The Adventure Continues: Year 5 - Week 3 In Review
As we pass the halfway mark for session 1, our learners are demonstrating immense growth and curiosity! More details below!
spark studio
Spark to ground control: “Can you hear us? We have an intergalactic emergency … what’s a podcast?!” Ground Control: “We hear you loud and clear. It’s time to interview your fellow heroes to find out more about your tribe’s superpowers. You must build a blanket fort recording studio for your interviews. Onward fellow heroes!” …
It has been called to our attention during a mission control meeting this week that our plan to build a “Superpower Tribe” includes instructions. It’s called a “Badge Plan” and we all have one of our own. We wonder if we’ll find our superpowers within? Highlights this week included focusing on “all” of us learning and/or knowing our sounds, numbers to 10 (because from there it goes to infinity and beyond) and, of course, the seven continents. You never know where this mission will lead us? Team work makes the dream work! Another important detail we discovered from one of our fellow heroes is that you must first feed your brain with knowledge (using hand to mind concepts) and books are for dessert. Sounds yummy to us, how about you?
Interviews are really fun. A few fun facts we’ve learned include, we are different ages, we look different, we are all human, and some of us like the same things.
Coming soon for our newest heroes: Look for an email from Transparent Classroom to follow along on your hero’s “superpower” journey … for all returning heroes, we trust you are finding your way through your hero’s “superpower” journey. Is anyone curious to know what’s next?
“To infinity and beyond” - Buzz Lightyear
elementary studio
We've passed the halfway mark in Session 1! This week we've gotten into the full swing of core skills and added Math Target Practice to our online platform work. We’ve had several launches about curiosity, our first session character trait, and it has helped to ready us for a school year full of deep learning and discovery.
Story Arts for this session has been focused on making podcasts, and our learners have started to script and record their initial drafts. Topics chosen by the heroes range from fictional animals to the history of cars, so we're sure to come out with something fascinating for everyone!
In the Harry Potter Quest this week we've learned all about the wizarding world of potions and charms. Heroes learned about aromatherapy, and made their own perfumes out of essential oils. They also made several potions from the Harry Potter universe, and learned about the properties of light and color by studying prisms, water beads, and creating their own color changing slime. In Civilization we studied the Crusades and asked some deep questions--what motivated people of different religions to travel so far and get to Jerusalem? And why did they feel so strongly about it that they would go to war with each other?
Our learners have discovered and studied so many things in this session already. As our curiosity grows, the only question we can ask is, "what will we explore next?"
middle school studio
Wow, week 3 is done and we are off to a great start! Heroes are getting the hang of how The Forest School works. We started the week off with a great launch on setting the tone and culture in the studio and what that looks like. We continued to explore in Story Arts with a range of videos and scripts for challenges. Next, we went right into Quest which has been a challenge but the Heroes are taking it one day at a time and making the best of it. This week they learned the importance of Water and its different components during the labs. Some of the labs focused on Osmosis, Dehydration in cells, and Electrolytes.
In civilization we discussed the meaning of different religious laws and Heroes were able to present their beliefs on this topic. Throughout the week we wanted Heroes to think about how they can serve others for their Servant Leader Badges so we dedicated some time to plan out that badge this year.
We want Heroes to walk away having learnt to be self-directed learners and exploring what creativity means to them! In art, heroes took it up a notch and learnt to make their own Picasso pieces. True creativity was shown during this time! To tie up the rest of the week we will continue Quest and have an expert come in and give feedback on work. We will also launch into Town Hall as we continue to build studio culture and governing rules. Remember, Tuesday we will have a ground breaking for our new building! This session is amazing and the learners are growing independently day by day.
high school studio
Monday morning took off with an awesome Hero led launch with very interesting information on the Vietnam war!
This week our High School Heroes created a schedule for the upcoming Math help desk. Every morning between the hours of 9:00-10:00am, two Heroes will volunteer to tutor any Hero in need of math assistance. We ended the day with a bang as our Heroes completed their first story arts challenge- making a music video, and a glorious viewing party to follow! On Tuesday, most of our day was spent creating! This week's story arts challenge will be creating very detailed music videos. Many different locations, angles, and props were used.
Our Quest challenge this week permitted us to interact with our first expert. Our expert was a nurse from Jefferson hospital in Pennsylvania who provided her feedback on the Heroes labs regarding the circulatory system, turns out their results were accurate!
Looking forward to next week and more discoveries!