My friend Sara works at Choice Technical Academy in Owatonna, MN. I used to work with her at another school and we became friends. This week I decided to go visit her so here I am.
This school is in its first year. Technical Academies of Minnesota is expanding and Choice is the second of four schools they are opening in coming years. Earlier this summer I came down and was at an open house for the school. I met prospective students and students who already knew that this is where they wanted to be. It is really cool that some of the students here recognize me from this summer.
We arrived at the same time that 2 students arrived. The students immediately decided to vacuum the room where school is held. It was awesome to see them take initiative to clean their community.
We started off the school portion of the day with Advisory. Sara's Advisory introduced themselves to me and told me a little tidbit about themselves that was new since starting here. We also all shared one fear that we had; ranging from the brave who claimed to fear nothing, to silly (Humpty Dumpty), and real (of graduating and what the future holds). Being a Friday, the students were a little more rammy than usual but were all at ease and curious as to why I was here. It seems shocking sometimes to teens that their teachers actually have friends and a life outside of school. *wink*
Math came next. I worked with a student on decimal place values, fractions with exponents, and some algebraic equations. I greatly enjoy working on math.
After math, some students went to a teacher led seminar. Others stayed behind to work on their individual projects. I went around to students in Sara's advisory and spoke with them about what they were working on. I saw projects on Australia, a personal Atlas using PowerPoint, Slipknot (as in the band, music, and psychological effects), tornadoes, cells, computer programing, foreign languages (German, Russian, Spanish), the Holocaust, photography, what colleges a student was looking at attending when they graduate, calligraphy, and more! Most were very excited to talk to me about their projects and books they were reading and using to research.
A few students needed to go to the library so I tagged along. The group grew to 8 students when others heard of the outing. While we were at the library a boy expressed his interest in reading Manga books. I learned last year from a student that you start Manga books from the back and read from the right to the left. (I found an example.) A couple of the students took him over to the Manga section. Pretty soon there were about 6 of the students in the section. I was standing right by them and I listened as the students all encouraged the boy and explained to him how to read the Manga books. He said it seemed confusing and they told him to come sit down, they would teach him. Five of the students went to a table and proceeded to teach him how to read the Manga and they gave him advice on what books he should try, what series were good, what ones might interest him, etc. I found this very cool and encouraging. A fun note on the trip is that a girl was VERY disappointed that the librarian would only let her check out 11 books. This reminded me of myself when I was a girl. I would check out 20 or so at a time.
After we came back from the library, we had lunch. Everyone, including students bring their own lunch. The school is too small (39 students so far) for a lunch program and there is no kitchen for them to prepare lunches. Sara had brought homemade chili for us. The only thing missing was avocados. 2 years ago she was eating her chili with avocados. I love avocados but had never tried them in chili. I tried it and LOVE my chili that way. But alas, there were no avocados today.
After lunch we had reading time. Ah, the quiet. Everyone was engaged in a book or in a reading group. I got a few chapters of The Death Cure by James Dashner read. No matter what school, reading time never lasts long enough!
Finally there is personal project time, which is when I am typing this. The last 40 minutes also include an optional fitness activity. Today was soccer and most of the students are signed up to play.
I greatly enjoyed my day at Choice Technical Academy with Sara and her students.
Selfie: Myself and Sara
