february/march feature teachers

koren eloul|Sustainable design project based learning at santa rita 

Koren Eloul is a CTE teacher at the Santa Rita Jail in Dublin, CA. Recently, his Roots of Success class was studying the Sustainable Building Module of the curriculum and he introduced the concept of Earth Ships, which are fully sustainable, off-the-grid homes that are built largely out of recycled materials. The students were really excited and it opened the doorway to a whole bunch of other work on sustainable building techniques and materials. The students were eager to learn more and more about it and then the class co-created the idea to do an extended, hands-on project. 

​Koren brought in information and they came up with the concept of not only designing a series of structures, but also orienting the purpose of those structures to social enterprise and environmental justice use. This incorporated what they had been learning thematically throughout the Roots of Success course into the project. Koren brought in basic materials – construction paper, regular paper, markers, crayons, the most basic stuff they are allowed to bring in – and with those limited materials the students came up with extensive blueprints, floor plans, schematics, and illustrations. Then they presented their projects to administrative staff – both showing off how the systems would work and then explaining what their purpose was, that is, in what way it would benefit the environment and society.  It was an incredible experience! 

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Emory christian|Diversity and justice quilt making project

Five Keys Charter School teacher, Emory Christian, a former, prosecutor, currently teaches students at the Santa Rita Jail located in Dublin, California.  Her love of quilting and her association with the Social Justice Sewing Academy Non Profit  inspired Emory to conduct a special class in early 2017, at San Franciscos County Jail # 5. Principal Cynthia Scott collaborated with Emory and  San Francisco State Professor David Palaita.  Together Emory and Dr. Palaita taught a class entitled:   "Diversity and Social Justice:  Racism and The Art of Social Justice". 

This fifty hour class required that the students examine, evaluate, and analyze racism on an individual, institutional, and cultural level in the United States, as well as expand their knowledge about racism.  The students increased their personal awareness of their own socialization and assumptions.  The final class project required that each student use their expanded knowledge and awareness to  design, draw and actually craft an artist's concept of "social justice" into a quilt block.  

Despite the class being taught in a highly secure and incarcerated setting, Principal, Cynthia Scott secured the approval of San Francisco Sheriff's Department Captain Paulson to allow students to use sewing needles to perfect their artwork.  The students'  finished art work, consisting  of finely embroidered quilt blocks, along with individual artists' statements were displayed at the Five Keys Art Show in June of 2017. 

The students individual quilt blocks were incorporated into a fully, finished quilt that is currently on display at the Mule Gallery in San Francisco through February 2018. 

Interested in doing something like this in your own classroom? Contact Emory at emoryc@fivekeyscharter.org.

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Yeni Zamora | ​A NEW SPIN ON AN OLD TOOL

Many ISP teachers use the WPR history of student coursework in Oasis to determine the appropriate coursework for graduation requirements. Yeni Zamora, an ESL teacher at Para Los Ninos Adult in Downtown Los Angeles, has repurposed the history tool. This handy tool can be used to individualize instruction for ESL students. Although ESL classes are direct instruction, they are still enrolled on a rolling basis. Since new students are constantly entering the class, frequently they will need to review prior lessons to smoothly transition into the course. 

A print out of each student's work history is printed out by doing the following steps (check out the video at right, created by Marchelle Broussard!)

1. Sign into Oasis
2. Identify the Student
3. Select the lavender schedule bubble
4. Go the Schedule Info (located in the blue bar) and Click on the down arrow
5. Select WPR History
6. View the WPR History
7. Print the screen from the browser

This document is then used to individualize ESL instruction by assigning homework that can be used for remediation or enrichment. Enjoy reflecting on the past and planning for the future with this historical tool! 

Questions? Contact Yeni at yeniz@fivekeyscharter.org.
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