By Lorienne Beals | Development Director
In September, we shared with you about a summer program at Neelsville Middle School and the challenges of working with adolescents. Teaching Artist, Anthony Truitt, had shared his first impressions after meeting the 6th, 7th and 8th graders participating in the program:
I've never taught at a middle school that's as ethnically diverse as Neelsville. Nearly 90 percent of my kids are 1st generation Americans. Each day I teach the children of Ghanaians, Senegalese, El Salvadorians, Mexicans and Guatemalans - to name a few - and it’s an honor. I see their thirst for knowledge and its truly gratifying to share in their daily achievements.
After four weeks of working with these students, Tony shares with us his reflections on the progress that was made and lessons learned:
The summer program at Neelsville has ended and as I reflect on the past 4 weeks I am struck by how much the students and instructors accomplished in such little time. It was truly a delight to see the youth display their creations and discuss the process used.
I was very pleased with how orderly the overall program was and how the Story Tapestries staff interacted with the Montgomery County Public Schools staff and Family Learning Solutions to provide a safe, nurturing and educative environment for the students.
This summer at Neelsville was not without some challenges, namely, establishing authority and maintaining order in the classroom, quickly. Another obstacle at times was convincing the students that this wasn't summer school. I made it a point to refer to my classes with them as workshops because the word class connotes school and I wanted them to feel completely free to express themselves and create. Also, identifying so many students individual interests and strengths was difficult at times but I strove to provide a multimodality lesson plan in my workshops so I believe that I rose to that challenge as an instructor.
In fact I think we as a team rose to meet all of the challenges it takes in providing summer enrichment and academics to 100 ten - thirteen year olds. The program at Neeslville this summer was a success and I look forward to returning.
With guidance and Tony’s keen use of multimedia tools, the students wrote and recorded poems to describe who they are:
Story Tapestries continues to work with middle school students at Neelsville and thanks to YOUR support they are thriving and growing - finding words to express their thoughts and shaping their words into structured writing. While language can be a barrier, approaching language through the arts can open up avenues for every student to participate and learn something new. Students at Neelsville are making new connections daily and are gaining appreciation for one another. They expressed this beautifully in a mural they created titled “We Are One,” which now hangs on the school walls as a source of pride and recognition.
We love sharing these stories because YOU helped create them.
Story Tapestries is grateful to be part of the GlobalGiving family and to be part of the #GivingTuesday global movement. Through corporate sponsorships, dollars from supporters like you are stretched farther thanks to matching campaigns on November 27th.
Thank you so much for being part of the movement that brings art into the classrooms and puts fun into learning reading, writing, spoken word stories and so much more!
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