The Memphis Upbeat

The visiting actors weren’t the only ones in costume at Caldwell-Guthrie Elementary School last month.

On the last Wednesday before the holidays, the cafeteria floor in front of the school stage was packed with pajama-clad students (and teachers!). Every hue, pattern, and cartoon character was represented in the sea of nightclothes.

But if you mistook the cafeteria for a nursery that day, you wouldn’t be too far off.

Germantown Community Theatre brought a dose of “nursery magic” to Caldwell-Guthrie with its traveling production of “The Velveteen Rabbit.”

Peculiar things happened that morning. A toy horse, a jack-in-the-box, and a stuffed brown rabbit rose from a toy chest and danced across the stage. And the audience of 6-, 7-, and 8-year olds sat entranced, listening to the narrator:

“Nursery magic is very strange and wonderful.”

Whatever force brought this end-of-term treat to their school, the students likely thought it pretty wonderful.

Caldwell-Guthrie’s principal, LaWanda Hill, was hoping to reward the students after a good first semester. At the school’s Fall Think Show, a pair of the judges heard Hill comment that “the kids deserve something fun the last week before the holidays.”

Those two judges were Shirley Gee and Jackie Flaum. Through their church, Germantown United Methodist, Gee and Flaum are part of a team that partners with Caldwell-Guthrie to provide weekly tutoring and mentoring. The two women also happen to be ardent thespians with years of experience directing plays and writing scripts.

According to Flaum, when she and Gee heard Principal Hill’s comment, “We immediately thought – theater!”

Their Sunday school class at GUMC, which wanted to give the students a Christmas gift, liked the idea and jumped on board. But as Flaum said, “It was cost prohibitive to take all the kids to a play.” So they brought a play to the kids.

Although the students weren’t sitting in plush red seats for “The Velveteen Rabbit,” booking a stop on the play’s tour schedule allowed them an intimate experience of theater. When the show ended, hands popped up across the cafeteria floor. The actors stepped out of character, sat at the edge of the stage, and took turns answering questions. Back-stage passes for everyone, you might say.

The actors didn’t get a standing ovation for their work, but they did get a robust shout of thanks and some pretty wide grins before the students filed out of the room.

After all, what’s better than taking a break from class to watch toys come to life?

Getting to do it in your pajamas.
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Amy Barger, a native Memphian, edits The Memphis Upbeat. 

By Leslie Lightfoot

Visions of sweet treats, games to be played, and time to be jolly have been dancing through the heads of third graders at Oakhaven Elementary in anticipation of their holiday party. Today, third graders will be entertained with a reading of The Grinch Who Stole Christmas and holiday games as well as treated to special snacks and beverages from their room moms.

What began as a classroom visit with some donations of school supplies in 2003 has evolved into the tradition of throwing four parties per year for each third grade class at Oakhaven. Debbie Jackson (Past PTO President at Ridgeway High School) initiated a school visit after meeting an Oakhaven teacher through a common friend. Three of us delivered art supplies and gently used computer equipment to her classroom. We had such a good time interacting with the students that the question was asked, “How can we be involved on a regular basis?” The teacher expressed interest in having room moms. We couldn’t resist the idea of putting on parties for these children.

In the first year, a Valentine’s party and a year-end celebration were held for the one class. We recruited some friends and were able to host four parties for two classes the next year. Within a short amount of time, all third grade classes at Oakhaven had their own room moms and a tradition was established. Parties are held for Halloween, December holidays, Valentine’s Day, and a year-end Field Day.

The 12 to 15 room moms are mainly parents of college-aged children and beyond. They’ve been volunteers with Memphis City Schools, Shelby County Schools, and private schools throughout the area. The women meet to share ideas, but then they personalize the parties for their room, just as they did for their own children’s classes through the years. The one thing that is shared is that students, room moms, and teachers have lots of fun.

If you see “reindeer” walking down the halls at Oakhaven this week, you can bet that the third graders’ visions have come true.

This program could easily be duplicated at other schools. If you would like more information, please contact Debbie Jackson at 757-5271 or Leslie Lightfoot at 751-0691.
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 Leslie Lightfoot is the parent of three Shelby County School graduates and is a member of the Stand for Children Study Circles.

By Lisa Harris

On Friday, December 3, I was excited to be part of Volunteer Mid-South’s Spirit of Giving event with the Memphis City Schools. At six locations (Sharpe, Treadwell, Cummings, Manor Lake, Fairley, and Caldwell/Guthrie Elementary Schools), community volunteers brought holiday messages of sharing to every student.

The children arrived that morning to hallways decorated with tinsel and goodie bags on their desks, which were delivered by Volunteer Mid-South volunteers the previous afternoon. There was a team of 40+ volunteers at Sharpe Elementary ready bright and early to spend time with the students. A few of the volunteers were decked out in holiday garb, adding to the festive mood. 

I was directed to Ms. Milam’s first grade classroom and was greeted warmly by her and her students. I read the book Kitty Princess and the Fantastic Frog by Trevor Dickinson and Emma Carlow, a wonderful story about friendship and giving. After reading, I had quite a spirited discussion with the children about the book. They seemed more focused on the specific toys that were shared, but I worked to bring them around to the real message of the story. The students were very excited that I left the book with them for future use. 

Sharpe Elementary School, near Lamar Ave. and I-240, was an impressive place to visit. The children were all friendly, well behaved, and on time to school. Many parents accompanied their children to school and walked them into the building. The principal, Mr. Gary Zimmerman, met me at the front door when I arrived and personally welcomed me to Sharpe. The school itself was very inviting, with cheery artwork and signs in the halls. The first grade class I visited was chock full of learning materials and exciting stimuli for the students. When I left, Mr. Zimmerman was walking the halls chatting with the students and volunteers. The whole experience was a very positive one!
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Lisa Harris is an MCS parent and serves on the Board of Directors of Volunteer Mid-South.    

This is Megan Carr.

If you meet her in her art classroom at Oakhaven Elementary, you might just get an “air high-five” in place of a handshake.

The air high-five is how Carr and her students celebrate success – from a well-executed art project to cooperation during group work. When I visited Carr’s first period class last Friday, the air high-fives were in full force.

But the energetic atmosphere in Carr’s classroom doesn’t happen by accident. It’s a product of careful research and planning.

For her Master of Arts in Teaching, which she’ll complete in May 2011, Carr is writing a thesis on teaching art through games. The idea is that an exciting game motivates students to learn. And there might be other benefits of a game-centered curriculum. “I’m trying to find out if games also help students retain material,” says Carr. She often designs new games so she can observe how her own students respond to this style of learning.

For Friday’s class, Carr prepared a game that would incorporate art vocabulary from previous lessons. Seated in a circle at her feet – almost team huddle-style – her fifth graders fielded questions about “horizon lines” and “perspective.” They popped up occasionally to point to the foreground, middle-ground, and background of a painting propped up on the whiteboard.

And that was just the pre-game review session.

Then Carr laid out the game plan. On each of the room’s four tables, a large folder was waiting. In addition to craft supplies, each folder contained detailed instructions for creating a specific landscape scene. To compose their scenes correctly, the students had to work together to interpret the art terminology they had just reviewed.

Carr started a stopwatch, and the students – who were told each group member should have a role to play – assigned themselves tasks. One student, ruler in hand, designed a road receding into the horizon of her group’s cityscape. Another constructed a snowman (complete with googly eyes and top hat) for a winter landscape. Amid the crafting, conversations buzzed about how to compose all the pieces into a unified scene.

The stopwatch beeped: Game Over.

The class reconvened, and each group presented its finished landscape. This was not just a show-and-tell session, though.  The students were defending their compositions – explaining how they put the elements of the scene together and spiced things up with their own innovations. Air high-fives were given for attention to detail, creativity, and teamwork.

I can’t predict whether Carr’s students will remember the meaning of “horizon line” a week from now. But I can say this about Friday’s class: all hands were on deck, and all brains were engaged.

I’ll give an air high-five to that.
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Amy Barger, a native Memphian, edits The Memphis Upbeat. 

When schools let out for the summer, many students’ brains take a vacation. Local middle school student Ashley Collins, however, spent some of her free time last summer digging into a new interest of hers: blogging. Ashley claimed her own corner of cyberspace by setting up a website through Edublogs.org, a popular educational blog-hosting site. The Memphis Upbeat recently asked Ashley to reflect on her experience with blogging. Check out an excerpt from Ashley’s blog below our interview.

Memphis Upbeat: Where did you get the idea to set up a blog?

Ashley: I was a participant in the MCS Got Tech Program for 5^th graders this past summer. We got to choose our own workshop; I chose Digital Photography and Blogging. At the end of the week-long program we had a showcase for our work.

How did you decide what to blog about?

Each person had to choose his or her own topic. For example, you could make a blog about something you enjoy or like to think about. So I decided to talk about animals from the zoo.

Was it difficult to figure out how to set up the site and post your pictures?

It was hard at first because we did not have any experience in photography, but with a few test shots I became quite good at taking pictures. Once it got easier, we went on a field trip to the Memphis Zoo as a class and took pictures of the animals. It was fun to research different animals. After I researched them, I uploaded the photos from the cameras the teacher gave us. Then I wrote information for all the animals and posted it on my blog. 

Do you enjoy writing?

As a student of the violin I enjoy writing music and learning different techniques. In literature I enjoy writing fictional “what if” stories like “What if I were an adult?” And sometimes I write about horror or scary monsters.

Any thoughts about what career you’d like to have someday?

I love Social Studies and learning about history and culture. When I grow up I want to be an archeologist because I enjoy discovering the world’s history.

Animals from the Zoo
by Ashley Collins

This is the Memphis Zoo and Aquarium. On Tuesday we went to the zoo to take pictures of textures, patterns, and animals.
First  we went to see the primates. We saw the orangutan and Sulawesi macaque monkey. The picture on the left shows one of the primates we saw.  

The next animals are the water animals. The water animals are the ducks and the flamingoes. The pictures below show these two amazing water animals. Do you like pink flamingoes?