It’s a wrap! Conway Academy’s 2023- 24 Celebration of Learning hosted parents, guardians, friends, and community members that turned-out in record numbers and our students wowed their audience.
Celebrations of Learning are more than a display of student work and more than school gathering at the end of the year. This event compels students to reflect on and articulate what they have learned, how they learned, questions they answered, research they conducted, and areas of strength and struggles. They are powerful opportunities to make learning public.
They are also a way to meet standards but also support our students in College and Career readiness by bringing the standards to life but it goes beyond that. Students at Conway understand how to articulate their learning. Our classrooms are intentionally designed to support oral communation, listening, and developing interpersonal skills. Extended discourse is at the forefront in teaching and learning. Students learn to be collaborators, they learn together by working together, that alone is a powerful skill for the future.
Students learn from experts inside and outside of the classroom through field work, partnerships and then they integrate that learning into their presentations.
Preparing for a celebration of learning requires that students know their standards- based content, independently use higher-order thinking skills such as synthesis or transfer to interact with audience members about that content, and cite evidence that demonstrates their learning.
Our guests were afforded authentic experiences when our learners share their learning, share their research and give evidence-based descriptions of their results.
In order for students to effectively communicate their achievement and learning, they must have regular opportunities to assess and articulate their progress toward learning targets. That happens on a regular basis in our classrooms!
It was an evening that takes learning beyond the classroom. It’s about building community, partnering with businesses, and celebrating our Conway Community. We thank our food vendors, Cactus Coffee, Fridas Tacos, and Muñecas Artesanal Desserts. They will donate a percentage of all sales to our Conway PTA.
This event motivates students and creates a purpose for them to care about the quality of their work. Presenting work to an authentic audience also raises the stakes and sets the expectation that all students, not just a select group, will share their high-quality products. It motivates students to push themselves as learners and achieve more than they thought possible.
There were hundreds of examples of High Quality Work curated for display so our walls speak to the learning.
3rd graders performed their Musical, We Only Have One Earth, to a packed house of proud parents.
Celebrations of learning open the door for meaningful conversations among families, students, and teachers about standards and achievement.
For our school to continually improve, we believe feedback is crucial and ask for everyone in attendance to complete our COL survey - https://tinyurl.com/2sz6muy7.
Together we will continue to create opportunities for our learners to achieve more than they think possible.