West Bath students employ the attribute of authenticity to do real work.

West Bath School students have come to expect authenticity and engagement with the community in all of their expeditions. This expectation resulted from a need expressed in an early High Quality Work protocol, and a work plan that focused on increasing authenticity in our final products. Our students truly want to be a part of a solution and better understand the levels of impact on their community. West Bath School students do not accept the role of just pounding the last nail into a project and cutting a ribbon at a ceremony. Our students want to research along scientists in the professional world to reseed clam beds, raise salmon eggs, or collect population data about the invasive green crab. These aspirations require our students to tackle complex texts and think like a researcher and writer, to persuade and inform targeted communities to affect a change. They also meet with local experts about food insecurity and passion projects. West Bath School students share their knowledge with the community by creating professional quality books and informational guides for local organizations to utilize for educational purposes. In the end, West Bath School students are well on their way to employing the attributes of those in the professional world.

The students demonstrated growth over time in original, creative thinking through their poetry writing. In 2011, the children each wrote a poem describing their observations of nature which they compiled into the book, Reflections of Hamilton Sanctuary. The students made observations of nature at a local Audubon sanctuary. The children wrote individual poems that described their observations using sensory details. While all students were assigned to write a poem about the sanctuary, the poems are the individual and personal work of each child. They chose the location of the sanctuary that was meaningful to them and wrote with vivid details that arose from their own senses. Student watercolors provided images of the sanctuary, from the perspective of their poetry.

By 2015-2016, the children's poetry became more original and creative by writing a two-voice poem where two students collaborated in writing one poem. The students wrote a poem that incorporated their scientific understanding of pollination as a dialog between the plant and the pollinator. While this was partner work, the students had to create "characters" and dynamics where pollination could happen, and tell that story through the format of two-voice poetry. The dynamic of having a partner in this case increased the rigor as the two voices needed to work together to correctly and poetically explain the scientific concept.

In 2017-2018, the same expedition had evolved to writing a fable about pollinators with the moral about West Bath School's Code of Character or Habits of Scholarship traits. The students wrote an original fable, utilizing all the appropriate literary elements of a fable, that creatively illustrated their understanding of one of the school's character or scholarship traits. All elements of the fable, along with the traits they connected with, were the individual and creative work of the student.

Student Passion Projects

Students in grades 3-5 have the opportunity to develop a passion project, either individually or as part of a group. The creation of passion projects was a new opportunity for students in the school year 2017-2018, allowing space within the school day for students to dig deeply into their own creative ideas and passions. Prior to this school year, students participated in an assigned exploratory - either yoga, reading, or team building. These activities were teacher-driven and allowed for no choice, and the feedback from children was lukewarm. The decision to move to the passion projects came from the concept of having makerspaces in schools, which allow for students to explore their own interests and make something out of nothing. While different from makerspaces in that they are not necessarily STEM based, the passion projects allow for students to have extended time during school to focus on their own original and creative ideas. Students begin by taking an interest survey, to help to target areas that are of particular interest to them. Additionally, groups of students work to identify local needs. Individuals or groups of students are encouraged to dig deeply into a passion that simultaneously solve a local need, however, at a minimum passion projects demonstrate original thinking, ingenuity, and problem solving of students that are focused on a topic that they care deeply about.

Student Passion Project - Making Origami Boats

This student has been pursuing a yearlong passion project that integrates science and math by creating an original origami boat and then using proportion and scale to enlarge it to life-size. His intention is to make the boat structurally sound enough to be able to float in it, launching this final product at our Celebration of Learning. His passion project demonstrates original, creative thinking of a student through the engineering design process of creating, testing, and revising. He needed to be creative in the use of various materials and structures to determine the optimum plan for his giant build.

Student Passion Project - WBS Entrepreneur Club

The WBS Entrepreneur Club embodies the collaboration of original, creative thinkers. They became scientists to develop a product for their new business called Super Seeders. The students began by brainstorming ideas for products that met the student-created criteria of being eco-friendly and contributing to society. Through this process, the students narrowed their ideas down to creating a Build Your Own Tea Kit that can be sold to people who want to grow their own herbs to make into tea. They were initially also inspired by a self-watering system that can be made out of a recycled water bottle. A student had recently made one at our local library. The students combined the two thoughts by making the Grow Your Own Tea Kit out of a recycled bottle and with the self-watering feature.

The students went through several drafts of the self-watering apparatus by experimenting with different bottle sizes, growing mediums, and wicking materials for the water. Some examples of changes made in response to their scientific testing are that they upgraded from a 12 oz. bottle to a 1 liter, switched to using clay pebbles for drainage instead of stones, and used sponges instead or rope for wicking. Every student can explain their scientific reasoning behind these choices based on their observations.

They also explored the role of temperature and light in the growing process so that they could best inform their customers on how to grow their herbs. The students attended a local tea making workshop so that they could provide literature to accompany their Tea Growing Kits that provided tips and information for how to harvest their herbs and how to make their teas.

In the end, the Entrepreneurs brought forth a high quality product that sold out within the first two hours of a local plant sale. This validated all the critical thinking and analysis they put into perfecting their self-watering system.

Students have created products that use formats and standards from the professional world. The students followed the criteria set by a local expert who expressed a need for her educational programming. The students also studied examples of an author's work to establish the professional expectations for producing a children's book. Students also created informational books that used nonfiction text formats. The exemplars below display growth over time with incorporating formats and standards from the professional world into their final products.

Invasive Species - The Green Crab

The fourth grade studied an invasive species to our coastline. They accessed Marissa McMahan, PhD, Senior Fisheries Scientist for Manomet as the European Green Crab expert. Manomet is a well established environmental organization that educates people on sustainability of our world. They needed informational cards to use as visual aids for their educational programs about solving the problem of the invasive green crab. The children made laminated informational cards that contained scientifically accurate drawings of the green crab for identification and important facts that Manomet wanted conveyed in their programs. The second year of the expedition, the students expanded their expert base and worked with Manomet on creating solutions to the invasive green crab problem. One solution was to encourage people to eat green crabs. They accessed a local chef to cook a variety green crab recipes. They made trifold brochures that included similar information as their informational cards but also included solutions and recipes, which was growth from the original product. They presented their findings at the Green Crab Summit in Portland, ME. Both the informational cards and tri-fold brochures met the format and standards required by Dr. McMahan.

Authentic Children's Books

Students have shown growth over time with the incorporation of formats and standards of the professional world when producing authentic children's books. In 2010-2011, first graders wrote an ABC book about the New Meadows Lake. The book lacked professional formatting as its sentences and illustrations did not follow a standard location. In 2013-2014, kindergarteners researched Eric Carle's illustration techniques and followed the standards within his published works. They produced the book Chickens by the Numbers which has a professional quality to the reader's experience.

Local Directories

In second grade, students learn about the community. Students have shown improvement in authenticity by creating products that use formats from the professional world. In the spring of 2013, the products were a compilation of student essays. In December 2017, the products evolved to be similar to real-world directories. Over time, the products have become primarily student writing. Student artwork has also been included rather than just photographs. Nonfiction text features like the table of contents and about the authors pages were also added to create a professional world format.

Third Grade Tick Repellant (2014-2015)

After third grade students learned about issues surrounding climate change, they tackled a local issue regarding ticks and Lyme Disease. Deer ticks carrying lyme disease have increased exponentially in the state of Maine, and lyme disease among members of our community is more and more prevalent. As part of their field work, third grade students worked with Midcoast Lyme Disease Support and Education to better understand the local challenge as it relates to climate change. They also conducted field work with Aveena Botanicals to learn about essential oils and to create a product that would repel ticks. Students mixed their own repellant and provided it to the public along with informational brochures as a way to help to decrease the lyme disease epidemic. This portion of the expedition was conducted as part of our school's desire to create more opportunities for our expeditions that result in products that benefitted our community. This was growth for the school, as earlier expeditions did not necessarily have a service component connected to local issues.

Supporting Plants and Pollinators

Given the Next Generation Science standards focus on interdependent relationships within ecosystems, a 2nd and 3rd grade spring expedition has been developed on pollination. Over the years, the expedition has focused on both global and local issues. Initially concerned with the decline of pollinators, students created a campaign asking residents to Save the Bees. They wrote persuasive letters, researched the right seeds to plant to encourage bees to pollinate, and provided Celebration of Learning visitors with information and seed packets. Finally, students constructed bee houses and brought them home to install in their yards to encourage pollination. In the next version of the expedition, students focused on the declining population of the monarch butterfly. Students raised butterflies, assembled butterfly houses and planted a butterfly garden on school grounds. Most recently, the students worked with the Kennebec Estuary Land Trust to build bat houses to attract and sustain endangered brown bats who are currently experiencing white-nose fungus disease. Students built bat houses, mapped estuary sites, and determined the ideal location for the bat houses within the estuaries. Kennebec Estuary Land Trust supported the students' work by installing the bat houses. This expedition has grown over time from trying to increase pollinator habitats in our own backyards, to creating opportunities for increasing pollinator habitats in the larger community.

Summer STEM Club

In Summer STEM Club 2015: Jack and the Beanstalk, the students explored different engineering challenges connected to their reading of a variety of versions of Jack and the Beanstalk. The guiding question was How can you design a more efficient method to solve Jack's problems? The students did a series of engineering challenges to answer the guiding question such as finding a more efficient method to get the goose's golden egg down the beanstalk without breaking it.The final product did not connect with real world issues but rather it answered the guiding question. The students weeded and watered the fifth grade's garden during the summer as a stewardship opportunity connected to the local community but it wasn't the central focus of the expedition.

In Summer STEM Club 2018: Fly to ME, the students learned about an endangered shorebird that migrates to Maine's beaches for nesting. The guiding question was What does it mean to be environmental stewards on Maine's beaches? The students studied the piping plover. They learned why this endangered shorebird migrates to Maine each year, how the piping plover helps Maine's beaches, and why we should protect it. The most valuable lesson learned this summer was that our shorebirds and marine life are threatened by the abundance of plastic debris in the environment. The children learned how to be environmental stewards of Maine's beaches by making educational brochures and flyers, participating in beach clean-ups, and reducing their use of single use plastics. In September they will share their discoveries with the school community and encourage West Bath School to switch from plastic to metal utensils and reduce or eliminate the use of straws in the cafeteria.

This shows growth over time as prior to the summer of 2015, summer school was a more traditional rote skills practice session. The students did not like attending and often were upset to learn that they were recommended for extended school year services. There was a 50% attendance rate of our students. In 2015, West Bath School withdrew from a larger district which provided the opportunity to recreate the summer school experience. In 2015, Summer STEM Club replaced summer school. The student attendance rate increased to 90% and has remained at that level for the past 4 years.

Field Work that Matters

Students have been exposed to local issues as they dive into expeditions. As they learn about the issue, they begin to own it. Fieldwork opportunities allow the children to connect with and learn from experts in the field. They engage in authentic work such as reseeding the clam flats, collecting population counts of green crabs, or raising Atlantic Salmon. They know that their efforts are important contributions to the the local community. Their mental, physical, and emotional investment into the issue deepens their ownership. This work matters to the students and contributes to our larger community! Prior to the school's partnership with EL Education, students participated in field trips that were sometimes connected to the work in the classroom. As the school began to develop expeditions, students began to participate in field work. These first few years of field work were little more than field trips that were focused on the work in the classroom. As the school continued to grow and the implementation of EL Education increased, field work became an essential opportunity for authentic work. While learning, students are conducting the real work of professionals in the field, giving back to our community.

Reseeding the Clam Flats (2018)

Green Crab Counts (2018)

Restocking the River with Salmon (2017 & 2018)

Second grade students at West Bath School studied Atlantic Salmon. In this expedition, students have worked to answer the guiding questions: How do Atlantic Salmon survive in their environment? How have people impacted the survival of Atlantic Salmon?

In the classroom, students raised 200 Atlantic Salmon eggs that came from a hatchery to their fry stage. Our salmon were released into the Little River in Lisbon. Students were excited to become environmental stewards, by releasing salmon to help increase the Atlantic Salmon population as Atlantic Salmon are a Maine endangered species.

Students conducted field work to the Sheepscot River to see how employees of the Department of Marine Resources tend smolt traps, and visited the Damariscotta Fish Ladder and the Nequasset Fish Ladder. Students also learned from local experts about obstacles that are harming salmon survival. Students studied the impact of dams, fish ladders, and culverts on Atlantic Salmon migration.

Students created an Atlantic Salmon calendar to share their learning of salmon survival in their environment. Students shared how important it is to improve salmon survival and ways people can help.