The Possibility Project

Where will your imagination take you?

On Tuesday, I was invited to chase a dinosaur in the woods. I was outside at Kindergarten recess enjoying the sunshine and nearly effervescent laughter of five and six year olds. A group of kindergarteners suddenly approached me to share Ms. Marshall, there’s a dinosaur in the woods!! They spoke in a half-whisper, half-yell voice young children so often use to mark this occasion as both surreal and mundane. They were more excited than surprised, as if they were setting off to see a familiar friend; as if there is nothing more ordinary than dinosaurs living in the woods behind Pike. What else could I say besides Can you show me? Slowly and a bit nervously, I crept through the woods in heels made more for sitting than hiking.

The kindergartners, much more agile, arrived before I did and pointed to an outline of large boulders. I saw the shape immediately - four legs, a body, extended neck and tail. Yet what amazed me most was not our Pike dinosaur but our Pike children. How did they turn a collection of rocks into a dinosaur? Do they think anything and everything is possible? This weekend, I hope you and your children - no matter their ages - find time to imagine. Read a book. Take a walk. Daydream. Slow down, simplify, and let your imaginations run wild.

Why do we need schools?

All that I am may simply be the culmination of hundreds of interactions with teachers. My first grade teacher showed me the power of stories, and my fifth grade teacher empowered me to write my own story. My second grade teacher taught me the beauty of dreams, and my favorite graduate professor explained how to turn a dream into a vision. My fourth grade Orchestra teacher inspired ten years of cello and a lifelong appreciation of Bach and Yo Yo Ma. My third and seventh grade teachers taught me to love poetry, and my college philosophy professors challenged me to love questions.

It is not a coincidence that I almost always start our faculty/staff meetings with a question and a poem. School is where we become our future selves. This week and beyond, I hope you take a few moments to wonder in amazement in your child(ren)’s doing and creating. Look how they are wonderfully themselves and imagine how they might further become their true selves in the coming weeks or years. Live in the beautiful tension between today and tomorrow. And then, send their teachers a thank you note.

What did we learn this week?

On Tuesday, I watched a second grade class have their morning meeting. It was a familiar routine (greeting, share, activity) done anew (six feet apart, masks on, all facing forward). In perhaps the greatest miming display ever, a student hunched near the ground, arms spread wide, face in a grimace, holding a very large, heavy, and invisible boulder. With significant effort, he heaved it to the teacher who caught it with outreached arms and an exaggerated stumble; remember, this is a very large, heavy, albeit invisible boulder. I left with a smile in awe of all we are learning. In this familiar routine (school) done anew (distanced by space or screen), we are learning to reach far enough to make connections, be joyful and silly in the face of grave circumstances, and find creative ways to share and shoulder the burdens this year will offer us. This year, perhaps more than any other, will be shaped by our communal learning. We must continue to stay curious, offer help with humility, and receive it with gratitude. Let’s see what’s possible when we learn together.

Here’s to our beginning.