A good portion of November was spent getting a new after school program off the ground. I have learned that there is A LOT more to after school programming than I had originally thought! Especially if you are trying to start something from scratch. Luckily, I have major support from the 4-H program coordinator here in our office. There are MANY moving parts and many different players that are involved. I am SO happy to announce that Tuesday Dec 4th we held the first day of the Donnelly After School Program. The U of I extension's 4-H program teamed up with Donnelly Public Library and we can offer two days of intentional and structured programming after school; something the Donnelly community really needs.
I oversee Tuesday programming. I am calling it Discover's club and the focus is Environmental STEM in a place-based methodology. This month of December we are focusing on Ecosystems; what they are, who lives in them, how all parts are connected, and what the ecosystem of the school yard looks like. we are also focusing on what it meant to be a scientist and using out built in scientific tools, our five senses, to make observations.
Day one we learned the terms biotic and abiotic. To practice what we learned and to be scientists we made simple data sheets and recorded every abiotic and biotic thing we could find in school yard. This was a great way to get the students exploring their school yard in a new way and get some energy out!
We ended the program by creating ecosystem skits and used the schools stage to perform them.
looking forward to seeing what this program becomes!