While Roleen and I were attending a California Mentor Director training in a remote, Franciscan, monastic retreat space near San Francisco, The New School-West rocked on…
We started the week with Luca (WW) and mom Katrina bringing snack and creating the menu and Agnes (EW) and mom Amanda added to the snack and made pancakes. And we were well fed for the rest of the week, too. Thank you, Lucy C. (WW) and mom Lisa, Hayes, Lola, Grey, Poppy and Dylan from the EW and Diego & Marina from the WW. We had a delicious week.
Jennifer (Fiona EW) cooked waffles with friends and brought matching chef hats and aprons for all.
The Gardening Team is in the design phase for the side garden and we’re excited by the possibilities!
Flowers came in from Diego (WW), Mehana (WW), Julian (EW), Agnes (EW), and Clem (EW). It’s beginning to feel a lot like Fall and look like Halloween!
Birthdays were celebrated, too, by Clem (EW) and mom Sammy as well as Lily (EW) with mom Amanda and dad Sean reading a book at morning circle.
Roxanne and Leah (EW & WW) hosted a farmer’s market trip last Friday.
And Katie (Poppy EW) and Maribel (Aliana WW) contributed to curriculum development at our weekly team meetings.
It was great to be invited and be part of the staff’s team meeting. It was pretty amazing to see the teachers brainstorm and be open to each others’ feedback on whether it was a good idea to have clay available for the children everyday. Cynthia made a compelling argument on why it was important to have a station of clay available at all times (with or without need of instruction for the children). The rest of the staff supported the idea, as well as provided feedback on how they thought clay could enhance the children’s learning, sense of belonging, and connecting it to the daily mantra of “being loved”. Cynthia offered to be in charge of the cleaning, which made me think she was very committed to providing this for the children and that she had put lots of thought into it.
Towards the end, I was asked for my feedback and I was just so in awe of the whole process. Also, because I have been wanting to incorporate clay in my clinical sessions due to the importance of what working with clay does. I validated Cynthia’s enthusiasm and encouraged her and the rest of the staff to make a clay station an every day experience.
I shared that clay cuts right into the subconscious and that children will benefit working/playing with clay even if it’s not representational work. They can work out things that they don’t even know is bothering them. It is wonderful, however, that they will also have a caring adult to be available to help them identify what they are working on with clay; a feeling, a representation of something or someone and/or just being there while they manipulate the clay to process whatever it is that is swimming in the subconscious mind.
The teachers welcomed my feedback and referred me to places where I can buy clay for my session! I really enjoyed being part of this staff meeting and I’m really thankful I had a chance to see some of the work that goes behind the scenes. Thanks again for inviting us to be part of your meeting!
xoxo
Maribel Dias