Teaching as a Hive

Classes do not just materialize in a ready-made syllabus. They are the product of weeks and months of careful consideration, research, meaning-making and collaboration. And even then, not every course fits into a curriculum, especially when there are only so many hours of school in a day.

But when the stars align, new classes can be an incredible source of energy and renewal for the school. And that’s exactly what Upper School Spanish Teacher Brian Cassady, Upper School English Teacher Sheila Pai, and Director of Student Support and Wellbeing Dan Taboada experienced when they transformed the FarmEx program into a year-long class called Small Farms.

“FarmEx started as a way to get students to see the campus as a living space,” says Sheila. “It was one of our experiential learning offerings: Students could take time outside of class — like for theatre or athletics — and spend time getting their hands dirty in the campus farm, putting on their beekeeping suits, and learning about local and national issues, like the perils of factory farming or the differences between native and invasive species.”

While FarmEx was an incredible experience, the lack of dedicated, in-school working periods made it difficult to plan too far ahead, and it was not always possible to coordinate everyone to be in the same room (or field) at the same time.

“There’s something to be said for carving out time during the school day to do this important work,” says Brian. “When teaching a class, you have to make sure you have enough material to last a semester. But that was almost the easy part for the Farm, since there’s always work to be done.”

With a class as big as Small Farms, it would be almost unthinkable that it would be led by just one teacher alone. There were at least three important but distant physical spaces — the Farm, the Beehives, and the Classroom — and a class’s worth of work to be done in each of them. From tending the gardens to composing essays, the students would certainly have their hands full, but that’s assuming a teacher could be in three places at once.

The scope of the class’s ambition made it clear that if they wanted to make this work, they had to have at least three people leading the charge. Brian, Sheila and Dan agreed that it would be worth whatever growing pains it would take to get there.

“I was immediately up for it, because team teaching is such an incredible experience for us as educators,” says Sheila. “There’s a way in which it’s like a microcosm of the learning environment, because each teacher provides a different viewpoint, a different lens to see the same classwork. So you end up leaving each class saying ‘Even though I saw the lesson plan, I learned something new today.’”

For the three class leads, team teaching lets them lean on each other as direct support. When they’re together, they can jump in to add energy on particular topics as they come up, handing off ideas as easily as passing a ball. Then, they can split apart when they need to do separate, smaller group projects: Brian can take one group to the beehives while Dan leads another group to work on the planters and Sheila leads a third group in readings.

Having more than one teacher also gives students access to a broader array of teaching styles and personalities in the classroom, offering an opportunity to connect with their teachers in new ways.

“You never really know with whom a student is going to resonate,” says Sheila. “Some students are going to want to work with Brian, some students are going to align more with Dan’s interests and expertise. A few students came up to me and said ‘Oh, I really love herbalism. I want to learn more about remedies.’ And that’s available to them.”

“This year is a pilot,” says Brian. “But it’s such a unique class. It includes students from all four grades in the upper school, which is pretty special. So students who go through the class one year can come in the next year and say, ‘So what are we learning this year?’”

By having some of the same students come through the class repeatedly, the teachers hope to provide a place where students can bring what they learned in previous years to bear in later years. In effect, students may be able to take Lower Schoolers on Creek Walks, show Middle Schoolers around the Bee Yard, or even lead younger classmates in discussions. In this way, students will also get a chance to see what it’s like to teach with the team.

“The great thing about this class is that the seasons are always changing,” says Dan. “We get to really see a timelapse, month over month, year over year. We get to see how the beehives hibernate and fight to survive in the winter. We get to look at the cycle of renewal, and watch as they come back, in all hopes, in the Spring. We get to look at soil health and permaculture in the Fall, and sustainable growing practices. The weather is always changing — but with us three leading the class, we have a full range of interests and ideas to ensure we are ready to take advantage of every opportunity our small farm has to offer for learning, growth and well-being.”