Anything is Possible!

I love teaching Pre-Prep. The excitement the children bring to class every day is motivating and inspiring. The way they yell out, ‘Mr Hill!’ when I walk in the room or the eager faces that light up when they see me, always brings a smile to my face. I am lucky enough to teach two lessons a week as a specialist Design Teacher and these lessons are the highlight of my week. The ideas they have, the playfulness in their learning, and their natural wonderment at the world brings joy to my teaching. However, my favourite part about teaching Pre preps is the ‘anything is possible’ attitude they have. They are fearless!

This term the children had an idea for a project and as a learning community, we turned it from an idea to reality!

One of the youngest boys (only 3yrs old) races BMX. His Mum was showing me pictures and videos of him racing and I was telling one of the Prep Teachers about this and she made the comment, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if the kids could bring in their bikes one day?’ That’s all it took to get me started searching for that day.

On the last day of Semester 2 each year, the school holds an U8’s day - a day for the PP-2 students, teachers and parents to celebrate their learning. There are stalls for Face Painting, decorating biscuits, games and activities, music, dancing and each year level sets up an activity. My mind went straight to an U8’s bike track.

I challenged the Pre-Preps with the question, ‘Could we design and build a bike track for U8’s day?’ Needless to say, the challenge was enthusiastically accepted. We invited the little BMX rider to talk to the class about racing his bike. His Dad came with him and together they showed us their bikes and equipment and talked about how they race especially the rules and safety associated with it.

Using the Design Thinking model, I started to engage the kids in understanding what a bike track is. What does it need? How we could make it? The kids came up with lots of ideas including stop signs, traffic lights, cement to ride on, ducks, clouds and rainbows, a gate so people wouldn’t walk on the track and a lolly pop person. The kids were firmly set on making it safe. Clearly the talk from the little BMX rider and his Dad had sunk in.

One of the first challenges was to find a place to build it, so we went for a walk around the area that U8’s day is positioned to show the kids the options. Adjacent to this area is the Prep Playground. A fenced off area, with a gate that the kids decided was perfect! The next problem was how to get an aerial photo of this area so the kids could draw some ideas? Again, I challenged the kids. Once again full of imagination and fearlessness they came up with a heap of clever ideas -  ‘We could get a really tall ladder’; ‘We could climb a tree’; ‘We could stand on the Chapel roof’ or my favourite -  ‘We could get a plane to fly over and take the photo’ …and that’s exactly what we did!

We had a year 10 student (Jack) bring in his drone and take an aerial photo for us. This was very exciting for the Pre-Preps and something they all wanted to fly! We printed the picture that Jack took in A2. I cut out a lot of ‘Jig Saw like’ pieces on the laser cutter for the kids to prototype shapes and designs for the track. In hindsight this was a missed opportunity to show the kids how the laser cutter works, but we were running short on time. The kids loved prototyping with these pieces and, like all good designers, they showed their ideas to their peers and asked for feedback.

It was time to get on with the other parts for the bike track. The Pre Prep class visited the Possibility Hub for a morning and with the help of some extra teachers and some parents, the kids explored materials to build their traffic lights and their give way and stop signs. We had also decided we needed an air pump station and petrol station. It was a busy but productive and fun morning. Over the following weeks we finished the Petrol station, signs, ducks, clouds and rainbows. 

The day before U8’s day, it was time to mark out the track. We had lots of rope and used the aerial photo we had taken to shape the rope to match the picture. Again, we asked Jack if he could bring in his drone to take a look from the sky and get the design just right. When everyone was finally happy that the prototype was similar to the ropes marking the track, I asked the groundsman, Lindsey, to mark it. Lindsey showed the children his line marker and explained how he uses it and what he uses it for. We set up the signs, the petrol station, air pump, ducks, clouds, rainbows and safety signs. The track was ready!

When Under 8s day arrived I was a little overwhelmed by the volume of bikes that arrived at school. We had around 100 kids bring in their bikes, scooters and trikes. They just kept coming!

I’ve said often on this blog that I love working at a PP- 12 school, and today was another example of why that is. The older kids turned up in droves to blow up balloons, set up streamers and help out. They literally lined up to be the lolly pop person, the petrol pumper and the air pump operator. The little kids loved playing with the older kids and it was great to witness. This was an amazing exercise in a school community coming together to create something wonderful. 

By opening time, I was very grateful for the extra helpers. We had to limit the amount of riders on track so it was all hands on deck. Sometimes we had kids and parents 20 deep waiting for a turn. Parent feedback was amazing. They were telling me that their kids were calling it ‘Bike track day’. One parent told me her son was awake at 4:30am and asked her if they could go to school yet. 

This was a really fun project to bring to fruition. It was great to let the kids imagination run wild and turn that into reality.

However, the learning that went with this was authentic and meaningful. These kids were motivated, persistent in their quest to build this. Kids learnt about working with others and about the importance of sharing their ideas and the value of seeking feedback on those ideas. They problem solved in every aspect of this project. They learnt the power of collaboration and drawing on others expertise. They learnt about being flexible, agile thinkers, how to deal with ambiguity and being willing to take a risk or get something wrong. But, most importantly they learnt how powerful imagination can be.

 I said earlier I love teaching these kids. I have never felt so creative or had so many ideas. Their attitudes, imagination and creativity is rubbing off on me. Its no coincidence that I see this in them and now feel like I am re-discovering these traits in myself also. I think we can all learn something from these 4yr olds. With the right attitude -  Anything is possible! 

Kindness

At the start of the year my friend bought me a message display board for the Possibility Hub. I decided early on that it was something I wanted to let the kids use to display messages. In the very first week two girls asked me if they could put a message up. I thought it was a lovely message and of course I said yes. Little was I to know what was to follow.

Three weeks later and I was teaching a Year 5 Design Technology class and the kids had prototyped something to show a type of energy use. I’d asked them to present it at the end of the lesson. As we went around the circle, I came to a boy who had an anxiety attack and froze. He didn’t say anything and wouldn’t speak to me and not knowing this boy, I was quite worried. I tried to keep the sharing going around the circle while assisting this boy, but kids don’t miss much. They noticed something was wrong and were concerned about him also. Obviously, we got on with the short remainder of the lesson and we sorted out the situation.

Fast forward one week. We were doing something similar again with the intent of sharing at the end of the lesson. I had worked closely with the boy this week to make sure he was comfortable and willing to share. We stood in a circle and as I got to this boy (albeit briefly), he told us what he had done. I didn’t want to make him feel uncomfortable so I tried to keep the sharing moving. As I went to the next person, I heard two voices from behind me say, “Well done ____”, “that’s two types of Energy!” I was really pleased that they had identified that it was in fact two types of energy, but more importantly I was SO proud that they had recognised this boy’s achievement and encouraged and supported him.   

I’ve been teaching for 18 years. I love teaching now, more than I ever have. Kids say things that make me laugh, kids bring out the best in me, to make them laugh. I love the ‘Aha’ moments when kids click and understand things. I love it when kids create things that are more than I could have imagined and most importantly I love when kids do and say things that are just beautiful, kind and caring. Today was one of those moments. Those two girls were not prompted. They weren’t looking for attention and you could tell by their tone and volume and the sincerity in their voices. I have not stopped thinking and talking about this incident since it was said, hence this blog.

We have a great responsibility as teachers to teach content and strategies. To instil in students how to learn and to love learning. But most importantly we have an opportunity to mould these students into good people. Kind, caring, polite, respectful young people. I’m not claiming that the girls’ actions were my doing. However, I will most certainly be acknowledging them the way they did their classmate. I will be celebrating every opportunity I see to reinforce this kindness and caring, to these girls and anyone else.    

So, going back to the message that the girls wanted to put on our display board. What was their message? It said…’One kind word can change someone’s day’. Coincidence? I’m not sure. But I’m sure it made that boy’s day and it certainly made mine!