Week two of our entirely outdoor, pandemic, not-schooling experience is in the books at Abrome!
This week the Cell 1 did some exploring. I- and J- found a looooooooong tunnel that opened to a giant reed forest, which I- used to build a house complete with wind-chimes. L- created watercolor paint out of sidewalk chalk and created a new language that is a hybrid of sounds and motions. A- spent much of the week hiking and finding some excellent chill spots. There were also several up close encounters with spiders, snakes, and bees (ouch), and the outdoor learning is off the charts for Cell 1.
Cell 2 had one constant theme this week—save the tadpoles! We first noticed hundreds of tadpoles in two puddles by the lake last Friday, and each day we have attempted to replace the water that had evaporated away between visits. When we arrived on Friday, after the remote day on Thursday, we had go all out to quickly add water to the muddy remnants of the puddles to save the ones that were borrowed in the mud, clinging to life. Fortunately many of them survived and we left on Friday having overfilled the puddles in the hopes that it can get the tadpoles through the weekend. But tadpole saving was not all we did. Some Learners enjoyed painting with water colors, especially A-, and J1- spent much of her time crocheting. We got to meet an African Grey Parrot who visited with her human, and some of us let it rest on our arms or shoulders. A- and J2- tried to make pottery by collecting clay, forming pieces, collecting firewood, starting a fire, and heating up their pieces with the fire. Antonio and M1- went on several hikes to the top of the park, with M2- joining us for one of them. Lauren, M1-, and A- also explored a part of the park none of us had been to before. William brought binoculars to boat watch and he shared pics of his cats and his dog Hunter with others. J1- talked with the Facilitators about how to apply to jobs and how to apply to college and is going to be researching that a bit more. And both M1- and M2- stepped out of their comfort zone to do a flocking activity with the Facilitators. Finally, multiple Learners dipped their toes in the cold lake and J1-, Lauren, and Antonio all took the plunge.
We had three Learners who were primarily remote this week and we miss their presence, a lot. G- is apparently spending a lot of time coding while K- is still in Indiana helping his parents move into their new place. R- has been scheming for Halloween and will soon have a published book that will be added to the Abrome library. All the Learners went remote on Thursday as we had another thunderstorm rainout. We had four offerings on the day, including a Scary Story offering led by R-. What a wonderful surprise it was that L- is also into scary stories and was able to contribute a story to the offering as well. Turnout for the “I’m thinking of a thing” game was strong, and 10 Learners dropped in for the afternoon roundup.
If I could summarize what day 9 was for my cell it would be supporting others. Two sibling Learners arrived in unhappy moods and were carrying with them a conflict that started at home. In small communities like ours, the attitudes of any individual can have an outsized influence on the rest of the people in the space. With a heaviness in the air, we started our day and worked through the morning meeting without being able to realize the benefits of a community coming together and connecting. But sometimes that happens and that’s okay.
Facilitator Lauren and I talked after the meeting as we all began to walk to our agreed upon destination, and we decided that each of us would try to find time to connect with each of the sibling Learners separately to see if we could support them. One of the Learners quickly came to me to tell me some of her struggles with the morning and with her relationship with her brother. I listened and validated her feelings, and asked some questions about how I might be able to be of service to her.
When we arrived at our destination we settled into our weekly Check-in and Change-up meetings where we raise awarenesses and develop practices that allow us to improve the culture of Abrome so that it supports everyone. Among the new awarenesses raised were the difficult topics of teasing and Learners not feeling like they fit into the group. Some of the practices raised seemed like great ways to begin to address the awarenesses, and thereby the needs of the group, and I left the meeting feeling really good about how we were co-creating culture together.
This was one of the puddles soon after we added the first couple of gallons of water
After the Check-in and Change-up, three Learners began putting together their foldable chairs, a couple ran off to play, and I headed toward the puddles to see how the tadpoles were doing. Except the puddles were now just mud, and it looked as though there were no live tadpoles left. We jumped into action and began ferrying water from the lake to the mud which soon became puddles again. To our relief many of the tadpoles seemed to come back to life and began swimming around. Although many of them died and their numbers were decidedly smaller than they were on Wednesday.
I asked the other sibling Learner if they wanted to do another hike that morning after the remote meeting, and he said yes. So after trying to save as many tadpoles as possible and meeting with the remote Learners, the Learner and I headed out on our hike. The Learner was also eager to share some of his frustrations from the morning, and I was able to give him the space he needed to share, and I asked a few questions about how they could move forward in a way that met everyone’s needs. There were no clear answers but at least the questions were out there.
The view from the top after we attempted to run up the hill
On our previous hike we debated how long it would take to run up the hill, and on this day I decided that I would try it out. It turns out that I grossly overestimated the time it would take to get up the hill. And I also underestimated how wrecked I would be at the top of the hill. We spent probably 20 minutes at the top of the hill just catching our breath and chatting. We decided to explore a new area of the park on our way back. We came across what looks like would be a pretty nice waterfall during heavy rains, some prickly pear cactus that was fruiting, and some interesting insects that were hanging out with the prickly pear fruit that made us choose to leave the fruit be instead of harvesting some of it.
A fruiting prickly pear cactus
When we returned from the hike I ate my lunch. The older Learners were lingering nearby, one Learner was further away watching something on his phone, and the younger Learners were hanging out at the dock. I invited the Learner who was on his phone to join in on our conversation by asking if he wanted to talk about Star Wars and the appropriateness of eating rats. He said yes and came over.
One of the older Learners was interested in talking about getting a job at a nearby grocery store so Facilitator Lauren began to discuss what the process looked like. They looked up what the application requirements were, and they roped in the Learner’s guardian to help provide some information that would be necessary for the application. That process led into a conversation about college for the Learner, so I joined in on the conversation. Instead of focusing on the steps needed to get into one particular college, I stepped back and asked why a degree from that school was necessary. It turns out that the Learner was interested in several particular career tracks so we talked about finding out what the requirements were to get into those careers, and how that would shape the college search process.
We then called in other Learners for a planned conversation about a cookout that several Learners had been talking with Facilitator Lauren about. Over the course of a half hour we decided that we would cook food outside during the coming week and that each Learner would have the opportunity to contribute food from the list we collectively came up with.
We left the tadpoles with lots of water at the end of the day
After the cookout meeting I jumped on a call with remote Learners to close out their week. Then I took off for a quick jump in the lake, and so did Facilitator Lauren. We then held our afternoon roundup as a cell. We reviewed our community awareness board, we did rose-bud-thorn for the week, and we also shared gratitudes with each other. Finally, we went back to filling up the puddles so that the tadpoles could survive the weekend. We filled the puddles up with more water than we had seen at any time since day one, so we left feeling pretty good about our efforts. I also left feeling really good about the many different ways that we supported the members of the cell through our meetings and interactions throughout the day.