Chestnut Hill Academy

Student Spotlight: We are incredibly excited to share that three of our students are competing in the USA Track and Field Junior Olympics this summer! Congratulations to rising 4th graders Bailey and Rayden, and rising 3rd grader Avery. Their determination and hard work have led them to this remarkable achievement.

At Chestnut Hill Academy, we believe in nurturing the whole student. Through our Leader in Me curriculum, our students develop tools to grow in the classroom and beyond. These habits—such as being proactive, beginning with the end in mind, and putting first things first—help our student-athletes soar to new heights!

Let's come together as a community to support Bailey, Rayden, and Avery, and celebrate the incredible journey they've taken to reach this point. Send positive vibes their way as they compete on this national stage this week.

Our Dinos and Dragons camp got off to a T-rex-errific start this week and has ended with fossil digs and dinosaur dance battles. Campers had a blast, and clearly our staff did too! We're looking forward to what’s in store next week for Express Your Emoji and Kindercamp!

Summer is a great time for professional development, and today we have an admin and kitchen team combo enjoying an opportunity to participate in the Charlie’s Produce Farm Tour, visiting local farms like Four Elements, Spooner Farms, Duris Farms, and Carpinito Brothers. It’s great to get connected to local growers and see firsthand where some of our food comes from. We anticipate that the chefs will have some fresh trivia and fun facts on their menu chalkboard this fall to engage students in food education!

"Color Me Crazy" Week wrapped up today with a first-ever CHA Camp Color Challenge, followed by a summer camp tradition . . . snow cones! It's a vibrant send-off into the weekend!

Have you stopped to smell the flowers today? This little strip of garden is a space that welcomes students each morning of the school year as they ease out of their cars and come in to start their day. It's a space where students slow down to ask what those red poker things are (they are called torch lilies, or kniphofia uvaria), or where they pause to watch a hummingbird buzzing about the salvia shrub. It's a space where Green Team students plant for the pollinators and brainstorm ways to achieve wildlife habitat certification. It's also a space where grade level cohorts host socials, and where students are entrusted with power tools to build garden boxes. Educators see the lupines and reminisce about the children's book "Miss Rumphius", and the Director of Curriculum picks stray weeds while waiting to greet children. In September, when students return to school inches taller, they will still have to duck under the hollyhocks that like to lean out over the sidewalk with their showy blooms. Good things growing all around!

Each week of camp at CHA features a different theme, and each day campers enjoy art, movement, and STEM-based activities corresponding to that theme. Throw in a little fun and friendship, and the fact that the PNW is providing a beautiful burst of sunshine this week, and we would say that we are off to a great start for this summer camp season!

First day of summer camp! This week's theme is "Color Me Crazy", and campers are kicking off the summer season with homemade slime, water balloon challenges, lava lamp experiments, tie-dying, and pH color testing. We're excited to have camp underway, especially with new students joining us throughout the coming weeks and getting their first experiences with CHA!

Wrapping up our school year brings celebrations, transitions, goodbyes, see you laters, and HELLO TO SUMMER CAMP! Our team has been eagerly preparing for our first week of Camp Explorations next week. Find out more and register here: https://www.chestnuthillacademy.com/campus-life/summer-camp

What a phenomenal Field Day earlier this week! While the Moving Up and Graduation ceremonies were meaningful rituals to mark closure to the end of the school year, Field Day is all about fun, and this childhood celebration was full of games, snow cones, potato sack races, face painting, water balloons, friendship and laughter. Huge thanks to Coach Sturgess and all of the other team members and volunteers who made the magic happen!

This week is all about end-of-year rituals and celebrations! Each grade level is participating in a Moving Up Ceremony, as well as student-led conferences which give students an opportunity to reflect on their progress and take ownership of their learning. Every afternoon of this week has seen a different group of students excited to showcase their learning and bring closure to the end of the school year, and we've also loved seeing parents and family members coming in with cameras and smiles and amazement at how another year has passed so quickly!

Congratulations to our amazing Green Team for achieving another year of Sustaining Level Green Team certification through the King County Green Schools program! This year, the Green Team expanded their recycling efforts to ensure that all ink cartridges on-site are recycled, they continued their battery recycling efforts (recycling over 200 pounds of batteries!), and the Earth Week plans this year were entirely student-led. We're appreciative of all of their environmental efforts around our school!

Our annual "Spirit Week" festivities are ending with a Favorite Character theme day, with students dressed up as their favorite book, movie, or TV characters. We think these kids are remarkable characters all on their own, and you can feel that "end-of-year energy" throughout the building. The traditions that bring each school year to a close are always precious, especially as we see these students easing into the next season and as we anticipate them coming back in the fall one more grade level older!

"Mystery Readers" are a much beloved feature of the kindergarten experience at CHA, and this week, even Chippy showed up to join in on a little circle time magic when Head of School Mrs. Senaga and Assistant Principal Mrs. Roseland came to read and spend time in the classroom!

Today our 2nd graders showcased their dive into project-based learning with the annual "Invention Convention", an opportunity for students to either create their own invention, or to research and model an existing invention. Some students took a trip down memory lane to the invention of the pay phone (remember those?), the truss bridge, and the kaleidoscope, and we also saw the introduction of ideas such as "Chaos Control Kits", coffee coolers and coffee timers, water spray hats, musical grow boxes, automatic bed sheet folders, water prevention ear caps, and soccer ball trackers. We think these innovators should be getting the patent process started now!

Students today enjoyed a magical visit from the incredible author Eric Ode! Our students were captivated during grade level assemblies by his engaging storytelling, lively songs, and creative inspiration. Thank you to Eric Ode and also to our Library Specialist, Charis Whalen, for creating this experience, and for sparking the imaginations of our young readers and writers!

"Art has the role in education of helping children become like themselves instead of more like everyone else." - Sydney Gurewitz Clemens

It is that wonderful time of year for the CHA Annual Art Show! Thanks to some phenomenal parent volunteers and also to the endless dedication of our Art Specialist, Phoebe Choi, who inspires countless students to create and share their work, every student has at least one piece of artwork on display. Hallways and galleries are lined with paintings, sculptural pieces, and personal masterpieces, and throughout the building, students and parents pause to take it in, or to lean closer, and to admire and exclaim. This building is looking its best when decked out with the evidence of children encouraged to explore and create.

We are giving a shout-out to the regional Bright Horizons Chefs' Group, who spent their most recent training meeting on Friday at Chestnut Hill Academy. These chefs know that part of giving people their best beginnings means not just nurturing young minds, but also nourishing their bodies. Executive Chef Liam and team welcomed approximately 40 people into their kitchen for a "Chopped" challenge, served as a judge panel for the results, provided lunch to all of the visiting chefs, and Chef Liam shared some of his tips and tricks for the trade. It's inspiring to see these chefs making the magic happen in their programs to create delicious and nutritious meals for children.

Yesterday, CHA students participated in our annual Leadership Day event with a "Leadership Live" focus on sharing their voices and celebrating the leadership that they all exemplify on a regular basis. Student drummers welcomed peers in the morning at car line, different grade levels shared their Leadership portfolios with each other, a guest alumni student and guest parent speaker shared their wisdom and inspiration with students, and every student had the opportunity to showcase examples of their own leadership with their classmates. These children are doing amazing things, and we're so proud to be a part of their learning and leadership journey!

What a lovely week of thoughtful generosity! This Faculty Appreciation Week was full of delicious food, lovely flowers, and fantastic parent volunteers. The kindness and support (and treats!) mean so much to this team, and there is gratitude all around!

Some of our favorite PE docents, the Active Minds Class coaches, have been back this week! They are facilitating fun and games that are all intentional learning experiences incorporating movement and social emotional learning. Teamwork, breathing exercises, pool noodles and cones, and lots of laughter!

CHA 5th graders recently traveled to Washington D.C. to share their research live, in front of monuments and grow in their understanding of United States history. This group of future global leaders got a first hand look at the impact so many of our nation's past leaders have had on our country and the rest of the world. A week's worth of memories to last a lifetime!

First grade was jamming this afternoon as they explored the science of sound through some creatively engineered and homemade musical instruments! Lots of drumming and twanging could be heard in classrooms, alongside students presenting their projects, talking about design, and taking pride in having produced something with an audible impact.

We value learning opportunities that take place both within the classroom as well as in the outside world, and this week, second graders took their science studies on species and habitats to the Cougar Mountain Zoo!

Our fourth graders are back this week after an incredible, immersive experience at IslandWood on Bainbridge Island, where they participated in a school overnight program that facilitates field investigations, collaborative problem-solving, and engagement with peers from other schools. In the process, they discover more about their world and the positive impact they can have on their environment and the community. They have reported back about some serious mud-squelching, amazing experiences outdoors with friends, and overall thoroughly enjoying this very special experience.

At last night's New Parent Orientation, new families for the 2024-25 school year were welcomed into the Chestnut Hill Academy community by staff and student leaders, and by none other than special guest Chippy the Chipmunk! We were thrilled to see the excitement for the coming school year, the connections being made between students, and the first memories being made for this great group at CHA!

STEM Day success at CHA! The scientific method and the engineering process were put to the test all over the building today, with different grade levels experimenting with ramps, knee braces, water filtration, space landers, and more. Cheers to all of the teachers and to our Director of Curriculum and Instruction for helping to organize these engaging and experiential opportunities!

Happy Earth Day! In addition to their ongoing sustainability efforts, student members of our school's Green Team proposed a seemingly impossible task in honor of Earth Day. Could our chef team serve an allergy friendly snack to each student representing each layer of the earth? Our incredible chef team took on the challenge and served each student an orange vanilla cream cake friendly to over 20 allergens and dietary restrictions to represent the complexity of this planet we call home. 🌎

As part of their exploration into the realms of physics and engineering, our 5th grade students took on the infamous Egg Drop Challenge today. The goal? To create something innovative and effective, using only their creativity and a limited set of materials. It's a hands-on (and sometimes messy!) lesson in problem-solving, critical thinking, and teamwork, not to mention opportunities to learn about the concepts of gravity, velocity, and impact force in an interactive way. If it doesn't already sound super fun, take a look at some of these faces "cracking up" (we know, we know - that's an egg-straordinarily bad pun).

Musical theater provides students the opportunity to cultivate empathy and emotional intelligence through the portrayal of different characters. From rehearsals to the final curtain call, our 2nd-5th grade students integrated singing, dancing, and acting on stage with the help of their teachers and the amazing Mr. Rees directing!