Since 2017, Wooster has partnered with with the Tryall Fund 'Success by Six' preschools in Montego Bay, Jamaica. Wooster collaborates with administrators and teachers on professional development and curriculum and resource enhancements. Wooster students engage in developing and leading various project-based learning opportunities for children in the schools.

In April 2017, Todd Blamires ‘19, Drew Greeley ‘20, Max Morales-Thomason ‘20, Monisha Mohan ‘20, Riley Damiano ‘20, and Zach Felton ‘22, and two faculty members visited the Sandy Bay and Hopewell Deliverance Basic Schools, located in Jamaica. The team spoke with great enthusiasm and excitement about their experiences in observing both schools and engaging with students. They observed first hand, how the 'Success by Six' model, developed by the Tryall Fund, has impacted these schools in terms of improving health, literacy and educational outcomes for their students.

Antoinette Fornshell, Director of Lower School had the opportunity to represent the Wooster School Center for Social Impact during a visit to 'Success by Six' pre-schools in Jamaica in April 2018, following Mrs. Smith and Mrs. Kerr's visit to Wooster in March. In order to continue the momentum, Antoinette met with these administrators to develop an action plan including short and long-term goals. While there, Antoinette also assessed how Wooster might be most effective and helpful in continuing the partnership in a meaningful way, and what kinds of future projects would be effective, meaningful and student-centered. Our goal continues to be to develop a sustainable partnership between the Wooster School Center for Social Impact and the 'Success by Six' program in order to learn from each other and to make a lasting impact for all.

"During my three day visit, I spent time in five of the Basic Schools near Montego Bay that are supported by the Tryall Fund. Basic schools refer to what we refer to as pre-schools, and serve children ranging from two to five years old. The 'Success by Six' program was started in 2010 in one school and has grown over the years to support six schools. Over the past 8 years, they have instituted a phonics program which has ensured that children have solid beginning reading skills by the time they enter the state schools at the age of 6. The students who attend the Success by Six schools stand out among their peers upon entering grammar school as many of them are already reading by the time the begin compulsory programs.

During my visit to five of the schools, I saw clear evidence of developments as a result of Jacque and Bernetta's recent trip to Wooster School. Teachers were very proud to demonstrate new approaches to teaching mathematical concepts that were shared with them by Jacque and Bernetta at a recent workshop. They report that as a result of their visit to Wooster and this partnership:

• Students are beginning to work more closely together in small groups and pairs
• Teachers are incorporating more manipulatives while teaching math
• Teachers have become more aware of teaching math with an eye towards developing an understanding of concrete, pictorial and abstract concepts in the children
• Teachers are in need of increased support and professional development

Moving forward, the goal is to continue to develop this sustainable partnership.

As a starting point for this trip, our team set out to address the goals collaboratively created for the Success by Six Schools by Jacque Smith and Wooster’s Director of Lower School, Antoinette Fornshell, during her visit last April. These goals included:

• Sending teachers and students to support the Success by Six schools by providing materials and demonstrating teaching methods
• Teachers are in need of increased support and professional development

In the last several months, collaborative planning with Jacque Smith guided our team of seven students and two faculty to support three main project areas: continued development of more intentional learning centers, promoting a more hands-on approach to the Singapore Math program through increased fluency with math manipulatives and professional development. In addition to this, modeling of arts-based and project-based learning were identified as areas of priority.

In order to best demonstrate how effective learning centers function, our team designed projects based on one broad theme, and then created project-based learning centers in the areas of art, math and movement at each school. At Hopewell Basic, due to more time at the school, we were also able to incorporate other activities including the use of clay and songs that also tied into the broad theme. At both schools, we created the learning centers in different rooms, to best separate the groups by age. This was deemed a better fit for the number of students and the physical environments at Hopewell Basic and Bamboo.

The broad theme was introduced with the story, The Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister, which Lower School teacher, Brenda Chapman, read to each entire school at the start of each day. This literacy-based exercise was focused on interactive reading: the predicting, interpreting, retelling, and making personal connections through the story which explores themes of selfishness, sharing, and the differences between individual and collective group identity.

At both Hopewell Basic and Bamboo Missionary Basic schools, the Math center was comprised of exploring units of measurement, shape recognition, and sorting objects into a variety of categories. Students were asked to measure various lengths of rainbow-colored ribbon by lining up longest to shortest or vice versa and to sort rainbow colored foam pieces based on shapes, colors and sizes.

Learning Centers at Hopewell Basic
Art Center: Painting

Hopewell students were asked to talk about the story read in the morning and then to verbally express what they remembered about it. Wooster students led this activity and offered Hopewell students paint, paper, brushes and smocks. They reinforced the connections from the story to the “rainbow of colors” in the form of paint on their paper. Wooster students asked the kids to think about the story, and to create an image about something that resonated with them, or they could just be free to express whatever they wanted. At the end of the activity, Wooster students went around to each child to ask them what they had made and wrote this on their painting as a way to honor the child’s experience and to promote the child’s interpretation and story. This activity involves the development of fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, verbal and non-verbal communication.

Movement Center: Dance

Students were given rainbow color sunglasses and rainbow scarves as props for dancing. This served as a connection with the Rainbow Fish, and Wooster students led the children in various movement activities including mirroring activities, freeze dance, and used slow and fast movement to encourage a variety of movements. This type of activity also helps to develop fine and large gross motor skills, and breaks up the day of sitting in the classroom. It also helps to develop sense of rhythm, listening skills and attention span to stay with the activity. Later in the day, Brenda Chapman and a student led a group of students in a song related to fish that also incorporated movement, to tie into the themes of the day, and also to help the children continue to move around in a structured way.

Learning Centers at Bamboo Missionary Basic School

Art/Dramatic Play Center: Sock Puppets

Children were asked to remember the Rainbow Fish, and to talk about the story. Students were provided with socks, eyes, yarn hair, felt of all colors of the rainbow, and were prompted that they could make any kind of puppet they wanted, either based on the story or from their own imagination. Teachers and students helped to facilitate the activity. The teachers at Bamboo were engaged throughout the process and this helped to facilitate this Center. The follow up to this would be to use the puppets with their peers to create their own stories. This activity blended the development of fine motor skills, sharing, independent thinking and storytelling.

Tae Kwon Do

One of our students, Jillian Schnaudigel ‘21, is a Taekwondo teacher for young children, and wanted to share this movement-based activity with the students at Bamboo. This activity tied in to the Rainbow Fish theme as kids were offered rainbow color sunglasses, and the activity was guided by the lens of focus, shared movement, and respect. It was intentional in the use of language such as stretching and incorporated counting (math), mirroring (focus, attention) and movement. Our students noted that the teachers at Bamboo were highly engaged which helped the children stay on task during this activity.

Professional Development Afternoon Session at Hopewell Basic

In order to best support the teachers at the Success by Six schools, Jacque Smith convened about 15 teachers at Hopewell Basic for a professional development session, where Brenda Chapman led an interactive teacher training based on the Singapore Math curriculum. Jacque Smith indicated that currently teachers have been working through the concrete, pictorial and abstract approach and there was a current need to focus on the concept of ‘greater than/less than.’ Wooster students helped to prepare the materials for this session and were also present to demonstrate the hands-on activities for the teachers to see how students might use the manipulatives in measuring, counting, etc. Students also participated as first hand learners of the Singapore Math program and helped to reinforce the understanding that students continue to use the concrete and pictorial to understand the abstract, even as they have moved into advanced math in high school. The teachers were engaged in the session and were asked to participate in the session in order to experience the concepts. Teachers and principals also shared what was working with their students and how they might incorporate some of these tools. It was a successful collaborative session, and we look forward to learning more about what might be working and what might be more challenging in their classrooms so that we can continue this collaborative teacher to teacher learning.

We look forward to continuing to evaluate and build upon our current projects to further our partnership with the Tryall Fund Success by Six School communities to be able to increase educational opportunities for our respective communities. It has been a wonderful experience for our students and faculty to get to know the children, teachers and administrators and we look forward to continuing to develop meaningful and intentional programs in collaboration with the Tryall Fund, Jacque Smith and the Success by Six teachers, as we are all working towards the same goal-to create the best possible educational opportunities for our children in order to better this world.

As part of the continued partnership with the schools involved in the 'Success by Six' program, Wooster invited Mrs. Jacque Smith, Executive Director of the 'Success by Six Program' and Bernetta Kerr, principal of Pondside Basic School to visit Wooster School in March, 2018. Wooster was also able to extend this invitation to Samuel Smith, Mrs. Smith's son, to offer the opportunity to immerse himself into the student experience for a few days at Wooster.

The learning intention of this visit centered around

creating opportunities for Mrs. Smith and Mrs. Kerr to interact with all levels of the Wooster community and to discuss their schools, country and culture. They were able to observe and interact with all aspects of our curriculum, and how components of the educational experience at Wooster might be transferable to their schools in Jamaica. Through teacher collaboration and discussion during the visit, professional expertise was shared and professional growth was promoted.

Following a very successful trip last April 2019, where, in collaboration with Jacque Smith, our team of seven students and two faculty went to Montego Bay to support three main project areas: continued development of more intentional learning centers, promoting a more hands-on approach to the Singapore Math program through increased fluency with math manipulatives, and professional development for teachers. In addition to this, modeling of arts-based and project-based learning were incorporated as a response to being identified as areas of priority. Aligning with the mission of the Tryall Fund, Wooster School is committed to developing and sustaining responsible international partnership collaborations that empower host institutions and improve educational opportunities for children in under-resourced areas.

To continue the positive development of this partnership with the schools involved in Success by Six program,Wooster invited Mrs. Jacque Smith, Executive Director of the Success by Six Program and Mrs. Elaine Henry, a senior teacher, to visit Wooster School this fall to continue the learning process, where our Lower School faculty could share resources and ideas to further strengthen the Success by Six schools.

The learning intention of this visit was to create opportunities for Mrs. Smith and Mrs. Henry to further engage with those aspects of the Wooster curriculum and teacher-learner model of professional development that would be beneficial to the Success by Six program.