Crew

The crew programme is based around three guiding questions

1. Who am I ?
2. How am I doing?
3. Where am I going?

There appears to be systematic team and skill building activities and challenges.

The who am i question resonates with Larry Rosenstocks assertion that "What is adolescence but when you try on new roles and trying on new identities?" Therefore providing student many different opportunities to interact and work like and with adults is central.

The crew session I observed was a great model of this practice at Casco Bay. 
1. the student arrived and without prompt gathered in a circle. 
2. They asked many more questions than the teacher.
3.They discussed an upcoming shared experience. ( community of practice) as they planned their performance for an upcoming talent contest.Everys student was required to be involved. 
4. Teacher asked the students to reserve judgement and then modelled this behaviour.
5. Student ownership was central, decisions left to them, Do you want to table this now? 

The portfolio, exhibition and student led conferences clearly dealt with the next two. The Crew time, therefore dedicated time for these tasks too. 

At King Middle students had around 2.5hrs of Crew per 6 day cycle. 

Community of practice

Communities of practice are groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly.

I have seen lots of this on this trip between the staff, between the students and between the staff and the students in both institutions.

" a community needs a common goal" was an opening gambit from Mike McCarthy, head of King Middle. There mission is clear and mantra like." We get everyone to the top of the hill, it is not enough to get yourself there"

It appears that EL have deliberately set up such a community of practice

Where a community of practice could be seen	Example	Expeditionary Learning model exampel
Problem solving	“Can we work on this design and brainstorm some ideas; I’m stuck.”	Guiding Questions.
Requests for information	“Where can I find the code to connect to the server?”	The primacy of Self Discovery
Seeking experience	“Has anyone dealt with a customer in this situation?”	Work with Experts
Reusing assets	“I have a proposal for a local area network I wrote for a client last year. I can send it to you and you can easily tweak it for this new client.”	Use of Models, prior student work
Coordination and synergy	“Can we combine our purchases of solvent to achieve bulk discounts?”	Crew, small teams
Discussing developments	“What do you think of the new CAD system? Does it really help?”	Student led conferences
Documentation projects	“We have faced this problem five times now. Let us write it down once and for all.”	Drafting culture
Visits	“Can we come and see your after-school program? We need to establish one in our city.”	Expeditions and experts. Public Exhibition
Mapping knowledge and identifying gaps	“Who knows what, and what are we missing? What other groups should we connect with?”	Concepts are mapped

An interesting part of this all is the notion of legitimate peripheral participation, where by newbies begin on the periphery. They make no attempt to tackle the hard problems, but watch and help out with simpilar tasks. Their contributions are welcomed as they learn to become more sophisticated in their craft. 

A few  of simple examples spring to mind. 

1. Mixed ability ( what ever ability means) groupings.

2. The pair of the students that showed me around. One was a very articulate, very assertive student clearly academically gifted student, the other had started learning English after arriving as a refugee in 2011, who smiled widely but sometime struggled to explain his thoughts. So, while the first student explained eloquently the complexities of her  6 day schedule/ timetable and used phrases like " the HOWL's help us to develop our skills", he would say "Please come this way" and "I like this school" 

3. The grouping for the crew session that was ran by 2 students and groups of 11 adults, had a similar combination of the word rich and the word poor. 

4. Every group of students follow the same expedition
5. Student practicing and rehearsing a class presentation. Class focus on volume. SOme were confident and enunciated others, read quietly and looked down. But their was models of how it should be done. A classroom assistant even modelled the posture needed to present well, as each student took their turn.

Although the formal teaching of language is considered deeply at King Middle the informal day to day practice helps a great deal.

Crew and crew advisors

Every students is a member of a crew. Crews are small and perfectly formed - 15 to 20 students max. Crew meets 4 times per week. The advisory time has a different focus each day but the three guiding questions are always the same

1. Who am I? (As an individual, a learner, contributor to crew, school and wider community)

2. How am I doing? (Academic standards, HOWs, goals and targets)

3. What are my plans for the future? (What college, what career do I want to explore, what steps am I going to take)

Crew is all about being known well by at least one adult in school, being an active part of a small supportive community and being cared for by a group of people in school.

All crew work is focused on progress in all areas of school - academic achievement, character traits, crew community, supporting others, etc. 

There are lots of crew which chime with us - home group, learning guide, learning reviews BUT do the structures we have in place really allow for this to happen?

How can we get smaller home groups?

Can we meet on a more regular basis and really have a clear focus on progress/growth of the individual?

Can we take away distractions which get in the way of 'crew type advisory' eg. PSHE was not delivered in crew but in the wellness programme. At the moment are we putting too much content in and this is stopping the work we really want to do in knowing students and knowing them well, learning guide as advocate, holistic achievement, etc?

A wonderful Lobster Coincidence.

Yesterday morning the Headline in the local Portland newspaper amused me. It is not often that a front page about Lobsters, but this also told me that Lobsters really matter around here.

For lunch we wandered past a Gilbert's Chowder House, a diner at the old port. Sitting down the first thing we noticed was a wooden flip book about the lobsters. It is written by elementary third graders at Presumpscot School. We instantly recognised this a expeditionary learning school.

It is basically a science project with questions and answers about the lobsters life history and biology. Although each answer is short it is written beautifully, in technical language and academically ie in genre ( eg third person)

What stood out was the choice of topic- a science project ran through a cultural element of the town. The project is purposefully placed in the students home town in their identity. Lobsters really do matter around here.