The following blog post was written by Andi Twiss, Spark-Y Sustainability Educator, on our school partnership with Best Academy Middle School.
Spring semester just started up at Best Academy Middle School and students are happily back in the classroom and reluctantly recalling what was learned during the previous semester. As the primary classroom teacher of these 120 students, we have learned so much already and there is so much more to learn.
The 2019-2020 school year is the first year Best Academy Middle School (BAMS) has partnered with Spark-Y and it has been a partnership of growth and opportunity. That is one of the primary themes reinforced to scholars at BAMS in each of their classrooms: a growth mindset. Throughout the hallways you'll find posters reminding students to be aware of a closed mindset and push towards a growth mindset. It's no different for us at Spark-Y.
Programming is a little different here at BAMS than with other Spark-Y school partners. Traditionally, a Sustainability Educator like myself would partner with teachers in an existing school classroom. Here at BAMS though, I am a primary resource for science education and operate closer to a traditional classroom teacher. I get to teach these scholars each and every day and Spark-Y gets to be the primary resource for their science education. This has been a partnership of growth in expanding our curriculum, scope, and depth in Life Science and Earth Science themes, and an opportunity to serve new students, enable, empower, and resource a new school, and work our Spark-Y magic in a new framework.
As the primary resource, I get to build each lesson around the holistic, sustainable systems design we employ. Instead of fitting our hands-on entrepreneurial-driven activities as a supplement in a traditional classroom setting, we get to build the curriculum around a Spark-Y experience.
One example of how we have built (I mean, literally, built) a robust Spark-Y classroom experience, is 7th grade scholars have built their aquaponics system! They have plumbed it, water is in the tank, and we are planning on fish this month! They submitted designs analyzing the classroom space, put thought in how to incorporate grow bed space for each class period, and excitedly counted down the days until they could get their hands on a chop saw! This final product will be the backdrop for lessons on ecosystem health, population analysis, and even introduction to animal anatomy. They are also hypothesizing ways to sustainably decorate the design and leave their mark as the class of 2021 that built it for all future classes to benefit from.
As for 8th grade, they will be spending the spring semester designing, budgeting, planning, and building raised garden beds for their school. This work will be done alongside their lessons of atmosphere and weather and reinforce the lessons learned on water cycle, erosion and deposition, and soil fertility. The efforts these 7th and 8th graders undertake will provide a permanent staples of a green campus for future scholars at Best Academy and I am so appreciative of their enthusiasm and drive they show knowing they are making a classroom resource. They take great pride in their work and I am thankful for it.
My scholars set New Year resolutions and goals for this semester. Some academic and some personal. Most pertaining to passing classes, turning in work, staying out of detention (although one included "growing taller"). I look forward to next year's group of scholars whose goals will focus on 'mastering material through brand new methods', 'pushing scientific inquiry both inside and outside the classroom', and 'leading investigative studies using the systems developed by students that came before me'.
The growth mindset being instilled in scholars is a great initiative. This mentality paired with Spark-Y's sustainable and entrepreneurial resources has huge potential to fundamentally change science curriculum in this middle school.
This initial year is setting amazing groundwork of a robust curriculum that sustains the entire academic year, going well above-and-beyond state standards. 2020 is off to a great start and I look forward to normalizing this method of teaching and securing future partnerships to the benefit of even more scholars.
To those of you who don't get the privilege of walking the halls of a middle school each day and witness the growth I get to witness, I'll share with you the words from one of the growth mindset posters that serve to remind students that are constantly pushing the bounds of their minds: “Change ‘I just can't do it' to ‘I just can't do it, yet.’''