Newsletter (S1W1-2024)

S1W1 (Session 1, Week 1) Newsletter

Spark Studio
The Eagles had a busy first week! In the Montessori studio, they painted with chalk by using buttermilk, made raisins dance and did a little cooking to round out the week. We took time to get familiar with the procedures both in the studio and on the playground. We sang songs and took our first outing to the park!

In the Reggio studio, we did lots of different activities. We read books, made origami, learned to draw all kinds of cool things, and spent time building new things and friendships.

Growth / Discovery
In order to get to know each other, the Eagles worked through a lot of different team building activities. “Hello Friend, will you smile at me?” was a clear favorite that produced a ton of laughs!

We got started on our onboarding game board - a game designed with activities for the Eagles to complete to set them up for success for the year. There is a list of over 50 activities for the Eagles to complete including logging into core skills, joining our Google Classroom, organizing drawers, sending an email to the Guides to name just a few. Learners also got started on core skills and studio maintenance. For core skills, the Growth studio started on workbooks and the Discovery studio got their Lexia and Khan accounts set up.

We focused on how we resolve conflict (peace tables), made some character callouts, and talked about learning through failures.

The Eagles also all got their Hero Planners.

Adventure studio
The large focus this week was on our “Becoming a World Class Conversationalist” Quest. There were a lot of critical thinking Socratic discussions about communication related topics.

The Eagles rotated going to the Spark studio to help out there and practice what they learned - smiling, using names, and starting conversations.

We also took on our first “Growth Mindset Challenge” by learning to juggle.
The Eagles also kicked off our focus on civilization by learning about the Gutenberg printing press. The goal of this year’s civilization work is to go through ~World War I.

DEAR and Core skills got started this week on Thursday.

Hero Planners
The Growth, Discovery, and Adventure Studio Eagles also got their Hero Planners this week. The Eagles added sticky tabs / notes on their planners for different areas they should review with you - Annual goals / Session goals. You will want to sign off on them.

Why do we have these planners? The intent is to help Eagles with their planning skills - developing goals, building habits, and being intentional about what we’re doing.

An important note about core skills / Khan Academy math. The Eagles are free to learn math skills any way they want - board games, flash cards, worksheets, workbooks (Acton-provided or others), etc. Last year, a lot of them played math games with me to develop their skills. However, for mastery, we will ask them to log back into Khan Academy and show mastery by completing unit tests. This goes for Discovery and Growth (once the math portion of the workbook is complete).

Note: These planners are new to everyone. That means we’re all learning how to make annual / session goals. The Guides will review the goals and we’ll also monitor them as the year progresses.

Getting Involved
Feeling lost? Yes, it’s a new school and you’re primarily concerned about your Eagle - how they’re adjusting, if they’re making new friends, whether they know what to do. At the same time, you’re grappling with a new morning schedule, driving to school, thinking about lunches, and figuring out “what’s okay and what’s not?” These questions will linger for some time as you get comfortable.

The very best thing you can do - get involved, get to know another parent, start texting or talking on BAND with someone. There are opportunities to meet parents before / after school. There are monthly parent meetings and a Moms' night out being organized.

We are asking our Adventure Studio Eagles to get out of their comfort zone and conversate with adults. I’ll challenge each of the new parents to do the same… to connect with at least one other parent. For returning parents, I’ll challenge you to find a new parent to connect to and help them on their journey as they get comfortable with Acton.

Playdates / Get-togethers
On a very similar note, if you’re new - your Eagle may be grappling with a lot of these things inside the studio. If your Eagle had a tough week, the best thing you can do is help her / him connect with one other Eagle. Playdates / get togethers are an awesome way to do that.

Every Eagle has made at least one connection this week. If you can help your Eagle build a deeper connection with that person, that will make a world of difference. If they have one friend they can connect with and that friend has another friend - it will very quickly become a spider web. Their new school won’t feel very lonely anymore.

It doesn’t have to be difficult. You can just have the Eagles play together outdoors after school at our playground or the numerous parks nearby!

Focusing on the core - Communication Guidelines with Guides
Our three big areas for change from last year were “Empower parents”, “Reduce the Chaos”, and “Focus on the Core”

In order to make this happen, there were a lot of changes made - none more important than bringing on our 3 new Guides this year.

If this week felt better than last year, you just have to look at the Guides. The changes didn’t just happen overnight - they’ve been working for weeks on prepping for this. Their experience and effort made a world of difference and for the first time I feel like we have the pieces in place to make Acton what we really want it to be.

In order to see that through for every Eagle, we need to streamline communication. Going forward, if there are specific requests / concerns / questions about your Eagle, please send those to me directly (email or band are fine) and I’ll work with the Guides if/as needed. Internally, we have a process to discuss specific Eagle concerns and I can bring them up in an orderly and timely manner.

Please note that all of us value the relationship between parents and guides - we are a team supporting the Eagles on their journey. So please feel free to chat with the Guides before or after school about general items or just to build rapport. These informal interactions are important for maintaining a strong, supportive community.

Nature Club
Reminder that nature club starts this Wednesday. It is run by Jared the Nature Guy LLC. Acton is simply providing them the opportunity to run it. For brand purposes, we’ve hosted the registration on our website but the rest is for Jared to manage. If you want to register, please do so as soon as possible: https://actonacademycolumbus.com/nature-club-waldorf-education