Anonymous wrote:The "garden" referenced in the earlier post should have been the "nature garden", which I understand is important to Reggio, but is yet to be much of a resource for the elementary students.

Maybe student government is too strong. How about "civic engagement", such as safety patrol or making morning announcements?

Which class has gone to the NE library for research or to check out books? Why? The librarian is outstanding -- she should be given more resources and not have to scrounge money from book sales. If the hoped-for library renovation occurred, somehow books would magically appear to fill the doubled space. Why wait?

Anonymous wrote:The "garden" referenced in the earlier post should have been the "nature garden", which I understand is important to Reggio, but is yet to be much of a resource for the elementary students.

Maybe student government is too strong. How about "civic engagement", such as safety patrol or making morning announcements?

Which class has gone to the NE library for research or to check out books? Why? The librarian is outstanding -- she should be given more resources and not have to scrounge money from book sales. If the hoped-for library renovation occurred, somehow books would magically appear to fill the doubled space. Why wait?

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What you are describing about the upper grades sounds EXACTLY like the programming at Watkins, which makes sense because that is where the 3rd grade teachers worked before joining SWS. They need someone to lead with a little more vision for the upper grades, whether it's the principal or someone else. They can't just wait for the renovations to start innovating. This has been coming for a long time.

so the two highly effective former Watkins teachers leading SWS 3rd grade are not good enough for you? The other upper grade teachers have extensive experience as well, both at SWS and beyond. The renovations have little to do with the pedagogy or personnel. You're conflating two entirely separate issues.

I agree PP. Certainly these two 3rd grade teachers don't need to be lead by the plans for renovation to innovate. They are innovators: they were the vanguards at Watkins that built-up the team teaching, project-based model. They did it together for more than 10 years, with nearly 20 years of teaching. They used the "whole child" approach, albeit not Reggio, without calling it starting many years ago.

PP here. I agree that the 3rd grade team is great. As an SWS parent, however, I think there has been a little too much focus on the playground, garden, worrying about the now-on-hold-again renovations. I would prefer that there be more attention paid to things that matter to the students in the older grades, like a better-resourced library and student government and maybe some computers. If we have to wait for a renovation for the library to have more books in it, my student will have read everything in it long before 5th grade.

by garden you make it sound like they're hobbyists-- it's integral Foodprints and it's integrated into the curriculum in any number of ways for science and math. Student Government for elementary students? Really? You want class presidents and Roger's Rules of Order for 3rd graders? Sounds very un-Reggio. Do any DC elementary schools have student government. that sounds like something out of the 80s. A good school library is more than titles -- it doesn't need to be massive and what it lacks in scope it more than compensates with a phenomenal school librarian. The NE library is all of 2 blocks away and class periodically visit as well.