January 19, 2018

Service Learning Days 2018

This week included our second annual Middle School Service Learning Days. As a complement to our fall Experience Days, Service Learning Days are designed to give students the opportunity not only enable students to provide assistance to people or organizations in need but also to develop a deeper understanding of the factors that result in social inequalities, injustice, marginalization, or suffering. Early in the academic year, we introduced the concept and cycle of service learning. While programming goes by different names - service, service learning, social action, social justice, etc. - the goal is always twofold: to improve the lives of others, and personal growth. As we continue to build our Middle School service program, we hope to expose our students to a variety of categories or contexts for service and to give our students a chance to engage in different types of service. 

For SL Days 2018, students in Grade 6 experienced an orientation to service learning, focusing on what it means to be part of a community, contributing to the life of the community, and identifying and understanding the needs of a community. Central to this is developing empathy, which is also a primary goal for our Design program. Over the last couple of days, students reflected on what it means to be of service to others, helped out in Early Childhood and Lower School classrooms, and finished their Cardboard Arcade and welcomed LS students to test out and enjoy the games. 

Students in Grades 7 and 8 went to one of seven sites - Mary's Place Donations Center, Mary's Place Family Center, Puget Sound Pet Food Bank, The REACH Center, St. Leo's Food Connection, Tacoma Children's Museum/The Muse, and Westside Stables. Each group had a unique schedule, including a mix of direct service and time to develop an understanding of the issues that each organization is responding to - the groups that went to Mary's Place, the REACH Center, and St. Leo's focused on poverty and homelessness; the groups that went to the Pet Food Bank and Westside stables focused on care for the environment and animals; and the group that went to The Muse focused on childcare, education, and early childhood development and on poverty. This is just a starting point - most groups finished their SL Days thinking about ways they could take action to respond to the need they've witnessed and started to understand, and this plants a seed for the Community Project that students will complete in Grade 8 in future years.

As we continue building our MS Service Program, if you are aware of or involved with organizations that would benefit from our students' help, or that could help our students develop a deeper understanding of different categories of service, please reach out to Mr. Hulseman!

Reminder about PSA

Since coming back from Winter Break, we've seen a spike in PSA violations. PSA refers to our policy around using technology. While on campus, Middle School students may only use devices (laptop, cell phone, etc.) with a teacher's Permission, under a teacher's Supervision, and it must be Academic or school-related. Students found violating this rule will lose their device for the remainder of the day, and repeated violations will lead to further consequences. If you have any questions about our PSA policy, please contact Ms. Clare Wagstaff. 

Attendance and Achievement

There are so many facets to understanding education - the research that is available is overwhelming! While much of recent attention in educational research focuses on advances in understanding neuroscience and its impact on learning or on social-emotional development, some "old" truths hold up. One of those is the relationship between attendance and achievement. At Annie Wright, we build our calendar and schedule very thoughtfully, putting the experience of students and shaping an optimal learning environment at the center of our considerations. For the last few years, the Middle School has been lucky to have a long Thanksgiving break, a long winter break, a February break, and a March break, but our observations indicate that, especially with MS Journeys in May, this makes for a very choppy spring. Next year, we'll be streamlining this a bit with a single, two-week spring break.

Even with ample break time, many of our students are committed to a variety of things outside school that demand time away from school, but, typically, those students who are heavily scheduled also develop effective time-management skills - in some part, because they just have to. These skills are a necessary antidote to lost learning time, but most Middle School students are in the process of developing the skills associated with assiduousness, grit, intrinsic motivation, time-management, and follow-through. When students miss school, they risk falling behind - not in a competitive sense, but in terms of their own intellectual and neurological development. Missing school has bigger consequences, too. Drawing on current research on attendance and achievement at the University of Chicago, Attendance Works highlights 5 Key Findings for Middle Grades:

1. Middle grade attendance and GPA provide the best indication of how students will perform in high school classes. 
2. Students who are chronically absent or receiving Fs in the middle grades are at very high risk of being off-track for graduation in ninth grade, and eventually dropping out of school. 
3. College readiness depends on very strong grades in middle school, as well as high school. 
4. Improving grades and attendance in the middle grades can have a large pay-off for high school success; even more so than improving test scores. 
5. High school selection matters for whether students graduate and earn the credentials needed for college. 

Attendance Works also identifies ten important facts about school attendance. While this research is looking at data about students throughout the US and the experience of independent school students can be different or present less risk, it does point to the relationship between attendance and growth - one more data set to shape our calendar!

Parent Education: Substance Abuse Prevention

On Monday, February 5, we will welcome back substance abuse prevention specialist from FDC Prevention Works. The specialist will speak to students during the day, and all parents are invited and encouraged to attend a special session at 7:00pm in the Great Hall. To register for the event, click here.

What we are learning...

Mr. Stuart Hake, Strings and Orchestra Teacher

What is your favorite color? Blue. No, purple. No, blue...

What is your favorite book? John Nichols, The Milagro Beanfield War
What is your favorite movie? "It's a Wonderful Life"

If I hadn't been a teacher, I probably would've been... a freelance cellist or a Jack in the Box manager. 
What is your favorite piece of music? Beethoven's 9th, or Led Zeppelin "Dazed and Confused" from The Song Remains the Same

If you could travel anywhere in space and time, where and when would you like to visit? Kennedy Space Center, July 16, 1969.
Where were you born? Endicott, NY

Any interesting trivia about you? I spent three years as a 'supertitle projectionist' for the Arizona Opera in the 90s.

Where did you attend Middle School? Vestal, NY and Las Cruces, NM.

Who was your favorite or most influential teacher? Marianna Gabbi in Las Cruces, New Mexico.

In the Sixth-Grade Strings class, our current unit which is winding to a close is called ‘Instrumental Technique’ with a statement of inquiry that says: “Changing technical skills and intellectual understanding are necessary to continually improve playing.” This is the longest unit of the year and lays the foundation of playing the instruments so that we can investigate all the other units in the course. We start with how to hold the bow and the instrument and move all the way to reading simple musical lines in our classroom book. It’s a process that takes months. Developing physical coordination and habits, tonal sensibilities, practice skills/routines, and critical thinking unfold across many weeks and watching the transformation in the students is very exciting. With instruments, learning is so visible and immediate for students. Hearing “I GOT IT!” after a first time through a song (or an eighth time) is such a great expression of how each student connects with their personal development on a step by step basis. The key ATL of the unit is resilience and if all the kids can truly internalize how to “bounce back after adversity, mistakes and failures”, whether it’s an entire performance or just getting the bowing backward, this is a huge tool for them to leave the class with. By the way, sometimes they actually are pretty fun to listen to as well!