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Wolf Pack Press - December 3, 2025

  • 6 days ago
  • 4 min read

Updated: 4 days ago

Hope everyone enjoyed their Thanksgiving holiday. Now Winter Break is only a few weeks away!


Upcoming Events



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  • ​​Tuesday, December 9 - Advisory Council (5:30-6:30)  & SAPSA Meeting (6:30-7:30) in library

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  • Friday, December 12 - Family Friday (enjoy coffee and bring a pastry to share in cafeteria after drop-off)   


  • Saturday, December 13 - School Choice Fair. 9:30-2pm at the River Centre

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  • December 22 - January 2 - WINTER BREAK!   




School Choice Fair


The School Choice Fair will be held on Saturday, December 13, 9:30-2pm at River Centre. We are looking for two or three volunteers to represent SAP Elementary. If you are interested, sign up HERE!



Art Adventure Is Another Masterpiece


If you see 2nd - 5th grade students coming home with an amazing sculpture, painting or frieze, odds are that it was created as part of Art Adventure.


Ms. Lee's class at the end of an Art Adventure class
Ms. Lee's class at the end of an Art Adventure class

This is a program organized by the Minneapolis Institute of Art and masterminded by SAP parent Sarah Langford. The MIA sends reproductions or photos of six works in the museum. Inspired by them, students create their own works as part of their Performing Arts curriculum. This year we've had:


  • Soap carvings inspired by the Jade Mountain sculpture.

  • Construction paper friezes inspired by a Malagan frieze from Papua New Guinea

  • Sculptures inspired by Picasso's bronze Baboon and Young and William Edmundson's limestone Ram

  • Painting inspired by Georgia O'Keeffe's Pedernal - From the Ranch #1 and Junius Brutus Stearns' A Fishing Party Off Long Island


Each class is presented the piece of art and then given the rest of the hour to work on their own masterpiece, with art projects designed by SAP parent Todd Balthazor. Todd's creative genius has really helped the kids' creativity SOAR! 


Most classes are taught by volunteer parents who do some training or research on the art. After volunteering with my wife Lisa, I must say this is a wonderful opportunity to actually "teach" your child's class ... well, you know, with Ms. Brandvik beside you to keep chaos in check. The kids love seeing new faces and have a thousand ideas about their own piece of art. See the Gallery section below for some standout examples!


Malagan Frieze examples with some Papua New Guinea artwork Ms. Brandvik brought from home
Malagan Frieze examples with some Papua New Guinea artwork Ms. Brandvik brought from home

Art Adventure runs through mid-December, and students will create their own "museum" with their works of art. Then early next year each class will take a field trip to the MIA to see their inspirations in person. Roadtrip anyone!?


Visual arts were dropped from the SAP specialist rotation in the 2024-25 school year due to budget constraints. But thanks to the volunteers, Ms. Brandvik, and the MIA, visual arts are now back in the classroom at SAP Elementary! And thanks to you all for your generous donations to SAPSA, which pays for the Art Adventure field trip buses and art supplies.



Gallery


Below are some examples of art created in the Art Adventure program. However we hope to keep a semi-regular "Gallery" feature in the Wolf Pack Press featuring student art. Send your child's art or writing to communications@sapsamn.org!






The Student Directory Is Here!

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Your student should have recently brought home the SAP Elementary 2025-26 Student Directory. Stop by the office if you need an additional copy.

    

Thanks to everyone who made the directory possible, as well as our sponsors (Life Inspired Fitness Training, Pletschers' Greenhouses, Dolly Langer at Edina Realty, and Courtney Law Office). Special kudos to Lea Chittenden for organizing it!






Wolf Ridge Calendars for Sale



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Each year, SAP Elementary 5th graders take an unforgettable trip to Wolf Ridge Environmental Learning Center in Finland, MN.  This 5 day, 4 overnight camp experience builds core memories through outdoor adventures and experiential learning about MN History and the Lake Superior Area.  The cost to attend is $300/student but NO child is turned away for lack of payment. 


One way scholarships are provided is through the sale of calendars featuring Minnesota Wildlife. This year's photographer is Dominique Braud. 


Calendars cost $20  and ALL proceeds go towards funding Wolf Ridge scholarships for 5th grade students. 


Order your Wolf Ridge 2026 calendar by filling out this form:



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Library Helper


Mr. Watson, our Library and Materials Management EA, would greatly appreciate help with reshelving books for an hour during the school week.


To sign up as a library helper, click HERE .




Spirit Wear


Rep your favorite elementary school! T-shirts ($15/kid, and $20/adult) and school signs ($10) are available for pre-order now. Email president@sapsamn.org for preorders. Or, look for in-person sales at school events.


For existing orders, shirt pickup is moved back to 10/10, not curriculum night as I initially planned.

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Have a great week, Wolf Pack!

If you have suggestions for content or questions about anything in the Wolf Pack Press, please reach out to Joel Van Valin at communications@sapsamn.org

 
 
 

Wolf Pack Press - November 19, 2025

  • Nov 19
  • 5 min read

Updated: Nov 20

Stuffy Day and Thanksgiving are on the menu next week—but first, Give to the Max Day!


Upcoming Events



  • Thursday, November 20 - Give to the Max Day (see below)


  • Wednesday, November 26 - Stuffy Day! Bring a stuffy to school for the day


  • Thursday & Friday, November 27-28 - NO SCHOOL - Thanksgiving





Give to the Max Day


November 20 is Give to the Max Day, and it's easy to give back to St. Anthony Park Elementary with a donation to SAPSA. SAPSA provides funds for school reading programs, artists in residence, field trips, mascot costumes ... this list goes on and on!

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Click HERE to donate to SAPSA.


There is a separate link to donate to the Jim Schrankler Wolf Ridge Endowment fund, a sustainable fund that provides scholarships for the fifth grade trip to Wolf Ridge. Click HERE.





No Sweat!


We have a request from Jeannie and Rosaleigh in the Health Office:


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Hello SAP Families,


The Health Office needs your help! We have been sending home lots and lots of sweatpants this year - but we have not gotten many returned to us. We kindly ask that you do a quick scour of your home for any sweatpants that may have come from school, and send them back with your student. 

    

If you have any gently used sweatpants, underwear or socks you'd like to donate, we would very happily take them! (Please, no jeans or other pants.)




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Donate Your Plastic Bags


Got any plastic grocery bags? Art Adventure, the art program grades 2-5 are currently engaged in, would love to use them!


Bring your PLASTIC shopping bags (grocery bags, Target white plastic bags, but not ziplocks) and they will be reused by the children to make sculptures. We are looking to get at least 600 bags. Please set in the mosaic mailbox structure in the front entry of school. 


Literati Book Fair


A huge THANK YOU to everyone who volunteered or shopped at the book fair this year! We raised over $7000 in book sales and were able to fill 100% of teacher wish lists and replenish books in the library.


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Phys Ed Update

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Here is a quick update on physical education this fall from Ms. Paulsen:


Kindergarten, first and second grade just finished the ball skills unit!  We worked to learn proper form for the underhand throw, overhand throw, catching, kicking, dribbling and rolling. Next week we will begin the manipulatives unit.  This will include juggling scarves, hula hoops, bean bags, paddles and scoops!


Third, fourth and fifth grade students are finishing up soccer and speedball!  Next, we will use our soccer and speedball skills to play Olympic team handball.  Team handball is a student favorite every year!


Wolf Ridge Calendars for Sale



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Each year, SAP Elementary 5th graders take an unforgettable trip to Wolf Ridge Environmental Learning Center in Finland, MN.  This 5 day, 4 overnight camp experience builds core memories through outdoor adventures and experiential learning about MN History and the Lake Superior Area.  The cost to attend is $300/student but NO child is turned away for lack of payment. 


One way scholarships are provided is through the sale of calendars featuring Minnesota Wildlife. This year's photographer is Dominique Braud. 


Calendars cost $20  and ALL proceeds go towards funding Wolf Ridge scholarships for 5th grade students. 


Order your Wolf Ridge 2026 calendar by filling out this form:



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Library Helper


Mr. Watson, our Library and Materials Management EA, would greatly appreciate help with reshelving books for an hour during the school week.


To sign up as a library helper, click HERE .




History Lesson - SAP Elementary's Connection to Yellowstone


Nathaniel P. Langford first came to St. Paul around 1854, establishing a bank with his brother-in-law William Rainey Marshall (later governor of Minnesota) and Marshall's brother Joseph. The bank failed in the crash of 1857, though, and in 1862 Langford joined an expedition to establish a wagon road to the Rocky Mountains. This brought him to the Montana gold fields near Bannack, and he started various freight and milling concerns there. In the absence of law enforcement in the area, he joined the Montana Vigilantes, a group that served "pioneer justice" against outlaw gangs and highwaymen.


In 1870, he was part of the Washburn Expedition that made some of the earliest explorations of Yellowstone Park. In his diary he writes of the sublime scenes of mountain cataracts, waterfalls, and geysers, some of which he named:

Portrait by Olin D. Wheeler, c. 1870
Portrait by Olin D. Wheeler, c. 1870

We gave such names to those of the geysers which we saw in action as we think will best illustrate their peculiarities. The one I have just described General Washburn has named "Old Faithful," because of the regularity of its eruptions, the intervals between which being from sixty to sixty-five minutes, the column of water being thrown at each eruption to the height of from eighty to one hundred feet.


Following the expedition, he was named the first superintendent of Yellowstone Park, and N. P. Langford got the nickname "National Park Langford." Receiving no salary and lacking any legal means to protect the park from trappers and despoilers, Langford was accused of neglect and removed from his position in 1877.


Returning to St. Paul, he joined Marshall, John Knapp, and others in developing some land that Marshall had purchased in the 1850s into a neighborhood. This became the "railroad suburb" of St. Anthony Park, laid out by noted landscape architect Horace Cleveland, who also designed Como Park. Cleveland's design included winding roads that conformed to the natural topography of the land.


In the 1880s, a pond called "Rocky Lake" was filled in for sanitary reasons. The former pond, which once had boats and a bridge, became Langford Park. In 1955, a new elementary school, St. Anthony Park Elementary, was built at one end of Langford Park. Nathaniel Langford, who retired in St. Paul and became a western historian, would no doubt appreciate having a park (albeit much smaller than Yellowstone, and without geysers) named in his honor, where school children play at recess in the shade of majestic trees.


Langford Park in 1885, when there was still a lake there. Ramsey County Historical Society.
Langford Park in 1885, when there was still a lake there. Ramsey County Historical Society.

Fact or Legend?

A local legend is that when Rocky Lake was being filled in, a small train that carried the fill sank at the south end, and only the engine was saved. Does a small train lie buried under the south end of Langford Park??


Sources: The Discovery of Yellowstone Park 1870 - Nathaniel Pitt Langford. A History of the City of Saint paul to 1875 - J. Fletcher Williams. "St. Anthony Park: The History of a 'Small Town' Within a City" - Ferderic Steinhauser (Ramsey County History, Spring 1970).


Spirit Wear


Rep your favorite elementary school! T-shirts ($15/kid, and $20/adult) and school signs ($10) are available for pre-order now. Email president@sapsamn.org for preorders. Or, look for in-person sales at school events.


For existing orders, shirt pickup is moved back to 10/10, not curriculum night as I initially planned.

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Have a great week, Wolf Pack!

If you have suggestions for content or questions about anything in the Wolf Pack Press, please reach out to Joel Van Valin at communications@sapsamn.org

 
 
 

Wolf Pack Press - November 5, 2025

  • Nov 5
  • 4 min read

Updated: Nov 18

Conferences are this week—and also Spirit Night at Zero Gravity and the Literati Book Fair!


Upcoming Events



  • Wednesday, November 5th, 5-8pm - Spirit Night at Zero Gravity!

​

  • Wednesday - Friday, November 5-7 - Conferences & Literati Book Fair

​​

  • Friday, November 7 - NO SCHOOL (conferences)

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  • Tuesday, November 11, 5:30-6:30 - Wolf Ridge Informational Meeting for 5th Grade Parents. Meet in the school library


  • Tuesday, November 11, 6:30-7:30 - SAPSA Meeting in school library

​​

  • Friday, November 14 - Family Friday (coffee in caffeteria after drop off - bring a snack to share)


  • Friday, November 21 - Give to the Max Day




Literati Book Fair


The book fair is here! Stop by the school library November 5-7 during conferences to shop for books!


The hours are:

  • 7:15-8:15am and 3-7pm Wednesday

  • 7:15-8:15am and 3-7pm Thursday

  • 9am-12pm Friday


We still need a few more volunteers to run the book fair on Thursday afternoon and Friday morning. Sign up HERE to volunteer!


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Spirit Night at Zero Gravity!

 

Spirit Night at Zero Gravity trampoline park is on Wednesday, November 5, 5-8pm. Ticket sales will raise money for the school, so go ahead and jump into the action! Buy tickets HERE.


There is also a Facebook page.


Note that if you have Zero Gravity socks from last time, you can bring them and not have to buy new socks.


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Donate Your Candy!


Hope you had a spooky Halloween, and that rainy drizzle didn't dampen your spirits! Now it's November and ... what is one to do with excess Halloween candy? 


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Don't throw it away after your kids have eaten their fill!  Why not donate it to SAPSA?  We'll freeze any candy you would like to make disappear and reappear it during the Spring Carnival in May to be used as prizes!  A great way to spread out the sweets!


Candy donations can be dropped off at the SAP Elementary office.




Science & Technology Update

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Here is a quick update of science & technology coursework this fall from Ms. Wilson:


Kindergarten — Nature, things that are alive and what plants and animals need to survive

1st grade — Plants, structure and function, seed dispersal

2nd grade — Landforms and maps

3rd grade — force and motion with movement of playground equipment

4th grade — force and motion with movement of cars

5th grade — Properties of matter, solids - liquids - gases

​



Wolf Ridge Calendars for Sale



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Each year, SAP Elementary 5th graders take an unforgettable trip to Wolf Ridge Environmental Learning Center in Finland, MN.  This 5 day, 4 overnight camp experience builds core memories through outdoor adventures and experiential learning about MN History and the Lake Superior Area.  The cost to attend is $300/student but NO child is turned away for lack of payment. 


One way scholarships are provided is through the sale of calendars featuring Minnesota Wildlife. This year's photographer is Dominique Braud. 


Calendars cost $20  and ALL proceeds go towards funding Wolf Ridge scholarships for 5th grade students. 


Order your Wolf Ridge 2026 calendar by filling out this form:



Great Gatherings

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There are still some Great Gatherings available, including movies, bowling, skating, yoga, a scavengert hunt, and even a pool party! Purachase a gathering HERE.


The gatherings have raised over $1500 for the school so far this fall! If you are interested in hosting a Great Gathering, there is still time — fill out the form HERE.



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Library Helper


Mr. Watson, our Library and Materials Management EA, would greatly appreciate help with reshelving books for an hour during the school week.


To sign up as a library helper, click HERE .




Call for Submissions - Art and Writing


One goal I have for the Wolf Pack Press this year is to add a monthly "Gallery" featuring art and writing by SAP students. Children have wildly creative minds, and the things they come up with often amaze me. For example the painting below is not from a museum of modern art—it was painted by a four-year-old (my son Alex).


So parents, please scan and send in your kids' best art, photography, sculpture, poetry or stories. All student art & writing (PreK to grade 5) is welcome, and teachers can also submit their students' work. Email the work to me (Joel Van Valin) at communications@sapsamn.org. Many thanks!


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Spirit Wear


Rep your favorite elementary school! T-shirts ($15/kid, and $20/adult) and school signs ($10) are available for pre-order now. Email president@sapsamn.org for preorders. Or, look for in-person sales at school events.


For existing orders, shirt pickup is moved back to 10/10, not curriculum night as I initially planned.

ree



Have a great week, Wolf Pack!

If you have suggestions for content or questions about anything in the Wolf Pack Press, please reach out to Joel Van Valin at communications@sapsamn.org 

 
 
 
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