend a winter weekend morning. Please consider registering yourself and your child. It's at Von Steuben, so it is within walking distance.  Besides the choir, students and parents will be asked to self organize their attendance. Friends has been a 20+ year partner of the Waters Ecology Program, and I  would love to support this worthy event.

Mr. Leki

​Dear Eco-Friends, 
Three Beautiful, out of world experiences at the Lake last week. Beautiful, beautiful!  Our Friends of the Parks partner / teacher  Andrea taught us this beautiful Ojibwe song in homage to Water:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ks5IIzYX3t8  

She reminded us that if we were born in Chicago that most of the weight in our bodies was Lake Michigan water!!
We are related to Lake Michigan!
Kin!

On Monday, I will be teaching Tree classes for the 1st Grade, and putting together the 2nd grade River trip journals....

...which happens on  Tuesday, January 28, 2020!
2nd Grade Room 111 will sally forth to the river at Berteau to look at Winter, Wildlife and Weather. Today, in this half frozen, half melted winter, I saw a great activity in our multi-cultural bird community: junkos, cardinals, robins, three species of wood peckers, chickadees, and  blue jays! A rainbow of birds. 
We leave school at 8:30. If you would like to join us, meet at the fish tank. Back by 10:30. The kids will sing you this song written by Yoko Ono and myself (well, I just changed a few words):
We're all water from different rivers,
That's why it's so easy to meet.
We're all water in this vast vast ocean. 
Someday we'll evaporate together!

Perhaps, you noticed a Water strand, a stream, a trickle and wave. 
That is because water is life, 
and we are asking our students to know this and become water protectors. 
Water is Life!

On Wednesday, January 29, 2020, 4th grade, Room 308, will travel to Sauganash to cut invasive brush, and witnessed the wonder of the woods in winter.  Join us for a briefing at 9:00 by the fish tank. Bus leaves at 9:30. Returns by 12:30.  Lunch will be at school. 

On Thursday, January 30, 2020, 4th grade, Room 307 does a repeat of the above. 
Please join us, and dress yourself and your child for the weather: cold and wet!

The best to all, 
Mr. Leki

​...and parents who find time time to help, 
and teachers working through the weekend to prepare, 
and students who get distracted from video games and school work,
to take note of the wonders of and dangers threatening our world....

Tomorrow, 
Tuesday, (yes) January 21, our 1st grade thespians will be performing for (and with) their classmates 
the Legend of Snake and Turtle, 
an origin story about Waters School and our gardens. 
8:30 Room 211
9:00 Room 208
9:30 Room 210

Right after that I will be teaching a class-prep for the 2nd grade, Room 111
(they will be going to the River at Berteau  Tuesday, Jan 28.)
They will be learning a new song, prepping their trip journals, and
creating (scientifically proper) snowflakes. 
If there is time we will also explore the endlessly amazing properties of H20:
surface tension, adhesion, cohesion, refraction...

Then, 
on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, 
the 7th grade will be braving our beautiful, magical, majestic, 
and priceless Lake Michigan
to Learn, and Experience why it is so special. 

please join us on the Yellow bus to be part of this adventure, 
details will follow.

Mr. Leki

Dear Friends, 
We enter our first full school week of the new year!
I wrote a little note to myself, sealed it in an envelope, and placed it on my desk, facing me. 
"Open on first day of school 2021".
Last year the note said : "What happened?"
That is THE question. What will happen? And will we be able to shape our future? Will we have effect? We will see. Here we go.

On Monday, the two 8th grade classes will carry on a tradition of processing mint leaves that they harvested and hung to dry in the shed.  They strip the leaves and push them through a colander to create a fine tea mixture. Other kids spoon it into paper filter bags and staple shut.
While they are doing that, other students prepare mint tea in pots, and serve it to their classmates as they work. The tea is paired with small slices of french bread dabbed with gooseberry jam made from our berries. 
Still other students will spoon roasted pumpkin seeds into small envelopes that will be gifted to staff and the 8th grade. These seeds were taken from the left over pumpkins from harvest day, cleaned, spiced and roasted over my wood burning stove. 
It is a nice ritual, remembering the past seasons, and work done.

First Grade tree study will be up and running again, as well as rehearsal for the Snake and Turtle performances.  Snake and Turtle have a new address, on the south side of the big net by the sports field. 8th grade will be working on the finished installation in the Spring. The backs of Snake and Turtle adorned by beautiful mosaic paving stones created and donated by my neighbor Liz Chase.

I will be scheduling  prep classes for the winter field ecology program. The schedule is up and running on the Waters School site. 

Waters Ecology Incorporates!
Sounds scary, huh? Last year I was asked to create an entity that could receive funds from Waters Today, our fundraising organization. So, I created Waters Elementary Ecology, L3C.  Thanks to Jamie and Adi for doing the filing and translations. This is all new stuff to me. I will have to do some more filings, and due diligence on the book keeping side of things. I am wondering if anyone out there has experience or knowledge about what is required, what is urgent, and where you find Form llc49-3876-c9 (joke!).
Anyway, if anyone has a suggestion or a moment to consult, please let me know. 
Happy New Year to all, 
Mr. Leki

​Dear Friends, 
This Friday we will perform the Water Cycle necklace activity with Rooms 204 (11:30) and 203 (2:15). This is a kinetic demonstration of the random  flight of a water molecule through nine possible places where water is found on earth: ocean, clouds, glaciers, lakes, rivers, soil, groundwater, plants and animals. So we create nine stations, each one equipped with its own unique die (singular of dice) and bowl of beads. The students start at one of these stations carrying a cord, knotted at one end. They take a bead from the bowl and thread it onto the cord. Then they roll the die. The die tells them where their water molecule will go next. For example, from ocean to cloud. The student goes to the cloud station and threads a cloud bead, then rolls the cloud die. It might land in such a way that it instructs the student to go to cloud. That means the student stays at cloud station, threads another bead and rolls again. The student rolls 20 times, creating a unique trail, a unique story about the motion and experience of one water molecule in this world. After twenty rolls, we attached barrel clasps on each end of the cord to create a necklace, suitable for gifting or keeping. The students also write about their molecules' journey. Part of the profound meaning of the water cycle is its endless dynamism, a masterpiece of recycling. We can tell the students with a good degree of certainty that some of the water molecules currently in their bodies were once in clouds, glaciers, dinosaurs and spiders. Truly we are all part of everything in this living world. Another wonderful realization is that the water cycle is powered by two fundamental forces: the Sun to raise the water to the skies, and gravity to return it to Earth. Also, the great flow of waters from the Mississippi into the Gulf carries with it the taint of our civilization: eroded soils, fertilizers and chemical pollutants of every sort. The Water Cycle, Mother Nature, bails us out by evaporating that spoiled water, thereby distilling it, and returns it to us as pure, drinkable water. How lucky can we be? 
One can imagine 30 students cycling through nine stations, rolling (throwing) 9 large dice, threading beads and accidentally letting their beads slip from their cord. It is very kinetic! Volunteers are greatly appreciated. If you can help, you will witness a very fun an important lesson.
I teach the kids a song about water and us. I borrowed it from Yoko Ono and added my own verses.

We're all Water
(Ono / Leki)
We're 90% water
We're like the plants and algae,
We're mostly water
We're 90% water
Like the surface of our planet
Our Mother Earth.

(Chorus)
We're all water from different rivers
That's why it's so easy to meet
We're all water in this vast, vast ocean
Someday we'll evaporate together.

We're cousins to the glaciers
The raindrops are our aunties
Because we're water
We're like the streams and rivers,
The lakes and ponds and oceans
Because we're water

Chorus

Hope you can join us!
Mr. Leki