This week, my class finished and sent off our pen pal letters to Westbury Friends School in New York. We had so much fun writing these letters, and we are anxiously awaiting replies. Before this project, most of the students didn’t know what a pen pal was, but they quickly grew excited about the idea…
Reflection
Every day before snack and lunch, all classes engage in quiet reflection time. Usually, the topic for reflection has to do with the specific Quaker idea we have discussing during community meeting on Monday mornings, such as peace, integrity, community, etc. Sometimes, the reflection is more tailored to issues or topics that have come up…
Point of View
The books my students are reading now in their book groups are all chosen to reflect a theme of two cultures meeting, and either valuing one another or devaluing one another. In King of the Wind by Marguerite Henry, a prized Arabian stallion is sent as a gift to the King of France — but…
The Power of a Deadline
A couple of weeks ago, I noticed that the students’ progress on their all-about books was moving along much more slowly than I expected. I took a day or two to closely observe their progress and thought about strategies that might encourage them to try to get more down on the page during independent writing…
Reflecting on Integrity
Integrity is definitely the most difficult of the Quaker values to discuss with children. This is partly because while it’s about being good and doing the right thing, it’s particularly about trustworthiness and inner honesty, so that’s complex. It’s also, in some ways, more about intent than actions, which is likewise complicated to talk about…
Taking Notes
One new skill my class has been focusing on recently is taking notes. Elementary school isn’t usually a time when people think of note-taking as an important skill, but then again, the kids have been taking notes in one way or another for years: writing an interesting fact from Time for Kids on a post-it,…