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.