Programming Spotlight: New Victory Residency + ELA collaboration

This month students at Belmont participated in a New Victory residency program that brought two extraordinary teaching artists from the theatre into our school library for a week.  The gifted teaching artists were Marisol Rosa-Shapiro and Ugo Anyanwu who led the series of workshops at Belmont  which were bookended by two trips to the New Victory theater where we saw productions of both Romeo and Juliet  and The Three Musketeers.  

Our two wonderful teaching artists played theater games with us,  taught us to give compliments and Shakespearean insults,  facilitated the drafting of an original soliloquy, and had us read and recite pieces from the classic texts connected to  the two plays we saw at the New Victory. --Jessica Fenster-Sparber

Interdisciplinary Collaborations-- Hidden Figures

Interdisciplinary Hidden Figures Unit Leadership Team meets at the start of 2018 to co-plan at the Intrepid.

Ms. Chau supervises an NSD student bottle rocket launch after teaching students how to create their own rockets in February.

The books are ready to be distributed to every student at Belmont.

Ms. Ikawa leads "I Have, Who Has... in Ms. Ernyey's Advisory

At the Intrepid, students are challenged to complete simple tasks with gloves on to simulate the challenges faced by astronauts in outer space.

At MoMath in March!

Interdisciplinary Collaborations-- Hidden Figures

At the end of January we kicked off an interdisciplinary collaborative literacy initiative in advisory classes with two language learning activities to prepare students to engage with Hidden FiguresYounger Readers’ Edition.  Our school’s principal purchased a copy of this new paperback for each and every student and we had the fun job of partnering with advisors to distribute these gifts.  Students expressed satisfaction that they would be able to keep the books and were generally eager to begin reading them.

Ms. Ikawa, Speech-Language Pathologist, led students through a round of “I Have… Who Has” first, and then I introduced the terms associated with front matter and back matter.  We walked through the back matter together and concluded with a small competition to see who could utilize the index most efficiently.  Students did not want to stop looking things up at the end of the period.

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Approximately one month later, the unit concluded with hands on learning experiences at the IntrepidMuseum (for placement students) and the National Museum of Mathematics (for detention students.)  We were so consumed with the work at hand--science, literacy, social studies were all involved-- we had little time left over to post, but here are a few photos of the highlights. --Jessica Fenster-Sparber, School Librarian, Belmont

Programming Spotlight: X: Or Betty Shabazz v. The Nation at the New Victory Theater

All four photos X: Or, Betty Shabazz v. The Nation, by Marcus Gardley, directed by Ian Belknap
The Acting Company

Photo Credit: T Charles Erickson

On Friday, March 24th, a small group of teachers at Belmont accompanied our placement students to Manhattan's New Victory Theater to see Marcus Gardley's X: Or, Betty Shabazz v. The Nation.  Teaching artists Chad Beckim and Janet Oneyenuchea returned to Belmont on Monday to debrief with our students, some of whom spoke at length in response to the discussion questions the teaching artists posed.  It was wonderful to see them draw out the synthesis that had taken place in many attendees' minds since the start of the unit back in February as they reflected on their learning experiences.

We are grateful to everyone at the New Victory Theater for their steadfast support of our students' learning and unwavering encouragement to New York City's detained youth, and to Literacy for Incarcerated Teens (LIT) for the funding to purchase such a large block of tickets so that all placement students and their chaperones could share this special theater-going experience together.  Thank you!--Jessica Fenster-Sparber

Class Trip: Pedal Punk

On Thursday, December 10th, nine students from Passages Academy's Belmont site visited the New Victory Theater to take in Cirque Mechanics' Pedal Punk performance.  Students were prepared during the days leading up to the trip by lessons co-taught in the library with Erica Nadel, ELA and Special Education teacher, and with a pre-theater visit from the talented New Victory teaching artists Chad Beckim and Shela Rhoulhac.  Literacy for Incarcerated Teens generously purchased the tickets for students and staff, all of whom seemed to enjoy the experience.  Said one participant, "After the show I felt very calm and satisfied.  I felt this way because the show was so entertaining that it had me concentrated and amused." Indeed.  --Jessica Fenster-Sparber