We have a Theme!

We are very excited to report that the 8th grade class has chosen a fantastic theme to engage with for the remainder of the first term: Anthropology. More importantly, they did a remarkable job sticking with a challenging and intense selection process to get to a theme that had class consensus. We commended them for the work they did in preserving class unity throughout this process and we'd also like to share with all of you at home how we got our final selection.

You may recall that the girls did an exercise in their Curiosità journals a few weeks ago in which they wrote down 100 questions in a single sitting. We teachers have also been participating in the Curiosità work and this is an exercise I'd recommend to everyone - your results might surprise you. Each girl was then asked to review her 100 questions and choose her 10 "burning questions" and turn those in. You would be amazed to hear what your daughters' core questions are right now.

We compiled a class list of all of the "burning questions" (minus the ones that were very personal) and distributed it to the class. Everyone was asked to read this list of over 200 questions and seek out patterns that they noticed within the questions. They then shared their observations in small groups who reported back to the whole. We compiled a master list of patterns as a starting place for theme ideas while noticing connections and offshoots within each. We finished our theme brainstorming by opening the field wide-open to theme possibilities that may have been sparked by these or other acivites so far this year. In all we generated a list of about 60 possibilties.

We started our retreat last week with this list and asked the girls to do some personal reflection on which of the themes spoke most to them and to be prepared to connect with others who were also interested and advocate for this theme in the whole group. On Thursday afternoon, we had a modified "Open Space" session where the girls stated their interests, met in small groups about 11 possible topics, and brainstormed a myriad of different subtopics and project possibilities for each. These topics included such things as world religions, measurements of happiness, and fears. On Friday morning, each group presented their proposed topic and ideas to the whole class.

Then came the really hard work of narrowing down amongst what were all really great ideas for topics. We went through a series of discussions and votes to accomplish this. Through it all, the girls did an excellent job of checking in with one another and conducting their deliberations in a way that was respectful of everyone's ideas and passions. By the end of Friday, we had narrowed our list to 5 possible topics. In the same way on Monday the list was narrowed to 4, to 3 on Tuesday, and to our final topic first thing this morning. While the process was certainly longer than we originally thought, and perhaps laborious and cumbersome at times, it was an excellent introduction to the real work of consensus building with a large group. It will without a doubt serve us well not only the next time we choose a theme or do the Production in the Spring, but in all of our work together this year.