Oh. My. Gosh.

We love your children. 

Today’s challenge was 100%, absolutely, incredibly, beyond belief magical! Or maybe we just thought so– but really, it was pretty amazing! 

Check out these slides to see exactly how the class played out.

This video also captures the essence of the class. If you listen carefully, you can hear their support for each other. 

It was seriously a dream come true to watch and listen to your children work so seamlessly together. The work they’ve been doing around teamwork, the entire quarter, has been absorbed and is being lived in the 5th and 6th grade.  

In our reflection discussion at the end of class, it came out that even the kids were amazed at how marvelously they worked together. They couldn’t pick just one “I can” statement to reflect upon because they felt like they did all of them SO well in the challenge. They were actually eager to document about the experience on their rubrics! 

They shared that because they’ve been working with their classmates so closely, they feel like they know what they need from each other and how to collaborate so they can find success — even if working with someone who operates totally different from them. 

We asked the kids, “How many of you found it difficult to work with someone on an earlier challenge that you now find yourself working with really well?” Twelve out of our 20 students raised their hands. 

These critical skills– collaboration, communication, planning and managing for results, adaptability, higher-order thinking– are transferring into their other classes and will hopefully stick with them as they are such valuable, important life skills. 

Even as we write this, hours after the challenge, we cant help but smile. We are so proud of the work your kids are doing at MJDS. It feels wonderful to be a part of this kind of teaching and learning.

An amazing thing happened during ETC on Wednesday. Every single group failed! Say what? We are excited about failure? YEP! 

The best part came during our discussion at the end of class. Each group reflected together about what worked, what didn’t work and shared out. Through our conversation they realized they may know what it takes to find success in the challenge. We will try the challenge again on Friday and see what happens. Stay tuned!

Additionally, we saw so many students being 100% honest about their participation within their team. They documented growth, challenges and goals on their rubrics which we will share at student led conferences. Can’t wait! 

Your kiddos continue to impress us with their ability to self assess and reflect. Today we shared a wonderful story, The Dot, where a young girl develops a growth mindset and confidence through a little encouragement and a lot of perseverance. It was a prefect connection to what we’ve been working on in ETC.

The story connected perfectly to our dot challenge– Build the tallest tower using only 50 index cards and a sheet of DOT stickers. 

The activity led to great conversation where we decided that learning really takes place through asking questions.  Groups that had more success (or felt more successful) were constantly asking questions of themselves as engineers and also about the challenge parameters. It was a really authentic learning opportunity that we weren’t anticipating.

Students also shared personal growth toward their teamwork goals and continue to hold each other accountable to our expectations. 

We hope you’ll ask your children about this fun activity!