The Start of Session Two

The start of session two of the summer PAGE program started off with a bang, quite literally. While the previous session had been focused on projects geared toward middle grades girls in 6th-8th grade, the second session of the program was created with older girls in mind. The main project of the second session is the astronomy exploration with Mimi, who the rest of the interns trained with last week. Mimi brings passion and excitement to everything that she does and the introductions at the start of this week were no different.

On Monday, Mimi collected us all together to do a very energetic and active icebreaker that had everyone laughing by the end of it. The premise was that everyone would stand in a circle, clapping, and as it became someone's turn, then they would jump to the middle of the circle and say their name and a word that described them. It was a great way to get everyone together in a fun environment and set a great precedent for the rest of the day. Also on Monday, Mimi had us begin to think about the solar system and the stars by having us write about our connection to space and science in our journals. One teaching tactic that Mimi uses that I really like is how she implements plenty of writing and art into her lessons; something that you might not normally expect from a science instructor. She provides ample avenues of entry for students wanting to learn more about science and makes sure that everyone has the knowledge that they need in order to succeed. I think that writing about how we relate to science was a good entry prompt because it allowed us to reflect on how we may or may not see ourselves as scientists and then be empowered through the day’s activities to believe that we most surely could be.

Throughout the rest of the week, we learned a lot about space and our place in the cosmos, which were supplemented by a plethora of activities and experiments. Above, I’ve included a picture from one of those experiments where we created a pocket sample scale of the universe. Out in the hallway we had done an activity where we assigned girls to be different planets in our solar system and then converted AU measurements to pieces of toilet paper. One girl had started as our sun and by the time that we had measured out to pluto we had taken up the entire length of the school hallway. Then, back in the classroom, we further condensed those measurements to a single strip of paper and listed the AU distances for each of the planets so that the girls would have those references handy for other experiments throughout the rest of the week.

Another one of the experiments that we did was building a simple telescope in order to view the supermoon that took place this week. While we built these telescopes we learned about light and mirrors and optics and how all of that plays a role in how we see the sky. A happy occurrence was that right after we built these telescopes and had recorded observations of our moon viewing in the journals, the James Webb telescope released new pictures that allowed us to have even more in-depth discussions and explorations into this topic. I feel so incredibly blessed that I am having this experience when there are so many cool things going on in space right now and so excited that we all at the PAGE program get to share in this collective excitement together.

Another aspect of the program that I have been working on this week has been the literature groups. While I am still doing work as the literature coordinator and working on more organizational and administrative tasks — I have also stepped back into working directly with my friend Emily and their literature group. This decision came after the team decided that we needed to place another intern in tech support to help with communications items.

I am so happy to be working directly with a group as teaching is something that I very much enjoy and love. Being able to plan and facilitate lessons has been such a blessing. This session, we have split into two groups (each led by two interns) and are reading the novels “Bone Black” by bell hooks and “Weedeater” by Robert Gipe. The goal of the literature groups is to focus on Appalachian authors and we have tried to select novels that portray the diverse landscape and people that inhabit the region. I am working with the group that is reading “Bone Black”. We have decided directly focus on the elements of how memior works and how objects can represent a sense of self when recollecting pieces of our lives to tell a larger story, as bell hooks does in her novel.

To start, on Monday we did a building background workshop (BBK), which I learned about last year when I was taking a class taught by Dr. Wong at Berea. We looked at several artifacts such as booklists, poems, short articles, artwork, and digital media to learn more about who bell hooks was. Girls were guided by two questions that Emily and I asked them to keep in mind as they explored:

1. Who was bell hooks?
2. What was important to her as an author and activist?

When girls were done reviewing the materials, we reconvened to share what we had learned. I particularly like BBK workshops because they allow students to review large amounts of primary and secondary documents and then come together to share and learn about things that they may have not gotten the chance to look at.

Throughout the rest of the week we focused on reading the novel and really honing in on discovering and discussing how bell hooks uses objects important in her life to guide the arc of the memoir. In the beginning of the book, hooks mentions the importance of a hope chest in her family and then turns that idea on its head as she explores what it means to create a hope chest of things to carry into adulthood, but not necessarily into marriage. The main project that we are doing with the students is having them create their own “hope chest” of objects that they feel like have had an impact on their lives and also represent what they would like to carry with them into their adult lives. These projects will be shown at an exhibition which will take place on the last day of the session, this upcoming Friday.