Clara Barton Open School

Original Water Colors to be Featured at Silent Auction

This year’s silent auction to be held on December 9^th will feature three signed original water colors by Minnesota artist Edie Alrut.  These paintings were originally displayed as a triptych, but will be sold separately giving bidders the option to purchase just one if they wish. The color of these paintings is extraordinary and very vivid. The irises are very large images with the color ranging from cream to pale peach to almost red and reddish-orange.  Click on image to enlarge.

Original art is just one of the many categories of interesting items in all price ranges you’ll find at our auction.

Reminders: List of Live Auction Items, List of Available Activity Sign-Ups. 

Can I Work On This at Home?

You can now download Media Specialist Jean Dolittle's "Can I Work on This at Home?" - a guide for moving homework and other computer files back and forth between school and a home computer. 

We've created a permanent link to it on the Web site under the heading "Computer Corner" in the right sidebar.  Watch for more tech stuff there. 

List of Live Auction Items Now Available

Follow this link to a list of items available in the live auction portion of the Quilt Raffle/auction night on December 9.  We'll keep the list in the right-hand column of this site under the heading Auction Updates!  Check back regularly for new items. 

Two related items:

KARIN EMERSON'S CLASS READ-A-THON

On Dec. 13th and 14th several members of Karin's 3rd and 4th grade class will conduct a Read-a-thon. Their goal is to read a minimum of 150 books in this two day period. The kids are excited about the chance to raise money and help Barton enhance its programs.
     Pledges will be taken from 5-8 in the Commons during the Barton Silent Auction/ Quilt Raffle. Some of the kids will be there to answer any questions that you might have.

SILENT AUCTION ITEM

Parents Marcia Zimmerman and Frank Hornstein are donating the use of their 2003 Honda Civic Hybrid car for ten days. It is a new generation gas-electric car and is available from Dec. 18th-28th.  Perfect for those expecting out-of-town guests over the holidays!

 

Reminder: Friday Night is Book Fair Night

A quick reminder that the annual Book Fair at Wild Rumpus is this Friday between 2 and 8 p.m.  Details

Quilt Raffle Update

With three weeks of ticket selling to go, some ambitious students have already sold and returned all their tickets, bringing our sales total to $1574!  There are more tickets available, just ask your teacher!  Here’s the link to the quilt photos and the student selling instructions.

State Capitol Tour

Third and fourth graders from Claire and Jaci’s rooms went to the State Capitol on Friday, November 12th.  Their tour included the rotunda, the Supreme Court Chambers, the Governor’s Reception room, the golden horses, the House of Representatives Chambers, and the Vietnam Memorial.  The highlight of the morning was a debate and vote in the House Chambers, moderated by Rep. Frank Hornstein, about the students' proposed bill to increase recess time. 

Where in the World is Barton School?

The flagpole in the Barton schoolyard is 44 degrees, 55.529 minutes north of the equator, and 93 degrees, 17.519 minutes west of the Prime Meridian in Greenwich, England.  These Barton students used a global positioning system (GPS) device to find the exact location last week as part of their Options class. 

Gearing Up for the Silent Auction

Mark your calendars - on Thursday, December 9th, Barton will hold its second annual auction in conjunction with the quilt raffle.  Our purpose is to bring the school community in a fun event that will raise money to continue to support school needs.  Examples of items our fundraiser supports include:

• Band instruments and instruction
• A part-time Somali interpreter and liaison to our Somali families
• Upgrades and expansion of computers in our Media Center; and
• Special training for our teachers.

We also aim to continue the long-standing Barton tradition of community building. The Silent and Live Auctions are assisted by community businesses, parents, teachers, administration and students. This year's volunteers include several of our uppers students. Also, this year we will have a Marketplace with items made by our very own students.

The Auction is comprised of four parts:

• The first is the Silent Auction. Approximately one hundred items will be up for bid. New this year will be several items donated by Antarctic explorer Ann Bancroft, as well as donations from teachers, businesses, and parents.
• There will also be a Marketplace. The Marketplace will handle items that will be priced at $15 or less.
• The third aspect will be the "Sign-up". We will have various parties and tours that people can pay a set fee to join. For instance, there will be two tours of the new Walker Museum that people can pay $15 each to attend.  Chris Hagedorn will be putting together an ensemble to play at Anodyne @ 43rd on Jan 8th. The cost will be $10 per person. People will pay immediately for these items as they sign-up. There will be volunteers around to answer questions about where and when these events will occur. There will also be a "Read-a-thon". You can pledge for Karin Emerson's students  to read.
• Finally, there will be our second annual Live Auction from 7:15-8. There will be several items up for auction including six box seats-two of which are front row, for the Barry Bonds-Twins series next June, a rug donated by Navab Brothers, and a week's stay in a condo in Mexico. There will be live entertainment by the Fizz and Wally the Root beer Man so please plan on staying for the entertainment even if you don’t plan to bid.

In the next two weeks, we will post a list of the "Sign-ups" along with the Live Auction items on this site. Also, we are still looking for volunteers and donations.  Please feel free to e-mail Barry Epstein at epsteincas@cs.com if you are interested.                

Room 104 Supports Puffins!

The first and second grade students of Room 104 (Dawn White's class) are concerned about wildlife.  We want to help support the Audubon's Project Puffin, a restoration program on Eastern Egg Rock Island off the coast of Maine.  For the past 300 years, Atlantic Puffins have suffered from intense hunting for their eggs, meat and feathers.  As of 1973, Atlantic Puffins had all but disappeared from the east coast including Eastern Egg Rock Island.  By transplanting over 954 young puffins, 52 pairs have established a continued nesting ground.

Students of Room 104 are collecting the UPC labels from Puffins Cereal and/or Cereal and Milk Bars.  Barbara's Bakery, maker of Puffins products, will support a puffin through the Audubon Society for a year when we collect 250 UPC labels.  Please save your UPC labels and turn them into the "puffin" box outside our classroom.

Barbara's Puffin products are available at the Linden Hills Co-Op, Seward Co-Op, and Wedge Co-Op. 

Quilt Raffle Kicks Off . . .

The Barton Quilters were hard at work over the summer and have created a beautiful quilt for this year’s raffle fundraiser. Students have 5 short weeks to sell raffle tickets. The drawing will be held December 9th at this year’s second annual auction.

Barton School benefits greatly from every ticket you sell. So, sell early and sell often! Click here to see more photos of the quilt. Click here for quilt raffle selling instructions.