Chester+Valley+Elementary,+Anchorage+AK

Chester Valley Elementary Currently Learning @ J.F. Kennedy 540 Dyea Fort Richardson, AK 99505

We have two schools this year! Our old building is being renovated from the ground up, so we are fortunate to be learning in the J.F. Kennedy building at the home of Alaska’s Arctic Warriors on Fort Richardson. L: Entry to Fort Richardson ........................... R: Entry to J.F. Kennedy Our school website is: []

Here’s a website to follow our renovation. []

We’d like to share some information about our schools.

We have a very small student body of 207 students in ten classrooms grades kindergarten to 5th grade this year because we are learning off our home campus during a planned renovation. Our original Chester Valley building was built in 1964, several months after the Good Friday Earthquake. Back then, our building had 14 classrooms, a Multi-Purpose Room, an office, a hockey rink, and a courtyard. We’ve heard that one of the teachers used to bring a donkey that stayed in the courtyard during the day! Later the courtyard was enclosed and became the library (without the donkey), and 6 additional classrooms, 1 additional office, and a sunken auditorium were added. The auditorium was later covered and became our computer lab. The school is shaped like a letter H. After renovation, our school will have 25 classrooms, a gym and a cafeteria, and even a stage! These pictures were taken of Chester Valley this year. L: January 4, 2009 ................................................ R: October 16, 2009

Our school this year started on August 19th, 2009, and will end on May 20th of 2010. We are a public school, and part of the Anchorage School District. We study many subjects including district-selected math and reading programs, and participate in required Alaska Standards Based Assessments in March. Our 5th graders compete in the Math Derby with other Anchorage schools, and our 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders compete in the Alaska Association of School Librarians sponsored Battle of the Books. Last year our 3rd/4th grade team won First Place in the NE Anchorage 3rd / 4th grade tournament and went on to compete at the state level as representatives of our district. Here is our Battle team with their coach and the ASD Director of Elementary Education.

In Alaska we have lots of snow; in fact we’ve already had snow on the Chugach Mountain Range that runs alongside the highway we drive iin our buses to school on Fort Richardson every day. During the winter we have many sports opportunities. We can usually ice skate at our own CV hockey rink, but this year it is being moved as part of the renovation. That’s OK, because we can skate on Cheney Lake only two blocks from Chester Valley, or at Kennedy during our lunch recess and when our rink is done being re-constructed, it will also be a basketball court. At Kennedy this winter we can also ski, snowboard, and go sledding. Fort Richardson has even invited us to have a swimming field trip on the Post. In Alaska, pools are indoors. Winter sports are pretty big in Alaska, because we have a lot of time to participate in them. Football season starts way before school does, and state championships take place at the end of October. During the school year, we love cheering on our professional hockey team the Anchorage Aces and our college team the Seawolves. Skiiing is great here, and we can drive south to a world-class resort called Alyeska for downhill skiing, or go cross country skiing ANYWHERE! Here's the first snow on the Chugach Mountains behind Cheney Lake. We call it "termination dust" because it means the end of summer. Chester Valley is behind the trees. October 1, 2009

Our school is a pretty fun place to be. Our Student Council promotes Spirit Days like PJ day, Sports Wear Day, Crazy Hair Day, and of course school T-shirt or school colors day (our royal blue and gold shirt has a husky dog on it). The classroom with the highest percentage of participation gets to hold on to our stuffed husky. A husky dog is our mascot, because we like the way a musher and husky team work together to race to victory in Nome during the Iditarod race. The dog team and their musher are a metaphor for the way we work together with our teachers to learn. Our Student Council officers also lead us in community projects. This year we are participating in a canned food drive and in raising money for families in Indonesia who were hit by the tsunami.

We have many incredible wild animals in Alaska, but the one we see the most often is the moose. Chester Valley is surrounded by a neighborhood that is full of willows and alders, so we see moose all the time – in fact, we’ve had to leave the playground many times to go inside to be safe when a single moose, or more dangerously, when a moose cow and calf are on the playground. We haven’t had a moose alarm at JFK yet this year.

We celebrate Read Across America with a breakfast of green eggs and ham, and lots of reading. We do a "Hats off to Reading" and an I-did-a-read book race to measure how many books are read in March. We don’t just read Dr. Seuss’ books on Read Across America day, though. __Oh the Places You’ll Go__ is often read when we start new things – like when our fifth graders graduate Chester Valley to move next door to the brand new Begich Middle School. And of course, we read __Hooray for Diffendoofer Day!__ right before we take our SBA tests to remind us that we are doing our very best, and learning a lot every day!