ALMA – Students at Alma Public School have taken up a letter writing initiative, labeled the Alma delivery system, that highlights kindness and positivity in the school community.
For the month of December, students across the school have been writing messages of kindness to one another, an initiative that first began in teacher Megan Scott’s Grade 3/4 classroom.
“The students in general are reluctant writers who really need motivation to write and so my goal was to find something that the kids would be excited about,” Scott explained.
“And they would really just drop everything and want to write.”
After conversations with her students and colleagues, Scott, along with her class, decided to commit to creating a mailbox for the school, where students are encouraged to write letters, cards or post cards for students and teachers in the school community.
“That not only encouraged the expectation that the class should be writing … but then we’re also showing kindness,” she said.
The mailbox sits outside the school’s front office and letters are collected, organized and delivered by Scott’s Grade 3/4 class each morning.
“It was really neat to see all of the adaptations for each grade,” Scott explained. “The kindergartens are simply writing names and little words and pictures with stickers and then the older students are into full-out letter writing.”
Scott said the goal is to run the initiative through the month of December and then they’ll look at other fun and creative ideas to inspire writing in the coming months.
“I think one of the neat things for me is being in and out of all the different classrooms and seeing how the groups are engaging,” said school principal Jason Boyce.
Boyce said the students’ writing skills are really “taking off”.
“I think any time we can provide those meaningful learning opportunities, whether its meaningful writing or meaningful reading or meaningful math, it’s a real chance to practice those skills and do those life things,” he explained.
“I’m a big fan of the idea that we learn not for school but for life and I think by giving kids hands-on realistic opportunities to try things and make new things, it gives them an opportunity to see what real life is.”
Boyce added students are learning more than just how to write a letter. They’re also learning how to run a post office and to distribute mail, as well as organization skills and manners.
“What we’d like to see is school is one of those places that we want to foster ownership of the things that they’re learning,” he said of the hope behind the project.
“When we give kids opportunities and allow them to move just beyond pencil and paper and book tasks, where it’s actually being active and involved, that they take ownership of it, and they want to do more.”
He added one of the things the school is focusing on is ensuring students are taking initiative and leading some of the initiatives on their own.
“That’s the thing that we really want to pursue because we want to make those lifelong learners that even as they graduate from here and through middle school and through high school that as they leave, they see that school is a great positive place and that’s one of the big takeaways we want them to take away from all of this,” he explained.
Scott added one of the parts of the assignment was to write a proposal to the principal asking if the project was possible with COVID-19 restrictions, which she said was an important learning experience.
“It was neat to see everyone kind of has that order of working within a system,” she explained.
Boyce added, “It’s great to see that the kids are grabbing something that they want, they came and asked advice and guidance … and they see that systems do work and that they can be an active member of those systems and be an agent of change and that’s been really amazing to see.”
Scott said students have been excited to write each day and that excitement carries across the grades.
“The very day of this starting I received a few emails from parents about how excited their child was when they came home,” she explained.
“And they’ve been writing at home so that’s been really great to see it carry over.”
Boyce said during a time when everything is different for kids, including school, it’s important to focus on community.
“The biggest thing we need moving through all of this is community and it’s been a really great opportunity to build community within our school and to build positive engagement,” he noted.
“We need all the chances we can get to help keep building that community and to build those positive stories and positive messages in a time where news is sometimes hard and bleak and hard to deal with.”
Boyce added, “There’s a lot of positivity out there and this is just one way that they’ve been able to grab on to that and do something amazing.”
