The Lesson

“No.”  

People say children do not hear it enough.

They say children are not being prepared for the real world where the word “No,” is a common occurrence.

 

They say educators set students up by not letting them fail.

That is what I was being told as I stood in the rain on my elementary school playground talking to three experts from my public school county’s facilities department.  I had just told them about one of many student proposals to enhance the playground and space at our school.

“No.”

These gentlemen from facilities have the tall order of ensuring absolute safety and security for children on all playgrounds throughout the county’s schools.  They uphold student safety with laser focus, as well they should, and that can leave little room for innovation on our playgrounds.

And that means they must hear ideas and, in the best interests of our children, must be prepared to be steadfast in saying, “No.”

For the record, I am the school principal, and I am directly responsible for ensuring the “No” I will deliver becomes a profound learning experience that will construct support beams of strength in my students.

I take that responsibility seriously.  And I am excited.

This lesson will not fail.

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The Students

Cunningham Park is a diverse elementary school in Vienna, Virginia, that sits on the outskirts of Washington, DC. In an area where schools may sprawl in size, and many attract students away from their neighborhoods to attend specialized programs, Cunningham Park stands out in its steadfastness to remain an intimate, community school. It does not draw from populations outside of its boundaries, and all who enter its front doors each day, do so with the intention of being part of a close family.

Among the other schools in Vienna, Cunningham Park also stands out in its diversity.  One third of its student population eats breakfast and lunch with free or reduced prices, and at the same time, many of its other students are living in homes that have been recently flipped and are worth seven figures.  Twenty seven different languages are spoken amongst the school’s children, the greatest representations being English, then Spanish, then Arabic.

The most profound benefits of attending a richly diverse school do not show up on traditional test scores, so on the surface, Cunningham Park may seem unassuming. Yet it is dynamic.  Sometimes electric.

Typical reporting tools that rate the success of schools rely on traditional test scores.  And those lack reliability. They underestimate children. Tests cannot show the true brilliance or value of education.  It is impossible.

There is no measurement tool that reports how a first grader has grown to effectively collaborate with peers whether or not they speak the same language.  No test question reflects if a third grader is able to hear and understand different perspectives, and put them to use. A test bank does not exist that indicates if a fifth grader is able to understand “community” to an extent at which the student can bridge the cultural divide between an American school system and his or her own family that just moved to this country.

And no standardized test will reflect the grit my students are about to acquire in proposing playground ideas.

And grit is what will make my students raging successes when they’re grown.

Watch.
 

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The Opportunity

In 2018, Virginia’s Board of Education doubled the amount of required recess time in all elementary schools from a minimum of one 15-20 minute period, to a minimum of two 15-20 minute periods of unstructured play time.  This is fantastic news! Play-based learning is a well-researched, highly effective way of ensuring students construct their own knowledge and understandings of curriculum, as well as the world. The trick is to intentionally put tools that further learning in the path of the child, and let the child play.

 

And when the school board passed its recess resolution in the spring, that became my mission: to find tools to further learning through play.

The problem was, those tools are not as readily available as I had thought they would be.  They either did not exist (how hard is it to make a basketball that is painted like a globe so when students shoot hoops, they’re holding the world?), or they were outrageously expensive.  My limited public school budget would not allow much expansion of recess tools.

And at 45 years old, my perspective on play was limiting as well.  I solicited ideas from friends via social media, I contacted a man from a news story I ran across about innovative playgrounds, I asked colleagues and my own children, and I still struggled.  Until this pierced through my thinking, “Why are you working so hard? Your school is brilliant. Let your children do the work!”
 

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The Logistics

The wonderfully diverse demographic makeup of Cunningham Park’s student body brings with it many riches, and some challenges.  The challenges, largely, are material. Our 33% free and reduced meals rate sits us just below the threshold to receive Title I funding, we are doing well enough on standardized tests to warrant no additional resources from the county, and our private fundraisers are hard-won and we are proud of even the most modest income.  So every penny put into our school is coveted.

What may be a challenge financially, is more than made up for in investments of sweat equity, time, and in the shared belief our staff and parents hold in the potential of our students.

So last summer, when I approached Tracy McCarty, my incoming Parent Teacher Association president, a daughter of educators with a keen eye for innovative learning opportunities, and asked her to trust me, we partnered in an adventure like none-other.  

I had told Tracy my plans to roll in innovative teaching practices school-wide this year that were radical in their simplicity, and she had already agreed she would request funds from the PTA to support professional development for that shift.  It was a risk, although heavily calculated and certain to succeed. Here, I asked Tracy to consider a second risk, ask the PTA to allocate more of their hard-earned dollars to fund a PBL (Project-Based Learning) for students in all grades to redesign and maximize play spaces across the school campus and inside our facility.  

Tracy is well aware of the value of play, and she was excited.  And once she shared the theme for the year she dubbed “Upping our Game” with the PTA, our parents jumped to support her in getting behind our children.

None of us could expect the unwritten-in-any-curriculum, untested-on-any-test, profound skill that would ignite and catch our students’ spirits on fire:

Grit.

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The Method

Project-Based Learning is a method of teaching with authenticity.  Teachers guide students to identify and attempt to improve real-world and relevant issues. Through PBL, students take the lead in determining what they need to learn, and how they are going to learn it, and then they apply new knowledge and skills again and again until they’ve mastered them to fix the problem.

The problem:  How can we renovate the play spaces at Cunningham Park Elementary School to make recess more fun, keep it safe, and help ensure continued learning?

The student answer:  Sky’s the limit.

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The Journey

The system of public education in America is emerging from the burning embers of long-lasting federal and state regulations built on standardized testing.  The emphasis of accountability placed on inappropriate, shallow, high-stakes measures of the No Child Left Behind Act signed into law in 2002 firmly established a punitive system that fostered anti-trust of public educators.  The short-sighted requirements for students to solely memorize a plethora of facts ushered in a return to rote learning and cookie cutter teaching that looked the same no matter the needs of students.

That system of control and punishment is a hard one to come out from under.  Yet we are. The coals of ridicule glow brightly and threaten to reignite, engulfing us back in its flames.  But the courageous will maintain focus and move forward, bringing our children, the future of our nation, with us.

Cunningham Park’s foundation is courage.  Teachers and staff seek cutting edge teaching strategies, and evaluate them with the the eye of a Cheshire Cat.  Every member of the school’s staff views each other as a team, standing in between our beloved children and a world full of opportunity that is too many times unkind.  Good luck to the sorry individual who dares try to cross this thin line of teachers, administrative assistants, custodians, and cooks, with any intent at hindering our students’ learning and potential.  The staff here is fierce in their love for our children. I have witnessed them jettison unsuspecting outsiders whose intentions were not child-centered. I am proud to be among their ranks.
 

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The Disruptor

Thinking about what authentic student success looks like can shift a person’s opinion on what qualifies as great learning activities.  Implementing innovative lessons successfully requires expertise and innovative thinking to guide a disruption in traditional teaching methods.

Jeff Lonnett, Educational Specialist with Fairfax County Public Schools, who focuses on PBLs, is an empowerer, inspirer, and he shares some of my distaste for inside-the-box thinking.  So when it came time to formulate this play-space project and propel the entire school into action, there was no question Jeff had to be a force of leadership.

Jeff is well-known at Cunningham Park and all surrounding schools as an energetic, risk-taking, larger-than-life individual who plays no games with the trust he easily persuades teachers to place in him.  He has no fear of the open-ended, undefined, and untethered learning potential of students who have taken charge of their own growth, and his energy is viral.

I reached out to him with the sentence, “Jeff, I want my students to redesign my school’s play spaces, and I want you to tell me how to do it.”  And that was it.

“You want one grade level to design a PBL?”  Jeff asks.

“No.  All. School-wide.  Everyone.”

Jeff clarifies, “You want to assign a space to each grade level to focus on?”

“No.  Open-ended.  Teacher choice based on their time and comfort level.”  

Jeff smiles. Pretty sure his eyes sparkle too.  “How?”

“I don’t know.  That’s why you’re here.”

Jeff, “Let’s take a walk.”

He picks up his camera, we walk around the school talking, taking photographs, imagining.  

Preparing to positively disrupt.

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The Magic

On Thursday, November 8th, roughly three weeks after embarking on our school-wide PBL, a visiting county facilities specialist named John Rusert found himself surrounded by enthusiastic, knowledgeable, well-rehearsed groups of 6th graders, listening to proposals for playground enhancements.  John, whose specialty is to ensure facilities are in ADA compliance, used to be a high school and college football coach, and his inspired motivation for progress is unquenchable. I mentioned our PBL to John once long ago, and he was immediately committed to making this experience come to life for my children.  Although the building was brought into compliance during the summer, John still stops by when he’s in the area to ask how the projects are going. So this day, I decided to show him.

“Come with me, John.”  

Three weeks prior, the PBL had been introduced in a School-Wide Morning Meeting where all students were in assembly. In the time since, teachers, with training and support from Jeff, have guided their children to look for spaces that needed improvement, and come up with proposals to enhance those spaces.  Proposal development was currently in-process, yet far along enough to start sharing with outside experts for feedback. John was a perfect outside specialist.

On this day, we walked through the building together in search of any classroom where it seemed I could grab some students with minimal distraction, because students could explain the project better than I.  We found those students in sixth grade classes.

Together, John and I listened to proposals to install a Gaga Ball pit from one group, new soccer goals from another, and a mini-zip line from a third group.  The students had no warning. All three groups blew us away.

As I walked John out afterward, he could not stop talking about how “poised and put together” the sixth graders were.  They “knew their stuff, and asked smart questions, and were so excited about what they were doing.”

And they had proposed a zip line.  

To the surprise of us both.

John and I found neither of us had any idea if a zip line had a prayer of being approved by FCPS.  And both of us were dumbfounded that after completing the amount of rigorous research required for each group to create their proposal, a zip line would have made it through to the presentation phase.

The next day, I would meet with the zip line group again to learn about their research process.  That is when I would discover the most profound and unanticipated lesson that was about to be learned:

Grit.

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The Spark

A conversation between the zip line student group (in quotes) and me (italics) the next morning at 8:00am, before school:

Guys, Mr Rusert and I were incredibly impressed with your presentation yesterday!

*smiles*

He did ask me a question that I don’t know, he asked if zip lines are allowed in Fairfax County Public Schools, and I told him I don’t know.  What did you find out in your research?

“We found much of our information on another school website.  That school has the mini-zip line we proposed.”

Was it a school in Fairfax County?

*silence*

“I don’t think so, but we can find out.”

Ok, Mr. Rusert has invited two of his friends who are experts on FCPS playgrounds to visit today.  You are on a field trip, so you can’t meet with them, however if you would like, I can share your idea with them and find out if it is allowed.

“Ok.”

So here’s the thing, I am concerned that due to safety, they will say ‘No.’  So let me ask you this question: why is it you want a zip line on our playground?

“For fun.”

“To feel freedom.  Because when you’re on a zip line, you feel the wind in your hair and you feel free.”

“For presence.  Because when you’re on a zip line, you’re not worried about what’s coming up, you’re not thinking of that test ahead or that assignment that’s due.  You’re just present.”

“For inclusion.  Because it can be enjoyed by everyone, even people in the community when we’re not in school.”

Ok, do you hear what you said you want?  ‘Fun, freedom, presence, inclusion…’ and you’re going to think of more ideas.  If that is what you want, the zip line is not important, what’s important is that you have fun, freedom, presence, inclusion, and other ideas you think of even after you leave my office.

So I will ask the experts when they come today, and their answer may very well be “No.” And if it is, you have two choices, you can give up, turn around, walk away, never take a risk like this again…

“I have the feeling that is the wrong answer…”

Or, you can show GRIT.  Have you heard that word before?

“No.”

Grit means you hear ‘No’ and ask yourselves, ‘What’s next?’  

Because the zip line is not important.  What is important is that you bring fun, freedom, presence, and inclusion to our play spaces at our school. So if you hear “No” to one idea, what do you do then to bring those essential elements that are truly the important things to our school?  What’s next?

If you choose to show grit, I will personally ensure with your teachers that you have the time and resources you need to adapt your idea in time to propose it to the PTA on December 11th.  

These students left my office smiling.

These students, who I had just informed their hard work, excitement, and idea would likely very publicly fail, had optimism and fierceness in their eyes.  They saw a challenge they were about to meet. Smiling.

With grit.  

A word they had never heard before.

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The Impact
 

“No.”

I was under my umbrella wearing a too-thin coat listening to two gentlemen from facilities explain to John and me schools were doing a disservice to students by not allowing them to hear that word.  “Wait a minute, hear what she has to say.” John had brought out top specialists from playground and landscaping departments and he was determined they would stop and listen long enough for me to explain why under my watch, a group of students had developed a zip line proposal to add to the playground these gentlemen oversee.  

“Please say ‘No.’  If there is no possibility a zip line will be approved, say ‘No.’”  I got their attention. Barely. I kept going.

“But you are not going to just say ‘No’ and walk away, because you are a part of their learning now.  Because they are not going to learn that ‘No’ means ‘It’s over. Give up.’”

I continued, “You are going to help them learn ‘What’s next?’  You are going to help them learn to probe for additional information and for clarification.  You are going to help them learn ‘Grit.’ But you cannot do that by just saying, ‘No.’ and walking away.”

The gentlemen were not convinced.  To them, it seemed clear I was teaching our children to be soft, to be entitled, to have no idea what adversity feels like.  This is the opinion of too many adults.

And so many of those adults have no idea.  My children have faced adversity. They face challenge every. live-long. day.  All of them.

The judgment of today’s youth is misguided, though, and it plays into the current era of accountability that is overly-reliant on shallow learning and measurement standards.

Yes, children all the way up to millennials have learned to passively accept information and decipher the answer a teacher wants so that when they regurgitate the correct answer, they receive their just reward.  Yes, children through college-age are accustomed to doing the right thing largely because of what they will get in return rather than because it is inherently the right thing to do. Yes, students since 2002 have learned there is a defined right and wrong to every answer and so there is no need to think critically about issues at hand.  Absolutely, students up to young adults struggle to accept a world that does not accommodate them, and to make their own decisions when someone isn’t there to do it for them.

Yes, adults are right.  

Because since No Child Left Behind became law and high-stakes multiple choice standardized tests became the only judge of students’ success, this is the climate that was created.  This is essential to know and understand, because a system is governed by the accountability methods that judge it.

And our system remains largely judged based on students’ ability to memorize existing information and spout it out on command.

The American public education accountability measures that have focused on memorization of finite factual information and has inflicted consequences and judgment based on that single indicator of success has defined instructional practices to meet the requirements of testing for over a decade.  These are the entrenched embers we are just starting to climb out from under with great trepidation because we have been burned. All of us. Every one of us.

But, if those same adults think for one moment my stalwart staff would permit me to take a risk that will allow my children to be scorched again, if they think my hard-working parents would believe in a method that would set students up to fail, if they have an inkling that I will stand by and watch more children fall victim to an educational era of memorization, submissive behavior dependent on rewards, unthinking, disengagement, then watch this…

To the hard-working gentlemen in front of me here, in the cold mist on my playground, I hold up my phone. There, I have a recording of a portion of the sixth graders’ amazing, unrehearsed, surprise presentation from the day before.  I hit “play.”

Silence.  

Students don’t need me.  They don’t need us as we think they do.  

They need us… out of the way.  

They need us to set up adversity, challenges, learning opportunities in their paths, and then to step back.

To watch.

To guide.

To believe.

And to get out of the way.

The gentlemen’s faces changed at seeing children present their case through the screen on my phone.  They smiled at the students’ poise and creativity. And then, they divulged to me there’s some magical secret book the county uses to select playground equipment from.  After hearing the message from the students, the gentlemen would like to bring the special book out to me the next week so this group of students can investigate ‘What’s next.”

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What’s Next

The following Monday, I received an email from the head of playground design, he’s coming to see me to hear about my students.  When he arrives, he appears with two more gentlemen who are contractors with the company that builds our playground equipment.

A few days later, I receive another email, the vendors have developed a proposal for us.  Can we meet next week?  Certainly, I’m happy to meet… and tell the vendors the proposals my students have for them.

I told my zip line group the FCPS answer was “No.” and told them if they chose grit, I would personally ensure they had ample time and resources to regroup and adapt before giving a formal presentation to our PTA.  

The following Monday, the zip line group asked to meet with me.  They had talked. They had heard the feedback from FCPS facilities, and they wanted to move forward.  They believed there were additional safety precautions they could address to convince FCPS to install its first ever zip line.

I discovered a fourth grader was also proposing a zip line, and she had found additional safety elements, so she joined the sixth graders.  After all, I had given my word that I would ensure they would be able to adapt.

There are student proposals from all grades that range from painting a life-sized board game, to outdoor libraries, to a maze, to a track and sport field, to inside games for the days we can’t go outside.  These proposals are this Tuesday evening during our PTA meeting.

The PTA raised funds this fall to sponsor as many projects as possible.  Sponsored proposals will be implemented throughout the spring, 2019.

My meeting with the playground vendors is later this week.

Our school-wide PBL is not a one-shot deal.  It is an example of an essential disruption to a national education system mired in outdated policy and accountability. Innovative teaching practices that bring authenticity to learning heighten the potential for high levels of academic achievement in students.  Authentic teaching techniques such as PBL, as well as other methods like Backward Design Curriculum and Concept-Based Instruction, which are also being implemented at Cunningham Park this year, bring excitement, natural engagement, joy, and passion into the classroom for students as well as teachers.  

Positive disruption in education can only happen when schools are supported by their school systems as Cunningham Park is by Fairfax County Public Schools, and the county’s Region 1.  Student joy and intellect are profoundly impacted when communities rally around and trust their schools the way CPES parents and the town of Vienna surround our school. And calculated risks that promote rich student growth are successful when a school staff is highly professional, knowledgeable, and most importantly, in love with their students, as is the entire Cunningham Park staff.

I have no idea what will happen with the projects to be proposed by our students this Tuesday. And to be honest, I don’t care. Because the projects, themselves, aren’t what matters.

What matters is what the students express they want “fun,” “freedom,” “presence,” “peace,” “learning,” “inclusion,” “exercise,” “creativity,” and so, so much more.

So that whether they get their piece of equipment or not, they know what’s important.  And whether they’re getting their way in the end or not, they’re all walking away with one thing in common:

Grit.