Principal Bobby
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Total Engagement, Deep meaning, powerful learning

12/18/2015

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I was blown away today by some IAA dances connected to ecosystems.  The dances left many in the audience in tears. Who knew ecosystems could be so moving?  

The real beauty was in the learning and through the process.  It was palpable that these students grew and connected deeper as a community through this active learning.  They were also able to articulate the connection of the dance to their learning of science standards.  

The engagement was so apparent as well.  It is no wonder that during arts integration and arts experiences we have almost no office discipline referrals over the last 3 years.  The arts engage our students and in turn they are engaged in their learning.  I truly wish we could teach this way every minute of the day.  However, there are pressures to finish curriculums and meet testing benchmarks that push us away from this powerful learning tool.  To have the complete freedom to develop a curriculum based from the bottom up around arts integration is a dream we hope to realize someday.  

Today also made me think about who was engaged.  Everyone!  But at our school that means these arts integration experiences include a vast majority of students with little english skills, students with special learning needs, students impacted by poverty, homelessness and trauma.  I have said many times, Arts Integration is the great classroom differentiation tool.  Every student was involved with the same task, same learning goals and same activity that allowed them to develop meaning for themselves.  Amazing.  

So get your tissue boxes out and enjoy these dances.  
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School as community Builder

12/15/2015

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A message from the principal
You’d think that schools would naturally nurture deep community bonds. But we live in an era and under a testing regime that emphasizes individual accomplishments, not community cohesion. Even when schools talk about values, they tend to talk about individualistic values, like grit, resilience and executive function, not the empathy, compassion and solidarity that are good for community and the heart.
The above quote is from a New York Times article by David Brooks, Communities of Character.  While individual skills and accomplishments should be developed and acknowledged, we need to go deeper as a school.  I hope our Monday Morning Meetings and Friday Town Meetings are seen as moving is this direction.  The stories we tell and the narratives we use to describe student accomplishments are meant to accentuate positive character and connect us more deeply with one another as community members.  

This type of community building has to be worked on and honed over time.  Just like all the intricacies of math are not learned in its first lesson, we must continuously come back to character and community and how they relate to and improve one another.

I am reminded of our 6th IAA belief statement, Building Community:
We believe that creating a school culture where each child, family member, and staff
person is a valued and welcomed contributor to our community allows us to practice
hospitality, inclusion, and invitation.

We also have to believe that the skills inherent in this type of focus hold the same value as educating our children around Math and Literacy.  

Being bigger than ourselves, connecting to others in meaningful ways are vital to not only the work we do at IAA, but the work we will do in life.  As students remember their time at IAA I hope they have two major takeaways in this regard, I was loved for who I was and I was accepted as part of the larger community and I now I have the skills to contribute and improve my community.  I think we are well on our way.  
​

Artfully, Mr. Bobby
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    Mr. Bobby

    I was principal at IAA for 9 years and employed there for 18.  I loved every minute of the journey. We were all about community, the arts and positive vibes.  Now I am in my first year as the District's Alternative Learning Program's Principal. Learning new things and applying my experiences to a new setting. 

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