Creek Village Rises Again

Fat alder buds (Alnus rubra)

As early tree and shrub buds were swelling and opening last week, signs of human habitation suddenly appeared on the west side of North Creek.

Indian plum (Oemleria cerasiformis)--one of the earliest blooming native shrubs

I spotted this mysterious structure on the far side of the foot bridge and crossed over to look more closely.


After I crossed the bridge it became obvious there was more to the lonely structure than what I could see from the other side of the creek.


Soon I spotted another structure with a little pile of firewood in front. (Fire is not allowed on campus, but firewood is essential for authenticity.)


One group constructed a long house of sorts and were inside refining the structure and enjoying each other's company.


This hamlet is the latest incarnation of Creek Village, which for the past four years has arisen and flourished for about a month, in early or late spring.

During the first year, four Clearwater students created homes within the natural structure of shrubs, trees and underbrush across the creek. Matt, the only staff member in the village, acted as lodge keeper. Creek Village residents paid him in salmonberries for the opportunity to sleep at the lodge, located at Second Beach. (There are three accessible beaches along Clearwater School's stretch of North Creek. Starting with the most northern beach, they are consecutively named First, Second and Third Beach.) Every day residents trooped to their village. Someone yelled "Breakfast!"; five minutes later, "Lunch!"; after five more minutes, "Dinner!"; then "Night time!"; and finally, "Morning!". They shared food from their lunches and ate salmonberries at meal time.


A year later the four original village founders were joined by two more people. In addition to the daily schedule, they added picnics at Third Beach and hikes to First Beach, where they foraged and explored. The third year of Creek Village was much the same, with the addition of four more residents.


By most accounts, Creek Village this year is a lot more fun than the previous three years combined. For one thing, around 16 people are involved so far, although they're not always all in residence at the same time. No staff members are regular residents of this year's village. The group abandoned the tree and shrub dwellings from previous years (which they call "Abandoned Creek Village"), although some continue to poke around the old digs in the same manner as anyone who is fascinated by abandoned townsites.


More after the jump...
This year residents scavenged sturdy downed tree branches to shape conical and oblong skeletons, and then covered them with blankets and tarps. Inside the structures residents placed sleeping pads, blankets and lunches. At the end of each day, they leave the building skeletons standing and pack out all the tarps, blankets and pads.


This year villagers divide the day into four segments: breakfast, dinner, night and morning. A day is 30 minutes long. Residents who have cell phones keep track of the time and announce when each segment begins. Residents have created currency to pay for stick weapons and food. Currency is mined in the sandbar at Third Beach, although some people also bring trinkets from home to serve as currency. There is also a lot of item trading.


With the influx of new residents this year, conflict was inevitable. One group of people wanted everyone to have imaginary pets that followed people around, but another group was firmly opposed. One resident described the conflict as a civil war that involved the destruction of some homes and different factions yelling "Pets" or "No pets". Everyone agreed to put the matter to a vote. A majority voted against a requirement that everyone have pets, while allowing people who wanted pets to have them.

Soon after this issue was resolved and homes were restored, residents decided to practice stick fighting for fun and everything was peaceful.

Peace continued even as Outcast Village was created by three students nearby as an alternate place to hang out and to have fun good-naturedly bugging Creek village residents.


A new person joined Creek Village and decided to start his own town near First Beach, which he called Riverside Village. He recruited so many Creek Village residents for his town that half the population left. The remaining Creek Village inhabitants felt abandoned and declared war on Riverside Village. Stick fighting ensued; no one was hurt and no one destroyed people's homes.

By this time, each village had a mayor--Lily for Creek Village and Stephen for Riverside Village. The two mayors met and decided the fighting was pointless. They convinced the residents of each of their villages to stop fighting and everyone agreed to be residents of Creek Village. The town retains the two locations as distinct and cooperative neighborhoods. The two mayors agreed to be co-mayors of greater Creek Village.

The residents of Creek Village last week included Lily, Justin (aka Boombox), Arlo, Nikos, Tommie, Jackie, Vera, Mara, Jesse, Chiara, Zoe, J.R., Jackie, Stephen (aka Crazy Uncle Steve), Tarka and Caden.


End of post.

Tales of Warcraft

Meghan, who is 12 years old, started attending Clearwater seven years ago. In a recent interview, Meghan said, “My favorite, favorite thing about Clearwater is doing whatever you want, whenever you want.” This year, she is learning to play the guitar with the expert assitance of staff member and musician, Matt Garrity. She loves the grounds and the creek, because there are places to mull things over. She is also in love with fantasy and made-up worlds and at Clearwater is able to explore the never-ending facets of that passion, including creating unique experiences and stories based on it. In recent years she has read Warriors, a children's book series that focuses on four clans of wild cats in their forest homes and the Harry Potter book series, among others.

She and her friends have spent a lot of time at school role playing in worlds they create based on fantasy books and World of Warcraft, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG). (Commonly referred to as WoW, the game has over 12 million subscribers around the globe making it the world's most-subscribed online game. The fantasy world of WoW is vast and owes much of its inspiration to the fantasy worlds of J.R.R. Tolkein.)

Another of Meghan's favorite activities is writing. She keeps a running file of ideas to develop into stories, and has written five chapters of a story based on WoW. The idea came to her when she was between waking and sleeping. She made up an area in the Warcraft world called Emerald Forest.


Her story starts with a character that is half elf, half troll--a rogue.

She is excited to publish her story, as it exists so far, in installments on this blog. The first chapter and installment begins below.

[One of the challenges for a new writer is learning how to use punctuation to make a story more clear to the reader. Meghan and I worked on punctuation edits to the story. She wrote the entire text with no editing from anyone but herself. Meghan requested that the version of her story with her original punctuation be included for those who want to experience it as she did, flowing out unedited. You will find that version below the punctuation-edited version.]

Tales of Warcraft
Chapter 1
Assassination and Capture


It was dusk. Clouds floated lazily across the red-orange sky and the Horde encampment Ren'kal stood menacing, framed by the flaming sunset. A hunched figure, draped in a dusty brown cloak, stood at the entrance to the encampment and watched as a guard paced up and down in front of the gates. Long bluish-green ears poked out of the top of the creature's hood and tusks the color of sand protruded from under it. It took a moment, but the guard paused in his pacing and looked up, noticing the strange figure watching him. The guard tramped up to the strange figure. The guard was a large, slightly hunch-backed creature with emerald skin and glaring hazel eyes. His ears were pointed; he also had tusks, though not even half the size of the ones of the strange trespasser.


"What is your business here?" the guard demanded, pointing his spear at the throat of the stranger.
"I be here tah speak tah Kesh," said the stranger.
The guard grunted. "And what makes you think you can just waltz right into Ren'kal and talk to Kesh, eh?"

Swift as the wind, the stranger had straightened up and put a dagger to the guard's throat.
"Take me tah Kesh, now," the stranger growled.
The guard froze. "You wouldn't!"
The trespasser laughed. "Oh, trust meh, I would."
The guard's breathing quickened. "O-okay....this way."

The stranger withdrew the dagger from the guard's throat and melted back into the shadows. The guard ventured forward into the camp, made his way towards the largest building in the encampment and went inside. He climbed a flight of stairs before coming to a door.

"Open it," hissed the trespasser from the shadows, surprising the guard, who knocked. Hearing a voice call, "Come," the trespasser entered. It was a high-ceilinged room with a large tapestry along one wall showing The Sundering of the World. As the door shut with a thud, a voice greeted the stranger.

"Lok'tar, Salith*."
Salith let her cloak fall from her shoulders as she drew out her daggers. She walked up to the chair where Kesh sat with his back to her.
"Goodbye, Kesh."

Crash! The walls of the building shook as another Alliance catapult launched a boulder into Ren'kal. . As soon as word of Kesh's death had reached the Alliance--how it had, no one knew--it had immediately ordered an attack on the now leaderless encampment. "Gryphons!" someone screeched as Kesh's assassin fled the now-collapsing building. "Stop right there, Assassin!" It was the guard who had escorted her. Salith laughed, grinning beneath her hood. "What are yeh goin' ter do, orc? Sit on meh?"

The guard charged, spear outstretched. Just as she had done before, Salith swiftly pulled out her daggers, but this time she didn't hesitate. The blades cut into the guard's neck and he fell to the ground. Salith whipped around and raced towards the ruined gates as flaming arrows rained down. She held on tightly to her hood as she raced away from the burning ruins of what once was Ren’kal.

Deep in the Emerald Forest, Salith ran. She ran as fast as her long legs would allow. She could hear the thundering of hooves and knew she was being followed--by who, she didn’t know, nor did she care at the moment. All she wanted to do was get as far away from Ren’kal as possible. The hoof beats got louder and Salith’s heart quickened.


“HALT!”
Salith fell back onto the ground as a great black steed pulled up and reared. Its hooves landed at her feet and the human astride the steed looked down at her, almost mockingly.

“Well well well, what do we have here?”
Another human rode up beside the first, astride a beautiful white mare.
“I believe it’s a Troll, sir,” said the rider, who appeared to be female.
“I know that!” spat the first rider, who Salith guessed was the leader.
More troops surrounded her, this time on foot, and the leader jumped off his horse.
“Wh-“ Salith began, but the human silenced her with a sharp kick in the side.
“Quiet, Troll!” the man spat.

Salith looked up at the human; blood dripped from the corner of her mouth as she grinned up at the human.
“What are you grinning about, beast!?”
Salith spat blood into his face.“I be wonderin’ where yeh got such an ugly face.”
One of the footman spoke. “Umm, Ronik, Sir, the King asked we bring the Half-breed back… alive, Sir.”
The man called Ronik straightened up and glared at the footman.
“I am aware of the King's orders, Skinth! Now you are going to shut your trap and lis-“
Ronik whipped around and stared down at Salith.
“It's laughing!” Skinth cried.

Ronik leapt down and bound the cackling Salith’s hands and legs. Finally he stuffed a cloth into her mouth and tied her to his saddle. Mounting his steed he called three sharp commands to his men and began to ride off. Salith’s head hit the ground and she blacked out.

*Pronunciation note: Sal'-ith

[Meghan's original version without editing]

Chapter 1
Assassination and Capture:

It was dusk. Clouds floated lazily across the red-orange sky and the Horde encampment Ren'kal stood menacing, framed by the flaming sunset. A hunched figure stood at the entrance to the encampment, Draped in a dusty brown cloak, Watching as a guard paced up and down in front of the gates, long bluish-green ears poked out of the top of the creature's hood and tusks the color of sand protruded from under it, it took a moment but the guard paused in his pacing and looked up, noticing the strange figure watching him, the guard tramped up to the strange figure. He was a large, slightly hunch-backed creature with emerald skin and glaring hazel eyes, his ears were pointed, he also had tusks, though not even half the size of the one's of the strange trespasser "What is your business here?" The guard demanded, pointing his spear at the throat of the stranger "I be here tah speak tah Kesh" Said the stranger, the guard grunted "And what makes you think you can just waltz right into Ren'kal and talk to Kesh, Eh?" swift as the wind, the stranger had straightened up and put a dagger to the guards throat "Take me tah Kesh, Now" the stranger growled, The guard froze "You wouldn't!" the trespasser laughed "oh, trust meh, I would" the guard's breathing quickened "o-okay....this way" The stranger withdrew the dagger from the guards throat and melted back into the shadows, the guard ventured forward into the camp, he made his way towards the largest building in the encampment and went inside, he climbed a flight of stairs before coming to a door "Open it" hissed the trespasser from the shadows, surprising the guard, who knocked, hearing a voice call "Come" the trespasser entered. It was a high-ceilinged room with a large tapestry along one wall, showing The Sundering of the World. As the door shut with a thud, a voice greeted the stranger "Lok'tar, Salith" Salith let her cloak fall from her shoulders as she drew out her daggers, She walked up to the chair where Kesh sat with his back to her "Goodbye, Kesh"

Crash! The walls of the building shook as another Alliance catapult launched a boulder into Ren'kal. The Alliance, As soon as word of Kesh's death had reached them- How it had, no one knew -had immediately ordered an attack on the now leaderless encampment "Gryphons!" Someone screeched as Kesh's assassin fled the now-collapsing building "Stop right there, Assassin!" It was the guard who had escorted her, Salith laughed, grinning beneath her hood "What are yeh goin' ter do, orc? Sit on meh?" The guard charged, Spear outstretched, and just as she had done before, Salith swiftly pulled out her daggers, but this time she didn't hesitate, the blades cut into the guards neck and he fell to the ground, Salith whipped around and raced towards the ruined gates as flaming arrows rained down, She held on tightly to her hood as she raced away from the burning ruins of what once was Ren’kal

Deep in the Emerald Forest, Salith ran, She ran as fast as her long legs would allow, She could hear the thundering of hooves and knew she was being followed- by who, she didn’t know, nor did she care at the moment, all she wanted to do was get as far away from Ren’kal as possible, the hoof beats got louder and Salith’s heart quickened “HALT!” Salith fell back onto the ground as a great black steed pulled up and reared, its hooves landed at her feet and the human astride the steed looked down at her, almost mockingly “Well well well, What do we have here?” another human rode up beside the first, astride a beautiful white mare “I believe it’s a Troll, sir” Said the rider, who appeared to be female “I know that!” Spat the first rider, who Salith guessed was the leader, more troops surrounded her, this time on foot and the leader jumped off his horse “Wh-“ Salith began, but the human silenced her with a sharp kick in the side “Quiet, Troll!” the man spat, Salith looked up at the human, blood dripped from the corner of her mouth as she grinned up at the human “What are you grinning about, beast!?” Salith spat blood into his face “I be wonderin’ Where yeh got such an ugly face” one of the footman spoke “umm, Ronik, Sir, The King asked we bring the Half-breed back… alive, Sir” The man called Ronik straightened up and glared at the footman “I am aware of the kings orders, Skinth! Now you are going to shut your trap and lis-“ Ronik whipped around and stared down at Salith “its laughing!” Skinth cried. Ronik leapt down and bound the cackling Salith’s hands and legs, Finally he stuffed a cloth into her mouth and tied her to his saddle. Mounting his steed he called three sharp commands to his men and began to ride off, Salith’s head hit the ground and she blacked out.

End of post.

Clearwater Singers Winter Concert

The Clearwater Singers presented their winter concert on Tuesday, January 25, 2011. Everyone worked very hard to produce a delightful concert. In addition to the singers, two other students made entertaining cameo appearances in one of the songs. Staff members Matt Garrity and Stephanie Sarantos accompanied songs on guitar and accordian, respectively, as well as providing invaluable stylistic and musical assistance to all of us. Stephanie also joined me in singing most of the songs with students.

The songs that ended up in the program were chosen by different individuals within the group. The lyrics to "Castle in the Sky" were written by singer Delayney and the music was composed by Matt Garrity. The hand rhyming piece, which was put together completely by the performers, included traditional hand rhymes as well as hand rhythms and movements they applied to original and well-known song lyrics.

Concert Program

"Hand Rhyming"
"Zombies on Your Lawn" (from Plants vs. Zombies)
"Have You Seen the Ghost of John"
"Castle in the Sky"
"Accidentally in Love"
"Gower Wassail"
"This Land Is Your Land"

Here is a video of the concert. It's about 26 minutes long. A very big thank you to Bob Freeman for recording and editing the video of the concert. And another huge thank you to everyone who came out to watch us sing. The concert was standing room only.



End of post.

The right to waste time: video games and kids

(This is cross-posted, with some modifications for a different audience, from my philosophy blog Speculum Criticum Traditionis.)

The last Clearwater Blog post featured a new short (13 minutes) film recently produced by Sudbury Valley School. You can view it here.

About two and a half minutes into the film, SVS graduate Ben mentions that many parents ask, when they are first exposed to the Sudbury model of education, "But--what if my kid just plays video games all day?!" (Ben notes that this is more or less what he did during the first of his four years at the school.) This issue also comes up in the other piece I want to mention. The Brooklyn Free School was recently featured in an episode of N.P.R.'s This American Life. The segment (Act 3 in the show) addresses the school's commitment to empowering students with all the decisions involved in running their school, which includes the degree of use to which computers will be put.

There's a great deal more to both SVS's film and This American Life's radio segment than computer games and movies. But for the rest of this post I want to focus on this issue, because in my experience, Ben is right. This question comes up again and again, and as the Brooklyn Free School learned, it may need to be asked over and over again by the students themselves.

I volunteer at Clearwater, but I make my moderate living working for an after-school program at a public elementary school. My program allows me to give my students a good deal of autonomy, but the notion of letting them just "do what they want" brings reactions from my co-workers that range from blank stares to deep you're-joking-right? discomfort. Surely, it is assumed, it's my job to give them "projects"-- mini-lessons in science, art projects in clay or wooden craft sticks, songs we all learn together. Won't they just waste their time if I don't? And when it comes to computers (I am able to make the computers in the school library available for not quite an hour and a half every week) well, maybe they could be using the computer to, you know, research something or finish their homework, but you wouldn't let them just play games? or watch videos?

I'm going to mainly talk about games here, though a lot of my considerations apply to videos (and I mean either mass-media or homemade) as well.
The concerns that arise seem to me to be motivated either by concerns about content (potentially violent or disturbing images, actions or plots), or about the medium itself (computer games being a “waste of time,” “addictive,” and so on).

My thoughts on this are in process and revisable, but they are also the fruit of long reflection and practice. I should first say that I have a threshold for what I consider “appropriate” content at my work. This standard is far stricter than what would be countenanced at Clearwater (anything less than AO, the resident student tells me), or than I would eagerly welcome in my own home, for instance. The reason for this is simple: job security. One or two angry parents are all I have needed to encounter before I decided to err on the side of over-compensating caution. In general I am prepared to trust the school district’s internet filtering program, but I keep a close eye on the browsing and playing that students do. So far I've never felt the need to tell a child they couldn't watch what they were watching, but I've had plenty of discussions about online content with kids. What I've found is that kids (1) can take in a tremendous amount of variation in even a short while online, (2) are capable of thinking critically and creatively about it and will do so aloud with you if they trust you and feel the need, and (3) are very good at enforcing their own “screening.” Whether its a game that's too violent, or a Wikipedia article with too-much-information about sex, material that triggers kids' own internal repulsion does not stay on their monitors.

Computer games were in their infancy during my formative years and so I spent little time engaged in them as a child. (Arcade games held some appeal but were too noisy, cost more quarters than I wanted to spend, and I was rarely very good at them.) Consequently, I could not at first empathize with the unabashed enthusiasm for these games which I meet in kids. It took me a conscious and intentional effort to familiarize myself with them. I played alongside students and I played with my stepson. I have acquired a significant respect for the art and imagination of both the design and the play of computer games, which I almost entirely lacked when I first started working with students over a decade ago. Far from being a single monotonous activity (as the dismissal “just playing video games” might imply), such games are complex discrete units designed to build competencies in attainable steps. The advanced dexterity and the strategizing required will often hamstring anyone who tries to navigate one of the higher levels of a game before mastering the basics. This was borne home to me over and over, and it alone ought to have persuaded me that the notion that no learning was happening in these games was naïve.

It took me longer to come 'round than it might have; not because the games weren’t really learning tools, but because I actively resisted seeing them that way. It took me a long while to get over what I eventually conceded was a prejudice against the form of the game: I just didn’t like video games! I was reacting against the form; I found them strange and hard to understand, “cartoony,” and trite. My reasons weren’t all compatible (“too difficult” and “too simple,” for instance); but so long as I was content not to examine my motives, they tended to reinforce each other anyway.

My reticence was finally overcome when I asked myself: what's the salient difference between a computer game and any other game? Say, a computer version of Monopoly. I am not a fan of Monopoly--like most grown-ups I know, I find it tedious and frustrating--but I am at a loss to say why a board game that (despite my personal distaste) would never be banned from my classroom, should be any different from a version played on a screen. And once I have conceded this, I fail to see why games that more fully exploit the medium they employ are any less appropriate; indeed, they are arguably much more so, since they actually do familiarize players with the technology which is indisputably going to be no trivial part of our culture for the rest of our lives.

When I watch kids in my room play these games, I am struck by how social they are. They are not staring at a screen doing nothing; they are vocal, mobile, often jumping up to see what someone else is doing. They are excited, engaged, and interactive, not just with the game but with each other; far more so than they would be if, say, they were reading a book. Whatever is going on with the game, the kids are also navigating the always-more-complex-than-you-think terrain of peer society, not the least considerations of which are fairness and turn-taking, but also learning how to teach and learn from each other.

I regard the students in my class as capable of making responsible decisions for how they conduct themselves and I have found time and time again over ten years that they fulfill those expectations, and follow their passion if I get out of the way. But of course, students have more than one passion; the artist and the runner are often the same kid. A child has limits just as I do, and boredom sets in sometimes. In my experience, a child will indeed get bored with running, or drawing, or a computer game, in his or her own good time (and, chances are, not on my schedule), when they have stopped learning what they are interested in.

This is why, beyond all of the considerations I mention above, salient and even vital as they are, there is one concern which grounds my whole approach, and which would obtain even if I agreed (as I don’t) that computer games, or any other activities the kids pursued, wasted their time. It is often noted at my work that my classroom style is somewhat “free.” This is a word I like and that I take very seriously. One of the most central values I have is respect for the autonomy of your children. Because my primary motivation is always to cultivate a respectful and honest relationship with each child, I want to give them exactly the same respect that I want for myself. It is true that sometimes I myself waste my time--by my friends’ standards, my family’s standards, even my own. I might fritter it away on television, or oversleep, or read a comic book, instead of working in the garden or writing my next essay. I might be decompressing after a hard day, getting valuable and much-needed down time; but let us assume I really am, even by my own standards, “wasting time.” Even assuming that this could be evident to the outside, I would still not want my wife or my best friend to tell me that I had to stop what I was doing, to impose a rule on my behavior that told me I had to do something more “worthwhile.” My wife might remind me that I have promised to wash the dishes; my friend might suggest that we have a jam session or even that I might find it rewarding to read this book he’s been recommending. But these suggestions are made in a very different spirit than laying down a rule or a demand. Would anyone say that the way to address this would be to invoke authority?

This is what it comes down to for me: respecting the right of a child to decide what to do with his or her time. And I have found that if I cultivate respect for the children I work with, I can have far more fruitful engagements with them about things that matter, including the things they will, sooner or later, wind up being "exposed" to--"adult content" included.

New Sudbury Valley School Video Available

Update: After finding that the video frame was too big for blog parameters, the video size has been edited to fit. Apologies for the chopped-off earlier video.

Sudbury Valley School, the original Sudbury school and our model and inspiration, recently produced a video that gives insight--in a lovely, visual nutshell--into how and why Sudbury education works. They have been operating for more than 40 years.

The video is just over 13 minutes long and worth every second of viewing. Please set aside a few minutes to watch it.


End of post.

Hanging Out in the Kitchen

It's not all cooking in the kitchen. When the Cooking Class isn't whipping stuff up, the kitchen is a very popular hangout.

Pizza sales have been moved to the Conference Room.

A rare large group meal for Pizza Day.

One of the large tables often has Magic or another multiplayer game going.

A bidding game is a favorite right now.

One of our youngest students enjoys a candy necklace a friend shared with her.

Indoor Games

It's been terrible outside, but the weather hasn't put a damper on the fun and games at Clearwater. Players had to improvise some rules to fit Football in the Active room, and then they were off and running.

 It was so much fun watching all of the kids (Matt included) having such an unrestrained good time.