As part of our programming for this month, Middle School students participated in two assembly programs. Chaz Kellem, YWCA Senior Director for Advocacy for Race and Gender Equity, spoke at a morning assembly about the challenges he has faced as a person with a disability. A motivational and charismatic speaker, Chaz talked about living with the bone disease Osteogenesis Imperfecta and how he has not let this obstacle keep him from achieving his goals. The dance group Hammerstep performed at an assembly that had the Middle School and Upper School students, faculty, and staff clapping and cheering. Hammerstep combines many cultures through Hip Hop, Irish, African Stepping and Martial Arts to challenge the way dance and movement are presented. Afterwards, Middle School students had the opportunity to dance with members of the group in workshops. Grade level advisory groups discussed how Hammerstep builds community and works with differences.

 

The Middle School English and history curricula align during this time with a focus on the path of the United States from the Civil War to the Civil Rights movement and the stories of people who fought for justice. Each grade level incorporates developmentally appropriate instruction that allows for in-depth analysis and rich discussion.

In grade 5, students read The Watsons Go to Birmingham, the story of an African-American family living in Flint, Michigan in 1963, who faced segregation when traveling South to Alabama and the tragic bombing of the Sixteenth Avenue Baptist Church. In grade 6, students are reading Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, a novel set during the Great Depression in southern Mississippi. By sharing background information about racism and the economic situation in the 1930s and reading and analyzing text, students are able to engage in meaningful conversations. Grade 5 and 6 students participating in our Battle of the Books challenge also read and discussed The Lions of Little Rock, set in the segregated south of the 1960s.

In grade 7 history, students have begun their study of the Civil War and Reconstruction. One of the assignments during this unit is reading slave narratives. This allows students to hear the voices of enslaved people telling their own story. Students will write an essay from the perspective of an abolitionist and conductor on the Underground Railroad. In order to provide for deeper connections, students are collaborating in literary circles during English class to read and analyze A Soldier's Secret, about a young woman disguised as a soldier during the Civil War.  

Students in grades 7 and 8 listened to Martin Luther King’s I have a Dream Speech and analyzed the speech for effective rhetorical devices. In grade 8, students completed and presented Civil Rights projects that required them to research key figures during the time period of Brown vs. Board of Education to the passage of the Civil Rights Act. In their study of Sandra Cisneros’ The House on Mango Street, eighth graders are reflecting upon how a young woman of Mexican-American heritage in 1960s Chicago explores how traditional roles and her own identity can coexist.

Students develop their ability to think abstractly, to tackle controversial issues with sensitivity, and to engage in civil and respectful discourse over the course of their time in Middle School. In order to teach these skills, Ciera Young, our Coordinator of Equity and Inclusion, is working with the grade 8 advisory team to design workshops that will grow students’ capacity to consider other perspectives in decision-making, reinforce debate skills, and facilitate respectful discussions. These lessons will ultimately be adapted and implemented in the other grades in the Middle School. While we emphasize the contributions of African Americans during the months of February, these conversations about diversity will continue throughout the school year.