The Holiday Season
December brings the peak of the winter holiday season! Returning to campus after Thanksgiving, we saw a flurry of trees and decorations, including a tree reminiscent of The Nutcracker in the Great Hall. Each year, Mr. Price's Advisory cuts down a tree for the MS Lounge, adding both the fragrance of the tree and a chance for Advisory groups to decorate it with handmade ornaments. When you walk by the Lounge, you'll hear the radio playing seasonal music as well.
As the month goes on, we'll gather as a community to celebrate the season in formal and informal ways. The Middle School holds an informal Holiday Celebration during a mid-morning break that includes a special snack, a singalong, and a few special performances by students and faculty. One of the most beloved and longest-running traditions in the Middle School is our Holiday Tea, hosted by Student Council. The Tea, held in the beautifully decked Great Hall, is a formal high tea, and the Tea includes longstanding customs like the reading of a Christmas story by our venerable Mr. Rockne and Mr. Price, performances by our musical ensembles, and mixing up the Grades at tables to promote some new connections before the calendar year ends. We also gather with the Upper Schools for Lessons & Carols, an important piece of our Episcopalian legacy and the most formal extension of our Chapel program. Lessons & Carols takes the form of a traditional Advent liturgy that tells the story of Christmas through scripture and music, and it provides a beautiful venue for our student musicians to shine. Reflecting on this series of events, while each event points to an external seasonal element, each also gives us the space to focus on who we are. So in the end, it's not that we gather as a community to celebrate the season - we gather throughout the season to celebrate our community.
That said, the sudden appearance of decorations linked to the Christmas season can be off-putting for students and families who do not observe this holiday, and throughout the year (and during this holiday season) we strive to recognize and learn about the diversity of religious and cultural observances that fill the calendar. In Morning Meeting each week, Student Council members announce the variety of holidays and special days coming up, and in All Schools and Middle School Chapel, we intentionally devote time to explore and hear voices from a variety of traditions. In this vein, we invite you to reflect on what some call the "season of light," the bevy of holidays from different contexts that occur from late-autumn through the winter and that focus on bringing light to a dark world. The Christian observances of Advent and Christmas are layered with this meaning, but so are the Hindu festival Diwali, the Jewish festival Chanukah, the African American and Pan-African festival Kwanzaa, and the Wiccan observance of Yule. For Muslims, the holy month of Ramadan also attends to this idea of bringing light into the world, but as the Muslim year is guided by a lunar calendar, Ramadan occurs during the winter according to this cycle - in 2026, Ramadan will begin mid-February, and it will recur during the winter until about 2034. If you're interested in exploring the variety of observances that occur through the year, a go-to resource is the Interfaith Calendar, and Harvard University's Pluralism Project provides multiple resources to explore different religious traditions.
As we move through the winter season (and throughout the year, really), we invite you to engage with this aspect of our diverse community - our students and families come from a variety of religious and non-religious backgrounds, enriching our community culture and inviting dialogue about how our different points of view are valued. We also invite you to be mindful of the variety of ways that our students and families move through the season - some engage in the "Christmas spirit," some observe other holidays, and some observe nothing at all. Each of us is responsible for recognizing these differences, and that's part of being a strong community.
We see this risk every day, and as a 1:1 laptop school, we walk a tightrope between enabling students with developing sophisticated tech skills and handing them devices that promote an inward, and sometimes downward, turn. This is precisely why we direct so much time and energy to the structures around technology. Students are quite familiar with the PSA - our policy for the use of tech devices, requiring that students ask for Permission to use a device, they use it Supervised, and that usage is Academic or school-related. Our Handbook and Acceptable Use Policy (item 10.5 in the Handbook) are clear about particular aspects that promote safety and appropriate use. Throughout the school day, students are supervised, and tech use is actively monitored, but it's not always easy to monitor devices at home. While we invite families to begin a dialogue about the use of technology and to develop an agreement regarding expectations and consequences at home, not every family knows where to begin. Common Sense Media is our go-to recommendation for families looking for advice and tips for everything from movies to social media. In addition, we recommend the following:
As the month goes on, we'll gather as a community to celebrate the season in formal and informal ways. The Middle School holds an informal Holiday Celebration during a mid-morning break that includes a special snack, a singalong, and a few special performances by students and faculty. One of the most beloved and longest-running traditions in the Middle School is our Holiday Tea, hosted by Student Council. The Tea, held in the beautifully decked Great Hall, is a formal high tea, and the Tea includes longstanding customs like the reading of a Christmas story by our venerable Mr. Rockne and Mr. Price, performances by our musical ensembles, and mixing up the Grades at tables to promote some new connections before the calendar year ends. We also gather with the Upper Schools for Lessons & Carols, an important piece of our Episcopalian legacy and the most formal extension of our Chapel program. Lessons & Carols takes the form of a traditional Advent liturgy that tells the story of Christmas through scripture and music, and it provides a beautiful venue for our student musicians to shine. Reflecting on this series of events, while each event points to an external seasonal element, each also gives us the space to focus on who we are. So in the end, it's not that we gather as a community to celebrate the season - we gather throughout the season to celebrate our community.
That said, the sudden appearance of decorations linked to the Christmas season can be off-putting for students and families who do not observe this holiday, and throughout the year (and during this holiday season) we strive to recognize and learn about the diversity of religious and cultural observances that fill the calendar. In Morning Meeting each week, Student Council members announce the variety of holidays and special days coming up, and in All Schools and Middle School Chapel, we intentionally devote time to explore and hear voices from a variety of traditions. In this vein, we invite you to reflect on what some call the "season of light," the bevy of holidays from different contexts that occur from late-autumn through the winter and that focus on bringing light to a dark world. The Christian observances of Advent and Christmas are layered with this meaning, but so are the Hindu festival Diwali, the Jewish festival Chanukah, the African American and Pan-African festival Kwanzaa, and the Wiccan observance of Yule. For Muslims, the holy month of Ramadan also attends to this idea of bringing light into the world, but as the Muslim year is guided by a lunar calendar, Ramadan occurs during the winter according to this cycle - in 2026, Ramadan will begin mid-February, and it will recur during the winter until about 2034. If you're interested in exploring the variety of observances that occur through the year, a go-to resource is the Interfaith Calendar, and Harvard University's Pluralism Project provides multiple resources to explore different religious traditions.
As we move through the winter season (and throughout the year, really), we invite you to engage with this aspect of our diverse community - our students and families come from a variety of religious and non-religious backgrounds, enriching our community culture and inviting dialogue about how our different points of view are valued. We also invite you to be mindful of the variety of ways that our students and families move through the season - some engage in the "Christmas spirit," some observe other holidays, and some observe nothing at all. Each of us is responsible for recognizing these differences, and that's part of being a strong community.
Technology
Recently, this article circulated, sparking a variety of reactions and conversations. The article briefly summarizes the findings of recent research that digs into why members of the "iGen" (born after 1995) are more likely to experience mental health issues. The authors of the research identify the coincidence that this generation came to consciousness in the age of the smartphone, and they explore the data indicating that more time online was linked to higher rates of depression and suicide factors. In the end, they write, "Depression and suicide have many causes...Some teens would experience mental health problems no matter what era they lived in. But some vulnerable teens who would otherwise not have had mental health issues may have slipped into depression due to too much screen time, not enough face-to-face social interaction, inadequate sleep, or a combination of all three."We see this risk every day, and as a 1:1 laptop school, we walk a tightrope between enabling students with developing sophisticated tech skills and handing them devices that promote an inward, and sometimes downward, turn. This is precisely why we direct so much time and energy to the structures around technology. Students are quite familiar with the PSA - our policy for the use of tech devices, requiring that students ask for Permission to use a device, they use it Supervised, and that usage is Academic or school-related. Our Handbook and Acceptable Use Policy (item 10.5 in the Handbook) are clear about particular aspects that promote safety and appropriate use. Throughout the school day, students are supervised, and tech use is actively monitored, but it's not always easy to monitor devices at home. While we invite families to begin a dialogue about the use of technology and to develop an agreement regarding expectations and consequences at home, not every family knows where to begin. Common Sense Media is our go-to recommendation for families looking for advice and tips for everything from movies to social media. In addition, we recommend the following:
- Review the MS Technology Handbook regularly with your student, and highlight those elements that need highlighting, including instructions on passwords, community standards, and privacy and safety.
- Check your student's devices regularly. Parents should have the passwords to access laptops, phones, tablets, and any other device. Check their text messages, what apps they are using, and the amount of time they are using the device. This recommendation does not intend for parents to pry - it is for your student's physical and emotional safety. Frequent use of devices can mean information overload, and sometimes students communicate with friends and others using inappropriate language or engaging inappropriate topics. Students don't always know what to do with this information - but parents do.
- Keep devices out of the bedroom. The research is quite clear about the impact of screentime on sleep, and the buzzing of a phone on the bedside can be too much of a distraction to resist. Some families require that devices are kept in a central or common location at home - this is a great practice!
- If you see something, say something. If you see inappropriate or concerning language or behavior coming through your child's device, address it! Have the conversation with your child. If another child is being inappropriate or indicates any form of self-harm, notify that child's parents. If you're not sure how to address it, reach out to Mr. Hulseman or Mrs. Dicks.
- Develop a Tech Agreement at home. We use the following questions at our Tech Orientation as a starting point to develop a clear understanding for use of technology at home:
- When should technology be in use?
- Where can we use technology?
- Who can we communicate with digitally?
- When can laptops be used for non-school related activities (i.e., chatting with friends, watching online videos, gaming, etc.)?
- How many hours a day can we use laptops?
- What are acceptable activities?
- What are consequences for violating rules?
What we are learning...
What is your favorite color? Blue.
What is your favorite book? Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift From the Sea
What is your favorite movie? Tis the season - "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation!"
If I hadn't been a teacher, I probably would've been... a pediatrician.
Who is your favorite song? Tough one - I am an equal opportunity music listener.
If you could travel anywhere in space and time, where and when would you like to visit? My father passed away nine years ago, and if I could, I would travel to the space where sweet, strong and gentle souls go after this place as we know it. I imagine it to be a beautiful place, and I would sure love to see him there.
Where were you born? North Carolina.
Any interesting trivia about you? I still have two baby teeth.
Where did you attend Middle School? Bloomington, Indiana.
Who was your favorite or most influential teacher? My 6th Grade teacher Mrs. Grover. I credit her with my understanding of the need for and power of a positive and optimistic outlook on life.
The format of the Physical and Health Education (PHE) class this year is really exciting and I am thrilled to be a part of it. I co-teach the 8th grade class with Holly Drown, and cycle through at times in the 6th and 7th grade classes as well. PHE is just as it sounds- a class combining the elements of physical fitness with health and wellness. We try to make the class informative and active, sometimes within each class, while other times one class might be more informative and the next one quite active. So far this year, students have learned about and set goals relating to their levels of physical fitness, nutrition, sleep, stress management and social/emotional needs. Some of these areas are easier to quantify and understand than others, so we will continue to follow these threads throughout the year. Next week we welcome nutritionist Mary Verbovski to speak to our students about nutrition and best choices for the growing bodies. If you haven’t met Holly Drown yet, please know she has been a great addition to Annie Wright and brings great energy and experience to the middle school students. After the new year and into the second semester, we will target more specific areas of fitness and the components of team work, dig deeper into social awareness and relationship skills and welcome experts from the community to speak on topics including but not limited to substance abuse prevention, gender diversity and healthy decision making.
