Welcome to the 2015-2016 school year! - Week one in review

Wow! Just like that, we've completed our first week of school! It's only Friday evening, but the first day jitters seem like a distant memory as we've all settled into our new class. Read on for a brief overview of the various threads of study that we began this week!

But first, say hello to the mysterious, affable, two-headed creature that we call Junella.

Identity Theme - Communities

Our first theme for the school year is Identity. One of the ways that we'll be exploring this topic is by taking a closer look at our own identities. There are many ways to think about who we are as individuals, and one particularly useful one is to think about what communities we are members of. After some discussion, we filled out charts listing (some of) our various communities, along with the benefits we receive for being a part of them, and the responsibilities that we have to them. 

For example, everyone listed their immediate families as one such community. The benefits they receive are food, shelter, love, safety, etc. Each person had different responsibilities to their family, such as doing chores, going to school, being kind, and so on. 

Other examples of communities were sports teams, the city of Ypsilanti, the city of Ann Arbor, the Summers-Knoll School community, our classroom community, the State of Michigan, the United States. Some kids thought even more broadly: We are a one species, and we are all citizens of the world. 

Everyone was able to think of several communities, as well as list some benefits that come along with being a part of that community. On one level, this got us all thinking a little more pointedly about the privileges and advantages that we are afforded in our lives. (And our upcoming field trip to Howell Nature Center will reinforce and expand this concept!) 

By also thinking about our responsibilities to these communities, it made us a little more conscious about what we're doing to serve and support them, and perhaps how we might be able to be even more mindful about them. (So feel free to use this weekend to try and encourage your child to pick up a few more household chores.) 

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Technology at Summers-Knoll -- Crafting our technology guidelines

Each member of our class will soon be issued a Chromebook laptop for school use. These marvelous machines are remarkably useful tools, and we'll have them out regularly. However, learning to use them properly is fraught with peril. First of all, we all have to agree what "properly" means! Each year, we work with students to help them craft their own set of guidelines for safe, productive use of technology at Summers-Knoll. 

We began with a group brainstorming session with Jason's Class and Sam's Class working together to get our ideas going. What are some things that we shouldn't do with our computers? What are some things that we should do with them? Students then broke off into small groups to come up with guidelines that they felt were reasonable. ("Don't have food or liquid near your computer." "Do good work." "Don't get out your computer unless you've asked or been told to get it." "Use appropriate search terms." "Make sure your computer is plugged in at the end of the day.") 

Then we came back together and shared our drafts of items for our technology agreement. Once we've drafted it (and made sure that we didn't miss anything important), students will read through the rules that they created (and that we approved) and sign an agreement to abide by the guidelines. 

Giving the students an active role in the creation of these guidelines instills a sense of ownership in them that is far more powerful than simply being handed a list of rules to follow. It also gets them thinking about the challenges and issues that they will face over the years as they venture online more frequently. 

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Stepping up and helping out
As recess was wrapping up on Thursday, we had an impromptu opportunity to help our our community. Shan had the Kindergarteners out on the playground as part of a science scavenger hunt, and one of her students got cut. As Shan tended to the (very minor, but bleeding and potentially disturbing image for our littlest students) wound, each of the 5th/6th graders quickly paired off and teamed up with a Kindergartener and proceeded to help them out with their task, while Shan took time to clean and bandage the cut. 

Ella takes a photo of her Kindergartener's find.

One of the best ways to bring out the best in older kids is to have them work with their younger schoolmates. It was lovely to see in action. 

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Identity Theme: What is an American?

As another way to explore the concept of identity, we began a study of American history. There are many possible points to begin this story, and I've chosen the epic tale of Cabeza de Vaca. 

If you don't know his story, it's worth looking into. Cabeza de Vaca was part of a doomed conquistador expedition to the mainland of North America. Things went... poorly, and eventually only four explorers were left to struggle their way across this new (to them) continent. Along the way, they were attacked, befriended, enslaved, and borderline worshipped, depending on the disposition of the local population. Operating without the benefit of European technology (armor, weapons, horses), the stranded explorers were forced to deal with North America on its own terms, as opposed to acting like conquerors. 

It is for this reason that I've chosen to use this story as our entrance point to American history. It provides context for the strong European heritage of the United States, while still acknowledging the fact that the Americas were first populated by large numbers of complex and distinct societies. Cabeza de Vaca's experiences give us a unique glimpse into these cultures (albeit viewed through a European lens). 

They were eventually "rescued" eight years later, and Cabeza de Vaca prepared a lengthy and surprisingly accurate report for Spain, particularly given the fact that he did it all from memory. He had no way of recording information during this journey. In addition to describing the people and customs of the societies that they encountered, Cabeza de Vaca advocated for more peaceful and humane interactions between the Native Americans and the Spanish, a position that was rejected. 

We're using two books for this part of our studies. One is a translation of the report authored by Cabeza de Vaca himself (vocabulary term: Primary source!), and the other is a book that tells the tale as we understand it today (vocabulary term: Secondary source!). 

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These were but a few of the happenings this week. We also visited all of our specialist classes (Math, Latin, French, Mandarin, PE, Music, Art, and Science. Science was particularly cool, and I'll add some photos to the blog soon! 

Thank you to everyone for a wonderful first week! 

Science: Filtration investigation

Various filter designs

As part of our ongoing study of water, watersheds, and water quality, we began a discussion today about water filtration.


We began with a reading to build some background knowledge, making note of (and discussing) terms that were unfamiliar to the class.

Then, students were tasked with creating two different designs for potential water filters, given a list of materials and their costs. Their budget was $8.00 per filter.

The groups set to work, brainstorming ideas and crafting designs.

The next step will be to present their designs to the class to get feedback.

Bigfoot projects - Filming and editing

We started today with a quick demonstration about filming and editing our Bigfoot videos. We're using Macbook Airs to film and edit our projects. They're great machines, but they're not necessarily an ideal choice for capturing audio and video. We talked a little bit this morning about how to use close ups and editing to make a more interesting film, and also to work around some of the technical limitations of our equipment. 

For example, filming your script in a single take from far away is visually uninteresting and difficult to hear: 

Filming using establishing shots and close-ups, however, can bring the film alive, while also making things a little easier to see and hear: 

Ford River Rouge Plant tour

We visited the Henry Ford River Rouge Plant last Friday, the highlight of which was touring the factory where the Ford F-150 is assembled. 

Photography was strictly forbidden, which is a shame. I would have loved to have taken a few pictures of the awestruck faces watching as partially-assembled trucks sailed above, below, and around us in a carefully choreographed ballet. It was hypnotic.  

Someone else in the world broke the no-photography rule, so here's a glimpse of what we saw:

We also visited the observation deck, where you can see the rest of the plant sprawling out before you, crowned with one of the world's largest living roofs.

(We weren't quite this high up.) 

Back at school, we showed a couple of classic clips that were relevant to what we had seen:

I Love Lucy: 

Charlie Chaplin in Modern Times:

You may or may not be surprised to hear that the comedy holds up!

STEM: Learning about circuitry and wiring

We've been learning a lot about electricity as part of our STEM work with our Cities theme. We'll be putting this new knowledge to use later this week when we visit Joanna's 3/4 class to help them install lighting in the tiny city that they're building in their classroom ("Ant Arbor"). 

Before we can teach the younger kids, we needed to get some experience ourselves: 

We disassembled switches, outlets, and power cords, examining the inner workings. 

Most kids didn't know how to strip a wire, so Marcellin shared his expertise by teaching a mini-workshop about how to use the tools to prepare wires to be connected. 

We'll be visiting the 3/4s on Wednesday afternoon to begin helping them illuminate their cities. 

STEM -- Ohm's Law

For the last couple of weeks in STE/Math the middle schoolers have been learning about electric circuits.

We started with the initial prompt: "Here is a battery, a lightbulb and some wires. Make it light up."

After the initial investigation we discussed the key elements that are needed to complete a circuit: a closed path, a voltage source (battery), a load (lightbulb).

Now students were asked to investigate more complex circuits with multiple bulbs and batteries. 

In math class we were able to go a little more in depth into the relationship between the number of lightbulbs, batteries and the brightness of the light (the energy usage rate, which we came to learn in this case is directly related to the current). From some thought exercises, experimental observations (we also talked about independent and dependent variables) and a basic understanding of the mechanism of electrical current we we're able to derive an approximation of Ohm's Law for series circuits--basically doubling the voltage (number of batteries) makes the bulbs twice as bright and doubling the number of lightbulbs cuts the brightness in half.
This led us a little further into math as we talked about direct and indirect proportions; the green group even got a little into the characteristics graphs of direct (a line through the origin) and indirect proportions (a hyperbola with the axes as asymptotes).

Ad project, round two!

We continued our advertising project this morning with a discussion about the science of persuasion and Aristotle's Appeals: ethos, pathos, and logos. 

We watched the following video, pausing frequently to discuss its content:

After that, everyone was sent off with their groups to make a commercial for their new product, this time incorporating what we learned through our class discussion. 

As with yesterday, each group was assigned a fancy Mac Air laptop. Throughout the week, students have been teaching each other how to use iMovie to greater effect, which has led to notable improvements in the quality of video editing. 

A large part of this project has involved the kids teaching themselves how to accomplish certain results, and then sharing that information with others. It's been wonderful to see them collaborating both within and beyond their small groups. You would hardly know that it was the last week before the long break, given how focused and directed they've been these last few days! 



Then, just to shake things up a bit, they went sledding in the afternoon for P.E.  

Signs of the Season...