To be alike; to be agreed; to be of one mind; to be in union or unison 

Andrews, Hawaiian Dictionary, 1865

ALOHA FOCUS FOR THE WEEK: LŌKAHI

Between the hula performances and robot demonstrations, a high school student approached our booth with a piercing question:

What is the thing your school values the most?

Hosting a table at the Hawaiʻi K-12 Parent and School Expo, we had been fielding questions throughout the day, sharing about the great things happening at our school. From STEM Hōʻike to our KES Ohana to our various community partnerships, there’s much for us to be grateful for. How might one narrow it down to a single thing?

Thoughtfully, after a brief pause, Ms. Yamada, our Academic Coach, summarized it best. We have a shared mission. Our teachers and support staff, our students and their families, all strive to fulfill our mission to inspire all to embrace learning, discover passions with Aloha at our core. 

While we might possess different talents and strengths, we interdependently strive towards the same goal. Dr. Manulani Meyer puts it as, “We are all the same, differently.” The attainment of our shared purpose is elevated by our unique gifts presented in harmony. 

Our mission enables us to be He Kaula Paʻa, a strong firm rope. As individual fibers, we wind around our shared mission to form a stronger whole. Whether it’s through art, dance, games, field trips, projects, or lessons held in the classroom and at the farm, combined our students gain a stronger sense of who they are, what they want to be, and why learning is essential. 

Inspiring learning, discovering passions with Aloha at our core is our lōkahi.

5 PURSUITS of LŌKAHI

Inspired by Gholdy Muhammad

Please watch this: Packs – Strength in Numbers written and illustrated by Hannah Salyer. Then with you child, answer the following:

• IDENTITY: Are you a part of a team? Talk to your kupuna about the best teams they have been a part of and what made them so effective.
• SKILLS: What genre of literature does this book belong to? What is your evidence?
• INTELLECT: Create a Bridge Map that features all the different names for packs of animals featured in the book. Add to the map with the name for a pack of animals not included in the book.
• CRITICALITY: Many of the animals featured in the book are endangered in the wild. Similarly, Hawaiʻi is home to many species of plants and animals that are endangered, with 75 percent of extinctions in the United States occurring in Hawaii. Research how you can help the plants and animals native to Hawaiʻi survive.
• JOY:  Learn from the author, Hannah Salyer, how to draw a zebra and then make your own drawing. (You can also hear her read the story as well as explain her process of illustrating the book.)

KINDERGARTEN REGISTRATION

Do you or do you know someone who has a child turning 5 on or before July 31, 2024, and would like them to enroll at Kāneʻohe Elementary? We are now accepting application for kindergarten for the next school year. If your child requires a Geographic Exception (GE), please submit your application as soon as possible. The deadline for submittal is March 1, 2024. All kindergarten GEs received after the deadline will be placed on a waiting list and will be accepted as space becomes available. If you have any questions about this or any other kindergarten related business, please call me or our registration clerk, Brigette Leavy, at 305-0000.

Mental Health & the Importance of the Independent Ability to Learn

George Couros is a humble, thoughtful educator who’s writing often resonates with me. In this article, he shares how he resists the urge to solve his daughter’s problems and instead fosters her independence. This not only empowers her as a learner, but fuels her hope and optimism for the future.

“Sometimes, the hardest thing to say to our kids at the moment is “figure it out yourself,” but sometimes, that can be the best for them in the future. Of course, we do our best to ensure that we build a community that is supportive of others, but it is hard to count on others when you don’t learn to first count on yourself.”

George Couros

Social media Safety tips for kids

Last year, the US Surgeon General released a health advisory on Social Media and Youth Mental Health. While there are benefits to using social media, the report finds “Children and adolescents who spend more than 3 hours a day on social media face double the risk of mental health problems including experiencing symptoms of depression and anxiety.”

To assist your efforts to ensure your children are safe while using Social Media, here are a few tips provided by the National Association of Elementary School Principals. 

CONTINUED PRACTICES:

NOʻAHUNA OF ALOHA

See Uncle Pono Shim explain the Noʻahuna, the esoteric meaning, of Aloha as taught to him by Aunty Pilahi, the Keeper of Secrets.

WEAR PINK FOR MAUI WEDNESDAYS

Join us in letting “that light, that divine inspiration that Aunty Pilahi Paki says is given to you at your very beginning, come through and let your ALOHA join with the ALOHA of the collective to bring about healing.” 

DAILY VIRTUAL PIKO

At the Daily Piko, we share thoughts on the Aloha value for the week which helps us become centered and ready to learn. We begin at 8 AM everyday except Wednesdays.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Aka, with care, and hai, to speak. To be tender of heart; meek

Andrews, Hawaiian Dictionary, 1865

ALOHA FOCUS FOR THE WEEK: AKAHAI

Note: The following is a modification of a message I wrote to staff on August 1, 2022.

Of all the elements of ALOHA, akahai seems to be the most akin to the common definition of aloha. Aunty Pilahi Paki and Uncle Pono Shim taught us that while the literal meaning of akahai is gentle or meek, it’s deeper meaning is grace, leaving others better than when we found them.

Last week, I attended a lecture on La’au Lapa’au (traditional Hawaiian medicine and spirituality) . The kumu, a student of the late healer, Papa Henry Auwae, shared his expectations of a Lāʻau Lapalaʻau practitioner, one of which was Hoʻomaikaʻi Akahai or to have respect for everything – the plants, the protocols of your practice, those you heal, everything. This expectation serves as a reminder to be intentional. As the healer practices akahai – helping someone get better – they must show akahai and imbue their tools and plants with positivity and kindness.

As educators, we do the same. The act of teaching is really a practice of akahai. We help students get better through the learning process. Thus all of our tools, resources and instructional methods should be instruments of kindness and grace. Likewise, when we regard our students, their families, and our school ʻohana  with akahai, we strengthen our impact. Hoʻomaikaʻi Akahai is our charge as well.

As parents, we too strive to be Hoʻomaikaʻi Akahai:

• From teaching children to share to modeling how to treat others with respect;
• From ensuring they’re well nourished to encouraging them to serve our community;
• From reading to them everyday to helping them plan for their future.

By filling these everyday occurrences with kindness and grace, we model as we teach, how to be Hoʻomaikaʻi Akahai.

5 PURSUITS of AKAHAI

Inspired by Gholdy Muhammad

Please watch this: THE RED BICYCLE: The Extraordinary Story of One Ordinary Bicycle written by Jude Isabella and Illustrated by Simone Shin. Then with you child, answer the following:

• IDENTITY: Like Leo, have you or your kupuna ever donated something that you truly valued? Talk about that item, what it made it special and the hope you had for its new owner.
• SKILLS: Make a Flow Map of the red bicycle’s journey from Leo to Haridata.
• INTELLECT: After being donated, the red bicycle travels from the East Coast of America to Burkina Faso, a country in West Africa. Research countries in West Africa. How are they similar to and different from Hawaiʻi.
• CRITICALITY: Describe the different ways Leo’s donation of his bicycle helps others (including the earth.)
• JOY: Make a donation drive with your family, gathering things that can still be used by others in need.

CONTINUED PRACTICES:

NOʻAHUNA OF ALOHA

See Uncle Pono Shim explain the Noʻahuna, the esoteric meaning, of Aloha as taught to him by Aunty Pilahi, the Keeper of Secrets.

WEAR PINK FOR MAUI WEDNESDAYS

Join us in letting “that light, that divine inspiration that Aunty Pilahi Paki says is given to you at your very beginning, come through and let your ALOHA join with the ALOHA of the collective to bring about healing.” 

DAILY VIRTUAL PIKO

At the Daily Piko, we share thoughts on the Aloha value for the week which helps us become centered and ready to learn. We begin at 8 AM everyday except Wednesdays.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Literally, great breath

Pukui, Mary Kawena, Hawaiian dictionary : Hawaiian-English, English-Hawaiian , 1964

s., Aho, patient, and nui, much. Forbearance; long suffering; patience.

Andrews, Hawaiian Dictionary, 1865

ALOHA FOCUS FOR THE WEEK: AHONUI

My father loved growing flowers. He filled his garden with vibrant fuchsias, velvety burgundies, and joyous ambers. Though difficult to cultivate, he patiently nurtured roses and azaleas to take root and blossom. Every weekend, he spent hours in the yard, pruning, weeding, and repotting. Then, in the evenings, he’d sit in the garden, puffing on his cigar, appreciating his ephemeral jewels. Beyond their beauty, he seemed to value most, the challenge and ahonui it took to get them to thrive. After all, his favorite of his entire garden was the one that demanded the most care; his gardenia. 

With blinding white blossoms and an intoxicating scent, the gardenia needed to be in soil both moist and well drained. Hence my father constantly monitored the soil to ensure it possessed to proper dampness. He lovingly pruned the branches during the off-season and filled our house with bountiful bouquets when in bloom. He diligently guarded against insects, misting the leaves with insecticide. He weeded and weeded, keeping its base free of competing pests. 

Eventually when I moved to Nuʻuanu, my dad blessed our house with a cutting from his gardenia plant. Barely 8 inches tall, he carefully planted the sapling in a sunny spot filled with nutritious soil. With daily morning and afternoon showers, the gardenia easily thrived in the Nuʻunau weather. I, the antithesis of the gardener version of my father, barely tended to it as it steadily quintupled in height. 

Even after my father passed away in 2014, the gardenia continued to grow, magnanimously blessing us with its abundance. Scenting the garden near the anniversary of his death, the plant served as a constant memorial to my father’s generosity. 

Then in 2020, near the start of the shut down, I noticed that the gardenia’s leaves began to yellow. Had it not been for the pandemic, I might not have noticed. But every afternoon, I conducted Zoom calls in the back yard, and like my father, gazed upon the ephemeral jewels of my garden. The differences I saw were not subtle. There were no flower buds and more than half of the leaves were chartreuse like overripe mango pits. Consulting Google, I thought the plant might be deprived of water. Impatient for it to get better, I desperately watered the plant twice-a-day. But instead of reviving it, the leaves went from yellow to brown and began to fall, leaving the branches bare. My heart sank.

Only at that moment, as the gardenia was dying, did I think about how it represented my father and the gifts he shared with me. He put himself into that plant as he nurtured it from a small cutting into a sapling he gently nestled into the soil. Prior to this, I mostly ignored it. Sure, I admired the blossoms when they were in season. But outside of that relatively small window, I forgot it was there.

As I franticly googled for some sort of fertilizer or medicine to cure it, I admitted to my mother that I sickened the plant through my own neglect. She looked at me, not with the disappointment which I sorely felt, but with recognition. She and my father had encountered this problem before. She advised that the yellowing and dying leaves were probably caused by aphids and that I needed to religiously spray the plant with neem oil. She also said that the aphids attract ants who in turn protect the aphids, so I would also need to get rid of the ants.

From that point, I conditioned the ground with an insecticide to deter the ants from forming a colony near the gardenia. I then regularly treated the gardenia with a regiment of neem oil. Over the first few weeks, I saw little difference other than the few remaining leaves persistently holding firm to the boughs. But, with ahonui and faith I continued to spray neem oil on the plant and guarded against ants. Then, after another week or two, almost imperceptibly, tiny sprouts of jade began to emerge from the darkly sparse branches. With ahonui and renewed hope, I continued. Sprout by sprout, leaf by leaf, after a couple of months, the gardenia reemerged from its coma. Fully blanketed in hues of emerald and jade, my father returned.

5 PURSUITS of AHONUI

Inspired by Gholdy Muhammad

Please watch this: Gwendolyn’s Pet Garden written by Anne Renaud and Illustrated by Rashin Kheiriyeh. Then with you child, answer the following:

• IDENTITY: In the book, when Gwendolyn grows marigolds, basil, fennel, and zucchini. Talk to your kupuna about plants you would like to grow if you had a garden, including ones that might be valued in your culture. 
• SKILLS: Once Gwendolyn’s garden takes root, the author states, “Vines and tendrils like hairs of wild beasts inched along the soil” Looking at the illustration and thinking about the description she uses, what do you think tendrils mean?
• INTELLECT: The plants Gwendolyn selects for her garden are known to grow well together. Research companion plants to learn how some plants help each other grow.
• CRITICALITY: By reading about it, weeding it, watering it, talking to it and protecting it, Gwendolyn shows ahonui in caring for her garden while it grows and comes into bloom. How might we show similar ahonui in caring for others in our community?
• JOY: Start a nature journal similar to Gwendolyn who collects measurements and observations of her garden. 

SPREADING HOLIDAY CHEER

Mahalo nui loa to our Student Council and their advisors for organizing an effort to spread holiday cheer to the kupuna in our community. Students colored and wrote dozens of cards and our staff decorated ornaments that were delivered to the seniors receiving food through Meals on Wheels. Mahalo to all for sharing a bit of aloha.

HOʻOMAIKAʻI ANA THE PACIFIC AMERICAN FOUNDATION

Our partner, the Pacific American Foundation (PAF), stewards of Waikalua Loko Iʻa, celebrated 30 years as an organization dedicated to strengthening our community through place-based education grounded in ʻike kupuna. Kāneʻohe Elementary is fortunate and grateful to be a partner to PAF as our students benefit greatly through the support and resources they provide. From project-based units at the fishpond to free Lokahi afterschool programs, PAF elevates our efforts as educators. When time permits, please view this video celebrating PAF’s 30th anniversary. 

IF ONLY I HAD KNOWN

Did you know that as adults, we can pass along to students our negative beliefs and attitudes about math? This in turn perpetuates the myths that not everyone can be good at math, or that you need to solve problems quickly to be smart in math. Even students at Stanford University carry these harmful beliefs with them to college, steering them away from majors and careers they might excel in.

But, if we change our minds and communicate positive, growth oriented beliefs, we can open greater opportunities for our students. We can help them believe in themselves and get them become math achievers. To begin this task, please read this letter from Dr. Jo Boaler, professor of math at Stanford University.

CONTINUED PRACTICES:

NOʻAHUNA OF ALOHA

See Uncle Pono Shim explain the Noʻahuna, the esoteric meaning, of Aloha as taught to him by Aunty Pilahi, the Keeper of Secrets.

WEAR PINK FOR MAUI WEDNESDAYS

Join us in letting “that light, that divine inspiration that Aunty Pilahi Paki says is given to you at your very beginning, come through and let your ALOHA join with the ALOHA of the collective to bring about healing.” 

DAILY VIRTUAL PIKO

At the Daily Piko, we share thoughts on the Aloha value for the week which helps us become centered and ready to learn. We begin at 8 AM everyday except Wednesdays.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Unity, agreement, accord, unison, harmony; agreed, in unity

Pukui, Mary Kawena, Hawaiian dictionary: Hawaiian-English, English-Hawaiian

ALOHA FOCUS FOR THE WEEK: LŌKAHI

Recently, I had the chance to talk story with Uncle Earl Kawaʻa, a cultural specialist with Kamehameha Schools. We attended a conference on Kukulu Kumuhana, a framework for well-being grounded in Hawaiian values. Although we sat in different parts of the room, I overheard Uncle Earl mentioning something about the concept of Ea which the framework defines as self-determination and agency. As I was in a different breakout, I could not hear what he shared however knowing Uncle Earl I guessed he was telling moʻolelo about Ea.

Later at lunch, I approached Uncle Earl as he dug into a bowl of chicken luau. Always generous with his knowledge, Uncle Earl explained that he advised his group to get to know the deeper meaning of the Kukulu Kumuhana concepts. He cautioned the literal meaning would suffice for basic actions, however the deeper meanings influence behaviors and attitudes. He used Ea as an example. Uncle Earl asked, “Where have you most prominently heard ʻEaʻ used?”

“The state motto: Ua mau ke ea o ka ʻāina i ka pono”

“Right, and where did that saying come from”

Sadly, I had forgotten that part of Hawaiian history and struggled to recall who authored the phrase. Without missing a beat, Uncle Earl went into teaching mode and said, “It came from the failed attempt by the British to take over the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi. When the captain who held the country captive was forced to retreat, King Kamehameha III proclaimed, ʻUa mau ke ea o ka ʻāina i ka ponoʻ But who was he saying that to?”

Before I could even utter, “who?” Uncle Earl said, “Everyone. Not just the Hawaiians. He meant it for all people.” Then referencing a talk Aunty Puanani Burgess gave earlier in the day, “Pono does not just mean righteousness. The deeper meaning is about being in harmony.” 

I understood. King Kamehameha III was speaking to all of us – all who share in the riches of this ʻāina. He proclaimed that Ea is not just about life but our responsibility to stand up for what’s right and serve this ʻāina. And pono is not just about righteousness, but our LŌKAHI, the common responsibility we share.

5 PURSUITS of LŌKAHI

Inspired by Gholdy Muhammad

Please watch this: Remember written and read by US Poet Laureate Joy Harjo; illustrated by Caldecott Medalist Michaela Goade. Then with you child, answer the following:

• IDENTITY: In the poem, the author says, “Remember the sky that you were born under,
• know each of the star’s stories.” Talk to your kupuna about the moʻolelo of the moon, the sun, and  constellations that were important to your ancestors.
• SKILLS: Using evidence from the text, how might this poem be about Lōkahi?
• INTELLECT: The author, Joy Harjo was the first U.S. Poet Laureate of Native American ancestry. Research what is a U.S. Poet Laureate and why this is such a great honor.
• CRITICALITY: In the poem, the author says, “Remember the plants, trees, animal life who all have their tribes, their families, their histories, too. Talk to them, listen to them. They are alive poems.” How might we “talk” to plants, trees, and animal life? What might they be saying?
• JOY: Sit and talk story with your kupuna. Spend time remembering things important to your family and ways that your connect.

A copy of the poem Remember  by Joy Harjo can be found here.

WAS THAT A WHALE UNDER OUR TENT?

Last week, our first graders were treated to a fantastic opportunity to walk through a life-sized humpback whale and learn all about its anatomy. Our first grade teachers arranged for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary to have their scientists teach hands-on marine science lessons and provide our students a memorable and enriching learning experience.

A PARADE OF GOOD CHEER

If you sat along Kamehameha Highway on Saturday morning, you might have seen our very own Kāneʻohe Alala and Pū kani (the students who lead our piko every morning) reciting an ʻoli about Koʻolaupoko. You might have also seen our student council passing out goodies to the kids lined up along the road. And finally you might have seen members of our Lokahi dance program led by Ms. Nyonda. Mahalo nui loa to our VP Kalei Tim-Sing and Academic Coach Cherisse Yamada for organizing our entry into the Kāneʻohe Christmas Parade and for all of our students, staff and parent volunteers that joined us.

CONTINUED PRACTICES:

NOʻAHUNA OF ALOHA

See Uncle Pono Shim explain the Noʻahuna, the esoteric meaning, of Aloha as taught to him by Aunty Pilahi, the Keeper of Secrets.

WEAR PINK FOR MAUI WEDNESDAYS

Join us in letting “that light, that divine inspiration that Aunty Pilahi Paki says is given to you at your very beginning, come through and let your ALOHA join with the ALOHA of the collective to bring about healing.” 

DAILY VIRTUAL PIKO

At the Daily Piko, we share thoughts on the Aloha value for the week which helps us become centered and ready to learn. We begin at 8 AM everyday except Wednesdays.

UPCOMING EVENTS