The City is Our Classroom AND the Classroom is Our City!!

We may have been heading into Winter Break, but Seabury Middle School students did not slow down one bit these last few weeks.

Our Classroom IS Our City!!

They first had the exciting opportunity to help guide and shape the development of Tacoma's downtown Theater District through an art project with Spaceworks. It started with a simple window installation for Spaceworks, in one of the windows of the old Woolworth's building downtown. Working as part of art class, students created a vision of Tacoma through cleverly designed cardboard buildings and other structures. But, it did not end there! Spaceworks approached the Seabury art teacher and asked for students to produce an even larger window display on Commerce street, which would be featured as part of First Night. Adding to the display meant that all of Seabury's students had the chance to be a part of creating the installation, adding to what the middle school already created. It was an awesome opportunity for our students to be part of creating an important art installation for our city. The display is part of the "Transform Plan" in which Tacoma is re-envisioning the Theater District and what it could become for our city.

Seabury Middle Schoolers spent one day with the students from the Lower School campus teaching them and guiding them as they created their own additions to the display. It was wonderful to see the older kids working with the young ones. Creativity was everywhere! The little ones came up with their ideas, and the big kids helped them cut and glue and otherwise put their vision into reality. Feel free to drop by Spaceworks at Commerce and 11th to check out the amazing project!

The City is our Classroom!!

Students from the Middle School also got the chance this week to visit the Karpeles Manuscript Museum in Tacoma. Just walking distance from our campus, the museum is one of multiple locations nationwide which house pretty much every important primary source document you could imagine. The Tacoma branch featured an exhibit on the atomic bomb, and students had the opportunity to view original documents detailing the dropping of the bomb, schematic drawings of the impact done by generals during the war, and even Einstein's famous letter of warning to President Roosevelt.

Other documents on display separate from the exhibit included a rough draft with notes of WWI's Treaty of Versaille and a page form the score of Puccini's Madame Butterfly. Various students made comments about how amazing it was to be surrounded by real history, which was especially relevant to our study of Modern War and Policy this school year.