Spring Trip! DAY 2: Cave City and Mammoth Cave!

After a lovely visit at Serpent Mound, we began our long trip to Cave City, Kentucky. Google Maps says that it's a trip that should have taken us a little over four hours.

Google Maps is a liar.

We drove through torrential downpours, standstill traffic, more torrential downpours, and countless hills and valleys. There were points at which if felt as if we had driven all the way to the Gulf of Mexico. No matter how long we drove, the answer to "HOW MUCH LONGER," was always met with a tired, "about two more hours." This has since become an in-joke, a rallying cry, and an all purpose answer to all manner of questions.

The boys' cabin.

We eventually made it to Jellystone Park Camp, our home for the first two nights. Our amazing crew of parent chaperones called ahead and had a feast of pizza waiting for us, and we let the kids run around exploring together to burn off some of the energy built up by twelve hours spent on buses.

The lights-out portion of the evening went surprisingly well. It was late, and everyone knew we had a long day ahead.

The next morning, the kids rose with the sun, and they were treated to a feast prepared by our all-star parent crew. The parent cabins were equipped with kitchenettes, which were used to make toast, fry bacon, and scramble up several dozen eggs. There was also fresh fruit, yogurt, milk, and juice.

Then we loaded up the buses and headed to Mammoth Cave National Park. The drive from our campsite to the park is peppered with an assortment of local curiosities and attractions (a less charitable person might call them "tourist traps"). If you're planning on visiting Mammoth Cave National Park on a family trip (and I've already heard several rumors of people tentatively planning on returning), make sure to plan some time for bumper boats, the Mystery Spot, and the absolutely terrifying looking "Alpine Slide."

Our first cave tour was called the New Entrance Tour. The brochure sums it up:

New Entrance Tour

A wonderful complement to the Historic Tour, this trip includes a dramatic series of domes and pits, typical large trunk passageways, and a short journey through dripstone formations.

That description really undersells just how amazing it all was! First of all, the "new entrance" means exactly that. The entrance to this part of the cave is manmade, and looks nothing like what you would probably expect:

That utility door that that everyone is entering is the entrance to the cave. It looked much more like something out of the television show Lost than an ancient natural wonder.

DISCLAIMER: It is really, really difficult to get good photographs in caves. They are very dark, and frequently cramped. Rest assured that the views in person are amazing! The photographs that follow are... less so.

Just through the doorway is a damp, dank, manmade stairway. 

The manmade portion quickly gives way to the cave itself. Stainless steel staircases and walkways twist and turn through the passages. It's really, really cool. 

Aristea and Lev.

Here's a blurry shot of not-much, but if you look closely, you can get a sense of the scale of the interior. 

Again, this may give you a small sense of the scale of the passages. At the top of this photo, you can see a group gathered around a light. At the bottom, you can make out the ghostly silhouettes of people just in front of the camera who are about to climb the stairs.   

People were regularly exclaiming with wonder, pointing, posing, and generally having a wonderful time. Here are Aristea, Denali, and Margaret gathered around a light at a bend in a passageway. 

Each tour features a guide, who made frequent stops to tell us about the science and history of the cave.  We heard a lot about limestone, the sandstone cap (which is the waterproof barrier above the cave), and the colorful human history of the cave.

Following this two-hour excursion, we all enjoyed lunch together in a cafe in the park. Afterwards, Karl took a large group of kids kayaking above ground on the Green River, while I went with a smaller group on a second cave tour. I'll tell you a little about that tour in our next entry!

Spring Trip! Part 1: Serpent Mound

WE MADE IT.

By now, parents, siblings, and families have all probably heard many tales of epic adventure about our Spring trip. Between the parents, teachers, and photo-crazy students, I'm fairly certain that there are well over 11 million photos from this trip. Here are a few highlights from my camera. I'll start with Serpent Mound:

After a long, scenic drive through rural Ohio (and most of Ohio is rural), the kids were ready to run. Here we see them exploring the Serpent (and surrounding areas).

Of course, by "exploring," I mean "picking flowers" and "sinking into mud up to the knee..."

The mound sits on a ridge 100 feet above Ohio Brush Creek. 

A group shot on the observation tower. 

Serpent Mound was a really neat stopping point. It's out of the way (way out of the way), so we essentially had the place to ourselves for the duration of our visit. While there, I picked up a book called Indian Mounds of the Middle Ohio Valley. As it turns out, there are a lot of these mounds spread across Kentucky, Ohio, West Virginia, and Indiana. Serpent Mound is the largest, and generally the most well known. Others can be found on golf courses, in the parks of small towns, or tucked away in subdivisions. These mounds are often subtle, giving little clue that they represent the work of cultures that lived here one thousand years ago. (Artifacts found at Serpent Mound have been dated to 1030 AD.)

After lunch, a tour of the gift shop, and many, many photo ops, we loaded back onto our buses and resumed our long journey to Cave City, Kentucky.

The kids create their own serpent!

Place Out of Time banquet

For the last several weeks, the 5th-8th graders of Summers-Knoll have been participating in an online simulation called Place Out of Time. The project asks the question, what if we could bring the wisdom of history to address an issue of today? Participation has required the synthesis of numerous skills, including research, writing, improvisation, and acting, and has covered a variety of content areas; history, politics, society, and more. Eclipsing all of this has been how very fun and engaging it's been.

To begin with, each student selected a famous (or, in some cases, infamous) person that they wanted to research and portray. This yielded a motley assortment of luminaries, including a few fictional characters. We then portrayed these characters in the first person during in-school exercises. Gone were Margaret, Lee, and Alexandra, and in their places were Pocahontas, Socrates, and Nancy Drew.

After writing and posting an autobiography of their character, students began posting online on the Place Out of Time message board. There, they interacted with each other, students from around Michigan (and beyond!), and student facilitators from the University of Michigan, who made the whole thing possible. 

The issue that the students considered and debated was a complex one: The French law banning conspicuous religious symbols in schools. It's a controversial topic, and the simulation requires that students debate it in character, representing their character's views. For example, Matthew not only had to understand the issue at hand, but he had to make educated guesses about how Leonardo da Vinci might react to it. 

Of course, the complexities of this case are a lot for fifth-graders to wrap their minds around, so we've had numerous classroom and online discussions about much smaller, but related issues to ease into it. One line of conversation asked about the wisdom of school dress codes in general. Another found people arguing about whether children should have a voice in such matters at all. It has been fun and challenging for the students to portray the views of their characters, rather than their own. 

Watching them rise to the occasion has been a delight, and it all culminated with a field trip to the University of Michigan for the Place Out of Time banquet on Monday. 

For an hour-and-a-half, our students conversed, argued, and commiserated in character with other participants in the project. (One group of students drove all the way from Columbus, Ohio to participate!) 

The assembled group was an impressive sight to behold. 

Our own Victoria Woodhull, Angela Davis, Mr. Spock, Francis Scott Key, and Kim  Jong-il, bookended by Mohammed and "Pretty Boy" Floyd. 

Conversation and debate began in a large group, aided in part by some pre-planned drama played out by the University of Michigan student facilitators. 

Later, we broke into small groups for discussion and debate. You may not be surprised to hear that in many cases, Summers-Knoll kids were quick to jump into the debate. Here we see Jianmarco (in character as Mr. Spock) grilling a UM facilitator who was portraying former President of France Nicolas Sarkozy. 

Here we see a UM student facilitator leading a small group discussion while playing the role of former President of Turkey Kemal Ataturk. Our own Michael Jordan (Evan), Harry Potter (Henry), Nancy Drew (Alexandra), and Marcus Aurelius (Lev) look on.

Later, we dropped character and had pizza as we reflected on our experiences with the project. To wrap up, we were given a tour of the University of Michigan campus by one of the student facilitators. 

The entire project has been an enriching adventure, and I've hardly scratched the surface of the scope of it. Ask your student to tell you about it! They can even log into the website and give you a tour of some of the discussions they've been taking part in. We still have another week or so to go with the simulation, but I've already had a few students clamoring to get started with it for next year!

The Great Minds of History

A huge THANK YOU to the fine folks at the University of Michigan who invited us to participate, particularly Jeff Stanzler and his team of student facilitators!  

Melissa introduces Place Out of Time

Hi there, This is Melissa L., Rookie reporter. This week the 5th grade teacher, Charles Jason Depasquale (Jason), has made changes to the classroom blogging system. Instead of him doing everything, he thought up the brilliant idea of the students writing the blog, seeing the lessons through our eyes. When the sign-up sheet went up, I immediately put my name in big letters. But thats enough about me. Lets get learning!

Place out of time

(POOT)

This week, Karl Sikkenga’s class and Jason’s class started to do a U of M program called “Place Out Of Time”, Or POOT, for short. The main outline for this program is as follows:

The students pick out a historical figure of some importance and write a short summary of their lives. The students explain what they did, why they did it, their pet peeves, Their views, and all that jazz. When they have done that, They go deeper into their characters lives and really think about why you picked this person and make it a lot more emotional and real for you. Then you have a chat with, well, whoever. It could be a UM professor or your best friend or a UM student or the person your locker is next to. (In our case, hooks, not lockers.)

I think that this program is very interesting and that we, as students, will have a lot of fun With it.

Well, that’s pretty much it!

Ta-ta for now!

Melissa L., SK student.

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Thank you, Melissa!


For more information on the Place Out of Time simulation, visit their website! There, you'll find some helpful introductory videos there explaining the project. Just like this one:








As Melissa mentioned, we'll all be contributing to the blog from now on. Our current schedule calls for two student entries a week (in addition to my own regular entries), so expect to hear a lot more about POOT and more in the weeks ahead!

Compost Furnace and Read Alouds

Dr. George put the kids to work on loading up the compost furnace for our hoop house earlier this month. Read more about it George's blog.

Checking out the design.

Harvesting the fuel beneath our feet.

Alexandra loading the cart.

Bucket brigade.

Melissa, delighted by hard labor. 

Henry A. putting his back into it. 

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On the day before Thanksgiving break, guest reader Karl read to us from Before Columbus, telling us the true story of the man known as Squanto.

As for our regularly scheduled read aloud, we're rapidly reaching the climax of Esperanza Rising, which has introduced the concepts of organized labor, immigration, undocumented workers, the Mexican Revolution, and more. Here are some discussion questions that have come up in class that you might enjoy discussing at home:

Esperanza Rising discussion questions

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Finally, we're off on another field trip this afternoon. We'll be visiting the University of Michigan Museum of Art to explore their African and Asian collections as part of our Ancient Civilizations studies. Ask your student about the trip tonight!

The Summers-Knoll Middle School Math Program

Karl Sikkenga has written a blog entry that I'd like you to take a look at. In it, he discusses the current state of our middle school math program. While I've spoken about this to most parents individually, I think Karl has done a nice job of summarizing how our math program has developed, both in terms of philosophy and practice.

Take a look at the entry, and let us know if you have questions or comments!

 Karl's Blog: True Math

Here's an example of some of the work that Michael has been doing with our students. They spent today taking this concept:

... and building it using manipulatives in order to truly understand it:

It's an example of students literally constructing their own knowledge of mathematics! Read more about the specifics in this post over at Michael's Summers-Knoll Math blog.

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On a related note, parents will be hearing from me individually in the days ahead regarding individualized Singapore Math goals. I've been working with each student in the middle school to set weekly Singapore progress goals. I'm managing these goals with individualized Google Docs, which I will be making available to parents. I think you'll find this system helpful to gain insight into how your student is progressing throughout the year. As always, I welcome any feedback you may have!