Because of the school bond, Chehalem Online Academy (COA) students can visit a brick-and-mortar classroom, allowing this community of households to have some non-virtual opportunities to connect. The bond funded an expansion within Catalyst Alternative High School, including classrooms and meeting space for COA students.
Starting this fall, students can now partake in some hands-on activities every Wednesday and Thursday. However, this Wednesday, Dec. 13 was a little different, providing a wintry mix of educational activities and holiday revelry. Students gathered for the Winter Celebration, an ideal community gathering filled with laughter and the smell of fresh baked goods. The event featured: the Gingerbread Story Sharing event, Gift Book Exchange, cookie decorating, and Knowledge Walk, which was a two-classroom display of school projects.
Educational Opportunities
The Knowledge Walk offered students and their families the chance to share positive feedback on all students’ projects that were displayed in the COA classrooms of Teachers Eric Fuchs (Grades 3-5) and Christy Smith (K-2)
“The projects are an application showing what students have learned,” Smith said.
In Smith’s classroom, second-grader Sammi McKinley’s diorama displayed snowy owls in an arctic tundra as white as their feathers. To anyone who asked, Sammi offered all she knew about this bird of prey, including the varied range of foods they could consume.
“The snowy owl eats many things: rodents, bugs, other owls, and cats,” she said.
She paused and added quietly: “But I keep my cats inside. Well, they always sneak out.”
Meanwhile, in Fuchs’s 3-5 classroom, third-grader Jomar Torres and his mom, Sonia Garibay shared some details about Jomar’s project, building a usable solar oven.
“It’s an example of a solar oven, and it does work — when we have the sun’s cooperation,” Garibay said, smiling and laughing after a glance out the window at the cloud-covered sky.
Under the right conditions, the oven is quite clever, with no electricity costs required. Jomar created this sustainable wonder using a cardboard box. He propped its lid open with wooden dowels and spread tinfoil on the lid that could reflect sunlight down into the box. The opening was covered with a layer of plastic film to lock in heat. The oven can reach a temperature of 200 degrees, which is ideal for Jomar, who had a specific purpose in mind for his oven when he built it.
“It gets very hot and melts the marshmallow, and you can make s’mores with the sunlight,” he explained, proudly holding the little oven.
A tiny uncooked s’more sat temptingly inside of the solar oven, just waiting to be warmed.
An Online Learning Community
The s’mores would have to wait. There were many treats for the children to sample, and they soon gathered for some gingerbread decorating, adding icing and colorful candies to the tops of the cookies before settling in for storytime. Instead of waiting to be read to, the elementary students were ready with their own thrilling tales of mischievous gingerbread men and women.
The group sang songs, and then exchanged books, with their Winter Celebration not only an educational opportunity but a perfect showcase of a thriving community. When discussing the projects and the celebration with parents, it became clear that the parents truly were educators too. Parents are their students’ educational coaches, and to instruct their children effectively, they collaborate with Fuchs and Smith, who offer expertise and well-vetted materials. The students also have access to the same resources their brick-and-mortar counterparts do, such as talented and gifted screenings, outdoor school, the fifth-grade track meet, music classes, Oregon Battle of the Books, and iReady Learning resources.
“COA students have every single opportunity the other students do,” Fuchs said.
The COA experience seems to work for students.
Fourth-grader Ciara Hall said that she loves taking math classes through COA.
“I like how they explain it to me,” Ciara said.
Jomar says that COA is “very good” for him. Why is it so beneficial?
“It’s very good because I’m learning,” Jomar noted.
Fuchs said the beauty of the COA community, what helps students like Jomar and Ciara succeed, is the strong relationship parents have with their children’s teachers. These relationships matter greatly to Fuchs.
“I love COA,” he said, softly.
As he said it, standing in his classroom ringed by his students’ projects, with the laughter of the children in the background, it was no mystery how COA could mean so much to him. It is a close-knit community, his community.