This last week Arielle and I wanted to focus on reflecting on our event and making thank-you cards to all the classrooms for participating. We wanted to get each student's thoughts on the event on video so Arielle and I split up. I did the video recording and she did the thank-you's with the students.
I'm not exactly sure how it all went on Arielle's end, but asking the students about the event, and eventually about what they have learned so far about Public Achievement and being active in their community was a lot of fun. It was kind of noisy out in the hallway, but otherwise it went well.
Before we split into groups we really quickly debriefed with each other about the event and tried to recap some of it for the two that couldn't make it to the event on Thursday. One of our students had gotten suspended and didn't even realize he had missed the event until our meeting on Wednesday. He was very very upset and withdrew from the group. I went to talk to him because he needed to realize that even though he missed the event he still had a huge part in planning it and getting ready for it. The public achievement group wasn't all about the one event or just the solution. The group was about learning what it meant to be active in their community and how to do the things necessary to leading up to events or solutions. He missed the event and that was a bummer, but he still had contributed a lot and could continue to contribute a lot. He went on a walk to cool off and regain his composure, and then he joined us. I made up some special questions just for him to reflect on planning and meeting with the principle. I think that made him feel better.
Once again I'm impressed on what some of these kids think and say! They have so much going on inside their brains, and it's so easy to just think they don't care or think about things! Man, am I wrong. I'm excited about what they are taking in and learning, but also about what they are speaking out! We didn't get to fully reflect together as a group, so we'll probably do a little bit more of that next week. We also plan on bringing Praxis full circle and going over the Core Concepts that we introduced at the beginning of the semester, and looking at how we saw them play out during our time together.
So excited, and kind of sad for the last few weeks!!
These kids are great, and I'm going to miss them a ton.
Saturday, April 30, 2011
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Observing at Andersen United
On Thursday (the same day as the Clean-o-thon), I went to Andersen United to observe Paloma in coaching her group of 5th graders. Her public achievement group is focusing on Immigration. She has a 6th grade co-coach who she met with on Monday to prepare for this day's meeting. She said that she normally doesn't meet with him, but this week was a good opportunity to help him prepare and lead the meeting.
Unfortunately when she got there things hadn't went as planned, so they had to back-track in their plan for the day. One of her students was suppose to make an announcement about the May Day Parade a couple days earlier, but was unable to because he didn't get the sheet of paper he was going to read from from the 6th grade cocoach, and he forgot. Paloma responded wonderfully though. She only had 30 minutes with her students, but she did a very good job of leading them into what they needed to get done. She was quick on her feet, and worked well with what was coming at her. She took her students back down to the office to see if they could have another chance at making an announcement. They got that set up, and while they were down in the office they put up a May Day poster they had made and went over what they were going to announce. I just thought it was a great use of the short time they had--even during travel time they were getting things done, and it was a long ways to the office from the 5th grade classroom.
Another thing Paloma was good at was encouraging student involvement. I had heard that most of the students at Andersen were very quiet and it was hard to get them to speak out, but I felt like Paloma's group was comfortable talking with each other and talking about the project. She encouraged each of them to be just as involved in the project as the other, not leaving anyone out.
Paloma also knew how to keep her group focused. Constant reminders of what they needed to accomplish and where they were going next helped keep her students on task and moving forward.
While I was observing I reflected on how hard it must be to co-coach with a student. I have a cocoach, but we get to decide when we get together, and she's also my age, so we're kind of on the same page. Paloma's cocoach is much younger than her, a male, and is in school most of the time, so getting together to plan must be difficult if not impossible. I commend her for working so well with hers.
Overall I think Paloma did a very nice job working with her group and I'm so excited for their May Day project that they have put together!!
Unfortunately when she got there things hadn't went as planned, so they had to back-track in their plan for the day. One of her students was suppose to make an announcement about the May Day Parade a couple days earlier, but was unable to because he didn't get the sheet of paper he was going to read from from the 6th grade cocoach, and he forgot. Paloma responded wonderfully though. She only had 30 minutes with her students, but she did a very good job of leading them into what they needed to get done. She was quick on her feet, and worked well with what was coming at her. She took her students back down to the office to see if they could have another chance at making an announcement. They got that set up, and while they were down in the office they put up a May Day poster they had made and went over what they were going to announce. I just thought it was a great use of the short time they had--even during travel time they were getting things done, and it was a long ways to the office from the 5th grade classroom.
Another thing Paloma was good at was encouraging student involvement. I had heard that most of the students at Andersen were very quiet and it was hard to get them to speak out, but I felt like Paloma's group was comfortable talking with each other and talking about the project. She encouraged each of them to be just as involved in the project as the other, not leaving anyone out.
Paloma also knew how to keep her group focused. Constant reminders of what they needed to accomplish and where they were going next helped keep her students on task and moving forward.
While I was observing I reflected on how hard it must be to co-coach with a student. I have a cocoach, but we get to decide when we get together, and she's also my age, so we're kind of on the same page. Paloma's cocoach is much younger than her, a male, and is in school most of the time, so getting together to plan must be difficult if not impossible. I commend her for working so well with hers.
Overall I think Paloma did a very nice job working with her group and I'm so excited for their May Day project that they have put together!!
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Parent Flyer and Teacher Letter
To see the Earth Day Clean-o-thon Parent Flyer and Earth Day Clean-o-thon Teacher Letter we sent out go to:
http://elizabethkennedy.efoliomn.com/personal
http://elizabethkennedy.efoliomn.com/personal
EARTH DAY CLEAN-O-THON!!!
I feel like I've been at Sojourner ALL WEEK...oh wait, that's because I basically have been! Monday Arielle and I went in for the weekly school assembly. Two of our students put together a skit to inform the school about the upcoming CLEAN-O-THON on Thursday (today). One of the boys was going to throw a crumpled up piece of paper at a waste basket and miss (on purpose of course). And then another student was going to come up to him after he shrugged his shoulders and started walking away and ask him, "Hey, aren't you gonna pick that up?" And then he was going to say no and she was going to tell him about the Earth Day Clean-o-thon on Thursday, and at the end she was going to ask him again if he was going to pick the piece of paper up. Then he was going to try shooting the paper in the waste basket again, but this time make it (or go for a slam dunk if he missed again). It was short, to the point, and fun. Unfortunately, one of the students wasn't there that morning, and the other one was too upset to even want to do it, so the principle made a short announcement for them instead. It worked out, but it was kind of a bummer since we had spent a substantial amount of time working on the skit the Wednesday before.
Tuesday I was not at Sojourner, but Arielle and I took some time Tuesday evening to plan for our meeting with our students on Wednesday...so my mind was there. :)
Wednesday was our last meeting before our BIG EVENT!! We took some time to finish preparing for it. We finished coloring our posters and putting them up in the school. We checked in with the janitor to make sure he was able to order extra gloves and bags and such. We redrew the map for the teachers of where their grade was cleaning, and made copies for them. And we ended our meeting with an overview of how the next day was going to look. We talked about different roles that the students would need to take for their project, and they volunteered to do those roles. Unfortunately we were missing two of our students and they weren't expected to be coming back the following day. :(
It's funny, but I think I was more nervous about the assembly than I was about the actual event. Once the assembly was over on Monday all my anxiety just washed away. Arielle and I went over all that our group had left to do before the event on Thursday, and it seemed manageable, so I was able to get really excited for the Clean-o-thon!
Today I found myself back at Sojourner for the EARTH DAY CLEAN-O-THON!!! (yes, I do realize that Earth Day isn't actually until tomorrow, but they don't have school tomorrow). Arielle and I got there a little early, so we just sat and waited because our students were out at recess and I don't think it's very nice to take away a kid's time to play...or at least they probably wouldn't think that it's very nice. We did warn them yesterday that their recess would probably be cut a little short due to the fact that our event started right at the end of their recess.
Arielle and I grabbed the box of bags and the boxes of gloves and headed out to the playground to get our group. They were a bit resistant in leaving their friends, but we got them to come over. As we expected two of our group members were not with us which left us with only four students. We reminded them of the run down of the event and their roles they volunteered for. One of our students didn't seem very interested in helping out (actually this student didn't seem very interested for much of the planning of this event), but they still helped.
Our first group was the K-2nd graders. The Kindergartners cleaned up the outdoor classroom. The first graders cleaned up the playground area, and the second graders cleaned up the school and church side of Emerson. Our students did a great job of handing out needed supplies with this group, and then splitting up and helping these grades clean their designated areas. Though one of our students had a hard time with one of the second graders who was being mean to her, and she had enough (the same girl who didn't seem very interested in the event), so she went back to her class until they came out to help with the clean up.
After they were done a first grade class came out just for recess, but the other first graders were still on the playground (some were done cleaning and so just playing, but other kept picking up trash because they were having fun!), and so the class that came out just for recess wanted to help because they saw their friends having so much fun! When they asked for gloves I gave them some, but then their teacher said that I could tell them no, and to just have them ask their teacher. I thought that was kind of sad that their teacher didn't wan them helping clean up the playground. They were probably going to help either way and at least I could give them gloves to be sanitary about it!
After the first group came it was kind of hard to keep our public achievement group together and ready for the next group because the classes would come at different times. It's hard to stand there and watch friends play while you just wait for another class to come out and clean. Plus the groups didn't stop picking up trash at the same time, so it was kind of staggered which added to the chaoticness. (Though, like Arielle said to me after the event, it was not as chaotic as was expected). Because of this Arielle and I did some more handing out of gloves and bags than originally intended because we wanted our students to take most of the responsibility.
The fifth graders were next. There was some slight confusion as to where their were suppose to clean...apparently the teacher's had a problem with the street we chose for them? (actually it was just one of the teachers). But we got it figured out and they did an AWESOME job picking up trash!! One group of brave students even picked up a dead squirrel!! No worries, they used gloves. ;)
The sixth and seventh graders came out last. There was only a small group of them because the others had some sort of ice cream social to go to (i think that's what it was). Another 3rd grade class came out with them which i wasn't expecting, but we worked with. The sixth and seventh graders were a lot more willing to help than I thought they'd be, but they also probably picked up the least amount of trash. That may be because there wasn't a lot on the street they were assigned to, or because there was a smaller group of them, or just because they weren't actually that into it. The third grade class seemed much more excited and picked up trash all along the front of the school. While the 6th and 7th graders (and the 3rd grade class) were picking up trash we let our students have a little recess too because of all the hard work they put into the whole event and helping all the other classes clean.
After each class was done cleaning they got some time to play on the playground which i was glad that the teachers allowed their students that time as a thank you for helping clean up.
Arielle and I estimated the amount of trash that was picked up because I forgot to bring my baggage scale from home to weigh the bags. We estimated, by means of picking up the bags and approximating the weight we felt, that there was about 500 lbs of trash that was picked up. There were a LOT of bags, and a LOT of trash! WAY TO GO SOJOURNER TRUTH ACADEMY!
After every bag was tied up we got the rest of our group and put the bags in the dumpster-we finished!
As the students were lining up to go inside we talked with each of our group members individually and asked them how they felt it went, and told them how much trash was estimated to have been picked up! They did a great job!
We had sent a parent letter home explaining and inviting parents to come join us in our endeavor to clean up the school grounds. I saw at least two parents come. One woman was the mom of a 1st grader and a 5th grader. She was so sweet and friendly, and just a joy to work with! She spoke Spanish as her first language, but did a really good job speaking to us in English the best she could. :)
I think our students did a great job at facilitating and participating in this event. It was somewhat chaotic in making sure we had everyone when we needed everyone to help each of the classes, but some of that couldn't be avoided because classes would come out at different times. Arielle and I ended the day with a smile on our face and pride in our hearts for our 5th grade public achievement group!
Tuesday I was not at Sojourner, but Arielle and I took some time Tuesday evening to plan for our meeting with our students on Wednesday...so my mind was there. :)
Wednesday was our last meeting before our BIG EVENT!! We took some time to finish preparing for it. We finished coloring our posters and putting them up in the school. We checked in with the janitor to make sure he was able to order extra gloves and bags and such. We redrew the map for the teachers of where their grade was cleaning, and made copies for them. And we ended our meeting with an overview of how the next day was going to look. We talked about different roles that the students would need to take for their project, and they volunteered to do those roles. Unfortunately we were missing two of our students and they weren't expected to be coming back the following day. :(
It's funny, but I think I was more nervous about the assembly than I was about the actual event. Once the assembly was over on Monday all my anxiety just washed away. Arielle and I went over all that our group had left to do before the event on Thursday, and it seemed manageable, so I was able to get really excited for the Clean-o-thon!
Today I found myself back at Sojourner for the EARTH DAY CLEAN-O-THON!!! (yes, I do realize that Earth Day isn't actually until tomorrow, but they don't have school tomorrow). Arielle and I got there a little early, so we just sat and waited because our students were out at recess and I don't think it's very nice to take away a kid's time to play...or at least they probably wouldn't think that it's very nice. We did warn them yesterday that their recess would probably be cut a little short due to the fact that our event started right at the end of their recess.
Arielle and I grabbed the box of bags and the boxes of gloves and headed out to the playground to get our group. They were a bit resistant in leaving their friends, but we got them to come over. As we expected two of our group members were not with us which left us with only four students. We reminded them of the run down of the event and their roles they volunteered for. One of our students didn't seem very interested in helping out (actually this student didn't seem very interested for much of the planning of this event), but they still helped.
Our first group was the K-2nd graders. The Kindergartners cleaned up the outdoor classroom. The first graders cleaned up the playground area, and the second graders cleaned up the school and church side of Emerson. Our students did a great job of handing out needed supplies with this group, and then splitting up and helping these grades clean their designated areas. Though one of our students had a hard time with one of the second graders who was being mean to her, and she had enough (the same girl who didn't seem very interested in the event), so she went back to her class until they came out to help with the clean up.
After they were done a first grade class came out just for recess, but the other first graders were still on the playground (some were done cleaning and so just playing, but other kept picking up trash because they were having fun!), and so the class that came out just for recess wanted to help because they saw their friends having so much fun! When they asked for gloves I gave them some, but then their teacher said that I could tell them no, and to just have them ask their teacher. I thought that was kind of sad that their teacher didn't wan them helping clean up the playground. They were probably going to help either way and at least I could give them gloves to be sanitary about it!
After the first group came it was kind of hard to keep our public achievement group together and ready for the next group because the classes would come at different times. It's hard to stand there and watch friends play while you just wait for another class to come out and clean. Plus the groups didn't stop picking up trash at the same time, so it was kind of staggered which added to the chaoticness. (Though, like Arielle said to me after the event, it was not as chaotic as was expected). Because of this Arielle and I did some more handing out of gloves and bags than originally intended because we wanted our students to take most of the responsibility.
The fifth graders were next. There was some slight confusion as to where their were suppose to clean...apparently the teacher's had a problem with the street we chose for them? (actually it was just one of the teachers). But we got it figured out and they did an AWESOME job picking up trash!! One group of brave students even picked up a dead squirrel!! No worries, they used gloves. ;)
The sixth and seventh graders came out last. There was only a small group of them because the others had some sort of ice cream social to go to (i think that's what it was). Another 3rd grade class came out with them which i wasn't expecting, but we worked with. The sixth and seventh graders were a lot more willing to help than I thought they'd be, but they also probably picked up the least amount of trash. That may be because there wasn't a lot on the street they were assigned to, or because there was a smaller group of them, or just because they weren't actually that into it. The third grade class seemed much more excited and picked up trash all along the front of the school. While the 6th and 7th graders (and the 3rd grade class) were picking up trash we let our students have a little recess too because of all the hard work they put into the whole event and helping all the other classes clean.
After each class was done cleaning they got some time to play on the playground which i was glad that the teachers allowed their students that time as a thank you for helping clean up.
Arielle and I estimated the amount of trash that was picked up because I forgot to bring my baggage scale from home to weigh the bags. We estimated, by means of picking up the bags and approximating the weight we felt, that there was about 500 lbs of trash that was picked up. There were a LOT of bags, and a LOT of trash! WAY TO GO SOJOURNER TRUTH ACADEMY!
After every bag was tied up we got the rest of our group and put the bags in the dumpster-we finished!
As the students were lining up to go inside we talked with each of our group members individually and asked them how they felt it went, and told them how much trash was estimated to have been picked up! They did a great job!
We had sent a parent letter home explaining and inviting parents to come join us in our endeavor to clean up the school grounds. I saw at least two parents come. One woman was the mom of a 1st grader and a 5th grader. She was so sweet and friendly, and just a joy to work with! She spoke Spanish as her first language, but did a really good job speaking to us in English the best she could. :)
I think our students did a great job at facilitating and participating in this event. It was somewhat chaotic in making sure we had everyone when we needed everyone to help each of the classes, but some of that couldn't be avoided because classes would come out at different times. Arielle and I ended the day with a smile on our face and pride in our hearts for our 5th grade public achievement group!
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Meeting with the Principle
Today our Public Achievement group met with the Principle. I met with our group yesterday during their lunch period to tie up some loose ends and make sure they were really prepared for this meeting today. Roles were assigned to make sure everyone had an active part in the meeting. We had two main speakers, and two scribes (to write down important things the principal said and the answers she gave to our questions), and one video recorder. So, today we went in and the students really took control of the meeting! Arielle and I barely said anything! Each of them had a question or two they were suppose to ask the principal and they were good about letting each other know when it was there turn that Arielle and I didn't really need to remind them. I was sooooooooo proud of our group for how well they did in the meeting! We got a lot of information that we needed from meeting with her. There is a lot still to be done and we want to do our clean-a-thon on Thursday the 21st, and speak at the assembly the Monday before that! Things we still need[ed] to get done include: -Speaking to the custodial staff about ordering more gloves and get bags. -Sending a newsletter to teachers about the event. -Sending a newsletter home to parents about the event. -Making a schedule for when and where classes clean up. -Making posters advertising the clean-up -Deciding what to say and how to say it at the assembly. Clearly there is a lot to be done before we can move forward with this, but Arielle and I believe it can be done. After meeting with the Principle we went back and really utilized our time with the students. We split into two groups. Arielle took a group to work on making the schedule, writing a note to the custodial staff about gloves and bags, and making posters. I took a group to work on making a skit to present the clean-a-thon to the school at the school assembly on Monday. I think that it will be something fun for the student body to see in being informed on the event coming up! We got a lot accomplished in the thirty minutes we had left with them, but there is still much to be done, but I think we'll be able to do it.
Thursday, April 7, 2011
Past Two Weeks
So there has been a lot happening in the past two weeks. Last week was our first week meeting again after the students had their spring break. We were unable to use the extra classroom so we went in the hallway to work. It went well for the most part, but was more difficult towards the end. Arielle and I had planned on working on a letter to the Principle asking about getting a compost bin on the school grounds, and also making a letter to send home to families encouraging participation in the upcoming Earth Day Clean-up in the Folwell-Camden neighborhoods on April 16th from 9-12:30. But once again, we changed our entire plan only minutes before we met with the students! We decided to present a different option-an earth day clean-up at the school. Most of them liked the idea. The only fear was that some students in the school would not want to participate and then would make fun of the students in our group for it. This is a very legitimate fear, but we thought that we could also make it more appealing to their classmates by including prizes or something. So we went down to ask the principle if there were any clean-up or earth day events planned for earth day. She said that there wasn't, that it was her birthday, and that there was actually no school on Earth Day. But she said she would fully support us puttin something together sometime that week! So we went back up to the hallway to start planning this day. This is when we lost them I think. There were many distractions. We started writing our "Mission Statement" which would be a great outline to use for bringing our fully sculpted idea to the principle. This last week we were able to use the extra classroom which was very helpful. Arielle was unable to make it due to uncontrollable circumstances, but another classmate, Paloma, came to observe so it kind of evened out. We first went down to the Principle's office to schedule a meeting for next Wednesday to show her our ideas for the earth day clean-up (that won't actually be on Earth Day). After scheduling that meeting we went upstairs to the classroom and got to work on the mission statement. We finished up the part that talked about how trash affects the community, and started in on our proposal of what to do to solve the problem of trash! They worked really hard. Arielle and I prepared questions for them to answer to create their proposal such as-Who should be involved? (consider who you want to impact?) Where should we pick up trash? How long should we clean-up for? etc. It was great to hear all the wonderful ideas they had, and try to come up with the best one. I had a student writing the proposal ideas so it took a little longer to get it all down. I feel like a lot got done, and they worked really hard, but I still don't feel like we are quite prepared to go to the Principal's office next week. I had to applaud my group though, they were on-task pretty much the whole time. I think it helped that we were in the classroom, but also because I split two of the boys up; they just can't sit together and stay focused. There might be one more part of the proposal we have to finish, and then I wanted to go over a couple questions we need to ask the Principal when we get there. An important part that was missed was going over how to have a meeting. Another group did a wonderful job of role play. They were pretending that they were going to go into the Principal's office and practiced what they would say! Our group didn't really have time to even talk about it, so I plan on going in on Tuesday and working with them during their lunch. One of the students did volunteer to talk about the proposal to the Principle, but I still think there's some preparation to do before Wednesday! Though I didn't think we got everything done that I wanted to get done I think that this week was very encouraging. I'm excited to see how this all comes together! My students are doing WONDERFULLY!
Monday, March 21, 2011
The Family Letter
Follow the link the below and click on "Family Letter" to see the letter we sent home to the families of our public achievement students. :)
http://elizabethkennedy.efoliomn.com/education
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Pickin' Projects
This week MCTC was on Spring Break, but Sojourner Truth Academy was NOT, so we still went in to meet with our public achievement groups!
It was a lot warmer on Wednesday than it has been in the past, so we decided to change up our meeting schedule slightly, and go outside to do a small observation. Arielle had observed that there was only one trash can in a one block radius around the school, and that trash can was across the street by the church; it was also very small. So we asked our group to observe not only on the playground (that's the only place outside we could go) but look beyond the fenced in area for trash, trash cans, and vandalism. One of the students asked if we could start picking up trash! I told him that we'd probably need gloves first, but that's something we could possibly do sometime.
We kind of discussed what was written in the journals and asked how we all were doing, and reviewed what we did the prior week when we were going outside, so Arielle and I decided it would be best to skip those planned activities. We basically jumped right into talking about the projects that were brainstormed last week. Then onto voting on which project (or 2) they would want to do. The most votes went to creating a compost bin, and boarding up Willard Park. Most of them seemed very excited about both of them except for one student, but I think it's only because his idea didn't get picked. He's still on board for the other projects though!
We then went into the Cube game we played a few weeks ago to come up with questions that we still needed answered to be able to start doing this project. The students rolled a die and the corresponding word they would need to use to start their question. Some questions were, "Can we get a compost bin?" (like, is it even possible) and, "How can we make a compost bin?" and, "What are we going to do with the dirt?" and, "Where can we put the compost bin?" They came up with some very good questions that we should consider when trying to do the project.
We continued the meeting by discussing (roughly) what the rest of the year was going to look like. Though it was kind of tough to talk about because we had just decided about what projects we wanted to do, so we'll do more detailed agenda creating next time we get together.
Arielle and I mentioned an Earth Day Clean-up with the Folwell and Weber Camden neighborhood on the 16th of April to our students. We wanted to see if they'd be interested in doing something like that to learn what one would look like, and then maybe implement their own. It seemed like a long conversation, but it eventually seemed like something everyone would be interested in doing.
We ended our meeting once again with our journal question for the following meeting. The journal entry was, "For each of our projects: Compost Bin and Boarding up Willard Park what do we need to know and what do we need to do next?"
Hopefully they'll come up with more questions that we need to find the answers to, or find the answers to questions we have asked!
This coming Wednesday is their spring break, so we will not be meeting. :( So much to do and so little time left!! I feel like we have enough time though...just enough time.
It was a lot warmer on Wednesday than it has been in the past, so we decided to change up our meeting schedule slightly, and go outside to do a small observation. Arielle had observed that there was only one trash can in a one block radius around the school, and that trash can was across the street by the church; it was also very small. So we asked our group to observe not only on the playground (that's the only place outside we could go) but look beyond the fenced in area for trash, trash cans, and vandalism. One of the students asked if we could start picking up trash! I told him that we'd probably need gloves first, but that's something we could possibly do sometime.
We kind of discussed what was written in the journals and asked how we all were doing, and reviewed what we did the prior week when we were going outside, so Arielle and I decided it would be best to skip those planned activities. We basically jumped right into talking about the projects that were brainstormed last week. Then onto voting on which project (or 2) they would want to do. The most votes went to creating a compost bin, and boarding up Willard Park. Most of them seemed very excited about both of them except for one student, but I think it's only because his idea didn't get picked. He's still on board for the other projects though!
We then went into the Cube game we played a few weeks ago to come up with questions that we still needed answered to be able to start doing this project. The students rolled a die and the corresponding word they would need to use to start their question. Some questions were, "Can we get a compost bin?" (like, is it even possible) and, "How can we make a compost bin?" and, "What are we going to do with the dirt?" and, "Where can we put the compost bin?" They came up with some very good questions that we should consider when trying to do the project.
We continued the meeting by discussing (roughly) what the rest of the year was going to look like. Though it was kind of tough to talk about because we had just decided about what projects we wanted to do, so we'll do more detailed agenda creating next time we get together.
Arielle and I mentioned an Earth Day Clean-up with the Folwell and Weber Camden neighborhood on the 16th of April to our students. We wanted to see if they'd be interested in doing something like that to learn what one would look like, and then maybe implement their own. It seemed like a long conversation, but it eventually seemed like something everyone would be interested in doing.
We ended our meeting once again with our journal question for the following meeting. The journal entry was, "For each of our projects: Compost Bin and Boarding up Willard Park what do we need to know and what do we need to do next?"
Hopefully they'll come up with more questions that we need to find the answers to, or find the answers to questions we have asked!
This coming Wednesday is their spring break, so we will not be meeting. :( So much to do and so little time left!! I feel like we have enough time though...just enough time.
Monday, March 14, 2011
One Step Further
This last week our group was able to take our Public Achievement one step further. We brainstormed ideas for a possible project!!!
As Arielle and I got our group rounded up and into the classroom we were having out meeting in we could tell that it was going to be a slightly rough afternoon. The students seemed a little rowdier than normal. One of our students even told us that she was checked-out for the day. It can be kind of hard coming at the end of the day because stuff like that does often happen, and then we don't have any focus in the meeting.
This meeting, Arielle and I preassigned roles so that everyone would get a chance to be a different role. We decided that we only needed one facilitator and that we should have two recorders: a written recorder and a video recorder. It was a little harder this week for our students to focus on the role they'd been given.
We started the meeting off like any other-designation of roles, Opening Focus Activity, Remember and Review...then we went in to talking about what research they found and wrote in their journals. It was interesting what they found. One student said that her parents think vandalism is a form of art. I think they must have been thinking more specifically about graffiti. She said that she didn't agree with her parents; it takes a bold student to say that! Another student talked to their parents about vandalism in the place that they are from. Vandalism was associated with much violence there. A couple students didn't really do any research, but they still contributed to the conversation.
We then called for a consensus on what to focus on to make a project for. I feel like this conversation didn't really go anywhere because the topic of trash and vandalism seemed to be on the forefront of every one's mind anyways. The options were to either pick trash or vandalism or combine the two. Though we never ended up taking an official vote discussing it any further would have caused us to waste more time.
Next we took out our large poster board and starting going over what it means to brainstorm. Then after certain rules were inferred (ie. no details, save stories for journals, say whatever comes to mind no matter how crazy) we started to brainstorm. One of our students who doesn't speak up much was encouraged to give an idea, and at first I thought he was going to say something that someone had already said, or just pass along the spotlight without saying anything, but he blew my mind with his idea: creating a compost bin. Who would have thought a great idea like that was cooking up instead his 5th grade brain!
They all came up with some GREAT ideas! I'm very excited to see what they decide on this coming week! Now we (Arielle and I) have to look over the ideas and think about all the things we need in order to do the project, so that we can be prepared to lead these students in the right direction on whatever project they choose.
After we brainstormed Arielle discussed roughly the agenda for the rest of the year. She broke down what we had left to do and the time we had to do it in. She also introduced the project that the students have for the end of the year block party. That scared them a little I think, knowing that this isn't just for kicks and giggles, this is serious, and it means something.
As Arielle and I got our group rounded up and into the classroom we were having out meeting in we could tell that it was going to be a slightly rough afternoon. The students seemed a little rowdier than normal. One of our students even told us that she was checked-out for the day. It can be kind of hard coming at the end of the day because stuff like that does often happen, and then we don't have any focus in the meeting.
This meeting, Arielle and I preassigned roles so that everyone would get a chance to be a different role. We decided that we only needed one facilitator and that we should have two recorders: a written recorder and a video recorder. It was a little harder this week for our students to focus on the role they'd been given.
We started the meeting off like any other-designation of roles, Opening Focus Activity, Remember and Review...then we went in to talking about what research they found and wrote in their journals. It was interesting what they found. One student said that her parents think vandalism is a form of art. I think they must have been thinking more specifically about graffiti. She said that she didn't agree with her parents; it takes a bold student to say that! Another student talked to their parents about vandalism in the place that they are from. Vandalism was associated with much violence there. A couple students didn't really do any research, but they still contributed to the conversation.
We then called for a consensus on what to focus on to make a project for. I feel like this conversation didn't really go anywhere because the topic of trash and vandalism seemed to be on the forefront of every one's mind anyways. The options were to either pick trash or vandalism or combine the two. Though we never ended up taking an official vote discussing it any further would have caused us to waste more time.
Next we took out our large poster board and starting going over what it means to brainstorm. Then after certain rules were inferred (ie. no details, save stories for journals, say whatever comes to mind no matter how crazy) we started to brainstorm. One of our students who doesn't speak up much was encouraged to give an idea, and at first I thought he was going to say something that someone had already said, or just pass along the spotlight without saying anything, but he blew my mind with his idea: creating a compost bin. Who would have thought a great idea like that was cooking up instead his 5th grade brain!
They all came up with some GREAT ideas! I'm very excited to see what they decide on this coming week! Now we (Arielle and I) have to look over the ideas and think about all the things we need in order to do the project, so that we can be prepared to lead these students in the right direction on whatever project they choose.
After we brainstormed Arielle discussed roughly the agenda for the rest of the year. She broke down what we had left to do and the time we had to do it in. She also introduced the project that the students have for the end of the year block party. That scared them a little I think, knowing that this isn't just for kicks and giggles, this is serious, and it means something.
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Storytime!
Arielle and I went into today full of ideas and a very thought out agenda for our group. We planned on reincorporating the "Who's in the Spotlight" strategy to keep them all focused as well as individualized roles. One of our group members was not there this week, so we chose to have only one Facilitator.
This week La'Tavia was our Recorder. She did some video recording for the group which I think she took pride in doing. She's a little more quiet and shy and I think she felt comfortable being behind the camera and contributing to the group in that way. Next week though she will be back out and contributing to group conversation more. We tried to ask her her thoughts and ideas, but I think she was set in her role; she was behind the camera and that's where she was going to stay. I know she has thoughts and she does talk, so I think that once the Recorder role is passed on she will be more outspoken.
Rowmar was our Facilitator this week and he did a wonderful job of coming up with a question to ask the group and deciding who was in the "spotlight." He asked us to describe one of our birthdays that was the most fun. The stories they had to tell were funny and entertaining!
We then moved into a time of Remembering and Reviewing. It was great to hear all the things they remembered from the week before. I would think it would be hard to remember all the things we did because we only met with them for an hour and it was a whole week ago! They remembered the Pass the Paper activity, the roles, the journal entry, and what we had said we were going to do this week.
Next on the Agenda was to talk about what they chose to write in their journals. Each of them took a turn talking about what problem they chose. They all seemed to lean towards trash, but Brian brought up an incident that happened at his apartment complex (this is where the storytelling begins!). It was an act of vandalism, so I asked the group if they knew what vandalism was. They said yes, but some seemed unsure, so I tried my best to explain what I knew vandalism to be. I then asked if vandalism was a problem. It seemed to a couple of them that it was, and to the other two it wasn't such a problem where they live.
We then went into more stories. It seemed like each student had a story about some act of violence, trash, or vandalism. Some stories though went very off topic. That was probably the hardest part for Arielle and I. We didn't know how to regain focus without interrupting them and basically cutting them off. We did our best though...once they were finished with their long, drawn-out stories. Like Arielle said in our debrief, it's great that they trust us enough to talk to us about their lives, but it's hard because we have limited time and need to keep moving forward.
Another difficulty is the fact that we seem to be changing gears which leaves us still sitting in the issue development stage with 8 weeks left to go. :/ We noticed that though these students expressed interest in doing projects concerning trash/environment at the beginning, their passion to focus solely on that topic isn't there. On one hand it's great because they have this deep passion for some pretty big things, and have faith that they can do something about it, but that means we need to take a step back, which puts us behind in actually creating a project. Arielle and I are planning on encouraging our students in focusing on the area of vandalism because they seem to be passionate about it, though I think they need to grasp a better idea of what it is and where it is in their community.
We did a short question activity that we didn't get to finish, but Arielle and I plan on bringing back in future meetings. There were 7 words that were set up with numbers 1-6 (6 having two words) that would begin questions. The students rolled a die and they used the word that corresponded with the number to create a question that had about the issues brought up in the journals. They asked really good questions like "How does trash effect us?" But we cut the activity short because we needed to move into choosing a specific issue to ask these questions about. They seemed to focus on trash in their journal entries, but Arielle and I weren't convinced this is what they were truly passionate about. That's when we explored more about vandalism and other things they would like to focus on.
We soon ran out of time, and Arielle and I were kind of freaking out because we still had a few things we needed to do before they left. Luckily we had planned a little for the possibility that they wouldn't have agreed on a specific issue by the end of our meeting! So Arielle, being the awesome co-coach that she is, had them write down a journal question for the following week. "What are the causes and effects of vandalism or trash? What is a possible solution?" Then we had a few minutes to quickly talk about HOW TO RESEARCH. We listed different ways to research such as talking to family, friends, neighbors, and teachers, or observing and writing those observations down, or reading books, magazines, and newspapers. Before they left they had to write down three different ways they were going to research to come up with their answers to the journal question. Quick save for the end of the meeting-way to go Arielle!
I left the meeting fearing that like my Public Achievement class last semester, we were going to spend most of our time discussing problems, and leave little time to actually make a project concerning a specific problem. But there is hope. I learned a lot last semester in those discussions, so I know that learning and growing can still happen even if we need to take this step back and reevaluate what we want to focus on. Plus, they need to do a project on something they are passionate about, not something that they feel like they need to focus on because that was the group they were placed in. I don't believe however that my and Arielle's group needs to go down the same road that my Public Achievement class did, and I believe my fear of seeing it do that will help me keep pushing the group to get further.
In debrief we discussed some of the troubles that we had in our meeting, and got some good suggestions. We can ask refocusing questions, add a small "what's our objective for today's meeting?" right after our Remember and Review at the beginning of our meeting, and then remind them of our objective throughout the meeting to keep them focused and on task in all they say and do.
We love to hear their stories and hear about their lives. Unfortunately, we don't have all the time in the world, so we need to be able to reign in the stories to only those that are relevant.
Once again, our goal for next week is to decide on a specific problem to tackle! I plan on doing some research of my own on vandalism so we can all bring to the table some new information that will hopefully get us going in a more productive direction.
This week La'Tavia was our Recorder. She did some video recording for the group which I think she took pride in doing. She's a little more quiet and shy and I think she felt comfortable being behind the camera and contributing to the group in that way. Next week though she will be back out and contributing to group conversation more. We tried to ask her her thoughts and ideas, but I think she was set in her role; she was behind the camera and that's where she was going to stay. I know she has thoughts and she does talk, so I think that once the Recorder role is passed on she will be more outspoken.
Rowmar was our Facilitator this week and he did a wonderful job of coming up with a question to ask the group and deciding who was in the "spotlight." He asked us to describe one of our birthdays that was the most fun. The stories they had to tell were funny and entertaining!
We then moved into a time of Remembering and Reviewing. It was great to hear all the things they remembered from the week before. I would think it would be hard to remember all the things we did because we only met with them for an hour and it was a whole week ago! They remembered the Pass the Paper activity, the roles, the journal entry, and what we had said we were going to do this week.
Next on the Agenda was to talk about what they chose to write in their journals. Each of them took a turn talking about what problem they chose. They all seemed to lean towards trash, but Brian brought up an incident that happened at his apartment complex (this is where the storytelling begins!). It was an act of vandalism, so I asked the group if they knew what vandalism was. They said yes, but some seemed unsure, so I tried my best to explain what I knew vandalism to be. I then asked if vandalism was a problem. It seemed to a couple of them that it was, and to the other two it wasn't such a problem where they live.
We then went into more stories. It seemed like each student had a story about some act of violence, trash, or vandalism. Some stories though went very off topic. That was probably the hardest part for Arielle and I. We didn't know how to regain focus without interrupting them and basically cutting them off. We did our best though...once they were finished with their long, drawn-out stories. Like Arielle said in our debrief, it's great that they trust us enough to talk to us about their lives, but it's hard because we have limited time and need to keep moving forward.
Another difficulty is the fact that we seem to be changing gears which leaves us still sitting in the issue development stage with 8 weeks left to go. :/ We noticed that though these students expressed interest in doing projects concerning trash/environment at the beginning, their passion to focus solely on that topic isn't there. On one hand it's great because they have this deep passion for some pretty big things, and have faith that they can do something about it, but that means we need to take a step back, which puts us behind in actually creating a project. Arielle and I are planning on encouraging our students in focusing on the area of vandalism because they seem to be passionate about it, though I think they need to grasp a better idea of what it is and where it is in their community.
We did a short question activity that we didn't get to finish, but Arielle and I plan on bringing back in future meetings. There were 7 words that were set up with numbers 1-6 (6 having two words) that would begin questions. The students rolled a die and they used the word that corresponded with the number to create a question that had about the issues brought up in the journals. They asked really good questions like "How does trash effect us?" But we cut the activity short because we needed to move into choosing a specific issue to ask these questions about. They seemed to focus on trash in their journal entries, but Arielle and I weren't convinced this is what they were truly passionate about. That's when we explored more about vandalism and other things they would like to focus on.
We soon ran out of time, and Arielle and I were kind of freaking out because we still had a few things we needed to do before they left. Luckily we had planned a little for the possibility that they wouldn't have agreed on a specific issue by the end of our meeting! So Arielle, being the awesome co-coach that she is, had them write down a journal question for the following week. "What are the causes and effects of vandalism or trash? What is a possible solution?" Then we had a few minutes to quickly talk about HOW TO RESEARCH. We listed different ways to research such as talking to family, friends, neighbors, and teachers, or observing and writing those observations down, or reading books, magazines, and newspapers. Before they left they had to write down three different ways they were going to research to come up with their answers to the journal question. Quick save for the end of the meeting-way to go Arielle!
I left the meeting fearing that like my Public Achievement class last semester, we were going to spend most of our time discussing problems, and leave little time to actually make a project concerning a specific problem. But there is hope. I learned a lot last semester in those discussions, so I know that learning and growing can still happen even if we need to take this step back and reevaluate what we want to focus on. Plus, they need to do a project on something they are passionate about, not something that they feel like they need to focus on because that was the group they were placed in. I don't believe however that my and Arielle's group needs to go down the same road that my Public Achievement class did, and I believe my fear of seeing it do that will help me keep pushing the group to get further.
In debrief we discussed some of the troubles that we had in our meeting, and got some good suggestions. We can ask refocusing questions, add a small "what's our objective for today's meeting?" right after our Remember and Review at the beginning of our meeting, and then remind them of our objective throughout the meeting to keep them focused and on task in all they say and do.
We love to hear their stories and hear about their lives. Unfortunately, we don't have all the time in the world, so we need to be able to reign in the stories to only those that are relevant.
Once again, our goal for next week is to decide on a specific problem to tackle! I plan on doing some research of my own on vandalism so we can all bring to the table some new information that will hopefully get us going in a more productive direction.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Who's in the Spotlight??
"Who's in the Spotlight?" was a typical question that was asked in our group this past Wednesday. We had had some trouble hearing each other last week because everyone was talking over each other, so Arielle had this wonderful idea of using a flashlight to show whose turn it was to talk! If a student (or coach) had the flashlight they were "in the spotlight" and it was their turn to speak. If we noticed others were talking when they didn't have the flashlight we would simply ask "Who's in the spotlight?" to get them refocused. It worked magnificently!
We also established some roles in our group which helped focus them in. We had two Facilitator roles to do two different beginning activities. The Facilitator of the Opening Focus Activity (OFA) came up with a question to ask the group. It could be anything from what was one good thing that happened to you this last week to what's your favorite animal? Olivia was our OFA facilitator this past week and she asked, "What's the silliest thing that happened to you this last week?" As we were debriefing after our time with the students Arielle commented on how it was nice to have even that short amount of time to get to know the students a little better and not have to be solely focused on just "getting the job done;" the job being the public achievement project.
The other Facilitator was in charge of running the Remember and Review (R & R) activity in which we reviewed what we did the week prior. So they asked their classmates what they remembered from the week before and gave them the spotlight as well as said what they remembered. Avery was our facilitator for this activity. It was great to see him step into his role this week in contrast to last week where he was easily distracted.
We also had the role of the Recorder. The Recorder is in charge of writing or drawing anything needed during the meeting. They may also do any audio or video recording needed during the meeting. This last week Rowmar was the Recorder and we needed him to write down new ideas the group had about needed expectations for each other during our meeting times. He did a GREAT job and was very organized about it!
The Encourager is another role we assigned. It may sound kind of like we were running out of ideas, but I believe this is a very important role. It gives the students an opportunity to really reach out and care about their classmates. When they notice a student hasn't been saying much or had the chance to say much they might ask them if they have any ideas or what their thoughts are. The role of an encourager is to give everyone an opportunity to be heard and to encourage others to continue to contribute by including, uplifting, and complimenting them. Brian was the encourager and he was excited to encourage his classmates to speak and contribute to conversation. He definately felt this was a role for him!
The last role we had was the Task-Master. This person will get an outline of the schedule for the meeting and will make sure that the group stays on task to be sure to get all necessary things done. They will keep an eye out for the time and help with transitions to different activities by giving the spotlight to whoever is facilitating the next activity. La'Tavia was our task-master this last week and we could see the pride she took in her role as she paid close attention to the time and helped us move from one activity to the next.
Arielle led an activity in which we responded to the journal entries the students made last week. It was all about what they needed from their classmates in order to do their best with the public achievement problems. In short, what expectations do they have. They each got to be "in the spotlight" and share what "rule" (for lack of a better word) they thought was the best and why. In the end they came up with some new ones, got rid of some they didn't think were necessary, and decided on a list that was somewhat long, but they thought was best. I think having this conversation was very beneficial because now they all know what they need to do and not do. I was very surprised at the importance of throwing trash away to the group. They felt that if their focus was on trash and the environment they needed to be doing their part in not littering! What integrity from our group of fifth graders!!
The last activity we did was brainstorming. We did what's called "Pass the Paper" brainstorming. They used a journal piece of paper and at the top put one idea on a specific issue related to trash/environment. Then they passed their journals to the left. And then read the idea from their classmate and added another idea to the list until they kept passing journals and they got back to where they began. I was a little apprehensive as to how this would go. Would enough ideas be generated? Would it go too fast? It ended up going a lot better than I expected, and it was the perfect amount of time. I think it was a lot better than having 5 students shouting out ideas all at once. It kept them focused and thinking which I believe kept ideas flowing.
Their assignment for journals this week was to pick one of the brainstormed ideas (either thiers or one they read) and research it a little. What is the issue? Why is it important? What causes it? How could it be solved? They are going to bring back their researched ideas on Wednesday and we're going to talk about the different ideas they have and hopefully pick one to start really digging into and researching!
This week was a very motivating week! Things seem to start coming together and I'm excited where the students take us from here!
We also established some roles in our group which helped focus them in. We had two Facilitator roles to do two different beginning activities. The Facilitator of the Opening Focus Activity (OFA) came up with a question to ask the group. It could be anything from what was one good thing that happened to you this last week to what's your favorite animal? Olivia was our OFA facilitator this past week and she asked, "What's the silliest thing that happened to you this last week?" As we were debriefing after our time with the students Arielle commented on how it was nice to have even that short amount of time to get to know the students a little better and not have to be solely focused on just "getting the job done;" the job being the public achievement project.
The other Facilitator was in charge of running the Remember and Review (R & R) activity in which we reviewed what we did the week prior. So they asked their classmates what they remembered from the week before and gave them the spotlight as well as said what they remembered. Avery was our facilitator for this activity. It was great to see him step into his role this week in contrast to last week where he was easily distracted.
We also had the role of the Recorder. The Recorder is in charge of writing or drawing anything needed during the meeting. They may also do any audio or video recording needed during the meeting. This last week Rowmar was the Recorder and we needed him to write down new ideas the group had about needed expectations for each other during our meeting times. He did a GREAT job and was very organized about it!
The Encourager is another role we assigned. It may sound kind of like we were running out of ideas, but I believe this is a very important role. It gives the students an opportunity to really reach out and care about their classmates. When they notice a student hasn't been saying much or had the chance to say much they might ask them if they have any ideas or what their thoughts are. The role of an encourager is to give everyone an opportunity to be heard and to encourage others to continue to contribute by including, uplifting, and complimenting them. Brian was the encourager and he was excited to encourage his classmates to speak and contribute to conversation. He definately felt this was a role for him!
The last role we had was the Task-Master. This person will get an outline of the schedule for the meeting and will make sure that the group stays on task to be sure to get all necessary things done. They will keep an eye out for the time and help with transitions to different activities by giving the spotlight to whoever is facilitating the next activity. La'Tavia was our task-master this last week and we could see the pride she took in her role as she paid close attention to the time and helped us move from one activity to the next.
Arielle led an activity in which we responded to the journal entries the students made last week. It was all about what they needed from their classmates in order to do their best with the public achievement problems. In short, what expectations do they have. They each got to be "in the spotlight" and share what "rule" (for lack of a better word) they thought was the best and why. In the end they came up with some new ones, got rid of some they didn't think were necessary, and decided on a list that was somewhat long, but they thought was best. I think having this conversation was very beneficial because now they all know what they need to do and not do. I was very surprised at the importance of throwing trash away to the group. They felt that if their focus was on trash and the environment they needed to be doing their part in not littering! What integrity from our group of fifth graders!!
The last activity we did was brainstorming. We did what's called "Pass the Paper" brainstorming. They used a journal piece of paper and at the top put one idea on a specific issue related to trash/environment. Then they passed their journals to the left. And then read the idea from their classmate and added another idea to the list until they kept passing journals and they got back to where they began. I was a little apprehensive as to how this would go. Would enough ideas be generated? Would it go too fast? It ended up going a lot better than I expected, and it was the perfect amount of time. I think it was a lot better than having 5 students shouting out ideas all at once. It kept them focused and thinking which I believe kept ideas flowing.
Their assignment for journals this week was to pick one of the brainstormed ideas (either thiers or one they read) and research it a little. What is the issue? Why is it important? What causes it? How could it be solved? They are going to bring back their researched ideas on Wednesday and we're going to talk about the different ideas they have and hopefully pick one to start really digging into and researching!
This week was a very motivating week! Things seem to start coming together and I'm excited where the students take us from here!
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Public Achievement Core Concepts
This last Wednesday was our second time in the 5th grade classroom at Sojourner Truth Academy. Arielle (my wonderful co-coach) and I were a good half hour early, but it proved to be beneficial since we decided to tweek our focus of the meeting. :)
It was exciting to see the 5th graders again. I was surprised at my lack of memory when it came to their names. Normally I pride myself in how well I remember names, but it was difficult to put the names I did remember to the faces!! :( Hopefully by next week their names will be rooted in my mind. I don't think I'll have any difficulty remembering the students in my and Arielle's group though! I must say, we have an amazing group of kids! But I'll get back to them in a moment.
This last week we decided to help the students understand what Public Achievement was by showing them a video of a group of High School students in Colorado who were active in their school. After talking about issues in their school and deciding on which one they wanted to be pro-active about they set out and researched statistics and interviewed their fellow classmates. Their issue? The cliques and discrimination in their school. In the end they decided to have a "Mix It Up" day where students were encouraged to talk to people they don't normally talk to and sit by people at lunch whom they normally don't sit with. It was both a success and failure because some students chose not to participate while others benefited from the day. In the end, the high school public achievement group experienced democracy at it's finest. They learned they had a voice against the issues that surrounded them, and were active in their community.
After showing this video and talking about it for a very short period we split into our generalized issue groups. We had 5 groups as I believe I stated in my previous blog. We dispersed ourselves among the classroom. This proved to be difficult on our group. We decided to sit at a fairly large table at the side of the room which meant we were more spread out. In our debrief we discussed how this was probably not the best place to sit because it left room for a lot of distractions and it was hard to hear each other. The listening and hearing parts were the hardest of the day. In a room full of students all talking at once in different parts of the room we were unable to hear each other and give each other the attention they deserved.
Arielle and I had a few activities planned for our group. We wanted to talk about the core concepts of public achievement and dive into what public achievement actually is. Afterall if you don't understand what your doing before you do it how can you do it effectively, right? But before we discussed the concepts we went around and said our names and 2 positive things that happened to us this last week. I like that Arielle was thinking positively when she made up this opening question! :) I was surprised at the amount of participation and interaction we got from the 5 students in our group. Even the two students who had been labeled "non-talkers" participated when asked to.
There were 11 core concepts to public achievement. We had construction paper, sharpies, and definitions. Their job was to read the definition and redefine it in their own words so that it would make more sense (the definitions given were worded very complexly). I think it was hard for them to understand the concepts and Arielle and I tried to explain some of them, but we were also participating and trying to make some posters, so that took us away from helping them understand the meanings of the concepts. If we were to introduce core concepts again I would want to make the activity a little more 5th grade friendly. :)
I think another thing that added to the not quite failure, but not quite success of this activity was the simple fact that the amount of noise coming from the room was a huge distraction and it made it hard to think. One of our students got so frustrated with the fact that he didn't understand the concept he was trying to redefine he refused to do it. Thankfully, he didn't throw a fit, or yell, or walk off, he just simply and calmly refused to do it. He tried, and tried, and gave up. He didn't want help, he just didn't want to deal with it anymore which, in the end, was fine. We couldn't make him participate, and I think Arielle and I realized what we were asking the students to do was kind of difficult, though a little more simple for some.
I'm excited to see different personalities and characteristics already come out in our group. One student has shown leaderships skills already, another has a voice for speaking, another is strong-willed, and yet another has many good ideas. If they can learn to work together and allow each other to speak they will make a powerful impact on whatever they choose to do! I'm looking forward to what they come up with. Though I hope that Arielle and I can work together as good, effective, encouraging coaches for them! I have confidence that we can! My fear right now is talking too much. I like to be in control and offer my opinion, so I end up talking a lot. I'm learning about being aware of how much I talk and contribute and making more room for the students and Arielle to talk.
This coming Wednesday we will be talking about expectations that they have for each other in the group; things they need from each other to be able to work well together (ie. only one person talking at a time, stating opinions, being open, contributing ideas, etc). Then we hope to get into some brainstorming activities to think about issues involving trash/environment, so they can go home and research a little about one issue and bring that back the following week.
I really enjoy working with this age group, and as much as I feel like I should be nervous, I'm not. I think preparing for each week gives me confidence for going back and working with them. Sure, last week wasn't a complete success and improvement is needed, but it's only the beginning, and we're learning how to coach just as much as their learning about democracy and public achievement. It's a process, and maybe I have more grace for myself than I should, but I'd rather focus on doing my best, and enjoying my time there than worrying and fretting that I'm not doing things perfectly.
It was exciting to see the 5th graders again. I was surprised at my lack of memory when it came to their names. Normally I pride myself in how well I remember names, but it was difficult to put the names I did remember to the faces!! :( Hopefully by next week their names will be rooted in my mind. I don't think I'll have any difficulty remembering the students in my and Arielle's group though! I must say, we have an amazing group of kids! But I'll get back to them in a moment.
This last week we decided to help the students understand what Public Achievement was by showing them a video of a group of High School students in Colorado who were active in their school. After talking about issues in their school and deciding on which one they wanted to be pro-active about they set out and researched statistics and interviewed their fellow classmates. Their issue? The cliques and discrimination in their school. In the end they decided to have a "Mix It Up" day where students were encouraged to talk to people they don't normally talk to and sit by people at lunch whom they normally don't sit with. It was both a success and failure because some students chose not to participate while others benefited from the day. In the end, the high school public achievement group experienced democracy at it's finest. They learned they had a voice against the issues that surrounded them, and were active in their community.
After showing this video and talking about it for a very short period we split into our generalized issue groups. We had 5 groups as I believe I stated in my previous blog. We dispersed ourselves among the classroom. This proved to be difficult on our group. We decided to sit at a fairly large table at the side of the room which meant we were more spread out. In our debrief we discussed how this was probably not the best place to sit because it left room for a lot of distractions and it was hard to hear each other. The listening and hearing parts were the hardest of the day. In a room full of students all talking at once in different parts of the room we were unable to hear each other and give each other the attention they deserved.
Arielle and I had a few activities planned for our group. We wanted to talk about the core concepts of public achievement and dive into what public achievement actually is. Afterall if you don't understand what your doing before you do it how can you do it effectively, right? But before we discussed the concepts we went around and said our names and 2 positive things that happened to us this last week. I like that Arielle was thinking positively when she made up this opening question! :) I was surprised at the amount of participation and interaction we got from the 5 students in our group. Even the two students who had been labeled "non-talkers" participated when asked to.
There were 11 core concepts to public achievement. We had construction paper, sharpies, and definitions. Their job was to read the definition and redefine it in their own words so that it would make more sense (the definitions given were worded very complexly). I think it was hard for them to understand the concepts and Arielle and I tried to explain some of them, but we were also participating and trying to make some posters, so that took us away from helping them understand the meanings of the concepts. If we were to introduce core concepts again I would want to make the activity a little more 5th grade friendly. :)
I think another thing that added to the not quite failure, but not quite success of this activity was the simple fact that the amount of noise coming from the room was a huge distraction and it made it hard to think. One of our students got so frustrated with the fact that he didn't understand the concept he was trying to redefine he refused to do it. Thankfully, he didn't throw a fit, or yell, or walk off, he just simply and calmly refused to do it. He tried, and tried, and gave up. He didn't want help, he just didn't want to deal with it anymore which, in the end, was fine. We couldn't make him participate, and I think Arielle and I realized what we were asking the students to do was kind of difficult, though a little more simple for some.
I'm excited to see different personalities and characteristics already come out in our group. One student has shown leaderships skills already, another has a voice for speaking, another is strong-willed, and yet another has many good ideas. If they can learn to work together and allow each other to speak they will make a powerful impact on whatever they choose to do! I'm looking forward to what they come up with. Though I hope that Arielle and I can work together as good, effective, encouraging coaches for them! I have confidence that we can! My fear right now is talking too much. I like to be in control and offer my opinion, so I end up talking a lot. I'm learning about being aware of how much I talk and contribute and making more room for the students and Arielle to talk.
This coming Wednesday we will be talking about expectations that they have for each other in the group; things they need from each other to be able to work well together (ie. only one person talking at a time, stating opinions, being open, contributing ideas, etc). Then we hope to get into some brainstorming activities to think about issues involving trash/environment, so they can go home and research a little about one issue and bring that back the following week.
I really enjoy working with this age group, and as much as I feel like I should be nervous, I'm not. I think preparing for each week gives me confidence for going back and working with them. Sure, last week wasn't a complete success and improvement is needed, but it's only the beginning, and we're learning how to coach just as much as their learning about democracy and public achievement. It's a process, and maybe I have more grace for myself than I should, but I'd rather focus on doing my best, and enjoying my time there than worrying and fretting that I'm not doing things perfectly.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Successful First Day!! :)
So my classmates and I had our first visit to the 5th grade classroom we will be working with at Sojourner Truth Academy yesterday (Wednesday)!!! There's about 25 students in the class who will be splitting up into 5 different core issue groups.
We started our time there with an ice-breaker. They had to think about a one-word character trait or stength that they had that would benefit their public achievement group. Some wrote leader, drawer, math thinker, reader, speaker, encourager, organizer, and more! We (my classmates and I) also participated in this activity. Then it was time to introduce ourselves-students included! Everyone got up and walked around the room introducing themselves to each other. "Hi my name is _____, and I'm a(n)______!" And they talked about how their strength is important for their group. It was fun learning their names and hearing more about them!
Our second activity got them thinking more in depth about issues they already wrote about. They had a journaling activity to do in which they wrote about one thing they would change if they could. There were five different key issue areas we (the coaches) recognized, so we made 5 posters labeled "violence," "fighting," "increased knowledge" (aka. education)," "bullying," and "trash/environment." We added a poster labeled "anything else?" so that the students could add anything that we missed. They were split into 6 groups and spent about 3 minutes at each poster discussing why the issue on the poster was an important issue and should be addressed. They wrote their ideas on post-it notes and stuck them to the poster. I was at the "trash/environment" poster for this activity. I was surprised at how interested in this activity the majority of them were. They were very thoughtful in their responses. Many themes arose in their concerns about trash/environment. They were concerned about the health impacts on humans, pollution of drinking water, harm to animals, and the overall appearance of the community due to littering. I am excited to see what the "trash/environment" issue group comes up with to address one of these issues!!
After this activity ended the students sat back down at their seats and were able to write down their top three issues they would be interested in working on. Over half of the students chose violence as their first choice which shows that it must be a very big issue. Interestingly the topic of "increased knowledge" was the next largest in amount of interest with the students.
After class we had a debrief with Michael K. and Kristy. It was good to quickly talk about how everyone felt about the things that worked, and the things that we would have changed or done differently. We got a chance to split the students into groups and choose the group we will be working with. Arielle and I are working with 5 students whose first or second choice was to work to create change concerning the issue of "trash/environment." From the small amount of interactions I had with the students that are now in the trash/environment group I think we have a great group of students and I am excited to work with them.
There were a few things that we could have done differently or better. One would have been to have already pre-deligated roles for each activity. We, the coaches, did a fairly good job of working together, but I think it was somewhat unorganized for our liking because we weren't sure who was introducing what activity. In the end, it would have been better to have clarity on each one of our roles. Another thing that we decided would have been better would have been to leave out the summary of each poster at the end before they voted. After the students went around and discussed the importance of each poster we summarized what everyone had said, and during debrief we felt this wasn't necessary and took away from some time the students could have kept talking about the issues.
One thing that worked nicely was the ice-breaker. Many of us had our doubts on how the students would like it, but there was much interaction with the activity and many students seemed to have fun with it. I also felt like the coaches did a very good job of working together and planning for this first day with the students.
I enjoyed this first day very much!! I'm excited to get to know the students even better and dive into the issues they have with trash/environment! For the longest time I had wanted to be an upper elementary teacher, so it's exciting to be able to work with this age of students again!
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Getting To Know My Community Part II
I went into the neighborhood and visited the school yesterday to get a feel for what it was like.
The first stop was to the school. I didn't go inside, but I parked and walked around the block. It's on a corner with a big blue sign displaying it's name and slogan "Where the only thing going on is "Learning."" I don't know how I feel about that slogan...It doesn't sound genuine or unique. I don't know. The Building is made out of brick and the windows look fairly new. It doesn't seem to be in rough shape at all. On the end of the school towards the main road there was an addition put on made of a more yellow brick rather than red, but that is also in pretty good condition. The playground also is in very good shape. It looks fairly new, and not too small. The playground is fenced in and elevated off the sidewalk which slopes downward. On the wall elevating the playground to be at the same level as the school there is intentional graffiti art with the school name (picture above taken from school website).
I also took note of the houses around the school. The first building I noticed was the Convent right next to the school and St. Bridget's Catholic Church right across the street from the School. Otherwise many of the houses I saw were one level, probably only 2-4 different rooms on the inside. They were very small. The conditions varied from house to house. Some were well taken care of and others looked like the upkeep had been neglected for quite a while. Then I noticed a random large house amongst the smaller ones. It was two stories and much larger than it's neighbors. The garage was also quite a bit larger and it looked like the siding had just recently been put on.
My next stop was Well's Fargo Bank. Not much to be said about that...it was in what used to be "downtown Camden." I passed a Guy-am Grocery store on Lyndale (the main street in the Camden neighborhood) which is a grocery store that sells different ethnic foods-mostly Indian. It was yellow, red, green, and white on the outside. There was another grocery store that I found that was a little bit farther away than that. It was kind of sketchy looking to me though. Mostly because it didn't have windows besides the two that were by the door that was at the very corner of the store. The only windows they had were full of things and signs and one of them had bars on it. Just the feeling that I couldn't see inside it and I probably wouldn't be able to see much outside either made me feel like it wouldn't be a place I would want to shop. It was also connected to the Laundry Mat.
The closest playground is obviously the one at their school but besides that I found a playground at another school that is near the grocery store and Laundry Mat. I only saw it at a distance, but it wasn't small, and looked like it was in good shape. Weber Park is also nearby and has a Library.
The Camden Physicians is the closest doctors office to Sojourner Truth Academy and that is right off of Lyndale as well.
As I first drove through downtown Camden I noticed a cute corner coffee shop called 42nd Ave. Station. I decided to go in and take a look because from the outside it didn't look very appealing. It was fun, and artistic on the inside. Booths line one side of the cafe with tables and chairs scattered throughout the rest of it. The coffee bar (and bakery display) was at the back of the cafe. The place where you pick up ur coffee after you order it there was a display of a Native American's artwork. He made pictures out of beads, and had cards with pictures of his artwork on it. At the front of the cafe there was a corner stage and couches where they have live musicians come in and grace them with their talent.
I got talking with the manager of the cafe who was taking my order. I asked him if he knew of Sojourner Truth Academy. He said that he had heard of it, but didn't know much. He knew that it used to be St. Bridget's School at one point, but then changed to Sojourner's. He was able to inform me a lot about the Camden neighborhood though (he was the one to inform me that it was called the Camden neighborhood). Apparently Camden used to be what the city was called until Minneapolis took over and they put a freeway in. Lyndale was known as "Downtown Camden" as previously stated.
I then went about my business doing a little reading, drinking my sugar-cane, Ghiradelli chocolate, free trade turtle mocha. I figured I should probably be getting back to school, so i put my things together and started to leave. On my way out a woman who was sitting with her daughter complimented me on my purse. I thanked her and then used it as a doorway to ask them about Sojourner Truth. They also didn't know very much about it, but we talked about the coffee shop and the people in the neighborhood. The daughter works for the coffee shop and is in charge of choosing the art to be put up in the cafe. She told me what it's been like to sit in the cafe for over a year and see people come in with their families and individuals randomly meet people and interact. She said that if I come in enough I'll see a lot of people from the community. The mother assured me that despite what I might assume about the families and neighborhood in Camden that they actually treat each other like neighbors, and include their families in daily activites, such as, going to the local coffee shop.
I explained my purpose in asking them about Sojourner Truth, and apparently the daughter had started a program in her neighborhood when she was growing up that helped the kids implement ideas and act on them. She also gave me her card because she was hoping that in the summer she could show artwork from kids in the area in the cafe.
I have to admidt that my first reaction going into downtown Camden were very skeptical. Because I didn't have any results for the crime search for that area I had no idea what to expect. When I had parked in a parking lot to go to the cafe I was already worried that my car might get broken into. Upon getting out of my car and walking towards the cafe there was a huge sign on the brick building that talked about busting car theifs...and I thought, "Great...that makes me feel sooooo much better..."
But the first impressions I recieved from the three people I met were encouraging. I'm excited to meet more people from the Camden neighborhood.
My first impression of the school was fine too. I didn't feel like I was in danger being there. I felt fairly safe. The kids were out playing on the playground, so I was reminded of how Elementary students act. Working with Early Elementary students I sometimes forget how BIG elementary students are in comparison! It should be fun and interesting to actually go inside the building.
I start next Wednesday and I couldn't be MORE EXCITED!!
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Getting To Know My Community!
Sojourner Truth Academy is an Elementary School where I will be doing my Public Achievement Coaching for my Education 2600 class at MCTC.
I used www.education.com to look up the test scores for the fourth graders. It seems that the scores have dropped since last year by 6%. In math the fourth graders scored about 47% compared to last years 50%. In Reading they scored 26% opposed to the 50% scored correct last year. When put up against the state wide average these students scored considerably low. Minnesota's math average was 77%, and reading was at 73%.
At Sojourner Truth Academy there is an equal ratio of girls and boys. All but 4% of their students recieve free or reduced lunches in which eligibility is based on their family's income levels. 77% of Sojourner Truth students are black and 23% are Hispanic.
In doing my google search I happened upon the award winning Ms. Mitchell. She won the $25,000 Milken Family Foundation National Educator Award this past November for being an outstanding teacher. The Award was established to recognize teachers who do exceptional work and to encourage others to go into teaching as a career. Ms. Mitchell is a director of curriculum for the K-3rd grade teachers at Sojourner Truth.
(www.facebook.com/home.php#!/note.php?note_id=466919404801&id=98094084332 ...also there's a youtube link: www.youtube.com/watch?v=porw4YfWI00)
I found this really AWESOME video from one of the fifth grade classes at Sojourner Truth!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNaf1rmjdjw
They also had a woman come and perform a famous speech!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJHm1KSJakU
In a KARE 11 article from April 2010 that I read I found out that at lunch time the students will write letters to the President. It's called 'Bring the White House to Our House." The students will write letters about anything! For some it's a journaling process. For each letter they write they get a ticket that goes into a weekly drawing. This lunch program was formed out of the need for something constructive to do when students had finished eating their lunch because they would eat it in 2-5 min. with 15 min. left of lunch. (www.kare11.com/life/community/schools/coolschool/coolschool_article.aspx?storyid=848102&catid=148).
I had a hard time finding crime statistics in the neighborhood...I could only find informationon Minneapolis crime statistics.
Lastly (for this post at least), the website to the school which is very informative and gives an inside look on the school: http://www.sojournertruthacademy.org/.
I used www.education.com to look up the test scores for the fourth graders. It seems that the scores have dropped since last year by 6%. In math the fourth graders scored about 47% compared to last years 50%. In Reading they scored 26% opposed to the 50% scored correct last year. When put up against the state wide average these students scored considerably low. Minnesota's math average was 77%, and reading was at 73%.
At Sojourner Truth Academy there is an equal ratio of girls and boys. All but 4% of their students recieve free or reduced lunches in which eligibility is based on their family's income levels. 77% of Sojourner Truth students are black and 23% are Hispanic.
In doing my google search I happened upon the award winning Ms. Mitchell. She won the $25,000 Milken Family Foundation National Educator Award this past November for being an outstanding teacher. The Award was established to recognize teachers who do exceptional work and to encourage others to go into teaching as a career. Ms. Mitchell is a director of curriculum for the K-3rd grade teachers at Sojourner Truth.
(www.facebook.com/home.php#!/note.php?note_id=466919404801&id=98094084332 ...also there's a youtube link: www.youtube.com/watch?v=porw4YfWI00)
I found this really AWESOME video from one of the fifth grade classes at Sojourner Truth!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNaf1rmjdjw
They also had a woman come and perform a famous speech!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJHm1KSJakU
In a KARE 11 article from April 2010 that I read I found out that at lunch time the students will write letters to the President. It's called 'Bring the White House to Our House." The students will write letters about anything! For some it's a journaling process. For each letter they write they get a ticket that goes into a weekly drawing. This lunch program was formed out of the need for something constructive to do when students had finished eating their lunch because they would eat it in 2-5 min. with 15 min. left of lunch. (www.kare11.com/life/community/schools/coolschool/coolschool_article.aspx?storyid=848102&catid=148).
I had a hard time finding crime statistics in the neighborhood...I could only find informationon Minneapolis crime statistics.
Lastly (for this post at least), the website to the school which is very informative and gives an inside look on the school: http://www.sojournertruthacademy.org/.
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