Science and Creativity

Board member Barry Shuman helped the Science Task force get creative yesterday morning when he visited the new science room.  Barry imagined how best to form the main classroom and storage space, along with a special room for optics experiments.  This will involve removing some walls, which means a fun work party for those of you who enjoy demolition work!  We hope to begin the demolition in either the February break or spring break, dependent on removing some of the existing electical from the walls slated for destruction. 

Barry also schooled us in a creative exercise designed to create the lists of equipment we will need,  the best confiugration of the furnishings, and to delinieate specific space uses throughout the rooms.

In keeping with the theme of science and creativity, here is an interesting blog entry.

Future Focus: Science News

As a part of our ongoing focus on School Culture this year, the Leadership Team and the faculty as a whole have been looking at various elements that contribute to who we, Bright Water School, are.  We are also looking at who we want to be.  Thus far, we have been working with the School’s Mission Statement and Core Values, diversity, our ’branding’ (physical representation via brochures, website), and our programs.  We will undoubtedly have more to tell you about this study as the year continues to unfold, and as we begin to move the work from who we are into who we want to be. 

Before the new year begins, the entire faculty will review the Mission Statement and Core Values.  At our January 2 in-service day, the Board of Trustees and the Leadership Team will engage in a half-day working retreat, some of which will pertain to the Mission Statement and Core Values.

In this study of School Culture, when looking at programs our Leadership Team very quickly decided, and the faculty agreed, that we would like to bring our science program to the fore.  Bright Water School intends to be recognized for and known for its science program, and to provide an optimal science program for students. We also aim to strengthen our middle school.  To that end, we have formed a Science Task Force.  We have acquired an additional classroom, complete with lockable storage closets to keep equipment safe and organized.  Having a dedicated space for middle school science studies will allow for the program to expand and deepen in a way that is not possible at present. 

Currently, middle school science equipment storage is woefully inadequate, despite best attempts at organization.  A dedicated science room will allow teachers and students to sink into science with more depth and space, much as having a dedicated woodworking room has been essential in forming the foundation of our sturdy woodworking program, and as our theater has been for our eurythmy program. Providing a proper space for experimentation and for equipment will allow faculty and students to fully attend to lesson content and thus enhance learning.

But it’s not just space and equipment that we will focus on with this endeavor.  Professional development will fuel our efforts, and teachers will engage in appropriate trainings now and in the future. Another of the things we envision is to hold a science fair within the next five years.  Our hope is that many area schools would participate in such a fair, not just Waldorf schools. 

This is the beginning of what we see as a three to five year process.  We intend to have the new classroom ready this year.  It is because of our expansion and augmentation of this program that our auction theme is Science.  We hope to get each and every one of you interested in and curious about our science program.  Science doesn’t just take place in the middle school.  Our youngest students are engaging in physics studies every day, inside the classroom and out.  For the younger students, science equipment is shovels, buckets, planks of wood, and wheelbarrows.  Students in preschool through grade three engage in ‘stealth’ science, whereas students in grades four through eight take up overt scientific studies of botany, physics, organic chemistry, and more.  

Bright Water School has applied for a grant to help fund the start of the program and the set-up of the room.  This may also be the focus of our fund-an-item at the auction on March 12, 2012.  Below is more information about our Science Task Force.  Please feel free to ask me any questions you may have about this undertaking.  
Our Science Task Force is:

• Beth Simpson, Grade Five
• Trish Bondurant, Pedagogical Chair
• Bryan McGriff, Movement Teacher
• Laura Crandall, School Director
• Ellen Davis, Operations Manager  

The Task Force is responsible for:

• designing how the room will be set up and used
• inventory of current equipment
• shopping list of needed equipment
• costs of stocking the science program, annually, for three to five years
• sketching out professional development recommendations