The Cleveland Team gathered for a marathon journal reading on Sunday night at Erick’s house. He made us some fish curry soup of his own invention, and it sustained us for the five hours it took to read the brilliant writing of 70 students. We read everything our students write, and it is a pleasure, but given our teachers’ busy schedules, finding a time when everyone can gather to read so many journals is a challenge. We have to do it all at one go

For the Cleveland residency, we had two volunteer teachers, Katie and Lupe, who have been indispensible. They used their Spanish speaking skills to help those of us who studied French in high school communicate. They volunteered their time and energy to meet for breakfast before each teaching day, to teach for six mornings when they could have been at other jobs, and most recently, to read and sign all our students’ journals. The children love them—I know because they wrote about it in their journals—and we love them too.

Here’s the intrepid Cleveland Team before our reading meeting:

See the After picture post-jump . . .

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Hello, please.  Chris Mathews here, perennial newbie to the BoM crowd.  So, this session marks my first entrance into the BoM workshop teaching circuit.  As such, I have been nominated to be the Henderson Residency Blogger.  As I am new to this world and all that surrounds me in it, let me be your entry point into the story (I will be your Wolverine in X-Men, your young, unnecessary white guy in Hellboy, your Alec Baldwin in The Hunt for Red October).  You will learn, as I learn, what volunteer teaching for the Barrelses of Monkeyses is all about and how to navigate its Russian Nuclear Sub infested waters with glee.  er….Henderson Elementary School.

But I am not afraid.  Nor should you be, as I’ve got some of the most seasoned and spirited BoM crusaders in the company to stand at my side, ushering me into games such as ‘impersonate a banana and peel yourself like one,’ ‘act like sleepy zombies and move your desk to the side of the room,’ and ‘how to respond when one of the students already knew I was clumsy because I have a “clumsy face”’ (a physiognomic truth I am familiar with, daily).  On the roster is MC Christina Anthony, BeardMaster Joe Schupbach, Czech Rani Waterman, the conservatively-adorned Molly Brennan, and Team Leader Dixie Belinda Uffelman, with a guest appearance by Elizabeth “not one of the students” Levy. 

Stay tuned for updates as I make my first steps amongst Our Future and teach them how to imagine that toys and pillows will grow from sewer holes if you dig them deep enough. 

The first Monkey residencies of 2008-09 are well under way, and Cleveland School got a head start on everyone, starting way back on September 9th. We have two big fourth grade classes, and a faboo teaching team which includes Erick Deshaun Dorris, Sarah Garner, experienced volunteer teacher Katie, and brand new volunteer Lupe.

We’re into the groove of things with these kids, and they’re writing some brilliant stories.

The Cleveland School has produced some of my personal faves over the years, including the cheerleading classics: “Cheerleaders!” and “A Bad Day,” which is currently in Grandma. Why do I like them so much? Well, “Cheerleaders!” gave me the chance to play co-captain of a winning cheer squad, and in “A Bad Day,” two men have a cheer fight to the death over me. Yes, I’m using the children’s stories to live out my childhood dreams, and I make no apologies for it.

On dialogue day, we give students the opportunity to improvise scenes before they sit down and write. Then, at the end of class, we invite the students to share. They can choose to perform their own dialogues or have Monkey teachers act them out. It’s always tempting to plant ideas in the students’ heads of characters we Monkeys would love to play. But we resist.

Last week, the students created brilliant, stage-worthy characters all on their own. Don’t think I wasn’t secretly pleased when two girls chose myself and Katie to read their masterwork dialogue between two friends named Tasty and Tastier. We never know what’s going to make its way into the school show, but regardless, I can now mark “Play character named Tastier” off my list of things to do before I die.

We have been extremely fortunate for the last three years to have Dixie Uffelman as our Program Director.

(Dixie is second from the left)

The sadness at Dixie’s imminent departure from the office is, however, tempered by the excitement at having hired Elizabeth Levy as our new Program Director.

More after the jump!

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This morning BOM’s Program Director, Dixie Uffelman, and I attended Communities in Schools of Chicago‘s annual Partner Recognition Breakfast. CISC is a great organization that helps match under-served community schools with community organizations like ours that can fill critical unmet needs—everything from providing health screenings to anger management and so on. This year CISC honored us as a ten-year agency partner by giving us a lovely plaque.

That’s Dixie, showing it off.

The event was at US Cellular Field, which is always exciting. Dixie claims that she’s spent more time at the Cell as a guest of CISC then as a patron of the White Sox.

That aside, it was really great to see other partner organizations and some of the school principals and site coordinators and hear about the other ten year partners. Our friends at CISC were extremely nice (as always) and had a giant poster board depicting one of our school residencies. It’s always exciting to be in an environment where everyone in the room is committed to “meeting unmet needs” and serving the schools and communities. CISC got to thank us this morning, but I’d like to thank them—their help and guidance allows us to serve the schools that can most benefit from our specific programs and over ten years has provided us with many fruitful partnerships. We rely on their network to make sure that we can serve the most appropriate communities and help us make the first crucial contacts with new school partners. Here’s looking forward to another ten years of collaboration.