The Fourth-Grade Outdoor Sculpture Garden

"When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down ‘happy’. They told me I didn't understand the assignment, and I told them they didn't understand life."

John Lennon

A picture of some of the 76 legacy (children of alumni)  students at a recent breakfast event.

An Alumna Parent’s Perspective

Five years ago Dr. Sarah Timmapuri, D-E alumna and then the mother of a new third-grader, was invited to speak at an admissions open-house. What she said about the school and her and her daughter’s experiences was so moving that I asked her permission to reprint it, which I did. Just last week I reread it and would like to share it again. Her words provide an insight into what our school does best in as powerful and personal a way as I have ever heard. I include excerpts from her speech below. (It is a little longer than the usual Lower School Notes pieces, but it is well worth the time spent reading it!)

First-graders making squirrel nests.

I’m here today almost as two people – I am the parent of an 8 year-old girl who joined Dwight-Englewood this September as a third-grader. In that way, I’m new to the Lower School. And, I’m also here today as a graduate of the Dwight-Englewood class of 1985. 

...I thought I'd tell you about how Dwight changed my own life 30 years ago, and how it continues to play a part in my life today. Then, since this is an open house for prospective parents and students, I thought you all might like to hear about our experience as new members of this community.

As we all know, education doesn't end with high school graduation. No matter what our future holds, we constantly find ourselves in new situations having to “learn” something. In high school, I may have learned about US history, English literature and calculus. Today, as a cardiologist, I may be learning about how the arteries of the body aren't simple conduits, but living organs with their own particular physiology. No matter what the subject matter is, we are always learning. And, over the years, particularly as I've had the pleasure of needing to pass one 'board exam' after another, I've come to realize that the most important thing I learned here at Dwight was how I learn best. My experience here at Dwight taught me how to learn. More specifically, the teachers here at Dwight taught me how to learn and to enjoy learning... I have no doubt that the teachers here, helped and encouraged me to become who I am today..

So, Please allow me to briefly describe a bit about our experience here as new parents at the school this year.

Before we joined here, we had been somewhat struggling with school. An educator I know once told me that school can be a tough place for kids to transition into: At home, the squeaky wheel gets the oil, but in school the nail that sticks out gets pounded into the floor. And that actually did describe our prior experiences with school – I saw my daughter, who was so creative and active at home (writing plays, songs and movie scripts, making toys, decorating the house with her artwork) become silent, disengaged and completely uninterested in class, staring off into space without even making eye contact with her teacher...

Since we've joined Dwight-Englewood, if not everyday, at least every other day, she will jump up from whatever we’re doing (eating dinner, playing the piano) and say, “Oh! Mom! I forgot to show you something really cool we learned in school!” (this is entirely new territory for us).

Creating art in the preschool 

Recently, I had my first parent-teacher conference (which was, by the way, the most productive, informative and truly enjoyable meeting I’ve ever had with a teacher), my daughter's third grade teacher told me that she couldn't even imagine my daughter "silent"or "staring off into space."

We have been the overjoyed observers of a complete change in our child. Our child who used to cry for weeks when she had to go back to school now flat-out refuses to miss a single day. Imagine my happiness and relief when I ran into Ms. Abramson.., and she informed me that my daughter was writing a movie script and had asked her to be the star. Never ever before did she feel comfortable enough to go out on a limb, expose herself, and actually share her ideas at school. For the first time, I feel that my daughter is as comfortable being who she really is in school as she is at home.Here at Dwight, I think that rather than pounding all the nails that stick out into the floor, our teachers encourage their students to stick out in their own individual way while still allowing them to work together as a whole. I think that here, the teachers and staff strengthen our community not by preferring our kids all be the same or by forcing them to fit one particular style or ideal, but rather by encouraging our kids to find, explore and develop their own styles creatively, and in this way, complement each other with their diversity. As I watch my daughter change, I see her beginning to develop her own style of doing homework and preparing projects. In short, I can already see her starting to learn how she learns best, just as I did 30 years ago.

And yes, the campus here is gorgeous; all the technology is 

in place. The other day, I mentioned to my daughter that I had missed Obama’s and McCain’s speeches following the election. And, without missing a beat, she said, “Oh, I saw parts of them. My teacher plugged her laptop into our smartboard and went on-line so we could all watch them in class”. I will submit to you, that a “smartboard” is only as “smart” as the teacher using it to encourage her students to explore and share their thoughts and ideas without fears of 'making a mistake,' or 'being pounded into the floor.'

I’ve heard our Head of School, Dr. De Jarnett, say that we are an "intentional community" – we choose to be here. I live in East Hanover, NJ which is in Morris County in western New Jersey. We drive a total of over 90 miles a day to get my daughter to and from school. What in the world could be worth that?

In the third grade here, the kids are learning about Native Americans in social studies. Recently, the entire third grade were given a task – they were asked to imagine what kinds of things the Native Americans might have made for themselves in daily life. They all walked to one of the parents’ backyard and were given the opportunity to try to make those things themselves out of the natural materials they found. Now, when I read about this in the little note that was sent home with my daughter, the usual superficial things came to my mind – make sure she wears her sneakers, jeans would be better than regular pants on that day, make sure she washes her hands when we get home before she eats.

When I came in for my parent-teacher conference, all the 

Fourth-graders at recess 

"artifacts" that the third-graders had created were on display in the hallway, laid out and labeled with each child’s name and a description of the item neatly typed and matted on colored paper, like a museum display. My initial thought was about the time and patience required to put such a display together. But then, as I looked at those artifacts and read what the children wrote about them, I was amazed at their creativity. Then, of course, I found my daughter’s artifact. The name of it was "earrings," and she described how Native Americans might have used these to "try to look pretty."But, hanging next to her name was something that certainly didn't look like an earring to me, but looked more like a short necklace with a big feather on it. So, that evening, we were talking and I said, “Hey, I saw Native American artifact you made the other day. That must have been fun.” I left it at that. She answered, “Yeah, first I wanted to make earrings. But, that didn’t work, so I decided to make a bracelet instead. But, it kept on unraveling, so I turned it into a necklace.” I told her I thought that was a great idea and loved the big feather. She then said, “A bunch of kids tried to make a teepee. It was really really hard. It kept on falling over. But, they eventually got it to stay up. It was pretty cool.”

Three year-olds under 

their own steam

But, it was only upon reflection when I sat down to write this talk, that I understood how profound that little outing was. My daughter had attempted to do something she had never done before (make earrings). She had failed. She then modified her initial attempt and tried something else she had never done before (make a bracelet). She failed again. She tried a third modification (make a necklace), she succeeded, and she was happy. She had developed the courage to go out on a limb, try her best at something she had never done before, fail, and try again and again until she succeeded.

At her previous school, she had done the reading, writing and math – but she had never had a positive character-building experience. Here at Dwight, she’s still doing the reading, writing and math. But, she’s also learning that she can try something new, give it her best shot, fail, and it’s still ok. She’s learning that venturing out into new territory can lead to adversity. She’s also learning to find a path through that adversity that leads to some solution that she may not have thought of at the beginning of the journey.

Fourth-graders making 

Diwali designs

Prior to coming here, that failure at making earrings would have added to her prior belief that “that everything she did turned out wrong." Here at Dwight, it instead added to her current developing belief that it’s ok to try and fail, as long she tries. Here, she also saw kids working together and failing as they tried to make the elusive teepee. I could visualize those eight year-old kids trying to hold together the tops of those sticks that were taller than they were. And sure enough, next to the table of artifacts, there stood the bone structure of a proper tee pee. What better way to teach children the value and potential of teamwork. “Education” is about giving our kids experience in addition to academics. It’s about feeding the hearts, the souls and the imaginations of our children in addition to exercising their bodies and their minds. What good is it to teach our kids to write in cursive, if they are left with nothing to write about?

In summary, for us, it is worth every minute of our long 

Second-grader using her iPad to work on

the new Dream Box adaptive math program 

commute to watch our child learn how to learn from nationally recognized teachers who are valued by all of us here and who have the confidence and ability to allow our children to develop as individuals within a community that celebrates achievement and diversity. It’s worth every minute to allow our child to come here and not just complete those important tasks that are required for her to move to the next level of her schooling, but to also gain that experience that will give her the courage to use her education to the best of her ability without being afraid of failure.

In closing, when my daughter was very small, I had read somewhere that to help encourage children to speak and describe their thoughts and feelings, we could ask them open-ended questions, like, “What was your favorite part of so-and-so’s birthday party? What was your favorite part of visiting your cousins?” And so, this has sort of become a tradition in our family.

One day, my daughter and I embarked on our 

Children from the Bergen Family Center wearing  
Halloween costumes donated by our Lower School

usual long journey home in the afternoon and I asked her, “What is your favorite part of your new school?” When I asked this question, I thought she was going to pick something that was really fun for her here (whiffle ball, the smartboards, the tablet pc, digital photography, the giant playset). As always, she took a moment to think about all the things that were possible answers to that question – and then she gave an answer that I was not expecting; one that really warmed our hearts and solidified our belief that we had made the best choice.

She said, “I think my really favorite part is the teachers...I think that sentence coming honestly and spontaneously from the mouth of an 8 year-old says more than anything else I could possibly say here today."

Some Interesting Articles

• Stephan Turnispeed writes in a US News and World Report Op/Ed about Why Your Student Failing is Good for the Future Economy.
• Anne Murphy Paul write in kqed Blog “Research has Found that Interest is a More Powerful Predictor of Future Choices than Prior Achievement or Demographic Variables.” Read the Mind/Shift full post.
• Amanda Chan of the Huffington Post wrote an interesting article entitled How Creative are You? in the The Third Metric: Defining Success Beyond Money and Power Blog. She includes a vocabulary-based test that you can take. It also give insight into what will be valued most in the future.