6:00am Wake-Up
I wake up and get ready for my day – waking up my two daughters who will join me today at Kalexedy. They are with me three days a week for half of their subjects and the other two they are homeschooled by my husband for the other half. Today we are bringing our pet rabbit with us as a special surprise to the other students and undergraduate interns, so we have a lot to pack! Not to mention my fourth grader is bringing her four foot unicorn to share with everyone; my car is full.
7:00am Leave Home
We drive to Framingham each day – some days we listen to a playlist of our favorite songs, sometimes it’s an audiobook. We just finished Pride and Prejudice and are searching for another classic to listen to together. Today my daughters played the alphabet memory game “I’m going on a vacation and I packed a…” – this morning they had a space theme and took turns saying, “I’m going on vacation and I packed an asteroid.” “I’m going on vacation and I packed an asteroid, a black hole, a comet,” et cetera. It was a fun way for them to pass the time while I drove.
7:45am Arrive at Kalexedy
We’re the first ones in the building today, so we also turn on the lights and open all the window shades (and some windows, the weather is nice today!) . We make sure to get our bunny, Pickles, settled in the classroom while I do a walk-through of the 3500 square foot facility and make sure there were no overnight surprises like a leak or a fridge left open. I write the date on the board, the schedule for the day and pull together any supplies I need for the day’s enrichments. Right now we are also decorating for the holidays so I string up a couple strings of ornaments while my daughters get started on their math. I print out a sign that says “Beware of the Attack Rabbit” to put on the door to bring more smiles on people's faces as they arrive. I refill our water jug and other assorted tasks to prepare our environment for the day.
9:00am I have a full classroom! First Academic Period
I greet my students with a smile and am excited that they all chose to have Pajama day again today. Everyone has been fawning over Pickles before they get started on their first Academic Period. Then our Worcester State undergraduate interns arrive and get started cataloging new books and organizing board games. I help one of my students plan their three academic periods to schedule what items they are going to check off their list each hour. This helps manage time and expectations for the day. We work on executive functioning as much as academics some days and I'm grateful I'm able to support the whole student in their learning. I communicate with their parent using an Excel spreadsheet – making a note when a book is needed or the student needs more time to complete an assignment than allotted.
I sit down and check email and continue working on the next month’s calendar of enrichment activities. While they are working they may have questions about how to divide a fraction or what makes something an adverb, and I’m always excited to take advantage of a teaching moment. Even if not everyone is listening, they’ll eventually cover the subject. Sometimes they help each other – and teaching is an excellent way to reinforce learning, so I always encourage them to help each other with a concept. There are so many ways to solve problems; why not encourage their creativity and communication? Seeing they work together in a learning community makes me appreciate our multi-age classroom so much.
10:00am Break time!
Well, break time for the students. They play with the rabbit again, this time he is chasing them down the long hallway between the left and right pods. Today we have a student-led enrichment by one of our sixth graders so I am helping her gather supplies and she is setting up the blue room for us.
10:15am Enrichment Time
The next subject is “enrichment” which is an hour-long lesson, activity or student-led lesson which supplements their learning day. Each Friday is a different student’s choice and this week we are doing collage art. It’s a great chance for them to show off their talents, passions or interests and always a fun way to end the week. The rest of the week, during our enrichments, we have been learning conflict resolution skills, making handmade garlands for our holiday decor, and even had civics lesson about elections – it’s always something different and interesting. I usually post on our Instagram page around this time if I have a chance!
11:15am Second Academic Period
I make sure everything is cleaned up from our enrichment, and then we gather back in our main classroom space. I ensure that everyone is on task and answer any questions that arise. They work independently while I check in with the undergraduates (and the bunny), clean up a little more after our enrichment, and chat again with the student I am coaching in Executive Functioning skills to make sure they were still on task, had all their materials and knew what was coming next.
12:15pm Lunch
While it’s technically lunch time for the next 45 minutes, everyone takes this moment to take a break, socialize, play a game, tumble, swing and have fun! They crank the music up, it’s a fun time! Pickles was the main event today. My students are tweens and teenagers, they eat “lunch” all day long – sometimes right after we walk into the door. We don’t have any rules about when they can or cannot eat unless there is a safety concern (like we are working with henna or paint that shouldn’t also be eaten). I’m researching some ideas for the upcoming summer -- we are also running a STEAM summer camp, so I'm looking forward to all of the fun activities we can do together and in the community! I finish up our weekly newsletter updating staff, families and our students on what's new around Kalexedy and send it out during this time as well.
1:00 Reading Time
We all sit down to read for thirty minutes each day after lunch. It’s a mostly guaranteed quiet (sometimes we are treated to the squeals or gasps from particularly interesting plot twists) thirty minutes and we mark their achievement of finishing a new book with a paper spine on the wall – it’s also a great way for them to recommend books to each other. I’m currently reading classic novels written by women, and am fully in my Jane Austen era.
1:30 Third Academic Period
Most students have finished coding, math and Latin for the day, so they get started on science or reading comprehension – one student is doing a yoga class in an additional space. I get some writing done for our blog, continue researching and planning for the next month of enrichments, communicate with prospective families, collect the mail, and do checks on each student to make sure they’re making progress on their work. They’ve all pretty much wrapped up their week of academics at this point in the week and are doing art, reading their book or getting ready to go to their weekly OT lesson and getting an early pick-up.
2:30pm Group Activity
This month we are all spending this half hour writing – with a goal to have a novella by the end of the month. I’ve written about this here, but it’s also important that they respect each other’s writing time and progress – and even ask for and offer suggestions. We’ve become a little writing group for this half hour and it’s been so much fun to have so many facets to the day!
3:00pm Clean Up
A lot of academics, snacks, creative endeavors (and today, a bunny) have made a mess today so we spend half an hour cleaning up and resetting our facility for the next day. I appreciate the pride that our students have in their spaces and how they wipe down their tables, replace the toilet paper rolls, or whatever they need to do to show respect for their space. I also make sure that everyone has signed our paper crane for the day and then fold it and add it to our ongoing chain.
3:30pm Pick-up
It’s always so much fun to see what they choose to highlight to their parents when they arrive! Today it was Pickles, but some days it’s what they’ve created together, what we learned, what they wrote – or even that they finished a week’s worth of math assignments in a day. I’m always right there to celebrate their accomplishments with them! I close down the facility, close all the windows and blinds and keep doing my walk through – making sure everything is ready for the next week. By now my daughters and Pickles are packed up for our journey home. I say goodbye to our undergraduates and then we are on our way! Our playlist of Noah Kahan, Taylor Swift, Beyoncé and Adele takes us home.
5:00pm Back Home!
My daughters race to enthusiastically share with their dad about their day while Pickles gets some much needed alone time. I get a moment to be grateful they aren’t coming home frustrated and crashing like they used to when we were in public school. They’re happy and excited to go back next week, and that’s the highest praise a parent and educator can ever get. Additionally, I’m going into my weekend happily tired from a busy, interesting, and joy filled week. I can go into my wood workshop and do what I need to do for my own business. I look forward to a weekend of relaxing, refreshing, family time and happily anticipating Monday morning.
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