Service Learning and 21st Century Learning

There are so many wonderful and exciting things happening in our school community!  When we set out to create a character education program, we felt it important to include "service learning."  Service learning differs from community service - a service learning project involves learning about a problem in the community or world, and then doing something about it!

Our efforts to create meaningful units of study that incorporate "21st century" skills such as creativity and problem solving are intersecting beautifully with our service learning efforts.  At this time, two fifth grade classes that have studied health and nutrition are getting ready to plant their school gardens.  They incorporated a great deal of science and math as they created the garden plans.  They have engaged third grade students in planting basil for the gardens.  The sixth grade Eco Stars, who are learning about lake pollution,  plan to install rain barrels that will decrease the runoff from the school roof and provide water for the gardens.  The produce will be sold to the Abbey Group (more math there!) and served in the lunchroom.

Two other sixth grades have taken a more global view of "community."  They are reading the youth version of Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson.  Greg got lost coming down from a failed attempt to climb K2 in the Afghan/Pakistan border region.  He ended up in the small tribal village of Korphe, where the people nursed him back to health.  While there, he noticed that the children gathered each day to write in the packed dirt, trying to practice their lessons with no teacher.  He made a pledge to build them a school.  From this experience grew the Central Asia Institute, an organization that works to promote peace through education.  Swanton's Travelers and Team Socrates are learning about the power and promise of education, and are raising money for the schools through the Pennies for Peace program.   I had the opportunity to hear Greg Mortenson speak when I went to the National Association of Elementary School Principals last month.  He is a humble man, who calls himself an "accidental" celebrity.  I had my photo taken with him!

Meanwhile, our kindergarten students have been learning about trees and how they help the environment. They will celebrate Arbor Day by meeting with forester Greg Simard and then planting a baby pine tree near the school gardens.  Our second graders just completed a study of how to take care of their bodies, and hosted a bike safety rodeo in collaboration with the Swanton Police Department. 

This idea of "service learning" has taken on a life of its own.  Earlier this week a group of fourth graders approached me with an idea about helping with the oil spill in the Gulf.  I told them they would have to do the research on their own time and decide who to send money to.  I thought that might be the end of that, but today they returned.  They had completed their research and created informational posters, complete with photo images pulled from the web.  They had decided to send any donations to the National Wildlife Fund.  They did this all on their own, and gave up their recess to work on it!

All of our hard work is paying off. We are indeed, helping to educate a positive, productive group of future citizens for our community and our world.  We are proud of your children, and we hope that you are as well.

Happy Spring - the end of the school year is fast approaching!  I hope to see many of you next Wednesday night for the annual Faculty Follies. This is a fun opportunity to see the faculty "cut loose" and perform for you, and a great way to thank the hard working Swanton PTO by raising some additional funds.

Play Outside!

What a glorious weekend it was!  I had the opportunity to take my dog for a long walk, enjoying the feeling of a warm breeze on my face, the sight of green grass and buds beginning to grow, and the smell of fresh earth.  There is some growing evidence that today's children and youth are being deprived of the sensory experience of being outdoors.  I grew up on an old dairy farm in Jericho, with no TV!  It is hard for our children to even imagine that experience.  Yet I have clear memories of playing for hours with nothing but a little plastic lid and the rivulets running down our dirt driveway.  Imagination and the outdoors are a powerful combination.

Here at Swanton School, we have worked over the past 10 years to make the playground areas safer and more enjoyable for our students.  The Swanton PTO has partnered with the administration, School Board, and community toward this goal.  We put in the safe recycled rubber impact zone; added toddler swings; fenced in the area used by preschool and kindergarten; replaced the broken basketball hoops; added sandboxes; and added balance activities to the soccer field area.  Most importantly, we increased surveillance and working with the Swanton Village Police, we have reduced the effects of vandalism on our playground. Still, these additions were completed with no plan in place.  There is a certain "random" nature to our play areas. 

Now we are ready to create a strategic plan.  What can we imagine?  Can we create a creative, safe playground that is accessible to all children, especially those with physical conditions that are a challenge?  How can we create play spaces and activities that are developmentally appropriate for sixth graders?  For preschoolers?  What is safe and legal?  Several sixth graders wrote compelling persuasive essays asking for a basketball court near the soccer field.  Is this feasible? 

We have the opportunity to meet with a vendor this Wednesday evening at the PTO meeting, beginning at 6:00 p.m. in the Central School cafeteria.  Childcare is provided at no cost.  This is an opportunity for us to begin to build a plan for improving and updating our play areas at the school.  We hope you will be part of this exciting process!

Welcome Spring!

This week of sunshine has been a welcome break from the long and rather dismal winter.  Thanks to parents and teachers for their patience with the incredible stretch of indoor recess.  The PTO did a wonderful job of inspiring us to improve the offerings for indoor recess, and I must congratulate the paraprofessionals who stepped up and helped the children to play safely with the indoor soccer set up (you should see this cool little half soccer ball that "floats" over the carpet!), the indoor basketball hoop, the puzzles, the art and craft materials...I think the children really enjoyed it, but the lack of exercise and fresh air probably contributed to the spread of the dreaded stomach bug.  I was hit with it during winter break and can only say that my sympathies go out to anyone who caught it!  Yuk!

Thank you so much to all the voters who exercised their right to vote on March 2nd.  The PTO did a great job of making sure people knew where and when to vote, and we had fun that evening hosting a sing a long party for families with young children.  A couple of parents scooted out to vote while we sang, ate pizza, played on the tumble mats, and colored together. 

With the budget passing, we now are moving ahead with plans for next year.  We're really excited about the new full day kindergarten program.  We are going to be looking at the entire Master Schedule to ensure that all our children have equitable access to art, music, and PE, while respecting the development differences of the various age groups.  We're also going to take a look at the recess and lunch schedules and do a little "out of the box" thinking about how this works.  Sometimes "discipline" problems arise because children are finished eating and have to sit in the lunchroom - we're going to look at how we schedule playground supervision so that ideally those who have finished eating can go out to recess when they are finished.  We also want to make sure that children who take more time with their meals have that time.  We know that both nutrition and exercise/fresh air are key components to creating healthy learners!

About the playground areas: The PTO and the Board would like to create a 5-10 year strategic plan for our play areas. We have finally found a vendor who is coming on April 7th to visit our school and meet with the PTO and other interested people at our pot-luck PTO meeting that evening.  I have two groups of sixth graders who have written persuasive essays about the playground, and I have challenged them to attend as well.  What is your vision for our play areas?  How can we make them safe, fun and accessible to differently abled learners?  Come share your ideas and your energy!

Parent input forms for placement went home this week - please get these back to us as soon as possible.  Student placement is a really important and complex process.  We really do read every single one of those forms, so please let us know your thoughts.  Don't forget to come in next week to meet with your child's teacher during conferences - we have one more trimester in our school year and if we all work together, I'm confident that each child will grow and achieve their goals. 

See you next week at conferences!

Love,

Mrs. Benay

What A Wonderful Place

Recently, I was bustling down the hallway in the Red House, on my way to touch base with a teacher at the end of a hectic day. Some newly posted student work caught my eye - pieces of writing supported by lovely artwork. Although I was already late for catching up with the teacher, I was drawn in by the writing. The theme was "My Special Place." The writing was so sophisticated, I was certain it had been composed by students in one of the two fifth grades in Red House. After reading a few pieces, I realized these miniature essays were the work of our third grade students!

This year, with the support of the Supervisory Union curriculum coordinator (Mrs. Dena St. Amour) and the SU Literacy Leaders, we are using an approach known as "6 Traits." For the past ten years, writing in Vermont schools was driven by the Framework of Standards' "genres." Teachers were given "formulas" to make sure that students produced writing that would align with state "benchmark" pieces. I found the student writing to be rather predictable and often quite drab and uninviting. Since we've starting using the 6 Traits model, I find our students are much more engaged in writing and they are producing writing pieces that are truly rich in "voice," and expressive in unique and interesting ways. We are still accountable to the Vermont Framework and Grade Expectations, but our approach to teaching writing has been strengthened by this professional development.

Dr. Douglas Reeves, one of our nation's top researchers and experts on school reform, often refers to the power of a strong writing program in successful schools. Writing is unique in helping to strengthen our thought processes across all areas of the curriculum. I am excited that our school and our entire Supervisory Union are all working together to strengthen writing instruction and engage our students more fully in the process of learning to write effectively.

I am also excited about improvements in mathematics instruction. Last year, I authored a large grant for the entire Supervisory Union. Only two such grants were awarded in Vermont, and we received one! To date, the major grant activity has been a challenging math content course taught by instructors from the Vermont Math Institute. All our math intervention teachers, along with Mrs. Hunter, are taking the course. Interestingly, the entire MVU math department is also taking the course. This has been a unique opportunity for elementary and high school math educators to interact and learn from one another. At this point, we are heading into the second phase of the grant. This will involve the launch of a new website "Math is Everywhere." This site will showcase math instruction in our schools, and be a clearinghouse for helpful math links for parents. We are also planning to interview MVU alumni and post video of our alumni talking about how math is used in their current professions. In addition, all students will be taking at least one "math field trip," going out into the community to see how math is used in the workplace. The goal is to educate, excite, engage and energize our teachers, our students, and our community in regard to math.

I encourage blog followers to mark their calendars now for upcoming events:

February 3rd: PTO meeting with special guest speaker Ginny Iverson talking about behavior as a form of communication.

February 11th: Our annual Family Night with a theme of Health and Wellness

February 22nd: Budget informational meeting at the Village Complex

March 2nd: Budget VOTE

And definitely reserve the evening of April 1st for our annual and ever improving Faculty Follies "talent" show! This year will feature a performance by the students who appealed to the PTO for the classroom set of African Drums!

Listen to the Wind

I was so proud to watch our students present a check for over $1,000 to Representative Carolyn Branagan and other officials, including Board Chair Donald Collins, on Monday, November 30th. Five classrooms worked together to raise funds for the Vermont Guard soldiers to return from their training site to Vermont for the holidays. Vermont has a high percentage of Guard being deployed. This is in part due to the fact that our Guard is trained to work in mountainous terrain and cold weather, both factors in the Afghanistan conflict. Swanton, in particular, will be affected by this deployment. We have many children in our school who have a family member traveling to the Middle East as part of this most recent deployment.

It has been eight years since the fateful day in 2001 when our country was attacked. That means a solid percentage of our student population have grown up with their country at war. It is difficult for adults to comprehend the complexities of this conflict; imagine how challenging it is for young children to truly understand the roots of this complicated situation!

Two years ago, a good friend gave me an audiobook as a holiday gift. "Three Cups of Tea" tells the story of nurse Greg Mortensen, an extreme climber who got lost coming down from a trip to hike K2, one of the highest peaks in the world. Greg ended up being rescued by a small group of people in Korphe, one of the many small villages in the tribal region between Afghanistan and Pakistan. They saved his life. In return, he began an organization called the Central Asia Institute (www.ikat.org). Working together with a librarian (www.penniesforpeace.org), The CAI raises funds to build schools and purchase books and school supplies for children in the Afghanistan/Pakistan border region. The story is true, and it is a powerful story.

Just recently, Mortensen published a young children's version of his story, called "Listen to the Wind." I decided to create a lesson based on the story and share that lesson with the 5 classes who worked so hard to raise money. My goal was to help them understand WHERE the Vermont soldiers were going, and WHY.

The where part was fairly easy - I used Google Earth to show them the Middle East and explained a bit about the mountainous tribal area in the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. One of the things I learned from reading Mortenson's book is how little the border means to the people who actually live in that region. The partition of that area is a relatively recent political decision. The modern country of "Afghanistan" was created in 1919. 90 years is a long time to a first grader, but in a region with a strong tribal history going back for many generations, 90 years is not a long time. Pakistan is an even more recent political creation. Pakistan was carved out of "British India" in 1956 to partition the Muslims from the majority Hindu population in that region of "British India." Thus, the people who live in the moutainous tribal regions are not all that bounded by the distant and fairly recent governments in Kabul or Islamabad.

The why of the conflict was alot more difficult. I don't know if there is anyone who could clearly explain U.S. involvement to children at the elementary level! Mortenson's new book for young children, "Listen to the Wind," at least gave me something the children could connect to. Children hear alot about fighting for "freedom," but because they have so much freedom in the U.S. that they take for granted, they don't really have a concrete way to understand what we mean by "freedom." As this concept is critical to understanding what it means to be an American, I wanted to try to help them. One freedom they enjoy is the freedom to go to school. While they might grumble about it sometimes (or lots of times!), I thought they might appreciate this freedom more if they knew about children in other parts of the world that do not enjoy this freedom. Thus, the focus of my lesson was on the freedom to have an education. It is a fact that the insurgent Taliban are extreme in their views of the Muslim faith, and when the Taliban controlled Afghanistan, women's rights were taken away. In Mortenson's book, it is clear that one of the main concerns for the people he interacts with is the fear that the Taliban will once again be in control and prevent their girls from gaining an education, which they see as very important.

I asked the students to write an "exit ticket" to show me what they learned after my lesson. I feel the lesson was successful to some extent, but based on the responses, it is clear that some children were more engaged by the interesting details of the story and perhaps did not fully grasp the main point. However, I do think they learned a bit about this conflict that has been in the background their entire lives. Their responses are shared with you below. I wish all readers a peaceful holiday season!

Love, Mrs. Benay

Voyagers and Mr. Creelman’s class (5^th graders partnered with a second grader to write a response)

Boys and girls can go to school in the U.S. If a girl goes to school (in Afghanistan), she could be killed.

Pakistan does not have schools. Pakistan and Afghanistan border each other.

There is a mountain called K2. There is a man named Greg that climbed K2.

They could not go where they wanted to go. They did not have a school. They wrote on the ground with a stick.

In Afghanistan, there are no schools and they wanted to go to school so bad that they would write on in the dirt with sticks, so we are lucky to have a school.

When they did not have the school they had to write in the dirt. They had no cars. They barely had anything.

They built a bridge for the school. They (wanted) the freedom for going to school.

Girls were not allowed to go to school, but can go to school now. (Once in the U. S.), black people were not allowed to sit in the front of the bus.

Afghanistan and Pakistan are close to each other. I learned that K2 is one of the tallest mountains.

Afghanistan and Pakistan are right next to each other. Dr. Greg got lost in K2.

I (used to think) Afghanistan and Pakistan were far apart. I learned that girls couldn’t go to school.

The townspeople and Dr. Greg built a bridge to get the supplies across the bridge.

They had to make all of their supplies. Girls couldn’t go to school. Since they didn’t have a school, pencils, and paper, they had to write in the dirt with sticks.

They built a bridge because they only had a small box, so they built a bridge.

I learned that Pakistan kids didn’t have a school for a while, so they built a school.

People learned how to build schools and bridges.

There were no girls at school. They built a bridge. They built a school.

Moo Moo’s Friends (4^th graders taught by Mrs. Sullivan)

I think boys and girls should go to school and have a better church teacher.

To have freedom and to go to school and to choose what church they want to go to.

Some people want to go and build schools for kids.

Why is there a war? Because the girls aren’t getting education because a government or king won’t let them go to school. Some girls who try to go to school get killed.

Boys and girls want to be free to go to school.

The people of Afghanistan want girls to go to school and another country doesn’t want them to so America is fighting to help.

The Vermont fighting is not good and I don’t like it.

Vermont fighters are going to Afghanistan to fight for schools in Pakistan. Also, they are fighting for girls to go to school.

They are fighting for girls to go to school and learn. But other people don’t want them to do that.

The Afghanis want freedom to go to school.

The people in Afghanistan are fighting because of freedom.

They are going to Afghanistan to fight for freedom.

People is Afghanistan are scared. They want to get away and make their own rules.

So the military can save our state and other states.

Afghanistan freedom so girls can go to school.

November News

We are all so very grateful that Halloween occurred on a Saturday! I hope you all had fun with your kids, and that they adjust to the change in time with daylight savings. We had a fun "Pumkin Assembly" on Friday with our Kindergarten through Second Grade students. Many classes had carved a pumpkin, engaging in "pumpkin math." Students reported out on the weight, circumference, and number of seeds in their pumpkins. Thanks to Deweese's Ducks, we enjoyed singing pumpkin songs to familiar tunes before we reminded the children about safety tips and sent them on their way. We also had a fire drill that day, so it was all very exciting!

November brings many opportunities for parents and community members to be involved in your school and in the creation of the budget for next year. On Wednesday evening of this week, the PTO is sponsoring a discussion of full day vs. part-day kindergarten. Since I started Swanton's public kindergarten in 1985, I know the history of kindergarten programs in Swanton and will share some information about the history, our current state, and considerations for a change from the current schedule to full day kindergarten.

On Thursday, we are having two family dinners - one will be an opportunity for families with preschool aged children to "make your own pizza" with help from youth involved with the Caring Communities project. Families with older children will eat Shaggy's Snack Bar pizza, and everyone is invited to the Central Gym for our annual "Family Movie Night."

Your Board meets on the 9th of November. The main agenda item is crafting a budget for the next fiscal year, which starts July 1 of 2010 and is called the FY11 budget. Our state as a whole faces a fiscal deficit, and K-12 public school funding is often discussed in the news. What are your thoughts about your school? Your Board will be seeking community input as they work to create a budget that balances our hopes of providing a quality education with the reality of our current economic climate. Please let your ideas be known, either by attending the meeting or contacting a Board member.

Parent teacher conferences come at the end of the month, right before the Thanksgiving holiday. We have child care provided by National Honor Society students for both Monday evening and Tuesday morning. This is a wonderful opportunity to meet personally with your child's teacher(s) and see evidence of the work your child has done this trimester.

I hope I see many of you at these November school events.

October, 2009

What a wonderful year it has been already! We had our amazing All School Walk on September 24th, and that evening we held Open House, with the grand unveiling of our new banners celebrating our 5 Core Concepts. Evidence of our community's commitment to our school was evident in the Selectboard and Historical Society, represented by Mr. Kilburn and Mr. Thompson, joining us for the Walk, and Mr. Collins as well (dressed as "Mr. Footsteps!). Mrs. Deborah Kehoe-Yergeau and her husband David gave our school an amazing gift by hosting several young artists at their home this summer, where Deb has moved her professional design studio (Kehoe and Kehoe Design Associates). After the children created art all day, Deb and her intern (Christa White of Fairfax) used the artwork to create the banners. If you haven't seen them yet, please do stop by the cafeteria - they are simply amazing. The Swanton PTO purchased the finished banners. Just before entering the NECAP week, our students joined others from our Supervisory Union in a day of student leaders designing our annual bullying prevention activities. The new student leadership group, Speak Out Swans, will meet regularly with our counseling team to ensure that we do everything we can to stop bullying before it starts. Meanwhile, all the students are LOVING the new set of drums purchased with PTO grant money after a group of fourth graders wrote a grant requesting the funds. We are indeed, preparing active citizens for the 21st century!

Speaking of being a citizen, I had the opportunity to visit Washington D.C. this past week. There are only a handful of schools in the U.S. who are implementing the "Response to Intervention" model that we've been using since 2005-2006. I was asked to explain the model to the school division of the American Association of Publishers at their annual summit. It was a wonderful chance to share the hard work that our school has engaged in, and to ask for their support in developing materials that will help all schools to move forward using "Response to Intervention" as a school improvement strategy. I do want to reassure parents and community members that the AAP covered all travel expenses, so the trip was at no cost to the community or taxpayers.

With the help of Senators Sanders and Leahy, I was able to visit the White House, something I had dreamed of since I first wrote to President Kennedy in 1962, asking him not to put on his speeches during my favorite cartoons! I got a letter back from him on White House stationary, and since then have dreamed of being inside those massive gates. I told the kids I would blog about the experience:

There is a great deal of security in place anywhere you go in D.C. To visit the White House, I had to submit my information ahead of time and bring my passport. I could not bring anything else - no cameras, no purse, nothing but I.D. This is certainly a change from the time of Abraham Lincoln, when White House visitors took scissors along and collected samples of the new carpets and curtains ordered by First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln!

I had to go through a metal detector. Our group was escorted through the East Wing, which is where the First Lady has her offices. In the hallway were photos of President Obama, his family, and his puppy, Bo. We saw a library and one other small room before being led into a larger waiting room. All around us were portraits of presidents, and photos of many important events that have happened in the White House, including the signing of many important laws that have changed our country. The first room was the huge East Room. Our guide told us that this large room has been used for everything from drying Abigail Adams' laundry to an indoor roller skating place for Amy Carter! Today it is a place for large press conferences and concerts. When we were there, they were getting ready to build a stage in the room for a Latina Festival coming up. Next we went into three other rooms: the Green Room, the Blue Room and the Red Room. Each room has very beautiful carpets, furniture, and curtains and each is decorated with priceless art, mostly paintings of the different presidents. The windows are over 12 feet high! There are chandeliers hanging from the ceilings and precious vases, candlesticks, and other decorative touches in each room. Finally, we entered a large dining area that is used for special meals with foreign visitors and other important guests. We exited through the main hall and down the front steps of the White House.

I also visited the Capitol Building, where the U.S. Senators and House of Representatives meet, and the Library of Congress. The Capitol was VERY interesting and very beautiful. One of the things that impressed me the most about all our nation's buildings is the amount of beautiful art in all the buildings. There are paintings everywhere, and the walls and ceilings are covered with frescos. Sculpture is also very present. In the Capitol building, there are two statues for every state. I found one of Vermont's statues - it is a statue of Ethan Allen. The people who do the guided tours (both of the White House and Capitol) are very well informed and present some interesting history as they lead you through the buildings. They have to memorize everything!

I left Washington D.C. feeling very proud of our country, but also very happy to return to beautiful Vermont and our school, where we are doing such great work.