Alternative education post-pandemic: Where are we going from here?

We have an opportunity to create a new and better normal if we consider the needs of all learners
in re-entry. . . . As natural and human-made systems collide in unprecedented ways, young people
are growing up in a world where novelty, complexity, and mutuality are the norm. How we respond
in adaptive, thoughtful, inclusive, and creative ways will be the most important lessons we teach.

—Eric Tucker and Tom Vander Ark
“How to Reopen Schools: A 10-Point Plan Putting Equity at the Center”
GettingSmart.com, April 29, 2020

We’ve come to the fourth article in our series on the adaptations and transformations that are happening in schools here in Austin as a result of the sudden necessity of distance learning during the COVID-19 crisis. We started with a broad view of education in emergencies, then looked at how our own ATX family of alternative schools is handling social-emotional learning and injecting creativity and play into their evolving learning plans. Now we are going to look at a topic that’s on our minds a lot these days: What does the future hold? 

Without question, the way we educate our kids (and they educate themselves!) in the United States and across the globe will feel the impact of this moment going forward. Education reformer Tom Vander Ark sees cause for optimism “post pandemic.” He describes schools that embrace more personalized learning and flexibility based on competency. As we might expect, he anticipates more home-based and hybrid learning, with as many as half a million students just not returning to their regular schools. “Hundreds of parents will turn their homeschool into a microschool,” says Vander Ark. He also sees a boom in project-based learning:

. . . with state testing cancelled and a lot more flexible time, many learners are engaging in interest-based learning and impromptu projects. School closures have been a reminder that learning can happen anywhere. When kids return to school, some schools will respond with more project-based learning connected to local problems and opportunities.

Earth Native Wilderness School students turn their backyards and kitchens into botany classrooms.

And in very good news for our alternative learning communities, Vander Ark also sees the end of more than 30 years of preoccupation with testing as the main basis for measuring learners’ and schools’ progress.

Douglas Harris, an academic who studied the dramatic changes in New Orleans’s schools after Hurricane Katrina, says there are general lessons about how educators and students adapt to crises that we can learn from the New Orleans experience. One likely outcome of the pandemic is that there will be a few tools of distance learning that both students and teachers decide they like, and those tools will stick around. But it’s unlikely, Harris thinks, that there will be a dramatic move toward either homeschooling or fully virtual learning because there are too many disadvantages for the majority of families. Unlike Vander Ark, Brown also doesn’t think competency-based learning will expand dramatically in the long run. But there will be some surprising long-term indirect results of the pandemic, including putting more teachers and parents in the role of coaches, with students taking greater control of their own learning.

In our own survey of 35 Austin-area alternative schools, we found that all the educators are thinking about and planning for the future right now, with many focused on expanding just the sort of student-directed learning both Brown and Vander Ark are talking about.

Educators in the community feel it is their responsibility to support parents as far as possible in their new roles. In some cases that has meant continuing schooling online so that kids have a familiar routine and parents are able to focus on other tasks, says Eustace Isidore of 4Points Academy. And in other cases, it means guiding parents in setting up homeschooling, as is the case at Bridges Academy Austin.

One of the most consistent issues in our survey comments was dedication to student-directed learning. Cathy Lewis of Long-View Micro School explained:

Long-View has a cultural norm of “driving your own learning.” We take this very seriously as we are cultivating intellectually curious and driven learners. This norm was taken to a new level when we had to pivot to learning at home . . . We have seen some kids step up to new levels: We have one learner helping us develop content and several others choosing to support younger kids by meeting with them virtually or giving them feedback on work they’ve turned in.

Laura Sandefer of Acton Academy added that she believes parents have been “happily surprised” about what independent learners their kids are and that they do have the skills to drive their own school projects, even at young ages.

Clearly, the success of schooling right now depends on flexibility on all sides, and schools are trying to accommodate families’ needs. Acton Academy West Austin (the Westlake campus) shortened its spring break to help keep kids on track, and at Ascent, another Acton Academy, each family is getting one-on-one support tailored to their needs. Abrome and other Agile Learning Centers are working in collaboration to add new, optional offerings for learners.

A strong, kind, smart, and powerful Acton West Austin student opens up her home toolbox to hone some maker skills.

Beyond learners and families is the larger community, and the schools we surveyed are reaching out to connect there, too. La Tribu preschool is now opening to enroll students in a Spanish-language virtual learning program that mixes live classes and other activities. Jenny Alperin of Guidepost Montessori at Brushy Creek shared that they have created an online platform that is free to the general public so any family can join in interactive learning and find other resources. Long-View is also opening its micro school to kids beyond the regularly enrolled students who might like to take just a few classes.

So, what will the future hold for Austin’s alternative schools?

Some schools, including International School of Texas, AHB Community School, La Tribu Preschool, and Kirby Hall School report that they have seen an increase in connectedness during the crisis, with students and families feeling grateful for their communities in a way they hadn’t anticipated.

We see in all the schools’ responses a lot of hope for the future and the next phase of alternative education in Austin. There’s the hope, expressed by David Darcy of School on the Rise and Anne Remme at Speech-Language-Play, that small alternative schools, especially micro schools, will be among the first to reopen because the small class sizes mean less risk and easier social distancing.

David Darcy begins morning lessons live via laptop from a School on the Rise classroom.

Angela Griffiths of Acton Academy Northwest Austin says she hopes that parents everywhere will see more clearly all the realities their kids are facing. “It’s my sincere hope that they look at what their kids are being put through and say to themselves . . . ‘There’s got to be a better way.” And maybe that better way includes alternative education models.

Looking toward the future, journalist Anya Kamenetz reports that education researcher Maria Litvinova says the safest and best future is what most of our alt schools are doing already: keeping class sizes as small as possible. In Denmark’s International School, right now they’re sticking to 10 students per class. Other researchers suggest that staggering calendars for different groups of students, changing attendance policies, and improving both digital learning access and social and emotional support for all students are prerequisites in post-pandemic schools everywhere. Not only academic support, but also mental health support for students, says James Lane, Virginia’s state superintendent of public instruction, will be the top priority when kids return to brick-and-mortar schools.

In the meantime, educators, parents, community activists, and students are all thinking about the future and hoping that new and better ways of learning and connecting will emerge from this unusual time. As author Rebecca Solnit has observed in A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities that Arise in Disaster, sometimes the worst of times can provide flashes that give us “a glimpse of who else we ourselves may be and what else our society could become.”

Shelley Sperry  |  Sperry Editorial

Educating our kids and ourselves in times of emergency

Photo by Glen Carrie on Unsplash

Learning is a social phenomenon, and human interaction is a catalyst. Especially in emergency situations, learning is a social and emotional experience, so human relationships have to be a priority.

—Nishi Andra, technology for education consultant,
ICARE co-founder, and currently working with UNICEF

It’s hard not to gasp when you read the stunning statistic that nine out of every ten children in the world who are normally enrolled in school are not in class at this moment because of the coronavirus pandemic. An event of this magnitude remains difficult for most Americans to comprehend, but there are precedents on a smaller scale that can help us understand COVID-19’s impact on education. Disasters—from hurricanes and fires to wars and terrorism—affect large numbers of students in specific locations every year. Think of Syrian refugees or the victims of ebola in Liberia or earthquakes in Puerto Rico and Haiti. 

Prompted by a recent talk with Nishi Andra, a friend and collaborator with Alt Ed Austin who is currently working on an education project for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, I decided to look into the topic of educating students in crisis situations more deeply. In this article, I’ll examine some of the big takeaways and how they might help inform educators, parents, and students in the United States today. In the next three posts on this blog, we’ll zoom in to look at exactly how Austin’s own community of alternative schools is adapting and helping kids learn and thrive, despite the challenges. 

In a story for NPR, education reporter Anya Kamenetz introduced me to a field of research that’s about 20 years old, called education in emergencies (EIE). According to EIE studies, the learning time kids lose during a semester of extreme disruption like we’re all experiencing now can take up to two years to make up. As many of us can see in Austin and across the country, the struggle is especially hard for lower income and more vulnerable kids. As demonstrated not only in international crisis zones, but also closer to home in places like post-Katrina New Orleans, education disruption can have lasting effects on kids’ mental health and educational achievements.

First, let’s recognize just how unprecedented in scale our current situation is. Rebecca Winthrop, of the Center for Universal Education, says that in 2013, five million children were out of school as a result of the Ebola virus. In 2010, millions more in Pakistan saw their schools closed as a result of severe flooding. And in 1918, the global flu pandemic to which COVID-19 is often compared closed schools in 40 U.S. cities. Each of those crises affected only a small fraction of the 1.5 billion kids who are out of school in 180+ countries right now.

Still, EIE researchers believe we can use lessons from past emergency events to cope in the present. Here are the most pertinent lessons I think we can draw upon:

• Health Education: Parents and educators need to integrate education about the coronavirus and how to stay as safe and healthy as possible into daily learning time for kids from preschool on up to high school and college. Safety lessons about handwashing and social distancing and factual information about the science of virus spread can be turned into fun songs and games, but these messages are just as critical now (and for future waves of the virus) as are math and social studies.
  
  Health education is something that’s easy to forget with our own kids running around in home lockdown. We’re sealed up inside our homes or in our own backyards, so reminding kids to wash themselves or disinfect surfaces seems less urgent. Winthrop notes that many schools teaching remotely actually skip health information altogether in a rush to get other subjects in. But the fact that students are learning at home actually makes it more likely that health messages will turn into dinner-table conversation and stick with them for life—keeping them and the community healthier in the future.
  
  Austin early childhood educator Marie Catrett uses a cute story with a felt board and a comic from NPR to help kids understand the basics of the virus and how important good health practices, like handwashing, are. She shared her thoughts on communicating with kids about COVID-19 in a recent guest post on this blog. Some schools in the Austin area provide regular opportunities for students to ask questions. For example, the school nurse at the International School of Texas hosts “wellness chats” each Tuesday and Thursday.

• The Power of Routine and Ritual: Another lesson from research on education in emergencies is that routines—especially morning routines—matter. Jamie Weiss-Yagoda, of the International Rescue Committee, says that any routine educational activities parents put in place each day can “give young people a sense of stability amid rapid change.” A routine, no matter how simple, can counteract feelings of dislocation and chaos that children feel during an emergency disruption. Knowing what to expect each morning can soothe anxiety for kids—and parents, too!
  
  In some refugee camps in Greece, UNICEF is providing daily podcast lessons with students’ regular teachers, maintaining the social distancing requirements, but giving kids a sense of continuity and contact as well as a regular routine to look forward to.
  
  Early childhood educator Beth O’Brien suggests that especially for young children, short daily points of connection with teachers is important. That can come via email, texts, videos, picking up packets at drop-off points, or letters in the mail. “Our goal,” says O’Brien, “is not to replicate a typical school-day schedule or intended curriculum online or at home. The goal is to help students continue to feel connected (to the teacher, to each other, to the school), known, and nurtured even though a significant part of their routine has been disrupted.” AHB Community School in Austin reports that classes are still holding versions of “community circles” and sharing time through Google Hangouts. Both students and parents can attend teachers’ virtual office hours to get help or just a little companionship.
  
  In a recent report, educators Armand Doucet, Deborah Netolicky, Koen Timmers, and Francis Tuscano found that older kids may be experiencing a period of mourning because they’ve lost events and traditions they look forward to all year—a special field trip, prom, a science fair, and of course, graduation. In Austin, Griffin School will be holding graduation at the Blue Starlite Drive-In, allowing seniors to decorate their cars and drive by to receive diplomas—with the full ceremony playing over car speakers! That’s some serious innovative thinking.

• Social-Emotional Learning and the Healing Classroom: The International Rescue Committee emphasizes the importance of creating a “healing classroom” that provides for the social and emotional needs of kids in emergencies. In keeping with the approach of many alternative schools, our schools-at-home should be supportive, comfortable environments where kids feel safe enough to follow their natural inclination to learn. Often, that means de-emphasizing academic expectations and emphasizing anything that promotes mental and emotional health.
  
  As Doucet and his colleagues put it, school can be a place where kids “are empowered to lead their authentic lives.” Distance from friends and beloved teachers creates anxiety and stress that needs to be acknowledged. Like most of the schools we’ve heard from at Alt Ed Austin, Roving Learners is committed to providing an outlet for anxiety. They bring kids together in restorative circles twice a day and work one-on-one with students to relieve the stresses inherent in this new situation.
  
  We’ll talk more about Austin’s alternative school community and its approaches to social-emotional learning in the next article in this series.

• Instead of “Getting Back to Normal,” Getting Better: Educators and policymakers across the world are viewing the current moment as an opportunity to make schools better when kids return and to be better prepared for the next crisis. Some of the ways folks are rethinking the future of education to serve all students’ needs include things that we can work on right now with our kids at home:

• Finding better avenues for peer-to-peer connections for both kids and educators. Most students today are experts at staying in contact via social media of all kinds, but transitioning the tools they use regularly for fun into tools that can deepen and enhance learning is a challenge for educators. One piece of advice from education expert Erika E. Smith that applies to both educators and parents is to allow students to build connections on their own. They may want to use online forums or just exchange contact information without involving adults, and that will often allow for more comfortable sharing of ideas and information. Educators and parents have the same need to share ideas and help each other. Nishi Andra shared a touching story with me about teachers in other countries creating video lessons in the Rohingya language to help and support teachers in refugee camps. 

• Bending and breaking old rules that clearly don’t work or don’t serve kids’ needs. Some schools are saying it’s okay for academic lessons and specific content expectations to lapse right now and planning to develop summer school courses for catching up later. Many states, including Texas, are canceling standardized tests, and colleges are waiving admissions requirements for SAT and ACT scores—and using the moment to reconsider whether they will be needed in the future.

• Building stronger, deeper relationships between families and schools. In a national survey last year, only half of parents reported communicating with their child’s teacher outside of formal parent-teacher conferences and less than 75 percent were helping kids with homework. Those statistics may change as a result of the changes happening in almost every family right now.

• Making sure that free, high-quality technology and Internet connectivity is available to everyone, or if that’s not possible, investing in alternatives. Technology is a pivotal aspect of almost every discussion of the learning that’s taking place at home right now. At the same time, we know that many students don’t have access to the hardware they need or reliable Internet connections. Providing those essentials is a challenge for public policy in the coming years. At the moment, though, a lot of communities are finding that some older, tried-and-true technologies, including public radio and TV, can bring content to almost every student. 

In an op-ed about the impact of the Korean conflict of the 1950s on education in South Korea, Woody Paik emphasized crises as opportunities for growth and improvement, and schools as tools for recovery. The world can become a classroom and a laboratory for kids, parents, schools, and communities to experiment and explore new paths for learning. In the next three articles in this series, we’ll see how more than 30 of Austin’s alternative schools are doing just that.

To Learn More:

Armand Doucet, et al., “Thinking About Pedagogy in an Unfolding Pandemic,” March 19, 2020

Anya Kamenetz, “What Do Students Need to Recover When School Closes for Months?" NPR Morning Edition, April 1, 2020 

Woody Paik, “What the U.S. Can Learn About Education during Crisis from South Korea’s Wartime Example,” Hechinger Report, April 9, 2020

Reishan Richards and Stephen J. Valentine, “How to Keep School Rhythm and Routines for Young Children at Home,” EdSurge, March 17, 2020

Valerie Strauss, “If Online Learning Isn’t Working for Your Kids, Try Public Television,” Washington Post, April 14, 2020

Jamie Weiss-Yagoda, “Education Tips for Parents During the Coronavirus Crisis,” RESCUE April 3, 2020

Rebecca Winthrop, “COVID-19 and School Closures: What can countries learn from past emergencies?” Brookings Institution, March 31, 2020

Rebecca Winthrop, “COVID-19 is a Health Crisis. So Why is Health Education Missing from Schoolwork?” EdSurge April 3, 2020

Websites:

PBS Learning Resources

Learning Keeps Going 

Videos:

“How Learning Changes When School Happens at Home and Online,” PBS News Hour, March 31, 2020.

“‘You’re Not Alone’: How Teenagers Are Dealing with Social Distancing,” PBS News Hour, April 15, 2020.

“Teaching Special Education Online During COVID-19,” eLuma Online Therapy, March 19, 2020.

“Sesame and the IRC join forces to help Syrian refugee children,” CBS 60 Minutes, November 17, 2019.

by Shelley Sperry | Sperry Editorial

Middle school programming: How AHB Community School’s progressive model keeps middle years students engaged in the learning process

I asked AHB Community School Executive Director Sasha Cesare to explain the unique school’s approach to middle school education. In response, she submitted this guest post, written collaboratively by staff and other community members, including insights and images gathered from AHB teachers and real, live students.

What can middle school feel like? What should middle school feel like? Sadly, in our culture, it is often the accepted default that tweens and teenagers are “difficult,” and middle school is just basically a rotten time. “Everybody gets through it. You will too,” is often the response of even the most caring and connected parents.

But what if you don’t accept that? What if you expect something more for your child in their middle years? What if you continue to expect your child to be enthusiastic about and dedicated to school, and you expect school to continue to engage, nurture, and challenge your child?

What would that look like?

“Every morning I am happy to come to school and have fun with my best friends!”
“Always fun, not boring. Always, just fun.”

These quotes are the words of middle school students at AHB Community School, a progressive K–8 school in Central Austin that has been providing a creative and collaborative educational alternative for Austin families since 2004. In those 15 years, we have learned a few things about how to keep middle school students involved, challenged, and happy, while preparing them for the target high schools of their choice. It is not the only good model for educating young adolescents, but it’s a model worthy of study.

The AHB Community School Middle Years Program (MYP) is a four-day-per-week (with optional fifth day) program designed for students aged 11 to 14, working together in what is known internally as the “Delta” class. The MYP, built on the best of international and national standards, emphasizes intellectual challenges, interdisciplinary understandings of the world around them, and a sense of belonging and service to one’s community.

Specifically, the AHB Middle Years Program is built around five key tenets:

1. Inquiry-based, interdisciplinary projects

2. A student-centered curriculum

3. A developmentally appropriate social-emotional learning (SEL) environment

4. A community-minded, service-oriented focus

5. Strong academics

What does that look like in the classroom?

Here’s a week in the life, as described by the MYP teachers:

Currently, the MYP students are studying world geography as their theme, and therefore, along with map work, we have math, reading, and writing work that all relates to our world studies. Each week, students have the opportunity to explore the part of the world on which we are focused through cooking, art, theater, poetry/literature, music, architecture, politics, and/or wildlife. We are learning about the building of the Panama Canal, the endangerment of the Amazon rainforest, and mining of precious metals in Africa by researching, presenting to, and teaching one another in small groups.

In math we did some algebraic arithmetic in the African language of Hausa, which is spoken by 40–50 million people. Students had to decipher what value each Hausa word meant in numerous equations using substitution. We then got into small groups and tackled a major algebraic and logic problem where we had to create a formula for how many fields were required to feed a community in Africa when concrete numbers were not known. The overall goals were to be able to manipulate variables even when the values are not known and be able to work with them in terms of each other. Each group did an amazing job and made huge conceptual headway in terms of learning how to think algebraically.

Later, we switched gears and did a Lorax Stock Market Game project that included reading Dr. Seuss’s The Lorax, coming up with potential rules for the Once-ler to have created a sustainable business and environment, taking the Once-ler to trial and acting out the trial complete with judges, attorneys, jury, foreman, a bailiff, the Lorax, and the Once-ler. We also discussed the concept of environmentally responsible investing and how the students could diversify their own Stock Market Game portfolios to be more diversified, including incorporating more “green” organizations into their teams’ stock holdings.

In Language Arts we are learning how to write descriptive settings that use effective figurative language and how to develop an integral setting as a “character” that drives the characterization, plot, and mood of a fictional story. We are researching real-world geographic locations as inspiration for settings and creating different types of maps to illustrate settings for these original narratives.

Throughout each week, our students apply the concepts of theme to the learning objectives and are able to exercise significant choice in their projects.

—submitted by Kirsten Coleman & Alice Elder, the MYP co-teachers
Together, they have over 15 years of experience teaching at AHB Community School.

What do the AHB middle school students have to say about this model?

About the inquiry-based learning and interdisciplinary projects:

“AHB has a great way of teaching kids about how to tackle problems.” 

“The Delta teachers make understanding tough subjects a more community-centered and in-depth experience by including captivating projects into the curriculum.”

“AHB makes learning as fun as can be by doing project-based learning, which is better than sitting around doing worksheets.”

About the student-centered curriculum:

“Students are engaged because we have choices, responsibilities.”

“The teachers will teach you according to your intellectual level, not your age/grade.”

“The students get to have a major say in upcoming projects.”

About the developmentally appropriate SEL environment:

“We do a lot of group projects that help you interact with your peers and get better relationships with them.” 

“There is both freedom and structure.”

“We have daily recess time and get to be outside.”

About the community-minded, service-oriented focus:

“We do Hope Food Pantry every month.”

“We do projects that are aimed at helping our community.”

“We did science fair projects that were about solving world-wide problems.”

About the academics:

“AHB is academically flexible but also pushes the students to the point of being ready for high school.”

“AHB is very good at preparing children for high school. It meets children at their level and tries to teach them in the best way possible for that kid. I have been here seven years and I have never experienced feeling unprepared for a certain task or assignment.”

“Some [students] are better at math, some at language arts, and we really accommodate that.”

A Different Paradigm for the Middle Years

Every stage of childhood and the coinciding parenting phase has unique challenges, but the AHB Middle Years Program challenges the assumption that school bores “big kids.” We are convinced, and see daily evidence in our classrooms, that 12- and 13-year-olds can be just as smiling, curious, and energetic as our youngest learners. They simply need a classroom and teachers that grow with them, taking on the delicate dance of both nurturing and challenging the students as needed.

Learning (and loving) math through games

Dr. Mandy Menzer is a psychologist in private practice in South Austin. In addition, she is currently the Math Pentathlon coordinator at AHB Community School. Dr. Menzer has been involved in the Math Pentathlon program as a coach, game monitor, and parent for nine years. We’re excited to welcome Dr. Menzer to the blog today as a guest contributor. If you have any questions about Math Pentathlon or participating in the AHB Math Pentathlon program (your kid does not have to be enrolled full-time at AHB), you can contact her at mandy@drmenzer.com.
 

Why do smart people enjoy saying that they are bad at math?
Few people would consider proudly announcing that they are bad at writing or reading.
—Petra Bonfert-Taylor

It is a common refrain for adults in our society to talk about how math is boring or complicated when it comes time to divide up a check or calculate the compound interest on our mortgage, for example. Is it any surprise that kids from an early age pick up on math as something to be avoided at all costs? As parents, we struggle with how to help our kids get through the never-ending grind of multiplication tables and percentages before moving on to the mysteries of Algebra and other advanced-level math, where we really start to feel out of our league.

And yet, there is an activity that kids actually enjoy doing that integrates all different types of mathematical and quantitative reasoning. GAMES!  Virtually any game that you can think of incorporates some type of mathematical concept that kids already understand at a practical level and that a sneaky parent or educator can further build on. Monopoly? Keeping track of the money in your hand and adding and subtracting to your stash. In fact, any game involving dice (or cards, for that matter) can lead to discussions around probability, even in terms of something as simple as which properties you should buy (the answer is anything within 7 spaces of a frequent landing spot such as Go or Jail).

Have a kid who is into sports? Chances are that they know a lot of numbers and statistics around their favorite player or team, which they may be more than happy to spend time digging into. Even a “word” game like Scrabble contains a lot of math, in terms of Which letters give me the most points? and How can I stick those letters on some big multipliers?

And lest we forget, video games can also integrate math skills, such as visual-spatial reasoning, problem solving, pattern recognition, and strategic thinking. I know that nothing else in life has challenged my brain as much as some of the puzzles in the Legend of Zelda videogame series.

As a psychologist and mom to two boys, as well as a huge math dork myself, I have long believed that games can be the gateway drug to achievement in math. Certainly, kids who enjoy mathematical activities are more likely to spend time practicing it (or at least make the nightly math homework less of a battle), and there seems to be data to back this up. “A new study led by Johns Hopkins University psychologists shows Bedtime Math’s Crazy 8 club significantly reduces children’s feelings of math anxiety after eight weeks of participation in the club. The effect was more pronounced among younger kids in kindergarten through second grade club.”

So how can I get started?

1. Figure out what kinds of games your kids are into, and play with them! Depending on the age of your kid, sneak some extra thought questions in here and there (“Hmmm, is it worth selling off a cheaper Monopoly property here to build a third house on this property over there?”) or simply play dumb (“I’m not sure if I have enough money to build all three of these things . . .”). Engage them in a conversation as to whether LeBron James is better than Michael Jordan and make them back it up with stats and data.
2. Make everyday activities into math games. In my carpool, we routinely guess what time we will arrive at school. We have discovered that it generally takes about 11 minutes from Lady Bird Lake to get to school, so if they want to claim the “11-minute guess,” they have to do the math to figure out what time it will be 11 minutes from now. Older kids may really get incentivized by the whole concept of compound interest if you make it worth their while (“If you’ll save some of your allowance, I’ll give you 10% interest, compounded weekly.”) After all, who doesn’t like free money?
3. Find games and activities that have math components that YOU enjoy, and model that for them. Candy Crush? Pattern recognition. Gardening or building projects require a lot of geometry and measurement. You may not need to add anything new; simply verbalize and acknowledge the mathematical elements in what you are already enjoying and let your kid see your enjoyment.

In addition, there are numerous games, apps, and activities that are specifically geared toward “math fun.” Some of my favorites include:

• 7 ate 9
• Bedtime Math
• Dragon Box
• Family Math

If you are interested in a way to get some consistent and fun math time in this school year, you can consider joining the Math Pentathlon program, which is offered by many local schools. If your school does not offer a program, feel free to join ours, which starts up September 12. We have a few slots available for kids who are in Kindergarten through 3rd grade. My family has participated 10 times with two wildly different children, and it’s always been a wonderful experience for us. Contact me, Dr. Mandy Menzer, at mmh20cornell@yahoo.com with any questions.

Dr. Mandy Menzer

Home-brewed education at AHB

Nicole Lessin is an Austin-based writer whose work has appeared in the San Antonio Express-News, Edible Austin, and the Hundreds of Heads Survival Guides. She has recently returned from a two-year adventure living in Denmark with her husband and two daughters, both of whom are thriving at AHB Community School. We invited Nicole to the blog to write about the school and its unusual fundraising and community-building tradition.
 

For the past eight years, Austin Home Base Community School (AHB), a small, progressive elementary and middle school in Hyde Park, has been hosting the Austin Home Brew Festival, an annual fundraiser that celebrates Central Texas’s finest home-brewed beers, meads, ciders, and kombuchas.

Though the brewfest began as a small backyard gathering of parents swapping their homebrews and tossing cash into the kitty, the event has in more recent years emerged as a player in the city’s iconic festival landscape, offering participants a unique, DIY Austin experience.

“People say the beers at our festival taste professional, but they are not mass marketed,” says AHB parent and longtime festival volunteer Wendy Salome. “They are unique and individual and they exist in that moment.”

Indeed, this year’s uncommon flavors—all preselected by a panel of certified beer judges and not otherwise available for sale in any stores—will include Sweet Coffee Stout, Summer Cider, and some great traditionals like Helles Lager.
 

While small-batch beer and progressive education may seem at first glance to be unlikely bedfellows, festival organizers say the slow-food spirit of home brewing is a perfect match for AHB’s creative and collaborative approach to education.

“We talk about AHB a lot as a hybrid, taking the best of different things and creating something even better out of it, and I think that’s what homebrewers do as well,” Salome says. “It’s kind of taking the things that you like about your different beers and making the beer that works best for you. That’s what families and administration have done all along at AHB.”

To be sure, in an era of increasingly standardized education, testing, and grades, the emphasis at AHB is on authentic, project-based learning, critical thinking, and community participation. Instead of standard grade levels, kids work in mixed-age classrooms. And instead of mandatory attendance five days a week, the students’ school week ranges from three to five days—depending on age and interests. 
 

“When I first discovered the school and came into the classrooms, the thing that hit me the most was the confidence and the importance of the narrative voice of the child to be heard, to be understood, to be supported, and that follows along in everything we do in our integrated curriculum,” says AHB Director Mary Williams. “The teachers set the agenda, but then it’s up to the children to help drive the curriculum and to complete the process and the products and the projects.”

Parents say the result is a unique blend of creative freedom with rigorous academics, often at the level of or even exceeding international standards.

“We wanted to find a place where kids could grow and be free and be creative, but also have structure, so we knew that there was accountability for their learning,” says festival volunteer and AHB parent Valerie Sand. “I wanted someone who knew what they were doing to say, this is what’s going to happen now. Let’s make it fun. Let’s give you ownership of it. And I really believe in that, and that makes it easy to get involved.”
 

The 8th Annual Austin Home Brew Festival will be held from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m. on Friday, November 4, 2016, at Saengerrunde Hall. For more information, go to facebook.com/AustinHomebrewFestival or ahbfestival.org.
 

Nicole Lessin

 

Movers and shakers

Austin’s alt ed community has seen lots of movin’ and shakin’ this summer. Here’s a roundup, in no particular order, of some changes you should know about as you're looking for schooling options for your kiddos.

A new school serving ages 3 to 103 is forming in Central Austin, just south of the river: Integrity Academy at Casa de Luz, Center for Integral Studies. Led by executive director Ali Ronder, formerly of AHB Community School, and founder Eduardo “Wayo” Longoria, the school is currently enrolling (and hiring!) for the 2014–2015 school year. You can help shape the school’s future or just enjoy a stimulating discussion about how humans learn by attending one of Integrity’s weekly salons.

Taking over the helm at AHB is M. Scott Tatum, who brings a wealth of experience in arts education, administration, and integration. Meet Scott and learn what makes this part-time elementary school in Hyde Park special by watching its new series of short videos.

Bronze Doors Academy has a new campus and a new name. According to director and chief motivator Ariel Dochstader Miller, Skybridge Academy will continue the same liberal arts college–like program for junior high and high school students for which Bronze Doors was known, but with some additional STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math) opportunities made possible by its new location at the Stunt Ranch in Southwest Austin. As always, both full-time and à la carte options are available.

Accompanying Skybridge in the move to Oak Hill is its elementary school partner, the Soleil School. Cofounder and head of school Carly Borders says the new location on the Stunt Ranch will give her young students access to a ropes course, a pool, and more than 20 acres of beautiful land to explore.

Another unique school on the move this summer is Acton Academy. Construction on its permanent home on Alexander Avenue in East Austin is nearly complete. Laura Sandefer, Acton’s cofounder and head of school, invites you to check it out at the open house on October 24; meanwhile, take a peek at this architect’s rendering. It looks plenty big to house the academy’s current elementary and middle school students as well as the high school program slated to open in 2016.

The Olive Tree Learning Center, a Reggio Emilia–inspired preschool, recently opened its second campus, at 6609 Manchaca Road, near Garrison Park. Like the original Bouldin Creek campus, the new one is currently enrolling children between the ages of 18 months and 5 years. Director Michelle Mattalino says she is “very proud of the staff at both locations” and excited to fill the beautiful campuses with happy children.

Mariposa Montessori is also opening a second campus in South Austin. It will house this American Montessori Society full-member school’s new Lower Elementary program. Head of School Whitney Falcon recently reported that there were a few spots open for fall enrollment.

Progress School is expanding this fall to serve kindergarten through 5th grade. Located in Hyde Park, Progress offers “authentic education for natural learners,” with full- and part-time options as well as an after-school program. More exciting news from director Jennifer Hobbs: “We're getting chickens!”

Likewise, the Inside Outside School has expanded to serve kindergarten through 6th grade this fall, says executive director Deborah Hale. Its current enrollment of 24 will make up three classes—primary, intermediate, and upper elementary—on the school’s seven wooded acres in Pflugerville.

9th Street Schoolhouse is growing, too. The East Side home-based school will serve ages 5 through 9 this fall, with 8 students currently enrolled. 9th Street now has two mentors: founder Caitlin Macklin and Laura Ruiz.

Finally, the Whole Life Learning Center is rolling out a new nature-based one-day program called Mother Earth Mondays, which fosters a connection with the earth through gardening, wilderness survival skills, arts and crafts, games, and other fun activities with mentors Braden Delonay, Caroline Riley Carberry, and Leesalyn Koehler. In addition, director and founder Michael Carberry says he is excited to introduce the newest mentors for the Teen Mentorship Program, Kizzie, Etienne, and Adam, whose bios will soon be posted on the WLLC website alongside those of the school’s veteran staff.

Any questions or comments for these movers and shakers? Feel free to leave them below.

Teri