Chicks and Ducklings!

If you’ve been on the Upper School campus any time in the last few weeks, you will certainly have heard the students buzzing about the chicks and ducks.  US science teacher, Ms. Mytko, gets chicken and duck eggs from a farm in Placer County.  Not all of the eggs produce hatchlings, and this year, some chicken eggs got mixed in with the duck eggs.  Though the chick eggs mixed in did hatch in the duck egg incubator, any duck eggs that might have been in the chicken egg incubator would not have hatched.  The eggs have different tolerances for temperature.

The birds serve to complement the seventh grade life sciences unit on cells and development.  Students started the units with an egg lab to study osmosis; students found that the cell membrane is semipermeable, which allows substances such as water through, but keeps other substances out.  Osmosis is a key element as eggs form in birds’ reproductive tracts.  Students learned that calcium crystals make up shells, and that the pores are visible in the microscale level.  Seventh graders have been working with the Advanced Light Source at the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory to use tomography and visualization at the micron level, so the work on egg shells  was a great intersection.  Furthermore, students explored cell devision, as well digestion of cells of food to create new proteins to build tissues and, well, grow!  Seventh graders also were able to tie in concepts from evolution and the Tree of Life, considering the question: Why do birds lay eggs and have feathers?  Students also considered ethics in food production.  Of course, the Lower School kids took advantage of the hatching birds as well.  They got to learn the parts of an egg and how the egg develops.  They observed the hatchlings’ behavior and compared structural differences between chicks and ducks.  

So what now?  Usually, Ms. Mytko allows members of the BPC community to adopt the chickens or ducks to keep in their own yards.  Any birds remaining get to go back to where they originated--a farm in Placer County.  This farm is unique in that it will take back its birds that do not find homes.  This year, our garden teacher, Ms. Frycke, worked with science teacher, Mr. Cohen, to build a home for chickens here on the US campus at BPC.  On Saturday, students, parents, siblings, teachers, administrators, and other members of the community cleared out a space in our garden and built a coop for some of the chickens.  We won’t know if we’re getting any eggs yet--though professionals can sex the chicks earlier, we won’t be able to sex them for another three months.  We are lucky to be able to keep the chickens on our campus, where they will continue to provide lots of learning opportunities for our students!

Thanks to Ms. Mytko for helping me write this blog post!

Field Studies 2017

Approximately half of our eighth graders went to Costa Rica with the phenomenal Catalina Lacy and Michaela Garcia for a Spanish immersion experience.  The eighth graders staying at Black Pine Circle for the week were treated to a series of field studies.

On Monday, students learned that people first arrived in the Bay Area in 17000 BCE and the Ohlone started settling in villages in the Bay Area around 4000 BCE.  For context, note that the first human remains near the Seine River date back to 8000 BCE and the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt was finished in 2560 BCE.  Started in 800 BCE by the Ohlone, the shellmound in Emeryville was an area where domestic wastes were deposited for generations.  The Ohlone had no written language, instead relying on an oral tradition to transmit their histories.  As time passed, and as the precise location of objects were forgotten, the remains of the departed were placed in the same area; eventually the shellmound was 350 feet in diameter and 60 feet high.  Much of this was eventually bulldozed for landfill, to expand the surface area of Emeryville.

Eighth graders talked to journalist and documentary producer Andrés Cediel, who created Shellmound: The Documentary.  Released in 2004, this documentary traces the history of the Bay Street shopping area in Emeryville--from its Ohlone past, through its time as an amusement park, fertilizer and paint factory, and as a developed retail center.  The developers at Bay Street found hundreds of human remains, and removed the remains to an unmarked grave somewhere on the property.  They built a small memorial area as well, and mention the history on their website.  Students discussed whether the developers responded appropriately to concerns of local activists and Native American descendants.  Since Berkeley’s 4th Street shopping area is currently in a similar situation.  Students took a walk over to examine the general area where human remains were found, and where developers plan to add retail and residential space.  Activists have proposed an alternative.  With all this in mind, students worked in groups to design their own Ohlone memorial at Bay Street that they felt would be better suited to both history and contemporary responsibilities.  The goal for this lesson was to learn about the history of the Bay Area before the arrival of the Europeans, but also to think about how we treat our past.

In the afternoon, eighth graders took the bus to Albany Bowl, had pizza, and bowled.  Students who were not in class splits together enjoyed the freedom to play, tease, boast, chatter, yell, and goof off in the lanes.  

The next day, Tuesday, students separated into groups to volunteer in San Francisco and Oakland.  In San Francisco, Glide Memorial Church offers three square meals daily to people who are hungry--in 2014, they served nearly 800,000 meals.  Students were included in the 85-strong contingent of volunteers needed to run the meal program.  They bussed tables, served meals, and more.  Later, eighth graders said they said it was fun helping out where it was needed, and many enjoyed meeting so many people in such a short amount of time.  Other eighth graders visited the Alameda County Community Food Bank in Oakland.  The Food Bank organizes and provides food for 240 nonprofits throughout Alameda County, and distributed over 25 million meals in 2015 alone.  The eighth graders here were no less busy than their comrades in San Francisco; they were set at huge boxes of fruit, where they bagged and tied the fruit into smaller bags for distribution to local nonprofits.  They enjoyed the time, chatting with each other, the adult chaperones and teachers, and were surprised by the huge number of fruit they bagged by the end of their time.  Both groups of eighth graders learned more about the needs of the community around them, and discovered that fulfilling those needs was made easier with coordinated effort.

Some students came back to school early enough to watch Sneakerheadz, a documentary about the sneaker collecting culture.  They took some time to design their own custom sneakers, with the goal that the teacher should be able to look at the sketch and easily identify the identity of the creator of the sneaker.  Students relished the creative challenge, joshing each other about the quality of their drawings and praising each other for their ingenuity.

On Wednesday, students received a quick and dirty lesson on Bay Area architecture.  They learned the aesthetics and materials used in Victorian, Art Deco, Arts and Crafts--specifically Mission Revival, Tudor, etc.--as well as Neo-Gothic, Neo-Classical, and Neo-Renaissance architectural styles.  Architecture is art that is publicly accessible, and all of these styles would be visible in Downtown Oakland, where the Oakland Museum of California had an exhibit on sneaker culture.  Students were put into groups and then tasked with finding examples of these different kinds of architectures as they found their way to the museum by themselves--teachers and chaperones followed with first-aid kits and very little advice.  They were given addresses, a paper map of downtown Oakland, and instructed not to use their smartphones for help.  They had to learn how to use local transit maps and timetables, as well as figure out transfers.  Some students realized that an address of 1807 Telegraph Ave. meant that 18th St. was the cross street, just as 2025 Broadway meant the nearest intersection was at 20th St.  Eventually, after identifying the style of many buildings, all groups made it to the museum to see the exhibit, and then a park for lunch.  Students, teachers, and chaperones sat in the shade, climbed the tree, played games, and generally relaxed their tired feet for a few hours until it was time to take BART home.  It was a gratifying day that allowed students to make choices, learn street smarts--literally--and pick up some architecture and history along the way.  On Wednesday night, some students attended the Giants and A’s season opener.  (Kudos to the students, teachers, and adults who made it through such a long day!)

On Thursday, as an extension of the sneaker culture activities, eighth graders watched a clip from The Devil Wears Prada.  In the film, Miranda stingingly informs new employee Andy that aesthetic decisions driving the whole fashion world were made in that room, and that she--as a consumer--did not make any of her own choices.  We discussed the merits of Miranda’s claim, and discussed youth culture, as well as black culture, fringe culture, and culture of those in marginalized groups, as forces that drive designers.  Students took some time to describe their own fashion aesthetics.  They were then placed into 9 groups of 4-5 students each to play the 2nd Annual BPC Runway Games, a non-lethal combination of RuPaul’s Drag Race, Project Runway, and The Hunger Games.  Eighth graders were tasked with creating two looks in two hours, using everyday materials such as garbage bags, receipt tape paper, electrical tape, packing tape, paper plates, doilies, coffee filters, sticky notes, etc.--and disregarding gender constructs.  Looks needed to be driven by a specific designer, who included:  Stephen Burrows, Craig Green, Betsey Johnson, Jean-Paul Gaultier, Rei Kawakubo, Alexander McQueen, Vivienne Westwood, Yoshi Yamamoto, and Yiqing Ying.  Students raced to the “cornucopia” twice: once to get their designer and again to collect their weapons (materials).  At the end of the two hours, eighth graders walked the runway and presented their fashion to other BPC students.  Some audience members--teachers, especially--were surprised because they didn’t expect certain students to walk the runway so willingly (and so well).  8th graders learned to prioritize and cooperate, work with the material and limitations, and mimic but also individualize a fashion style.  They were creative, efficient, and good-humored in this experience.  Students followed the runway walk with a delicious potluck at Aquatic Park, with some time messing around on the play structure.  They returned to Black Pine Circle for a short lesson from Mr. G on physics and rollercoasters.  The next day, Friday, eighth graders went to Six Flags.  There’s not much to report back on that--most people know how that goes.

We are grateful to the chaperones and teachers who made the week possible for the eighth graders.  You can enjoy pictures here.

Educating Educators

A couple weeks ago, the Upper School Faculty took a professional development day the weekend before Martin Luther King Jr. Day.  We reached out to educators at peer schools in the area to see who could host us, and we visited individually or in groups of up to six teachers.  A total of 22 US faculty members made the visit.  Schools we visited included: Bentley, Berkeley High, Head Royce, Lighthouse Academy, Prospect Sierra, Redwood Day, and St. Mary's College High School.  One of our faculty members even reached out to the curriculum coordinator for the South San Francisco School district.

Many of us met each other for carpools in the morning.  This logistical choice ended up being a fruitful way for us to discuss our practices with each other.  While we have meetings every Wednesday, between planning the upcoming week and prepping our own classes, we don’t have time to talk to each other as often as we’d like.

After the meeting, we came together to share a luxurious lunch provided by the parents in our community.  Later, at a staff meeting, we further discussed the models we had seen, reviewed our own practices, and worked through fresh ideas for invigorating our curricula and programs.  A few teachers considered the ongoing problem of scheduling classes, given what we had observed, as well as the possibilities and limits of block scheduling in the Upper School.  We thought about how many minutes core subjects were given and how often they met each week.  Some considered the role of advisory and the time given to advisory daily or weekly.  I heard one teacher discuss the resources offered by a veteran teacher in the same subject at the high school level.  Many of us came away with new possibilities for different texts and approaches for assessment.  And in the few weeks after the school visits, our school therapist has already implemented some ideas she observed, improving our own learning services procedures by increasing transparency for teachers.  

While we recognize the best practices in other programs, we were happy to find reasons for why we love Black Pine Circle so much.  Our classrooms really are student-centered rather than teacher-directed.  Teachers at Black Pine Circle prioritize collaboration in the classroom--a true 21st century educational priority.  The administration at Black Pine Circle gives the teachers a great deal of power to drive their own curricula and develop professionally.  Our students shine because they have their own voice.  Moreover, our students’ skills in inquiry drive their academic success and nurture curiosity.  Our Socratic practice is undeniably unique, remarkable, and effective.

Many of these schools are ostensibly our rivals--we are competing for the same pool of students--but true educators believe in educating all students, whether in our own classrooms or elsewhere.  This was evident in the joyous and welcoming attitudes we felt from our colleagues at different schools.  Truly, we educators are at our best when we have a chance to be students, to continually question our own work, to grow, and to learn.

Juvenelia

I taught Wuthering Heights at Black Pine Circle for many years as part of my traditional English literature survey.  Eighth graders love to hate the characters in Wuthering Heights, and they love the drama in the plot even more.  (As my partner puts it, “Every night is 8th grade drama night,” as a comment on Andra Marziano’s fantastic production with our graduating class every year.)  I never found a way to shove Jane Eyre into the curricula, though I am still trying.  This is all to say that I was thrilled to be able to see the exhibit, Charlotte Brontë: An Independent Will, at the Morgan Library recently.  

This exhibit was created to honor the 200th anniversary of Charlotte Brontë’s birth.  It was a treat to see the original manuscripts, first editions, portraits, etc.  However, I didn’t expect to be so taken by the juvenilia on display.  Brontë illustrated and painted as a young teen, but she also doodled fashionable ladies and dashing men.  In some cases, the young Brontë made a copy of another artistic work, but in many cases, she created her own unique pieces.  She created imaginary worlds with her siblings and made tiny magazines or books, with microscopic lettering.  Museums don’t typically show off the juvenilia of famous artists or writers, and I was struck by how similar her juvenilia was to the products that our middle school students create at Black Pine Circle.  

A different Charlotte, my eighth grade student, has been writing stories and drawing since the age of six. She doesn’t confine her work to class assignments--rather, she finds writing and illustrating fun.  While her parents are not writers, she points out that she was exposed to arts at a young age in her grandmother’s studio.  I was talking to Charlotte about the advantages of being dedicated to this kind of art at a young age, and she said, “Children can be more creative.  They are not as influenced by culture and they have more to explore in their minds, which is a catalyst.”  She doesn’t like that it is hard to convince adults that her work is good, because they sometimes “dismiss [her work] as childish.”  Still, she continues to write.  Charlotte is a voracious reader, and finds that the act of writing helps her understand authors better.  As her English teacher, I have found that she has a deep understanding of authorial intent and literary concepts, which she proves in our Socratic seminars.  I am confident that what we do in the classroom informs her art as well.

Recently, I heard from our science teacher and K-8 STEAM coordinator, Cris Mytko, that a seventh grader, Elan, one day decided that he didn’t have turn signals on his bike.  After the weekend, he showed Ms. Mytko the results.  He is a programmer, has been using Arduino for years, and he has built a drone as well as a pedal car out of PVC.  Elan is a maker through and through, and I appreciate how he advocates for this kind of learning by going to events to represent our school.  Certainly, his juvenilia is different from that of Brontë’s, but he is still imitating and using pre-existing designs as well as creating his own unique pieces.  His performance of mastery is exciting not only because of what he is able to accomplish in his youth, but also because of his dedication and joy in these works.

Parents and educators know that learning comes from both imitation as well as independent creation; both Charlotte and Elan are proof of this, and their energy  The exhibit about Brontë’s juvenilia reminds me that students are creating all the time both in and outside of school.  The teachers at Black Pine Circle facilitate this for the students by giving contexts and questions to inform their passions.  The Masterworks program, implemented by former faculty member, Nico Pemantle, is one of the best examples of this process.  8th grade students create a capstone project of their own choosing, and faculty members serve as advisors.  The students just confirmed their projects, and the field is wide-ranging, including: reporting on homelessness; studying and exploring solutions to child labor in chocolate production; studying immigrant stories; creating a role-playing game, a podcast about innovation; and building a surfboard, a wooden bike, a brainwave-controlled helicopter, a bomber jacket, and more.  This project will take many months and requires student commitment, resilience, cooperation, and communication with faculty advisors, but the results are always stunning.  I look forward to updating this blog with the progress with their juvenilia.  Who knows--maybe you’ll be seeing their juvenilia in a museum one day!