“Please be Honest” (Year 2, Week 6)
Welcome to Session Two of the year at Heroes Academy! This week was launched with a discussion about the focus character trait for the session: honesty. Prompted by discussions about stealing, honesty and truthfulness that the heroes initiated themselves last session, this session they will continue to share, discuss and problem solve about how to develop the heroic character trait of honesty more in the studio.
As this trait has been brought to attention this session, the heroes are already beginning to discuss and highlight when honesty or dishonesty is evident in the studio. This has been evident through overheard comments from the heroes such as “please be honest” and “Are you being honest about your points?”
Quest
Day One back and the heroes were intrigued, curious and a little confused by a “crime scene” that was cordoned off in the studio…Their theories of what crime had been committed and who the culprit was quickly developed however the heroes had to wait until the afternoon for more information.
Welcome to the Session 2 Quest — Detective Science! Once the heroes were introduced to the crime scene they were all very excited to begin examining the evidence. This quest lets the heroes explore chemistry and biology as they take on challenges each week to solve the crime of the stolen files.
After examining the crime scene in detail on Monday, the heroes focused on analyzing fingerprints in quest time on Wednesday afternoon. Their exploration included how fingerprints are formed and how to take, dust for and lift fingerprints from pieces of evidence. Their investigation will continue over the following weeks, stay tuned to find out who the culprit was!
Storybird Project
The heroes took on another challenge this week to create their own story book using storybird.com. Throughout this session they will craft their own story following Freytag’s pyramid of storytelling with specific characters, setting, climax and resolution. The heroes who successfully complete all challenges in this project will be able to have their storybook creations professionally published and printed to add to our studio library.
It has been exciting to see the heroes more motivated to write this week — they have reached their group math and reading goals for studio levels and once they reach the group writing goal they will unlock the opportunity to pitch and plan excursion ideas to go on next session.
Heroes Who Lead
We believe these young heroes are more than capable of taking on leadership in the studio this session. The heroes work towards demonstrating mastery by earning badges in core skills work. However, they also work towards earning “Hero’s Journey” badges — badges that are more about learning to be rather than learning to do. The “Early Socratic Leader” badge challenges the heroes to take on a new leadership opportunity in the studio. Betsy is already working towards earning this badge by taking on leadership of Studio Maintenance time.
Some heroes have also taken on a new opportunity of leading a morning launch. After signing up and being emailed an example launch template, the heroes choose a launch topic and prepare their discussion questions. After receiving feedback from a guide on their preparation, the heroes can then schedule in when they will lead their launch…so far we have two launches being led by heroes next week!
Wrapping Up
The first week back after a break can often be a mix of intentionality, distraction and transition. The start of this week was quite chaotic, with many heroes failing to uphold their contract commitments. After bringing up some of these issues in a close group early in the week, the heroes identified promises where they felt that they personally needed to recommit to work on upholding. This was a vulnerable and honest time in which the heroes were able to reflect together on the choices they were making. After this, as the week continued, intentionality, kindness and focus increased and we once again saw a glimpse of the world-class community that this group of heroes can become.
