Students at Buck Lodge Middle School in Adelphi, Md., have been scrapbooking, juggling, and learning Chinese culture in their enrichment classes in this, the second year of a program at the school that came about as a result of the 40-minute extension to the middle school day in Prince George’s County, the Maryland Gazette reports.
Many schools in the county have turned the extra time into a study hall, but Buck Lodge offers non-credit classes by having students pick their 10 favorite activities from a list. Among the learning activities are yoga, engineering, soccer, model rocket building, and so on. Students will most likely get one of their top 10 choices, and then they’re placed in that enrichment class for an entire semester.
Regular teachers are chosen to lead the activities based on their passions and interests. “That’s one of the wonderful things about the enrichment program: Teachers can select something that is very different and students are able to see us in a different light,” the Gazette quoted Susan Creamer, the school’s technology teacher, as saying. “You learn things about your colleagues too, which is fascinating,” she added, referring to the recent expansion of her teaching résumé to include knitting and journalism.
Student love it. “I like being creative,” one eighth-grade girl was quoted as saying. She’s a veteran of the scrapbook class and told the Gazette she’d like to get the same class again next semester, beginning Jan 21. “We made pages and we also paint. You could duct tape your binders and journals and stuff.”
Besides engaging students, the noncompetitive, ungraded enrichment classes also give students experience in collaborating with teachers and other students. It’s just, do your best and don’t worry about it if the rocket doesn’t fly. Figure out what happened and build another one, after adjusting the design. I can’t think of a better way to teach some of life’s most important lessons.
Lessons today in collaboration are valuable in that they mitigate some of the inherent competitiveness and anti-collaboration we see when we pit students, schools, states, and nations against each other. Competition has its place in our schools, but learning isn’t the place. Competition would be completely appropriate if students took the model rockets to the next level, though.
According to the Seattle Foundation, which provides a grant to the Ingraham Rocket Club, a high school club that has successfully designed and built rockets for NASA competitions, “Through rocket science, students gain important science skills and discover new career paths. … aerospace engineering, chemistry, biology, physics, and bioengineering.
“Through the design, building and launching of rockets, the club engages students in science, math, physics, and engineering and teaches collaboration, problem-solving, and project management. And we have fun doing it.”
