To encourage dialogue and reflection about growth, new beginnings, and ‘second chances’, our question for this week is: Why are fresh starts and 'second chances' important? Fresh Starts and 'Second Chances' (Week of 4/30/23) (This is an anonymous Google Form)
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Our Students
Blake's Core Values: Respect, Responsibility, Resourcefulness, Reflection
Our Essential Question: How can we cultivate and curate the progression of student learning and growth?
Our Mission: Blake Middle School believes in a living mission statement, based on the concept that our community seeks and respects knowledge, integrity, character, wisdom, and the willingness to adapt to a continually evolving world.
The most important attitude that can be formed is that of desire to go on learning. - John Dewey
You cannot teach today the same way you did yesterday to prepare students for tomorrow. - John Dewey
After a busy first week back after vacation (did anyone else feel like we hit the ground running at about 90 mph on Monday morning???), it was energizing and centering - and wonderful - to see many of our students perform in the production of The Hound of the Baskervilles on Friday evening. It’s always so great to witness their excitement in their element, whatever element that may be - on stage, tech crew, and set crew. Big thanks to Tracy for her leadership and support of our students in fostering such a great culture of care and growth! One of the students told me it was his first time doing sound and shared his nervousness about it - right away, the student next to him said, ‘You’ve got this - I’m with you to help.’ And, special thanks and recognition to Joe Knaus, Maureen Doctoroff, Kim Price, and Nancy McLaughlin (along with many others) for all of their work and support of our theater program.
Walking by the growth in the neighborhood and looking at our own garden, I started thinking about the connections to school and learning - after also thinking about the yard work we need to tend to as well! These conversations happen on a daily basis (and often throughout the day) for us - student growth, providing opportunities for revision, mistakes and moving forward, end of terms and beginnings of terms, etc. In looking through some of the responses from last week’s question and mapping out the last portion of this school year, the environment of systemic fresh starts and ‘second chances’ is one that I hope we keep at the forefront of our thoughts and actions - for our students and ourselves as well.
Next week is Teacher Appreciation Week and I look forward to taking time to thank and recognize the team of wonderful and caring educators at Blake who bring their best for our students. A belief and value that I see ‘lived’ every day is one of reflection and learning of our teachers - a willingness and desire to learn, rethink, and give oneself ‘fresh starts’ on learning and habits. This openness to read, learn, and grow is a tangible realization of ‘second chances’ and ‘fresh starts’ as we continue to adapt and build upon our learned lessons and experiences. In that vein of continued learning, I am sharing a few posts that have helped me to reflect, rethink and grow, stay current, and better support our students - I hope they will do the same for others.
A Culture of No: How to Get Past Fear and Risk-Aversion to Make Things Happen
by Trace Pickering in Getting Smart
Schools as public entities have to appeal to a wide, and often vocal, constituency. Boards made up of lay people, not experts in important-to-the-business fields like a for-profit board, are working for free. These caring public servants are faced with critical decisions about both money and programming. They experience constant pressure from a variety of interest groups wanting or not wanting specific things. Add to the fact that every decision that is made is open to public scrutiny and debate, made easier due to the pervasive existence of social media.
…contextual realities create a pervasive and long-standing culture that is highly risk-averse and often driven by fear-based decisions. What will happen to us if we say yes? In systems like education, there is virtually no immediate or visible cost to saying “no.” It’s almost as if there is no opportunity cost to saying “no” (a huge faulty assumption). Saying “yes,” however comes with lots of very visible “costs” and a very public eye with people waiting for any reason to point out why it doesn’t work.
What are a few other straightforward moves an educational leader can make to ensure they can push break-the-mold, innovative changes needed in education today?
1. Find key leaders in your community and engage them.
2. Simply change your language.
3. Quit demanding that all the details be worked out first.
4. Be honest with the public.
5. Don’t let the “system” determine all the success measures.
There Are Better Ways to Study That Will Last You a Lifetime
by Daniel Willingham in The New York Times
Students get studying wrong because they don’t assess whether a method works in the long run. Instead, they pay attention to whether the method is easy to do and feels like it’s working while they’re doing it.
Psychologists have developed much better ways to study, some of them counterintuitive. For example, if you’ve only partially learned some material, trying to remember it is a better way to solidify that fragile learning than studying more.
Most people hope that schools will encourage each child to become a lifelong learner, which means teachers must show students how to learn effectively on their own. That’s unlikely until teachers have that knowledge themselves.
Parents can help children learn to stand up to hate. Here's how.
by Phyllis Fagell in The Washington Post
Helping our children understand how and why to stand up for one another is becoming more and more important. According to a 2021 U.S. Government Accountability Office report, roughly 1 in 4 students between ages 12 and 18 who experienced bullying during the 2018-2019 school year were targeted because of their race, national origin, religion, disability, gender or sexual orientation.
For tweens and teens actively exploring their identities, the spike in bias incidents is particularly significant. Adolescents are growing up in a polarized time and may need extra support to develop a strong sense of self, let alone defend a peer who is targeted because of their identity. Here are ways caregivers can arm kids with empathy, courage and the practical skills they need to stand up to hate.
1-Teach children early
2-Validate fears and offer choices for how they can react
3-Challenge their assumptions about social risks
4-Rehearse what to say and do
5-Address hate disguised as humor
6-Practice assertiveness
7-Encourage them to reflect after they observe a bias incident
It’s equally important to practice humility when your own efforts fall short, said Mishy Lesser, learning director of the Upstander Project. “You might say, ‘I wish I had spoken up about this, but I didn’t, and now I feel regret,’” she said. “If an adult doesn’t have the skills to interrupt hurtful, hateful speech, how can they expect children to be able to do that?”
Kids' Declining Mental Health Is the 'Crisis of Our Time,' Surgeon General Says
by Caitlyn Peetz in Education Week
U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called out social media as a driving force behind the surge in children’s mental health challenges on Tuesday, and encouraged lawmakers to regulate how the platforms are marketed to and used by kids.
“A lot of these platforms have been designed by some of the most talented players in the world to maximize the amount of time that kids spend on them, and then, frankly, that adults spend on them, too. … That might be, from a business perspective, a reasonable model, but from a public health perspective that is not actually what we want because it’s having a bad effect on our kids.”
But the most important thing parents can do is to simply remind their children that they’re ready to listen.
“The most important thing that you can do for your child during turbulence is to make sure that they know you love them and that they can talk to you,” he said. “For them just to know it’s OK for them to talk to you, it’s not something to be ashamed of, and there are people they can go to for help … can go a long way to helping a child feel that they’re not alone.”
Sampling of Responses from Last Week’s ‘Question of the Week’: What are your hopes for the end of this school year? How do you want to grow as a learner?
- I hope to have patience in looking forward to summer, and to soak in all the lessons and relationships for our final weeks of school.
- I hope that students end the year feeling energized!
- I hope that students are able to reflect on their time in class and feel that they learned something about themselves as learners as well as about the content we taught.
- I want to improve on my report card.
- Pass 6th grade and get to 7th, have more knowledge (I guess).
- Understand more in my classes and force myself to do better
- I want to learn a ton in all subjects and all areas
- My hopes for the end of the school year is to succeed in Creature Feature. I want to grow as a learner by incorporating all possible subjects into Creature Feature.
- I hope that my understanding of different concepts can grow
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Take care.
Nat