Education is all a matter of building bridges. – Ralph Ellison

How would you build if no one ever told you the "right" way?

Every Monday, rain or shine, our class journeys to our neighborhood library. Although the orderly rows of just right books are our final destination, it always seems as though the time we spend walking side by side is the truly valuable part of that hour. In not so orderly paris of twos and threes, we make our way down Killingsworth, taking in the sights and the sounds of our neighborhood. It is on this walk that connections are made, and it takes nothing more than a shared sidewalk and a common destination for a third grader and a fifth grader to strike up a conversation. Observations are shared we move along the streets but in a class full of students it always seems that more than a few need a constructive way to connect with the space around them. Over the next few months we will be working to recreate a small model of our neighborhood, focusing first on the bridge we cross on our walk each Monday and later on the diverse shops that make up Trillium’s home. Junk supplies are always welcome and appreciated.

This week I invite you to spend some time thinking about the buildings that are important in your neighborhood. If you could pick just one to re-create, what would it be?

Until next time, be well.

“An environment-based education movement–at all levels of education–will help students realize that school isn’t supposed to be a polite form of incarceration, but a portal to the wider world.” – Richard Louv

Each year teachers everywhere sit down and brainstorm ways to create strong classroom communities. It is our hope that over the course of a year classrooms of strangers will morph into the closest of families and that names once unknown will find themselves on the envelopes of new birthday invitations. In the past I’ve tackled community building with name-games and cooperative problem solving activities, class potlucks and back to school nights. Yet, it wasn’t until I arrived at Trillium that anyone proposed that I take a group of over 80 students into the woods for three days. Trillium is truly a place full of surprises.

Although the trees and beauty of Oregon have grown on me over the past three years, camping still has not made its way onto my list of preferred activities. When I was told that a 3-4-5 campout was an Intermediate tradition a few specific worries fluttered through my mind: lost children, poison oak, homesickness, and bugs. Many of you by now have heard firsthand about the terrors 🙂 of the wasps we witnessed on the trip. Many of you may have not heard about our miraculous three days of sunshine or the extreme acts of kindness that ensued as a result of a group of hungry insects.

The closest of friendships are often the result of nothing more than proximity. When you are young, a seat next to someone in a new carpool qualifies you for best friend status and a frantic flight away from a swarm of hungry insects is all it takes for a cabin of strangers to find common ground. On our campout students who had never met before openly invited others to join them inside of their lodges and night time campfires that could have been segregated by class or grade were intermingled, as students sought out new carpool and cabin mates. If ever there were a way to break the barriers of grade and class, camping in the midst of the furry of nature seems to be it.

In the next few weeks thank-you notes and campout reflections will drive the thinking in our classroom and all along the way our group will work to figure out how to capture the sense of community that developed at camp Whispering Winds. Once the excitement of each sting has worn off, I invite you to begin your dinner table conversations with questions about new friends, late night smores, sunny fishing docks, and campfire stories.

We will miss you camp Whispering Winds (not all of you).
As always, be Well.