Session 4 Week 3 in Review

Elementary Studio

Believe it or not, Session 4 has ended and so has the first part of the school year! The year is flying by! This week was nothing short of amazing! ES learners completed their MAR (Mid-action reviews) this week! If I had to use one single word to describe MARs I'd say inspirational! During each meeting, I witnessed learners taking ownership of their learning, creativity in their presentations, vulnerability, honest reflections, and so much more! Additionally, they answered questions from their guest honestly! Even when their answer was "I don't know or I'm not sure." Learners have shown tremendous growth since their first day at The Forest School Online! I'm looking to AAR (After-action Reviews) being even better!Story Arts concluded as learners published their memoirs! This week, learners continued reviewing the feedback they received last week, asked clarifying questions, and made changes before turning in their best work! As a studio, we listened to each learner share their memoirs and provided brief verbal feedback. In Civilization, we ended our study of Asia! This week, learners were introduced to the Mughal Empire in India. They were challenged to conduct their own research. Afterward, they shared their research with the studio.This session has been unique in many ways! Some learners earned their first badge, some earned multiple badges, and some worked after collaboratively after hours! To say the least, a lot of hard work to place! While continuing to learn to live together, learners are improving on their self advocacy skills, excepting each other’s differences, celebrating each other’s successes, supporting one another, and showing gratitude for one another. Concluding this session with a two week break is spot on! Until next year!!!

Middle School Studio

Session 4 is a wrap, and so is the first semester of the 2022-2023 school year! It’s hard to believe we are already at the winter break. It’s been an amazing year so far in the Middle School Studio with lots of laughs, learning, and leadership being developed. The learners have worked hard in these first four sessions, and it was so wonderful to celebrate their achievements in each of their Mid-Actions Reviews. Congrats again learners on earning your badges! I’m super proud of you all. I look forward to another great semester when we return to the Studio in January!The Mid-Action Review Quest is officially wrapped up as our last few learners presented their MARs on Thursday. When they were finished presenting to their Dream Teams, learners used the remaining Quest work time to continue finishing and turning in assignments and completing the last details of their MAR challenges. Some learners also took advantage of this time to catch up on other badge work like apprenticeships, deep books, electives, etc.Learners concluded the Renaissance Civilization badge this week by completing the mini projects that they have been doing research for and creating over the past three weeks. Most learners just needed to finish up their projects and then find a creative way to display their research, their creation, and how they used their research when creating their project. Learners are excited to share their finished Renaissance projects with their families!Story Arts this session has been short but intense! Learners were tasked with writing a screenplay for a pilot episode of a new series on a popular streaming network. They’ve been working hard on outlining the scenes, writing a killer opening, and this week, they continued bringing their stories to life. Learners looked at World Class Examples of screenplays from popular TV sitcoms, looking for how screenplays are structured, formatted, and the style of the writing used. They put their observations into practice as they added on to the opening scene they scripted last week, and wrote the remainder of the episode. This was a lot of work for such a short session, but the learners used grit to keep plugging along. I can’t wait to read their finished episodes!

High School Studio

Session 4 has officially come to a close, which means that learners have made it through the first half of the school year! The name of the game this week was Mid-Action Review; throughout the week, high school learners presented their MAR’s to their Dream Teams, got to share their most formative moments from Sessions 1-4, and were able to receive feedback on their goals for the new year. During our Morning Launch Retrospectives, learners had time to self-reflect on their accomplishments from the first half of the year, zeroing in on Session 4 work in particular. As always, we spent the last morning celebrating one another, and awarding our Session 4 “Learn to Be” winner, Annie VanHissenhoven, with her award.The Freedom of Speech Civilization unit concluded with a lesson on Hate Speech vs Free Speech. Learners heard a variety of opinions about what constitutes hate speech, what the repercussions of hate speech are, and what the benefits and drawbacks to legally limiting hate speech could be. Ultimately, learners were tasked with taking a side on the question, “should hate speech be legally protected as free speech?” Learners explained their reasoning by writing a response to this question for their learner challenge.Learners explored the genre of personal narratives during the last day of the Creative Writing Story Arts unit. After listening to a Ted Talk on how to construct a meaningful narrative from one’s life experiences, learners chose between two prompts and wrote their own personal narratives. Learners wrote personal narratives focused on either a meaningful object in their life, or a special setting/journey that they’ve taken. Learners had the opportunity to share out their work before our studio wrapped up for the year.The high school learners have accomplished a wide variety of learning and challenges throughout the first half of the school year. A long holiday break is much deserved! I look forward to seeing where the rest of the year takes our learners.