I created the What's In a Name (W.I.N.) project many years ago. I've blogged about it many times. It was even the topic for my Ignite for YRDSB's EdTechCamp on Air (first 5 minutes of the video below). Watching it develop into something that I deeply believe breeds a sense of identity and self discovery while also building a sense of community and cultural literacy for a class makes it a high yielding project that I use year after year to get to know my students and help them get to know each other and themselves. Other teachers do name projects, but sharing them with the class using the BOB Approach is a difference-maker. This project builds a lot of curricular skills while being a great diagnostic for presentation and research skills. This week, I witnessed the culmination of the first ever large-scale W.I.N. project, and I'm still processing the elation and sense of possibility that this has brought for me and so many others at my school.
My Ignite is the first 5 minutes of the Ignite Talks
When I was hired at Silver Pines PS this year, I had mentioned this project. I implemented it in the second week of teaching my Grade 8 homeroom class, and all of my students presented their W.I.N.s over the last few weeks of September. By October, we were building our class community around who was in the room. After one of the my students was chosen to present her W.I.N. for the Student Voice Talks for YRDB'S Quest Conference, my principal decided that the entire school was going to undergo this experience.
Silver Pines had pioneered The Story fo Us through their film festival, SPIFF, the previous year. Every student was interviewed to tell their story and share a piece of themselves for this collective film. This year's theme would be What's in a Name. I supported my principal in gathering and creating catalysts and accessible materials for teachers to use with every age group: a list of picture books, videos, graphic organizers etc. After some initial challenges, each teacher found their entry point, and the school was abuzz with name stories, name art and more.
On Wednesday night, my school hosted SPIFF- the Silver Pines International Film Festival. There was an actual red carpet, a media wall, velvet ropes, and a lot of great ways to engage our community. People posed for pictures with our student volunteer paparazzi. Then, they entered the gym for the screening.
The film took months to do. Our resident directors and filmmakers, Christian Scarlato (who was recently on my show, The Personal Playlist Podcast) and Matthew Fassell planned, recorded, edited and produced the What's in a Name film with support of Christian's Grade 6 class, who participated in the filming, as well. There was so much student voice in everything from production to finished product. Students were also running the lights and sound for the event as part of their roles on the Tech Team. You could see the hard work that went into this great celebration of our school community. Students and teachers shared their name stories, and there was even a blooper reel. When the film ended, there was this powerful feeling of a shared experience. Then, it was time for the after-party.
The after-party planning, led by our principal, Lindsey Diakew, and the leadership team took a few months. As the event was nearing, it was all coming together. Although I had contributed a centre and lots of ideas, I was unable to help with the set up as I had been presenting, learning, networking and hugging people at Connect 2019 in Niagara Falls that day. You can imagine my joy when I walked in to the festivities. It was so cool. I tried to take it all in. The student volunteers from our Social Justice League and others were working hard to set everything up with the teachers. The after party room had name-related quotes to add more ambience to the small gym. There were portable Smartboards set up with the powerful Mohammed spoken word video on a loop. There was a centre to research people's names, a place to look up the pronunciations of names and BehindtheName.com. There was a station for name jewellery using letter beads, a map to plot the location of the origin of each name, a station with ritual objects from naming ceremonies around the world, a cursive stations to learn to sign your name, a place to match the indigenous names to the places in Canada, and a graffiti board to add your name to the collective piece of art. It was a name-a-palooza. There were even swag bags at the end as parting gifts. The staff who planned this, such as my amazing partner on The Social Justice League Heather Grieg, worked tirelessly to make this night so special for everyone.
Reflecting on it all, our names are our stories, and it does much for the individual to learn about themselves through their names. It also does a lot for the people who get to learn about others through their names. Names are just the beginning.
I'm excited to hear about and contribute to the plans for next year's Story of Us for SPIFF. Whatever comes, though, nothing will compare to seeing my project unfold on this scale. I wish I could have a film crew at the ready to capture this at every school. I also wonder what other BOBs (Building Outside the Blocks projects) I have or could create to work as a whole-school experience. Whatever there is to come, I had never imagined seeing the W.I.N. on the the big screen, and I am so grateful to my principal and my entire school for showing me a wider lens on what's possible with this impactful project.
