Thank you to everyone who joined us for our our recent State of the School talk and preview of our 2020 Action Plan. This event was live-streamed on Facebook, but not all of the presentation was visible in the video.

I am sharing a screencast below so everyone can access this information. After viewing the screencast, I hope you will feel inspired to get involved while the Visiting Committee is on campus March 8-11 (and as we go into 2020 and beyond). RSVP for Sunday's parent focus group below. Your continued engagement and support is critical to the future of WHPS.

• Evidence List
• Parent Information: Elementary Version
• Mission, Vision & Goals
• Social-Emotional Learning
• Gifted Education
• Positive Teacher Language (explained)
• 2020 Action Plan

Persuasive Writing:
Student Letters to the Government

Since the beginning of the school year, we’ve been discussing the importance of climate change and how it’s affecting all of us. Room 19 watched Greta Thunberg’s speech to the world leaders at the UN Climate Action Summit. We discussed how strong and brave she was at merely 16 years old.  We talked about what it means to be an activist and how important it is to have a voice, no matter how old we are. Shortly after that, one of our WHPS parents came in to read a chapter from her new book about helping kids make a difference in the world. She also shared some of her personal activism experiences with the students, which inspired even more students to want to make their voices heard. That spark led us to viewing Meghan Markle’s 2015 speech at the UN Women Conference. In her speech, she spoke about a letter she wrote to a variety of government officials addressing a sexist advertisement when she was 11 years old. After that, we had no choice, we decided as a class that we would be writing letters to our government. Our class decided on five possible topics to address: animal rights, climate change, gun control, discrimination, and bullying. 

First, the students conducted research in groups based on their choice of topic because we knew we needed to gain some knowledge and facts. No fake news here! 

Here’s where Writer’s Workshop comes in. We were able to align this project with our already-planned persuasive writing unit. Below, you can see some of the skills we taught as part of this unit that ultimately went into the students’ letters.

Once the students developed strong arguments for their cause, it was time to decide where to send them. But, who was the best government official to receive our letters? This took a little bit more research and some lessons on how the government works. Finally, after each student found the appropriate official to receive their letter, the addresses were written on the envelopes, and the stamps were placed. The students were very excited to finally send their letters and to have their voices heard. At our publishing celebration, we also brought in parents to hear the published letters. Now, we’re patiently waiting for responses from the officials we wrote to.

Besides the student-driven nature of this project, one of the things I loved about it is that this is a beginning step of these children becoming active in their government. A step that many adults don’t take until later in life; a step some never take. With a presidential election around the corner and many pressing issues in the news everyday, it’s so important to get kids interested and involved in government early. No matter their view, it’s how our democracy works the best, with informed and involved citizens. As their teacher, it’s fun for me to see their passion each and every day, but, as a citizen, it’s even more exciting to see them speaking up and advocating for the world they want to live in. I hope for them, and for all of us, that this project was just the beginning.

Anti-Bias Education

Recently our teachers attended anti-bias training during their staff meeting. In our training, we learned that providing an anti-bias curriculum lends itself nicely to fulfilling our school’s philosophy. What is anti-bias curriculum, and how does it relate to the WHPS community? 

According to the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) there are four core goals of anti-bias education:

1. Identity:  Teachers will nurture each child’s construction of knowledgeable, confident, individual personal and social identities. Children will demonstrate self-awareness, confidence, family pride, and positive social identities.
2. Diversity:  Teachers will promote each child’s comfortable, empathetic interaction with people from diverse backgrounds. Children will express comfort and joy with human diversity, use accurate language for human differences, and form deep, caring connections across all dimensions of human diversity.
3. Justice:  Teachers will foster each child’s capacity to critically identify bias and will nurture each child’s empathy for the hurt bias causes. Children will increasingly recognize unfairness (injustice), have language to describe unfairness, and understand that unfairness hurts.
4. Activism:  Teachers will cultivate each child’s ability and confidence to stand up for oneself and for others in the face of bias. Children will demonstrate a sense of empowerment and the skills to act, with others or alone, against prejudice and/or discriminatory actions.

While these are some of the goals we strive to embed in our program, we know that our families enjoy being able to promote these same attitudes at home. We encourage you to be on the lookout for the many teachable moments you encounter everyday. The most important thing to remember is children are wired to notice differences and ignoring them (or pretending to) leads to the development of biased thinking. How we respond to differences will set the stage for children’s interactions with those who may be different from themselves. So don’t shy away from those awkward conversations. Be brave and if you’re just not sure what to say or how to have a conversation with your young child please stop by your preschool directors’ office. We are always happy to be your sounding board. Being able to talk with your child about their identity, diversity, justice (fairness), and activism (empowerment) will help your child develop positive habits and attitudes that will last a lifetime.