Front Row Center

T. Julie-Ann and students at Carmen

Friends School Middle School students were literally front-row center at the opera in Philadelphia on Wednesday afternoon.  Thanks to the wonderful connection by our MS Chorus teacher and Fine & Performing Arts Program Director Julie-Ann Green, who performed as part of the chorus, we were at the front of the house of some 2,000-school students to see the final dress rehearsal for Carmen.   Our students were fully engaged and by the time the curtain call arrived cheered loudly with the rest of the crowd, reflecting clear appreciation for the spectacular presentation they had just seen, and the talent and effort exerted by the cast and orchestra to tell the story of Carmen so movingly.

This trip was another expression of our hands-on learning philosophy, and one that particularly highlights the importance we see in music education.  Every student at Friends School takes applied music instruction as part of his or her program.  It may be Music Together, violin, recorder or chorus.  All students get opportunities to prepare for and then perform in public.  In Middle School this also includes a high level of student participation in the spring musical.  This is all supplemented with the Fine & Performing Art Program that offers music lessons to many of our students and to others in the community.

Google "music and brain development" if you’d like to explore the benefits of music instruction on brain development for young people.  Researchers posit that it has a beneficial impact on memory, visual-spatial development, and possibly verbal and mathematical strengths.  There is far more to be learned.  We do know without performing brain scans that students learn discipline and teamwork, as well as appreciation for a new way they can express themselves and how others may communicate to them feelings ranging from profound grief to ecstasy.   Yesterday’s trip to hear and see Carmen was certainly a powerful lesson, very likely to be retained, that reinforced these concepts.  And it was FUN! 

Helping Children Succeed in School, Life

September brings not only the school bus, but also some interesting articles on education and parenting.  One article that appeared in the New York Times on Labor Day made good reading and shared some good counsel, even though I don’t think the title, “School Curriculum Falls Short on Bigger Lessons,” applies to Friends School.  Citing Kenneth Ginsburg and Susan Fitzgerald’s new book Letting Go with Love and Confidence: Raising Responsible, Resilient, Self-Sufficient Teens in the 21^st Century it addresses many questions including the question of how to best praise a child’s academic achievement.   

It turns out that in one study children who were praised for their intelligence when completing mathematical puzzles began to underperform children in the same group who were praised for their effort.  The children praised for their intelligence did worse on subsequent tests and started to avoid answering difficult questions, fearful that they could not live up to their perceived potential and might fail, whereas children praised for their effort persisted and tackled even more challenging problems.   Dr. Ginsberg reported “When we focus on performance, when we say ‘make sure you get A’s,’ we have kids who are terrified of B’s.”  Instead he counsels, “Kids who are praised for effort, those kids learn that intelligence is something that can be built.”  I’m not a researcher, but I have tried this technique in my own parenting and found it to be useful and believe it had a positive effect.   (My son and daughter are 22 and 24 now, still growing and establishing themselves as young adults, and I’m delighted that they still seem to value my counsel!)

Dr. Ginsburg suggests that choosing the right words does not have to be hard.  Instead of saying “I’m proud you got an A on the test” try “I’m so proud of you for studying so hard.”  The same lessons spill over into the rest of life, including sports.   He also suggests using open-ended questions like “Tell me about the game.  Did you have fun?” instead of simply “How many points did you score?”

The article and the book address a range of topics, all addressing how to foster a child’s focus, self-control and critical thinking.   For example asking responsive questions and encouraging a child to find ways to research or test their own hypothesis rather than simply answering their question can promote critical thinking.  Engaging in collaborative research with your child may be a way to model curiosity and lifelong learning.

If these topics interest you then click on the link to the article above and look it over.  I’d be glad to discuss it with you when we next meet, or you can post your own reflections below.

Happy New Year

We are launched!  A new school year is underway.  I want to welcome each family, new and returning, to the 2011-12 school year at Friends School.  It has been very exciting to greet so many old friends, and to make some new ones. As we reported in the Summer Bulletin and Notes to Parents, a lot of work and preparation has gone on over the summer and we are poised for a wonderful year.

Before the school year officially started, we held our annual “Ice Cream Social” for Prekindergarten, Kindergarten and First Grade students. That evening a returning 4^th Grader excitedly pulled me over to the flower garden behind the Noel-Baker building to show me the Monarch Caterpillars he’d found.  I asked how he knew they were Monarchs and he said because they had yellow, black and white stripes around their bodies, and because they were on Milkweed plants, and Monarchs love to feed on Milkweed.  He was right of course, and together we spied five caterpillars.  He then explained to me how they would soon be making their chrysalis, after which they would emerge as butterflies and then start their journey south to Mexico!  Here was a student filled with excitement about a wonderful mystery of nature he has learned about at Friends School.  He was equally excited to be returning to school, and ready to learn even more new things about Monarchs and other subjects.

This is what we strive for at Friends School.  To provide students with numerous hands-on learning experiences that lead to their unquenchable excitement about discovery and knowledge.  When this process goes on year-after-year, with an ever-increasing level of challenge, we graduate 8^th graders who love to discover and learn, and who in the process have also learned a lot about themselves.  They are then ready for the increasingly independent challenges they will face in high school and beyond.  A wonderful year of exploration lies ahead.  I can’t wait to see what mysteries our students will uncover and discover as the year unfolds.