Beautiful or Not?

At the end of the day yesterday during closing, we played a little game called "Beautiful or Not?" I showed the kids the following pictures from their day, and here's the feedback they gave.

 Verdict: Not beautiful. Lots of stuff on the floor, including school headphones, trash and couch cushions. Lunch bag left on coffee table. Gage, as God's creation, brings a certain beauty to the scene, however. :-)

Verdict: Not beautiful. More stuff lying around, including Chromebooks and a school library book, both of which we are supposed to steward faithfully (that morning in launch, we talked about being entrusted with small things so that one day God can entrust us with big things.)

Verdict: Beautiful. These two girls are using their Project Time wisely to study together without distracting anyone around them. 

Verdict: Beautiful. Three students keeping the studio as a sacred place for learning (Covenant Item #1) by reading and researching together side by side, again without distracting each other or anyone around them. 

On the subject of caring for the environment, we saw a marked improvement in ES studio maintenance this week after I talked to the kids about how it still felt like my responsibility at 3:00 to determine whether the work had been done and whether we were ready for inspection. I wanted to transfer that ownership to them. They agree to volunteer as leaders each week to oversee the cleaning of our room and bathroom and make sure all jobs are done by 3:00. Camryn and Milam stepped right up and did an exemplary job as cleaning leaders this past week!

On the subject of Project Time, I've enjoyed seeing the enthusiasm with which the kids are approaching this opportunity to delve into their particular area of interest about ancient Greek history. They are eager to research, they are learning to take notes, and they're developing loyalties to their Project Clans: Troy, Athens, Mycenae and Sparta (which by far has the coolest clan badges and spirited cheers to date! They're raising the bar for the rest of us.)

Update on Diplomacy

Just wanted to give you all a quick update on our weekly Diplomacy sessions, which is what I've taken to calling the half hour we spend on Tuesdays to work slowly through the discussion-based book The Young Peacemaker. 

We've now talked about ...

• How conflict can be a slippery slope 
• "Peace-faking" options such as denying there's a problem, blaming others for the problem, or running away from the problem.
• "Peace-breaking" choices such as put-downs, gossip (talking to others about the problem instead of addressing it with the party we've offended or been offended by), or fighting.
• "Peace-making" choices, like choosing to let the offense go because it's not that important, or working it out (with an honest conversation over deeper issues, or with alternatives like compromise or rock/paper/scissors for problems like who sits in the front seat or where the family will stop for breakfast tacos!). If we want to have the conversation but we feel scared or stumped, we can ask for help (coaching, mediation, or arbitration).
• How God is with us in difficult things like conflicts with other people (as He was with Daniel when he had to respectfully ask to be served vegetables rather than the food from King Nebuchadnezzar's table).
• The good things that can come of walking through conflict and learning to handle it wisely. 

As usual, the children have all kinds of insights. And of course, we have opportunities to "walk the walk" all week long, as I imagine you do at home! Please pray for us as we continue on this journey and learn to climb off of the "slippery slope" -- or walk around it all together!

The Great Salsa Slam

Following on the heels of two terrific mama-led projects (painting and mosaic stepping stones with Mrs. Banister), our Project Queens of the day, Mrs. Outlaw and Mrs. Blair, bravely led the ES Griffins through an afternoon of designing and producing their own brands of homemade salsa. How is this botany-related? Well, as Mrs. Outlaw pointed out to the kids, you can make delicious salsa using only ingredients grown in a garden!

While the Middle Schoolers were busily planning tomorrow's botany lesson for their ES counterparts, our people were doing this:

Lots of chopping!

(Mr. Blair and a couple LaunchPadders had to get in on the action as part of their afternoon Spanish immersion experience.)

Time to taste! These guys had a salsa that blew smoke out Mrs. Blair's ears ...

After bottling their salsas, they all had enough leftover to give each other (and any other takers) samples. We had to guess the ingredients that had gone into each recipe, which challenged our discriminating palates!

I'm so grateful to the moms who have given their time and creative energy to make these projects happen, including dealing with quite a lot of mess and what can feel at times like borderline chaos. The kids have such a wonderful time making the magic happen, and I know they feel your love to them in these acts of service. Now, which of them will have a hero's journey that includes populating the world with fresh salsa stands???

Tuesday: Targeting Transitions

A couple weeks ago (already!) I noticed that the energy in the room seemed to be noticeably swelling -- and not very productively -- around every transition in activity. Reporting math scores, changing out the Writer's Workshop pods, arriving for Quuddle -- all these moments and more seemed to take longer than needed because of all the chatter and movement around the room.

I asked the kids whether they were happy with the level of chaos during times of transition, and gave them some examples of our transition times. They readily reported that no, they could do better. Starting immediately, they began alerting each other to those opportunities: "Guys! This is a transition!"

We still have lots of room for improvement, but I've enjoyed seeing them take up the reins of responsibility for this one. Since I'll be out this Thursday, I've challenged them to prepare in specific ways for a student-led day. We've discussed what that would look like and how to maintain order rather than chaos. On Thursday afternoon at closing, they decided that on Tuesday (tomorrow) they would Target Terrific Transitions.

We had a couple of funky days last week because of the rain, which gave us a chance to really "stretch our rubber bands" in managing schedule changes and yes, transitions! Here are a couple shots from our Project Afternoon at Megan's house, and from Thursday morning when the Middle Schoolers taught the Elementary Schools about plant dissections and other botanical wonders.

See you tomorrow! 

Session 4, Week 1: Worms, Rocks, and Monet

Our first week of Session 4 started off with a pleasant bang! The first Tuesday morning of every session, we gather for All-School launch, and this time the main item on the agenda was choosing gifts to send to World Vision using points converted to dollars from last session's Shark Tank Quest. We sure enjoyed seeing the teams' excitement as they chose their gifts. At the end of the day, we reconvened to report on their choices, and found that our school would be sending a mosquito net, a well, several chickens and ducks, ten fruit trees, and a goat. Hooray!

I have high hopes for the ES Griffins' enjoyment of this session's quest. The Botany/Gardening Quest is hands-on learning at its finest! Mrs. McDonald has worked her tail off preparing twelve project days in which the ES and MS will work in combined teams. Already, they're tasting, smelling, feeling, seeing and thinking about what they're going to grow and why. Oh, and having several pounds of worms arrive at the school ready for tending caused quite a stir!

In Wednesday's launch, we introduced Reed and Louisa to the concept of Big Rock goals, with Ben and Meg demonstrating the best way to fill a jar with rocks, pebbles and dirt. Springboarding off of that, each one set a Big Rock goal for the session and wrote it down (somehow, writing seems to make intentions more purposeful, don't you think?). Abigail and Camryn volunteered their time on Thursday to transcribe all those goals onto a poster. Just one of the many responsibilities that they are taking over for themselves! I must say that some of them set some pretty ambitious Big Rock goals for themselves this session. If you haven't already, ask your child what his or her Big Rock is, and how they decided on that goal.

Our Wednesday afternoon art projects didn't turn out QUITE like the sample I found on an art blog (fancy that!), but thanks to Mrs. Banister's volunteer help, they did go smoothly and the children seemed to enjoy painting outdoors, taking their cues from Impressionist painter Claude Monet (perhaps the ultimate painter-gardener!). We watched a couple videos on the life and work of Monet, and took note of the fact that he didn't create art in order to instruct or inform, or even to be understood, but to inspire love -- love of beauty, love of the natural world.

I hope these moments we share together, living out of our nature as image-bearers of the Creator God, will inspire a bit of that love as well -- joy in the process and in the creation, regardless of the results.

Writer's Workshop Update

As you all know, this session we started incorporating writing curriculum from the Institute for Excellence in Writing once a week in the Elementary studio. So far, it's gone swimmingly. The book "All Things Fun and Fascinating" serves up paragraphs on topics that cater to kids' curiosity, and they're either adopting or honing the skill of making Key Word Outlines. I've enjoyed seeing children who are a bit farther down the road with this skill help those to whom it's brand new.

One of the Writing Badge requirements for Level 3 and higher is a certain number of "polished papers." We've been using the last couple weeks of this session to hold their hands and gently guide them toward a polished paragraph. Today, nearly everyone chose their favorite Key Word Outline from the past few weeks and worked for about 15 minutes to transform it into a simple paragraph.

At the end, I handed out checklists which will be their rubrics for spiffing up those rough paragraphs and turning them into polished work. This process can occur at any time of their choosing, but paragraphs are due next Thursday. This assignment is optional, but strongly encouraged for anyone working toward their Level 4 or 5 badge. Completing a paragraph each session at the suggested time means no one need scramble to crank out paragraphs in July!

If you want to help your writer at home with revising his or her work, feel free to email me a request for the rubric so you can have a backup copy. Oh, and one more thing -- now that we have sixteen children in the class, I've started running two shifts of Writer's Workshop, each with eight children. Group One meets at 10:30 and Group Two at 10:50. The children prefer it this way, and I see the effect on their level of focus.

Onward and upward!

A Jar of Jellybeans

You know what's great about jellybeans? Yes, they're candy. True, they do contain sugar and food coloring. From a nutritional standpoints, there's nothing to love there. BUT: they're tiny! One or two little beans can give a child an instant happiness boost, and it's not like you're handing them a Snickers bar. Also? They're colorful and fun to look at. Ergo, I find myself using them for illustrations with some regularity.

(Image source here.)

This past Wednesday in morning launch, I introduced to the children the idea of the Emotional Bank Account. I told them that in every one of their relationships ("look around the room and meet every pair of eyes"), there is an account where they make deposits and withdrawals. We discussed some ways we make deposits, demonstrating by putting jellybeans into a jar: Giving compliments. Sharing our things. Helping with math problems. Keeping promises. Apologizing when we do wrong. Offering forgiveness.

Of course, we can also make withdrawals: Teasing. Touching each other's things without asking. Being rude. Singing loudly after being asked to stop. Lying. Excluding.

With their permission, I used two of the children as an example. Let's call them B and C. :-) Last week, B had teased C during closing when she admitted to not cleaning up her project area properly. I reminded the kids that C had said she wasn't offended by that teasing. (It wasn't malicious, but with different children, it could have felt hurtful.) I asked them why they thought B was able to tease C without C getting offended. Pointing to our two jars -- one full of beans, one almost empty -- I asked, "Which jar represents B and C's relationship?"

Since B and C have been friends for several years and have many "deposits" accrued, the teasing withdrawal didn't even register. However, if over those years B had made fun of C's choice of outfits, and C had broken one of B's toys and then blamed him for it, and B had tried to boss C around, and C had formed a club that excluded B ... well, with such a low balance to start off with, that teasing incident would have gone a lot differently, no?

Cyrus came up with the fun idea that during that day, each child would have a cup and would come to me each time someone made a deposit in their relationship, asking me to put a jellybean in that classmate's cup. There was some discussion about whether rewarding kind behavior creates impure motives, but it was ultimately agreed that doing this for just one day would be fun, harmless, and potentially motivational.

I enjoyed having the children approach me all day with good reports of one another, lobbying unselfishly to have each other's cups tended with jellybeans. "Abigail deserves a jellybean. She shared her Hershey's kisses with me." "Milam and Reed persevered on their project all the way through free time. That inspired me." "Hope made a deposit when she gave me a hug." Why does this matter? How does it relate to reaching higher in math, spelling, and economics? Well, don't we all learn more easily in an atmosphere in an atmosphere of love and kindness?

I hope this illustration may be useful around your homes in the days and weeks ahead. Asking "how can you make a deposit here instead of a withdrawal?" is a great calibration. If your house is anything like mine, balances in the jars among siblings fluctuate more than the stock market!