Friday, March 29, 2024

Beaver Valley, a small school with big ideas

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A small school to meet the needs of families living in Plain, Lake Wenatchee, and Merritt has existed in one shape or another for almost 100 years. Isolated schools often struggle, lacking access to resources more readily available in towns and cities.
However, Beaver Valley School (BVS), under the direction of Eric Tiegel and Heidi Flake, is flourishing. Both teach multiple grade levels at once; Flake teaches kindergarteners and first graders, Tiegel teaches second through fourth, and they share oversight of one fifth grader.
A recent Wednesday at BVS gave a sense of the unique opportunities found here. Students, in three multi-age groups, spent the day going through “Art Rotations,” interspersed with recesses and lunch.
The rotations were not rubric-based. “We don’t make explicit connections during this time,” said Tiegel. “We let the kids process, each in their own way.”
Activity filled the school. In Flake’s room kids worked on a Friendship Project. Kids looked at logos as a way to recognize and advertise products for people to buy,” Flake explained. “We are using the same concept of designing a logo but our theme is friendship.
“One student made a bubble and said ‘this is because friends can be in my bubble too.’ One logo is designed like a boat for ‘friends to go out and do something.’”
Para educator Sharlynn Parker gets to serve as a teacher too. For her rotation in the library, she had the group listen to “My Own Two Hands” by singer-songwriter Ben Harper. The students decorated the printed lyrics with vibrant colors, and added cutouts of their hands.
When finished they pulled books off the library shelves to read. Four boys piled onto a beanbag, their heads leaning in together over the words in a book.
Then came recess out in the dazzling sunlit snow. Several kids switched into skis boots, strapped on skinny skis from the shed and went to kick and glide on the undulating trail behind the school.
After recess the students flowed back inside and quickly settled down. Tiegel began his session with a conversation in a circle. The children recalled studying each others’ faces, using magnifying lenses. The lenses revealed details such as cracked lips and little hairs on the ears.
Tiegel subtly brought mathematics into the art lesson. He probed kids to remember what they’d learned about their faces.
“There are four quadrants of the face,” one child said.
“From left to right our faces are symmetrical,” said another.
“But they’re very different from top to bottom, right? What if they were symmetrical that way?” asked Tiegel, earning some giggles. He added, “Think about the distances between our eyes, and from our eyes to the tops of our heads.” Then he set them loose to draw a classmate’s portrait. At the end, the children tacked the portraits up for all to see and gave observant comments about their own work and that of others.
Building on this art lesson, next week they will draw themselves from a photograph and later draw a noteworthy historical figure in connection with Black History Month.
All of these activities exemplify Tiegel’s and Flake’s thoughtful teaching styles. Everything is done for a reason. As Tiegel explains, “Poverty of experience is the issue of rural schools. So, how can you get kids out? What experiences can you bring into the classroom?”
Field trips are important. In the fall, as part of a school-wide project, students wrote stories, learning about character development, setting and plot. They took a field trip to Mountain Meadows Retirement Community and read their stories aloud to the residents.
BVS, as part of Cascade School District, is under the direction of Principal Kenny Renner-Singer, who bases his day-to-day operations out of Osborn Elementary, fifteen miles away. “Mr. Renner-Singer gives us freedom to just teach rather than follow a strict curriculum,” said Tiegel.
For instance, science kits are designed for a specific grade level, but BVS has to approach science differently. Tiegel said, “We pick topics and link them to the next generation standards. We follow the agreed-to standards, and get the materials for curriculum to match that, rather than use pre-made published materials.”
Discipline looks different at BVS because, again, there’s no principal’s office down the hall. But with such a low student to teacher ratio, there’s time and space to handle each child’s needs. In addition, a sense of family amongst students helps diminish the amount of discipline required.
At the beginning of each school year the BVS students sign a contract with a few simple rules. “The rules are about promoting a growth mindset,” Tiegel said. “The most important one is rule #1: Make mistakes.” Other rules have to do with self-control, mindful choices and participating. “We use the words of the rules every day,” added Flake.
The two BVS teachers impact the district at large as well. Flake, as one of district’s Washington State Science Fellows, is engaged in helping the district implement the next generation science standards. Thus, the BVS kids benefit from her knowledge and passion for science. And Tiegel is the district’s robot club advisor, which includes teams from not only BVS, but also Osborn and IRMS.
Parker’s role has grown over the years and now she’s in charge of ukulele lessons, teaching traditional folk songs to the students in small groups. She plays guitar, and is learning ukulele herself. “I try to stay a few steps ahead,” she said. Grant money and financial support from the Parent Group and other local organizations bought enough ukuleles so each student can borrow one for the year and take it home to practice.
At 2:30 that Wednesday, Flake played the Mission Impossible theme song for cleanup. To an energetic beat, the students zoomed around, recycling paper scraps, putting away supplies and stacking chairs on tables.
With backpacks packed, everyone gathered in the foyer for Reflection. Many children raised their hands, but time allowed for only a few to share their favorite part of learning that day. One girl said, “I liked everything about today.”
That seems to sum up the students’ experience created by Tiegel and Flake, day after day.
 

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