Green Schools Conference
After attending the 2nd Annual Green Schools National Conference from
February 27-29, 2012, Kate came back with some great ideas.
At a breakfast session with the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA) in which the EPA was reaching out to hear schools’ and
environmental health communities’ perspectives on environmental health in
schools, Kate wanted to learn how to involve students in the process of
improving schools’ environmental health.
“Check out the Council of
Educational Facility Planners International (CEFPI).”
The annual competition challenges
middle school students to design a sustainable school while also providing
standards-based curriculum to use to direct the process. Every team
submits a built project/scale model using recycled materials and a video or
PowerPoint presentation and narrative that documents the planning process and
rationale for the team’s design. Through
project-based “hands-on” learning, students explore real world problems
relevant to their lives and offer solutions, bridging the gap between
conceptual theory and real life skills. They learn how math, science,
technology, engineering, history and art are all part of the design process.
Barb Worth of CEFPI says, “Our
program/curriculum is geared to middle schools, simply because they are so
disengaged in learning and middle school is the time to catch
that—project-based learning seems to be a good answer to that and we have seen
amazing results. “
Mark and Kate Sorenson, founders of the S.T.A.R. school –standing for Service
to All Relations—spoke about their school which focuses on staying rooted in the tribe’s cultural heritage. It is located on the SW edge of Navajo Nation
in Arizona. The school was started on
the idea that schools themselves are Anglo institutions and there are
alternative structures to learning that can integrate more indigenous values
into education—from things like what they teach and how they teach it, to
something as simple as using circles instead of rows.
Project-based learning, student choice, small group
instruction, sovereignty through service, outdoor education, and cultural rootings
make up the base of their academic curriculum which meets both state and
cultural standards. Students from this
school have had great success in high school as well as colleges and
universities. One of the most
interesting and successful components of the school was using video for
place-based education with media literacy.
For example, this video about a kindergarten class visiting a corn field
to make Nitsidigo'i', Kneel Down Bread, a traditional Dine' Heritage Food was
made completely by 7th and 8th graders Kira Butler,
Joshua Gregg, and Keanu Jones. Videos
from these middle school classes have been featured in multiple film festivals
including Venice Film Festival, AZ Student Film Festival, Cine Las Americas in
Austin, TX, Flagstaff Mountain Film Festival, among others.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ig9C41ZJnw&feature=channel
The Third Teacher Plus team was using design thinking
(creative problem solving à
tangible solution) to engage a different kind of learning ecology. The thinking process started from the student,
asking who is the person that’s learning, how can an environment facilitate
them to be a change agent, and how can he or she solve the problem on the
ground. They said that this perspective
required a few shifts in how we’re thinking about education, starting with
education.
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Education
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Learning
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Sustainability
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Regenerative
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Object
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Ecology
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Humanity
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Life
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They are partnering with the American Indian Institute for
Innovation to increase the number of American Indian students in Science
Technology Engineering and Math. They
plan to make sure that these subjects remain culturally relevant while also
ensuring American Indian communities have young professionals that can help meet
their needs. They are proposing to build the site in the
Black Hills.
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