Notes from Oak

Our 6th graders returned today from an amazing Walden West Outdoor School experience! Campers spent a week immersed in nature, engaging in hands-on activities like hiking, camping, and exploring the natural world.

The program at Walden West focuses on connecting students with nature and developing their leadership skills, while creating a fun and positive learning environment.

A special thank you to our 6th-grade teachers, Ms Cavanagh and Ms Pressman, who accompanied the students on this adventure. We appreciate their dedication and willingness to spend time away from their families to provide this valuable experience for our students.

We're sure our students gained valuable outdoor skills, deepened their appreciation for nature, and had a memorable experience!

Our district has begun the important work of adopting a new math curriculum, and Oak is playing an active role in the process. Several of our classrooms are piloting the shortlisted math curricula. These pilots allow us to see how well each curriculum supports student learning, aligns with state standards and district goals, and fits the needs of our teachers and students. Throughout the pilot period, teachers are providing feedback on instructional design, student engagement, and overall usability to help inform the district’s final recommendation.

To help families better understand the process, our Director of Curriculum & Instruction, Greg Drummond will join us at the next Principal’s Coffee on December 5 at 8:45am in the library. He will share updates, and provide insight into what the adoption timeline looks like.

We hope you’ll join us!

• Mon, Nov 24 - Fri, Nov 28 - Thanksgiving Break - No School

• Sun, Nov 30 - Festival of Lights Parade - Downtown Los Altos 6pm

• Fri, Dec 5 - Principal's Coffee - Library 8:45am

• Fri, Dec12 - Stay & Play Winter Pajama Party - Multi 2:30-4:30pm

• Tue, Dec 16 - Oak Winter Concert - Multi - 1-3pm

• Tue, Dec 16 - State of Mind Pizza Fundraiser - State of Mind 4-9pm

• Tue, Dec 16 - Linden Tree Oak Shopping Night & Staff Read - Linden Tree 6-8pm

• Mon, Dec 22 - Fri, Jan 2 - December Recess - No School

• Wed, Jan 7 - PTA Assocation Mtng - Multi 8:45-10:45am

• Mon, Jan 12 - Oak Spelling Bee - Multi 1pm

• Tue, Jan 13 - New Family Info Night - Covington School 6:30pm

• Mon, Jan 19 - MLK Jr Day - No School

• Tue, Jan 20 - Teacher In-Service - No School

LASD 2025-26 District Calendar here

Oak Website oakschool.org/

Breakfast & Lunch Menus https://www.lasdschools.org/menus

LASD has partnered with Smart Social to provide free resources to parents. Use this code here to register for a free account if you haven’t already and check out the upcoming events!

• December 2, 9, or 16: Is Screen Time Pulling Your Child Away? Balancing Parental Controls & Student Privacy

• December 3: 7 Quick Tips for Healthier Screen Time: Reduce Arguments & Build Positive Digital Habits

• December 11: Roblox & Minecraft Safety Night: Understand the REAL Dangers & Guide Your Child with Confidence

• December 17: ¿El tiempo frente a la pantalla está alejando a su hijo? (Sesión en Vivo en Español) (Dec 17, 2025)

• December 18: Safe and Successful: How Teens & Families Are Using AI

Can’t make a live event? Don’t forget to check out the 450+ Easy to Search, On-Demand Resources covering apps, dangerous trends, dialogue starters, and so much more!

Attention 4th–6th grade students: it’s time to show off your spelling skills in our school spelling bee! This is a fun, friendly competition where students can challenge themselves in a mixed age group and shine. Please note that students will be eliminated after their first misspelled word. Rounds will progress from easy to expert levels!

The top contestants from each site will advance to the district spelling bee, hosted at Gardner Bullis on February 12 at 3:30 PM. From there, the top two winners will move on to the Santa Clara County Spelling Bee on March 7 at 9:00 AM at the Santa Clara County Office of Education.

Don’t miss this chance to compete, learn, and have fun—start brushing up on those tricky words today!

Note:

• ​O​ak Spelling Bee is scheduled for Mon, Jan 12, at 1pm in the Mutli

Thanksgiving break is almost here! Before we all unplug and enjoy some well-earned downtime, here are a few updates and reminders from your PTA.

We are grateful for our wonderful school community - have a warm and restful holiday!

Oak Gives Back Food Drive - Dec 8 - 12th

Help support our neighbors in need this holiday season! Oak Gives Back is collecting unexpired, non-perishable food items for Community Services Agency, and you can lend a hand by donating the following:

• Pop-top soups

• Tuna/salmon/canned meat

• Pasta

• Rice

• Dry beans

• Canned veggies, beans, fruit, etc.

• Hispanic, Asian, and Indian specialty items

• Condiments, sauces, and spices

• Various oils

• Instant tea, coffee, and hot cocoa

• Nuts/trail mix

• Crackers, cookies, and snacks

• Shelf-stable milk and juice

• Lunch box snacks and drinks

Please leave all items in the labeled boxes in front of the multi from December 8-12. Thank you for your generosity!

Questions? Contact Julie Chai at julieschai@gmail.com

Save The Date: Stay & Play Winter Pajama Party

When: Friday, December 12th in the Multi, from 2:30-4:30pm.

Note: Parent/Guardian supervision required for attendance at Stay & Play.

This cozy and festive event will bring the Oak community together for the holiday season! The kids will watch The Grinch (2018) movie and enjoy apple cider and hot chocolate ☕, along with some light holiday crafting. We will also have cookie decorating available for the first 250 kiddos that join us! Oak students are encouraged to wear their favorite school-appropriate holiday pajamas. ❄️❄️❄️

Oak Fundraiser: Family Shopping Night at Linden Tree 📚& State of Mind Pizza 🍕

When: Tuesday evening, December 16th

Where: Linden Tree Books (265 State Street) from 6-8pm and State of Mind Pizza (101 Plaza N) from 4-9pm.

A percentage of the proceeds from this Oak Fundraiser to benefit Oak Avenue PTA. More information on book reading schedule with Mrs. Forrest & teachers to come!

Volunteer Opportunities:

If you are still interested in looking into volunteer opportunities at Oak, it is never too late! Please complete the Oak Volunteer Sign up form: https://rb.gy/fdbley

Noon Time Volunteers Needed!

Login to Classroom Parent, Click on Groups and Join Noon Play Group

The Noon Play Program is to help create a safe, fun, and respectful lunch recess. Parent volunteers assist younger children with lunches and supervise the playground, field, garden, and blacktop areas. Volunteers typically work once a week or twice a month from 11:50am - 12:55pm. Younger siblings are always welcome to join parent volunteers. Filling the noon play shifts are critical in keeping a safe and happy recess at Oak.

Lunch Service Volunteers Needed!

The California-sponsored Universal Meals Program offers breakfast and lunch five days a week to all grades. The purpose of lunch service volunteers (from 11:55am - 12:30 pm) is to help monitor the lunch lines and release kids 5 at a time as lunch is served each day. It only takes a bit of time out of your day and you get to see what happens at lunchtime!

Please email Amy Leung at aleung11@gmail.com if you have further questions.

Reminder! Room Parents to submit PTA Check Request forms!

Thank you to all our Room Parents who organized classroom festivities for Halloween! We appreciate your time and dedication to our students! Please remember to submit your PTA Check Request forms to the PTA Treasurer (Janani Ganesh: ptaoaktreasurer@gmail.com) so that the PTA can process the checks ahead of the holidays. Thank you!

https://www.oakschool.org/pta-reimbursementpayment-requests

🍁Have a festive Thanksgiving with all your loved ones! 🍁

Sincerely,

Elizabeth Hernandez, President

Jocelyn Jackson, Executive Vice President

Oak Avenue PTA Executive Team 2025-2026

https://www.lasdeducationpartners.org/

Let’s all come together and keep our schools strong!

Google employees: Google is generously

giving each employee $400 to donate to nonprofits now through November 21.

Please consider supporting LAEF from your Google Giving account.

We still need to raise $590K to help fund teachers and essential programs this school year,

including PE teachers, librarians, music teachers (4th-6th), the Art Docents program,

the Living Classroom program, computer science support, junior high electives,

and mental health counseling.

If you have yet to give this school year,

donate to LAEF today and request a corporate match

if it’s available to you.

Gifts of any amount are appreciated and make a difference.

Learn more about the complementary roles that LAEF and the PTA

fill in providing an excellent education for our students, and

consider supporting both organizations.

By Mrs. Forrest

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! Have a fun, wonderful time off with your family. I’m looking forward to resting, reading, and eating. Thank you for all the sweet birthday wishes!

In TK, we read a book called Thank You Neighbor. In Kinder, we did an author study of Ryan T. Higgins and read Thanks for Nothing. In First Grade, we did an author study of Cynthia Rylant and read We Give Thanks. In Second Grade, we talked about libraries long ago and read Miss Moore Thought Otherwise. In Third Grade, our author study featured Mac Barnett and we read How This Book Is Made. In Fourth Grade, students found out their genre personality and took bookmarks offering reading lists for the specific personalities. We also did an author study of Melissa Sweet. In Fifth Grade, our author study featured Alan Gratz and we read Thank You, Sarah, about how Thanksgiving became a national holiday.

The Adopt-a-Shelf program is ongoing for grades Four-Six. This is a community service program where students can qualify to be in charge of taking care of one of our library shelves. Students earn small prizes for continually organizing their shelves. We have a party at the end of the school year for those that diligently took care of their shelves.

You can still sign your students up for Birthday Book Club via the Oak Classroom Parent website. The Birthday Book Club is a great way to honor your student’s love of reading as well as to leave a lasting legacy in the Oak Library. Look for the tiny store icon along the top bar. Please submit your orders for the year now so that we may order books in advance. Remember that summer birthdays will be celebrated 6 months ahead at their half-birthday. Last minute requests are harder to fulfill, so order at least 30 days in advance at the latest.

How to visit the Oak School’s Library Catalog via Destiny Discover:

Go to this link: https://www.destinydiscover.com/aasp/ui/pick/picked

Choose California, type in Los Altos School District, and Oak Avenue Elementary School in Los Altos. There are multiple Oak Avenue Schools, so make sure you pick the one in Los Altos. This puts you directly into the Oak Library Catalog, which shows all the books the Oak Library owns. Click Go!

You can browse the collection by topic, genre, grade level, etc. You can search for a specific book title or author. You don’t need to log in to do any of these searches. However if you do want to put a book on hold or read one of our ebooks, you will need to log in.

To log in, click on the login button at the top right. Enter this year’s google username and password that you use to log in to your school google account and submit. Search for the book you are looking for and put it on hold. Mrs. Forrest will pull the book for you and have it waiting for you in the library during the school year. No summer holds available.

Student Access to Santa Clara County Library

All LASD students (unless parents opted out), have a student account through the Santa Clara County Library District. This student account offers access to eBooks, research resources, homework help, and much more.

To access the website, go to: https://student.sccld.org

You will be asked to provide an Account Number and PIN. The Account Number is S + Student ID + LASD (no spaces in between). The student ID is a unique 5 digit number provided by LASD. It is the same number as your student’s Powerschool number and is embedded in their school email address. The number is provided when you receive district communications specific to your student. The PIN is the student’s birth month and day (again no spaces). If the birth month or day is only one number, add a zero in front of it.

For example:

Account Number: S12345LASD

PIN: 0114 (for January 14th)

There are also resource links on the Oak School website under Programs/Library.

Please contact Mrs. Forrest at cforrest@lasdschools.org if you have specific requests, have any questions, or have difficulty accessing your account.​

• Office is open from 8am to 4pm daily
• PowerSchool access: send an email request to powerschoolsupport@lasdschools.org
• Free COVID Test Kits are once again available from the office - just ask!

• Independent Study Plans

  • Each student may utilize a maximum of 15 ISP days per school year

  • Please notify the office of the dates of absence as soon as possible. Note: We request a two-week notice so teachers can prepare materials

  • All Independent Study Plans are subject to principal approval

  • Work MUST be completed during the absence and returned to school on the student's first day back in class

  • For each day of absence, students are expected to complete 180 minutes of work

  • Parent to initiate the ISP. Please use this 2025-26 form

Mission:

It is Oak School’s mission to ensure high levels of learning for all students. Every day we respectfully collaborate to develop confident, resilient, joyful learners who care about the Oak School community and become responsible citizens.

Email: nshah@lasdschools.org
Website: oakschool.org/
Location: 1501 Oak Avenue, Los Altos, CA, USA

Phone: (650)237-3900