Multi-faceted Refractions

Tonight, the two fifth grade classes had their film festivals, simultaneously. I got to watch only a bit of the second, since my daughter’s group was in the first group. All of the films turned out great. I will be creating links to each of the offerings from each festival so that you can see the end result of what fifth graders can do, with time and support. What will be missing, unfortunately, is an examination of the process which they went through, which is a more important journey that was experienced by each group of students.

Stay tuned for the announcement of the online edition of the two film festivals.

I wonder sometimes why I say yes to different duties and responsibilities, but one of the tasks that I am currently responsible for is creating our high school schedule. Right now I am trying to start with scheduling our rising seniors. Imagine this puzzle, trying to create a schedule based upon 48 students who have generated 358 requests for 39 unique courses all in a seven-period day.

What was I thinking? Well, back to the third attempt to piece the puzzle together. At least I have gotten a tablet PC to demo for the next week.

Every Monday and Wednesday mornings, all 550+ students, faculty, administration, and staff, enter our theater to participate in Morning Exercise, or better known on campus as Morning Ex. Historically, this was the headmaster’s class and when originated, calisthenics were part of this curriculum. Today, we are treated to presentations from teachers sharing their passions, to a class presentation, show previews, and occasionally an outside speaker.

Today’s Morning Ex was a powerful example of what can happen when students are empowered to change the world. We had several student led presentations about the situation in Darfur and then attendees were challenged to get involved. The presentation began with the reading the story of a young woman, Clemantine Wamariya, who attended the school two years ago as a freshman. Clementine was a Rwandan refuge whose story is quite powerful and moving. The story still brings tears to my eyes as I try to imagine what it would have been like to be uprooted, watching family and friends get killed. I cannot fathom it. Clemantine was featured on Oprah’s 50 Young People in May 2006, where she was reunited with her mother, father, and sister, and two brothers that she had not met, who Clemantine thought had died.

Three eighth graders then proceeded to inform us about the situation in Darfur, which is the service learning project that they chose at the beginning of the year by eighth grade teacher Natalie Sept. The presentation was shocking, moving, and powerful all at the same time. With the permission of Natalie, I am sharing the show, which you can download from SlideShare.net, to use.

[slideshare id=49350&doc=what-is-really-happening-north-shore-8th-grade-service-learning-project-6709&w=425]

At the end of the Morning Ex, both the eighth graders and Upper School students challenged us to get involved. This can be as simple as writing your congressman or participating in a fund raising event. Both our Middle School and Upper School students are holding t-shirt sales to raise monies, a group of freshman are hosting a 3 v 3 basketball tournament, and a group of Upper School students are hosting a benefit this Wednesday.

Today’s Morning Ex once again showed how thoughtful and powerful student’s voices can be when given a chance to speak.

I enjoyed a wonderful Mother’s Day, honoring the wife of my two girls, by waking up with the dog at 6:00 a.m. and then after just dozing off, waking up with my youngest to start “her” Mother’s Day breakfast, which I ended up doing most of the work. After breakfast, I did the dishes and then went on a nice bike ride with my wife to the Botanic Gardens. In the evening, I drove to the airport to pick up my mother and father-in-law, who were traveling home from a funeral service.

This is the fourth Mother’s Day since my mother passed away. She was one of my strongest supporters, who helped model and set the stage for my present success. After my younger sister went to school, she went back to work. Her first job was as a volunteer librarian in the school that I went to. With this, she supported my love of reading by bringing the new books home to catalog (three cards, author, title, and subject) and letting me read them before they were first shelved. With several moves, she began her successful career as a Tupperware lady in 1974, where she empowered and taught women how to become salespeople. She nurtured thousands of people and for a time was one of the top 5 Tupperware ladies in the United States. In 1979, she appeared in both print ads and on a commercial. She always encouraged me to follow my heart and I am sure that she continues to be proud of who I have become.

I wish all a Happy Mother’s Day.

On Thursday morning, Tom Doar, our Head of School, wandered into the library where I was getting ready to help work with our fifth graders on their iMovie project which I wrote about last week. He told me:

On Tuesday evening, at a meeting of the strategic plan committee chairs, Pam Whalley, our Lower School Head stated that the accessibility to technology has changed the way that teaching and learning are done in the classroom, especially in the last three years. Teachers need more time to research and develop curriculum to take advantage of these new tools. Since I have to make a presentation to our visiting grandparents tomorrow, could you provide a few bullet points to me to highlight some of these changes.

While trying to figure out which projects to highlight, it became apparent to me that it was not enough to simply hear about the different projects, but it was essential for the grandparents to be able to see and hear the impact of these changes. Later that morning, I swung by Tom’s office to tell him that I would put together a presentation for him to use. This did require rearranging the seating configuration that was planned and also required testing the equipment to make sure it would be able to be viewed and heard well enough by the 170+ grandparents that would be attending.

Having just completed the book, Made to Stick, it was important to craft the proper message which would be able to be understood and memorable. So I decided on focusing on the following simple, five statement message,

That Technology has changed the way teaching and learning happens at the North Shore Country Day School by:

1. Allowing teachers and students to communicate and exchange information with others around the world. (Examples used are an 8th Grade Cultural Exchange that we have begun and a faculty meeting on global collaboration presented by Jennifer Lindsay in Bangladesh)
2. Allowing teachers and students to see the world in new ways. (Example used was the American Holocaust Museum’s GoogleEarth Darfur project, which is being used by our eighth grade Service Learning Project, our ninth grade Regional Geography and History course and our twelfth grade Holocaust elective)
3. Allowing teachers and students to reconstruct history. (Showed our fifth grade’s Mayan village recreation using Google Sketchup)
4. Allowing teachers and students to share new stories. (Played an excerpt of our third grade’s Podcasting project to research and tell the stories behind the named spaces around campus)
5. Allowing students to change the world. (Told about our eleventh grade’s service learning project as inspired by reading Greg Mortenson’s Three Cups of Tea)

Tom delivered the presentation flawlessly and while I have not heard any feedback, I believe that we showed the grandparents that while staying true to our core values as a school we are allowing our students to do richer, more authentic opportunities for learning.

I am sharing the PowerPoint presentation which we used via SlideShare.net. By downloading the show, you will be able to watch the movies (created by using our SMART software recorder) and listen to the sound clips which were shared.

[slideshare id=48348&doc=how-technology-has-changed-the-classroom-experience-at-north-shore-27507&w=425]