Growing Independence And Collaboration
I used to picture my five-year-old son starting kindergarten as an experience that I expected would be full of nervous excitement, joy, laughter, and new friends. My son loved preschool. His experience with school prior to kindergarten led him to hold a strong image of what it means to go to school and to learn–an […]
Blocks (and unblocking)
This year, the Primary Team is framing their intentions through a study of self. During the first week of school, teachers set intentions and committed to processes of observation, documentation, and reflection to open new questions and possibilities. During the first week of school, teachers wondered what provocations they might offer early on in the […]
Glimpses into the first week
When people come to visit Opal School, we often hear the question, “What does all of this look like in the beginning of the year? How do you start?” And really, that can feel tricky to respond to, because it never looks just the same as it did before. New children, new families, new teachers, […]
Getting Ourselves Ready
The teachers are back to work at Opal School this week, getting environments ready, cracking open big ideas, and imagining possibilities in anticipation of the children arriving on Tuesday. The primary team began our work together this year by sharing our excitement: things that each one of us was looking forward to exploring with children […]
designing for tension
“The most frustrating, agonizing part of creative work, and the one we grapple with every day in practice, is our encounter with the gap between what we feel and what we can express.” -Stephen Nachmanovitch, Free Play In my own experience as a writer, I know there is a gap between what I feel and […]
collaborating with colleagues
Recently I’ve been thinking about “developing a reflective practice” and the parallels I see between my own practice of reflection and the practices of reflection I’m inviting the children to engage in. In this month’s member meet-up, Matt and Mary Gage had a conversation with colleagues around the ways we mentor and collaborate with colleagues […]
Developing a reflective practice
Story Workshop began at Opal School many years ago with teachers and children working together to research the question, What is the relationship between literacy and the arts? Over a decade later, this question continues to guide the work we do during Story Workshop. When I was first learning about Story Workshop, I remember how […]
Sharing Gratitude
On Friday morning, Opal School children, families, and teachers gathered together for our weekly school-wide gathering. This week, it was the Dogwood community of first and second grader’s turn to lead. They decided to spend that time sharing about what they are grateful for and then giving the audience a chance to do the same. […]
Unpacking Compassion
“Empathy is a gateway to compassion. It’s understanding how someone feels, and trying to imagine how that might feel for you — it’s a mode of relating. Compassion takes it further. It’s feeling what that person is feeling, holding it, accepting it, and taking some kind of action.” – Lori Chandler My colleagues and I […]
Participating Together
One of Opal School’s Values guiding all of our decisions is, A belief in the rights of children, families and educators to participate together in forming and shaping rich environments of learning, challenge and choice. I began my 11th year teaching at Opal School this year, so I have spent over a decade practicing this […]