It was Monday. A Donut day.
On the way to the studio, early in the morning, my car tire went completely flat and my husband was nearby to help. On went the “donut” tire. Although a bit challenging, I just smiled inside, shrugged my shoulders and declared it a “Donut Day”. Ironically, I was already planning a launch to introduce the “Donut Challenge” where we use the metaphor of a donut to describe when we are in our comfort zone, challenge zone, or panic zone, and how we learn the most when we are in our challenge zone, where all the “tasty nutrients” are. As we walked to the park and the heroes saw my funny-looking yellow-rimmed tire, I told them it was a donut day and they were excited to see what would come next! They were excited to find out that they WOULD be eating a tasty donut as part of the activity. 😉
The heroes have grown this week in learning how to work together to complete challenges. They enjoyed un-knotting themselves in the “Human ‘Knot So Fast’ Challenge”, and safely crossing the lava-infested land blindfolded with the help of their peers. The best part of all is seeing how their teamwork and creativity are expressing themselves on the playground. They create different games like “Who’s King on the Playground” and I hear them tweaking it to include lots of Kings and Queens instead of just one. Most recently, they are exploring their superhero powers as each plays the part of a different superhero! They’ve created different ways that they lose their superhero powers and different ways that they gain them back. And of course, whenever they hear the whistle blow of the train, everyone says “TRAIN!” and everything stops for a moment as they run to the fence to watch and listen in awe.
We explored some new activities during our Stations work time this week! Magnet tiles, Marble run, Locks and keys, and Legos are still definite favorites. Heroes are also exploring making up their own songs on the piano, as well as creating art through tracing metal shapes and exploring a few new math Montessori works. It has been fun to see how well they are engaged and focused during this time.
The heroes are also making progress in their responsibility to honor the studio by keeping it clean. As they have been learning how to do their job and learning how to stay focused, studio maintenance time for our small space has taken up to 1 hour to complete some days. Whew! However, as they keep practicing, each day has gotten easier for them. In fact, they worked so well together on Friday of this week that it took only 1/2 as much time as normal. We celebrated with extra playtime outside! 🙂
One other fun addition we experienced this week was our first organized “Gym time” led by the staff of Lifestyle Fitness (located inside Thrive Space). The heroes loved feeling like they were training for “American Ninja Warrior” as they jumped, climbed, carried, bounced, and ran through the various stations. We are so grateful for their partnership in our Acton mission!
This next week the heroes will continue reflecting on our initial studio guardrails of 1) I promise to keep the studio sacred 2) I promise to speak with kindness, encouragement, and truth, and 3) I promise to never distract myself or others. The heroes will begin experimenting with any additional promises they would like to include as a part of their studio contract to each other, as we look ahead to sharing our created contract at our first session exhibition in just under 3 weeks! Will the heroes step up to the plate and choose to finish it in time? Stay tuned to find out! 🙂
