Okay, next up on our agenda, Ardale Proud School of Engineering and Arts. Superintendent Stallow. >> Excellent. Uh good evening all. This is one of the highlights of all of our school board meetings. Each month we invite uh principles of all of our schools to uh volunteer to come forward and share some of the great work that they are doing. So this evening, Dr. Principal Hansen and her team of both staff and amazing students will be sharing a little bit of how C integrates uh learning with uh naturebased experiences. Um so with that, I'll hand it over to you. Thank you. >> Thank you. Good evening, Chair Evans Becker, members of the school board, and superintendent Stalo. Thank you for the opportunity for us to be here this evening. My name is Heather Hansen, and I'm the proud principal of the School of Engineering and Arts. I'm here tonight with a team of people, family members, parents that came tonight, but also our admin internal Kelly Dela Cruz, our second grade teachers, Martha Hubdy and Toby Kriles, and our students, fifth grade students, Drexton, Maddox, Greta, and Jane. Together, we're excited to share how outdoor learning is being integrated into teaching and learning at sea and how it connects with the Robbinsdale Area Schools strategic plan and our commitment to engaging students in their learning. All right. So C is uh well the C mission statement tries to provide a stimulating and engaging atmosphere that fosters all students innate curiosity and joy of discoveries to achieve high levels of success and uh also students will positively contribute as members of a diver diverse and global community. Okay. And um outdoor learning is an educational approach that takes learning into the be no beyond the traditional classroom and into natural or outdoor environments. Or you could also say that outdoor learning empowers students to learn through experience and see the world as a classroom filled with opportunities for discovery. The district plan has four parts. The academic achievement, student engagement, collaboration and partnership, and staff investment and impact. [gasps] Outdoor learning academically honors diverse learning styles and backgrounds. Student engagement fosters creativity and curiosity and inquiry based learning collaboration and partnership. C has partnerships with the Jeffers Foundation, the DNR, Eagle Scouts, and parent volunteers. Staff investment and impact, staff development and planning, preparation, supported by admin and teacher leadership. Benefits of outdoor learning. Outdoor learning nutriers the entirety of a child academically, socially, emotionally, and physically. It engages their senses, curiosity, and creativity to deepen understanding and make learning more meaningful. Outdoor experiences improve focus, motivation, and academic performance. Being outdoors helps reduce stress and anxiety. Some more benefits of outdoor learning are taking care of outdoor learning spaces, gardens, and habitats. Instills a sense of accountability and stewardships. Outdoor learning can connect schools with local parks, nature centers, and environmental organizations. >> [snorts] >> Honors outdoor learning honors diverse cultural relation relationshipships with nature and creates inclusive learning spaces. Out our outdoor learning spaces, we have we have 10 outdoor learning spaces. My personal two favorites are the big rock woods and the secret woods. I'll tell you why. Number [clears throat] one, we got to observe flowers grow in the big rock woods. We got to plant trees to help the ecosystem. We also got to watch a bees nest grow. In the secret woods, we got to watch an animal decay and we had academic time to build forts out of natural resources. Some other outdoor learning spaces we have are the pollinator garden, chickity landing, and we have flood mitigation. So in flood mitigation, it's like, have you guys ever seen those theaters with the big seats almost? Amplathe. It's stone amplathe statues or seating areas. In Chickity Landing, we get to watch birds feed because there is bird houses and bird feeders. In Pollinator Garden, we get to watch the ecosystem evolve around it. Some of C's learning highlights include trout, weather graphing, and science notebooks. In fifth grade, sea students get to raise trout and then release them back into the wilderness at the end of the year. In [snorts] fourth and fifth, students graph make graphs to track the weather throughout the school year. [snorts] All almost all grades have science notebooks where they write down their questions and observations while doing outdoor learning. More learning highlights include gardening, poetry, and chickens. At C, we do a lot of gardening such as planting carrots, flowers, and trees. In upper elementary, we made we wrote poems based on nature and hung them up in the front woods. At sea, we own chickens that we take care of and observe. Well, I'm going to talk a little bit about how everything's integrated because when you get everything integrated across those curriculum areas, it really cementss all the learning and ties it all together. And like Jane talked about the trout presentations, as a teacher of a younger grade, when those the fifth graders come in to the younger grades and teach us all about the trout, and it is just fantastic. They make the presentations, they take the questions from the kids, they do a fantastic job. And she also talked about weather. Not only do we collect the weather, but they also write about the climate of Minnesota and compare it to other states. And we also integrate social studies at that time and they talk about the states and landmarks in those different states. Um, in gardening, we also graph what they have in the garden. Just fantastic. The listening walks were integrated with music. Our music teacher went out and did listening walks and they made instruments and heard different musical um musical sounds in nature and the ever popular pumpkin drop. We do grow pumpkins and in the pumpkin drop it is so much excitement. They design not only for like week a couple weeks before a contraption to protect the pumpkin and they have to collect recyclable item items to make that contraption just absolutely fun. and the flood mitigation system. I know Maddx said it was this the amphitheater. Oh, it's more than that. If you want to see something exciting, one of the second grade standards is um following where rainwater goes. And those kids excitement as they followed where that water went just beyond belief. Number one, just being out in the rain was fun. And then when they got to follow it down to the drain, they thought this was the coolest thing ever. Um we also do force in mo motion sledding. all-time favorite and seed dispersal. How different seeds travel. They go out and they starts when they get a burst stuck on them on a forest walk. Then they wonder how that happened. And then the next thing they're designing and engineering new ways for seeds to disperse. All right. For our outdoor learning, we have a lot of collaborations and partnerships. We work closely with the DNR. We have um part of our grounds is designated as a school forest by the DNR. So they um come out and work with us. We have a school forester that works with us on taking care of the school forest. We've worked closely um with the Jeffers Foundation. They do a lot of outdoor learning and tying it not only to science but to other content areas as well to really integrate and teach all content outside. We work um with field trips doing a lot especially with the Three Rivers Park District. Richardson Nature Center is one of those. Um Eagle Scouts and Seven Dreams Foundation have been instrumental in um supporting some of the um [snorts] the infrastructure we have in our outdoor classroom spaces as well as um providing materials for students for learning outside. We work closely with district buildings and grounds to help care for our spaces um and in installing different um outdoor classroom spaces as well. And for professional development, that's been a really big piece in making outdoor learning happen at C. Um because teachers have to understand how to effectively use the outdoors as a classroom. And it's not just um being outside but really integrating that into our learning. So the science house um from the um is part of the uh science museum and they were instrumental in the initial professional development when C started. um the C steam coordinator that we had in the beginning years um really connected with teachers on um modeling lessons as well as coaching um leading PD and bringing in other organizations like the Jeffers Foundation um Hamlin University's Center for Global Environmental Education has provided a lot of resources. Uh we're currently working with the science and engineering practices in action modules that they have created and we [snorts] had teachers in this photo here that participated in the teacher field school in the past and that was um a volunteer opportunity that those teachers gave up a few weekends during the year to really immerse themselves in outdoor learning. All right. And then we come to our community support. So, we've talked a lot about our partnerships, but we really really work closely with our community. Um, they really help to support and sustain our outdoor learning and our spaces. Um it's essential that we work together and we're working collaboratively not only to launch new outdoor um initiatives, but also how do we maintain everything that we've started to develop. And so we have to maintain it so it'll develop and grow over time. Um [snorts] we talked about different examples of our outdoor learning spaces, so I won't go over those. Um but the support from our community such as our PTA um our parent volunteers, our generous donations and our grants really play a vital role in how we uh nurture our outdoor learning and our initiatives getting those started. So these partnerships really allow our students to have the most authentic learning outdoor experience that we want them to have. as we've incorporated outdoor learning at the School of Engineering and Arts. It's been inspiring as a principal just to talk to teachers and parents within our community. Um, I talked to Liz Kinville. She's a fourth grade teacher at the school of engineering arts and she told me because they all knew that we were coming here to present and she and I was asking her if she had a a quote and she said, "Well, I've taken my students outdoors every day for two years." I go, "Oh, that's a good one." So, um she she's really uh the teachers there at C are committed to um providing opportunities for our students to to be able to use the outdoors as the largest classroom that we have. and her quote is, "Outdoor learning has transformed my teaching by intentionally planning integrated lessons to use in the outdoor classroom. I've helped my students develop academically, grow their curiosity, improve self-regulation [clears throat] skills, and connect with nature." And our parents, they're at our do a lot of volunteering and are active in our community as well. And I connected with Katie Cervanka just asking her what her thoughts were on outdoor outdoor learning spaces and she lives in the neighborhood. So she just said that it's a meaningful way for students to connect with nature and develop that lifelong love and care for our planet. We'd also like to um thank again on behalf of C, we want to thank Chair Evans Becker, Superintendent Stalo, and members of the board for your continued support of innovation and experential learning opportunities within Robbinsdale Area Schools. Thank you for having us. Thank you for listening. >> [applause]