Monday, March 5, 2012
Did they really say ugly?
Day 5 Did they really say ugly?
Our school has an After School Program and this year we are embracing more of an interest-based model. While still grounded in standards and data, we are giving students choices. We have had cooking, scrapbooking, sports, drama, environmental club and art club. This week we are honored to have community members volunteering their time and talents to teach our students.
In two of the classes the volunteer teachers asked the students to search for something ugly. Yes, they really said ugly! I was a bit taken aback at first. Then I saw the excitement in the kids’ eyes. They were laughing in the multi-media class as they searched for things that were ugly. In the photography class they searched around the building to take a picture of something ugly. The smashed raisin and the hairball were the top hits!
The true challenge was to find something ugly and take a photo that would make the item look beautiful. I suspect the multi-media group will be doing something similar tomorrow! The photographers flipped things, changed the angle, zoomed in and zoomed out. Changing the perspective turned something “ugly” into a beautiful picture.
The Lesson – we can find beauty in anything if we adjust our view, our angle, our perspective.
Ah, even those progress cards calling me to complete them, those too can be beautiful if I focus on true student progress. What can you find this week that is initially "ugly" and yet you find the beauty?
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What an insightful post. Seriously, imagine how we can reframe the "ugly" and find the beauty in everything. What a world it would be!
ReplyDeleteI heard them issue the challenge to search out ugly, and I thought, "Really? That's what we need our kids to focus on???"
ReplyDeleteSOOOoooo glad to get the rest of the story and hear how they crafted that into a powerful life message.
Thank you, (who was it? Edward R. Murrow?), for the rest of the story!