When the quarantine hit and schools had to pivot, quickly, to Distance Learning, it was clear that 8th grade Humanities would have to adjust, quickly and (hopefully) effectively.

The first detail that we faced was to agree - on both my end and the students' end - that we would be explorers in a new world and we would have to cope as well as we could. The assignment page on Google Classroom was renamed “HUM8 Spring MO”.  Those last two letters, ‘M’ and ‘O,’  took on several meanings. Move On-line. Modus Operandi. March On.

It has been confusing in many ways. It is hard to duplicate the robust discussions we were used to (and that were becoming more sophisticated and nuanced as the year progressed). Attendance was dependent on technology, which proved to be less reliable, in smaller and larger ways, than one would think. There was attention burn-out. We found that there are assignments and projects that simply could not be done remotely, for a host of reasons: supply shortages, demonstration snafus, collaboration challenges, and home space limitations, to name a few.

But for every challenge there has been a positive offset, enlivening and reinvigorating the course work, the teaching, and the learning.  Assumptions about what works and doesn’t work are being reassessed. Teaching styles are being challenged. The organization of the syllabus is changing. The methods of presentation – whether live in person, streaming on-line, or recorded – are being used in different ways and to different ends and in different ratios. The value of individual lessons are being weighed, for appropriateness, impact, resourcefulness, pertinence, interest, humor, and relevance. The ultimate responsibility for doing the background work, the day-to-day assignments, the more expansive projects, and the deep learning has, paradoxically, fallen on student and teacher alike. Never has the classroom been more collaborative than it is now.

Among the work that has been done in HUM8 since quarantine, three stand out as especially deserving of note:

1. Every year, a great deal of energy goes into the study of geography. The 8th grade theme is “Where am I from? Where am I going?” The short answer is ‘out into the great big world’. Year-long study leads to the ‘World Map Project’. Each student creates, after clearing a series of obstacles and difficulties, a 36” x 48” map of the world. Drawn entirely by hand and representing a tremendous expenditure of time, precision, and creative energy, the creators are rightfully proud of their creations.

2. The class’s year-long study of poetry recently culminated with students studying a range of “poems of greatness” (intended as a reference to the Robin Williams screed against J. Evans Pritchard in the movie “Dead Poets Society”). The poems were chosen because they represent Mr. Bartsch’s favorite poems, including ‘Ozymandias’, ‘The Second Coming’, and ‘Tyger, Tyger’, and poets, including Dickinson, Shakespeare, and Dylan Thomas. Working remotely with a partner, each learned about a different poem, analyzed it, and recorded a personal recitation. These recordings were shared with the class and subsequently during the weekly Friday morning All School Meeting.

3. The capstone event of the Glen Urquhart School experience, ‘Evening with the Graduates’ speeches. Loosely based on the ‘This I believe’ model introduced by Edward R. Murrow in the 1950s, the children are charged with preparing individual responses to the prompt “Something I am wondering about is…” to be presented the evening before graduation. Working independently (they are encouraged to limit sharing their work-in-progress with other students), a fascinating dichotomy usually emerges. Each year, there are speeches that cover topics ranging from the arcane to the quixotic, from the existential to the bizarre, from the confessional to the missed opportunity. This is to be expected. But, interestingly, each year there also arises a common theme, a thread that slides into many of the speeches, tying them together without any sort of coordination or planning. This attests to a central quality of Glen Urquhart – within a community of the strikingly individualistic, there always is a core value or theme or concern. While the specifics change each year, the uniqueness of each class shows through.  This year of social distancing and closed schools, the ceremony is, like much of life, going on-line. The speeches will be shown on June 9 at 7pm.