The Week in Photos

It's been a momentous week, and it's only Thursday night. Let's catch up:

A full dress rehearsal for Gilgamesh meant we had to dine when we could.

The kids are settling in with our new music teacher Mr. Riccinto. (I'm pretty sure that I heard a little bit of heavy metal playing as I listened from the hallway the other day...) 

There was a tremendous amount of anticipation on Wednesday, as it was 12/12/12. It's the last time we'll see this sort of month/day/year configuration until January 1, 2101. Here are Lee, Laurea, and Matthew counting down the seconds until 12:12 (and twelve seconds) PM...

High fives all around at the historic moment!

Posing with the clock.  

In Math, pyramid construction has begun in earnest. There have, however, been a few setbacks. Here you see the exact moment that Henry, Alexandra, and Christopher have realized that their pyramid is too wide to fit through the classroom door, and too heavy to tilt on its side. As a result, this fine ziggurat pyramid will be entombed in Karl's room forever, or until someone brings in a sledgehammer.

We spent some time talking about our Global Citizenship theme. Here we see Bob. He lives on an island by himself in a state of pure nature. He can do exactly what he wants, when he wants. All of the resources on the island are his to do with as he pleases...

... until, of course, Gary arrives. Now Bob's actions have an effect on Gary, and vice versa. Bob can no longer yodel at three AM without repercussions, and Gary can't eat all of the coconuts on the island. A community is formed, and each person has to surrender certain rights for the sake of their fledgling civilization.This scenario was an introduction to the concept of natural law, which is one the philosophies that influenced the founding fathers of the United States.

We also finished our read aloud novel, Esperanza Rising. We were able to use it to springboard into a conversation about globalization, immigration, shared resources, discrimination, and more. I originally chose this book because it fit well with our Farm to Table theme, but it has also provided some excellent conversation fodder for Global Citizenship.

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Of course, above all, Gilgamesh has dominated our week. At long last, we premiered the show on Thursday.

Backstage at the premiere of Gilgamesh, everyone gets a hand in... 

...then lets out a cheer for a great show!

Gilgamesh and Enkido contemplating a battle with Huwawa. 

As you can see, it's been a fairly epic week, and I've only covered the elements of it that I was able to snap photos of. We also found time to work on our research papers, summarize an international news story, and write a poem about snow (ask your student about the trick I used to get them to think creatively about writing their poems! They HATED it... at first...). 

On a gratuitously personal note, I also celebrated a milestone in my home life: Our daughter Violet turned one on Wednesday! As much as I love working with your kids, it sure is a delight to get to go home to this one! 

Only one more week until Winter Break! 

Student Exhibitions and Gilgamesh

We're a mere three days away from the premiere of our production of Gilgamesh (and a week and a half from winter break), and the energy around the school is palpable. Props and costumes are spread throughout the middle school commons, the hallways echo with the grunts and shouts of Jianmarco and Taylor practicing their fight choreography, and nearly everyone has the bulk of the script memorized, as evidenced by the frequency that I overhear people quoting lines to one another.

Our director giving notes during a full dress rehearsal.

Props

In addition to the spectacle of Gilgamesh, we'll have a range of student work from this year on display during the performances. Each student in our class spent a part of the afternoon selecting at least one thing item that they're particularly proud of for display. Some chose their Farm-to-Table reports, others are sharing stories that they've been writing, and others are writing up brief descriptions of math and science projects they've enjoyed. It's been exciting to watch them revisit their work and reflect on it. In many cases, students were eager to revise and improve upon their past work before display.

Gilgamesh has grown beyond the play: Lee has been adapting the plot of our play to create a computer game.   

We also spent some time today moving our research papers along. By now, each student should have a thesis statement written and the major points of their outline completed. We worked today to start plugging research notes into our outlines, with the goal of writing a draft of the paper by the end of the week.

Discussion starters: 

- Ask your student what piece of work they chose to display at Gilgamesh! Why did they chose that particular item?

- Ask your student about their research paper. What is their thesis? Ask them to take a look at the outline they've written. 

- Ask your student about what world news story they read about during our warm-up this morning. 

Global Citizenship

Earlier this week, I asked students to visit an online news source and read about an international story that interested them. They then summarized the details in a Google Doc. Today, we began sharing the stories that we read about as a way of introducing our new Global Citizenship theme. Cory told us about the recent Typhoon in the Philippines, Laurea told us about the latest from Israel/Palestine, and Alexandra and Matthew both wrote about Voyager 2 exploring the edge of our solar system. Sharing these stories helped us begin to think of the larger world around us, and our place in it. 

We also discussed the famous quote from Socrates, "I am not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world," and how that declaration might be interpreted. Socrates lived 2400 years ago, so our discussion moved to the present day, and what it might mean if someone said such a thing today. We talked about how our lives in the State of Michigan, in the United States of America might have an effect on people living elsewhere. How do our lives affect people living in China? In Africa? In Indiana? 

Many ideas were put forth. For better or worse, much of what we buy in Michigan was made in China. We may eat food that was grown in Indiana, or we may eat consume livestock that once grazed on clear-cut areas of rainforest in Brazil. A shirt that is dropped off in a donation bin in Ann Arbor might find its way to a new owner in Africa. Pollution from a factory in Pennsylvania might effect the fishing in Canada. A foreign country might receive aid from our government, which is made up of people who represent us. The more we talked, the more connections were made, driving home the idea that even if you've lived in Michigan your entire life, you've probably had an effect on many people around the globe. We'll be exploring many of these ideas as we begin working with our new theme. 

We see a Global Citizen as someone who:

• is aware of the wider world and has a sense of their own role as a world citizen;

• respects and values diversity;

• has an understanding of how the world works economically, politically, socially, culturally, technologically and environmentally;

• is outraged by social injustice;

• participates in and contributes to the community at a range of levels from local to global;

• is willing to act to make the world a more sustainable place;

• takes responsibility for their actions.

Of course, we're still not quite done with Ancient Civilizations! This week, we began composing thesis statements for our research papers, and constructing our outlines. 

UMMA Field Trip

On Wednesday, November 28, we visited the University of Michigan Museum of Art. It's a lovely facility that many of our students are well acquainted with. There's a tremendous amount to see, so we chose to focus our trip on the museum's African and Asian art, particularly the pieces that tie into our studies of Ancient Civilizations. 

A sculpture from a Cambodian artist made entirely of surrendered guns.  While it wasn't exactly ancient, it was a powerful image. 

Contemplating an African mask. 

We admired a statue of Ganesha while hearing a few stories about him. 

We learned a little about Buddha in front of this striking statue. 

One of the biggest hits of the visit was decidedly modern: An interactive display that responds to hand gestures made in the air above it. 

A group portrait on the giant, kinetic sculpture in front of the museum. 

Of course, if we're anywhere near the Cube, we need to swing by to give it a spin!

Many thanks to our parent chaperones, Jenny and Russ! 

Our next planned field trip will be to the City of Ann Arbor Materials Recovery Facility, which will tie in to our new theme, Global Citizenship.