Helping to design an outdoor oven: Project-based learning, Democratic education, and learning group process skills

By Lolita, home in Oliver, 2pm

I had had a few rough days from trying to do too much in too little time. Maybe some type of mini-breakdown? Here are some of my reflections.

Yes, I am alive and well. Thanks for all of your messages, texts, and comments. In my efforts to economize time, I apologize for not sending individual replies. But here come some specific gracias mentions: Thanks to Kitten for being able to tell that something was wrong just from my writing, Artie for putting me up in his apartment and checking up on me, Dee for another of her treatments, Guy and Bernie for picking up the slack when I took off and hid, my college mentor for understanding why I needed a short pause, and Julie for just sitting with me and listening after dinner.

I am so sad I missed the trip to the Patio and Hearth Store to examine models of our outdoor (pizza) oven to be used for cooking and warming us a few degrees on cold days. But Lori’s dinner tales made me feel like I was right there!

Today it was perfect weather for running: humid, drizzly, low 40’s. Not a single child complained. They are truly fleet-footed Indigenous at the core—and so are our “honorary Haudenosaunee” children. I will never, ever forget how beautifully they run and swim. And we enjoyed getting a bit soaked on the Perimeter Walk. As one of our boys said, “The forest looks so different in this weather, and the sounds are different, too!”

After returning, taking hot showers, and dressing in spare clothes, we sat in the Lounge for the weekly All-School Meeting, which we had skipped the day before because of the trip. Captain Dee served us hot drinks, warming porridge, and acorn/walnut flour “toast” with toppings.

The kids talked about “so much to do, write, draw, and study” today, asked to cut their meeting short, and skip My Side of the Mountain. They asked to skip Skills Hour as well, promising to work on their assignments at home instead.

They especially wanted to get started designing the outdoor pizza oven. We suggested that they break into “design teams” of four; each team would develop a proposal to present to the other teams after lunch.

Guy has been training them slowly in how to conduct small group meetings. They have already become quite fluent in taking on different roles, such as chair, timekeeper, note-taker, and reporter. He has also added a new concept that centers on DeBono’s Six Hat Thinking. It’s usually used by business groups, but our kids have pretty much internalized the idea that in their teamwork, they have to shift additional roles based on “The Six Hats.”

Next, we discussed the where and how, especially in this weather. “Well, we can work in the Pool Enclosure, the Dewey House, the warming huts, maybe the Rec Room if the RV clients aren’t using it. The teachers and parent volunteers assigned ourselves to different spaces.

Friday is “Freeday.” The kids divided themselves up by counting off “1, 2, 3, 4, 5.” Off they went, and we didn’t see them as a whole until lunch time.

After lunch, we had about 45 minutes to report out before heading to ice-skating. They had different ideas for colors, shapes, bricks, and stones. But they all chose the model that had a seating ledge around the front. One group suggested that a platform be built all around the oven to accommodate more kids around the heated stones.

They agreed that they really didn’t care that much about anything else, but could the store implement their seating idea?

Captain Dee joined us and switched topics. She told them how it is thought that the Pre-Invader Indigenous People (PIIP) baked by wrapping leaves around food and burying them in fires or hot cinders, and fried by finding large flat rocks and cooking food on them, sometimes with deer or bear fat when available. “It’s pretty much like our pizza oven and I can’t wait to get started cooking in one!”

Until I’ve caught up on my uni work, I’m pretty much banned from ice-skating. It’s for the best. I promised my mentor that I would update www.longhouseschool.blog this weekend.