This past year I completed my first Creative Advantage residency with two high school geometry classes at Seattle World School (SWS). Eva Leung was the lead contact on this project. She and I were familiar with each other as colleagues when I taught at SWS, where we both were mentor teachers in the Teacher Leadership program, and we were on the same 9th grade & newcomer teams during the 2020-21 school closures. Eva is an amazing teacher and Fullbright Scholar who went on leave a year after I did. We are both familiar with the diverse student perspectives at the school which is a unique program for immigrants and refugees in Seattle schools. I am taking great care not to share any photos without permission so unfortunately you will not see any photos with student faces and it means I missed getting a photo of Eva! Emily was the other teacher I collaborated with at SWS. She brought in a beautiful quilt her mother had made which was a great example of sharing textiles from home to help students connect with them as cultural artifacts.
Eva was the leader I needed when it seemed like the school district was unaware of the limited access our students had to technology during the abrupt transition to online learning. She had organized a home visit schedule when the schools closed abruptly before Spring Break of 2020 and created a database for keeping track of students, their family contact information and technology or material supports they needed. We spent one day a week or more delivering wifi hotspots, library books, or even groceries and diapers to our community. In the early days of March 2020, we visited homes in N95 masks and latex gloves to give side by side instruction on porches and stoops to show students how to use their new laptops to login and navigate the online learning environment. Some of these students were so new to the US school system they had not even been able to begin attending in person before the closure!
Returning to SWS this past fall felt like coming home. I met with both HS Geometry teachers to discuss the scope of my project, our budget and timeline. We agreed to start with a simple activity to warm students up to using hand-sewing needles with a cardstock embroidery project we jumped right into on the first day. I have HS teaching endorsements in English Language Learning, Math, Career & Technical Education, and Sciences including Earth Science and Physics, so I was delighted to integrate my full STEM/STEAM background in my first school residency as a fiber artist! I liked this project because it was accessible for low language comprehension but previewed coordinate plane geometry, uniformity of stitches and units such as the ¼ inch used in quilt measurement. It was surprising to recognize how much learning takes place when the cognitive load is high but the language or vocabulary are not creating a barrier to learning. Students executed a stepwise series of lines of gradually changing slope that embodies key elements of the functions of calculus while making beautiful curves. They also learned how to conserve thread, thread needles and how to avoid rethreading them too often! The cardstock embroidery project was engaging and gratifying: The students were able to complete the project in a single class session which hopefully prepared them for my return and introduction to quilt-making 2 weeks later.
This set a great foundation for our second phase, the reflection, rotation, and dilation of a simple shape designed by each student and raw-edge appliqued onto one of 4 background squares. The final phases was maintaining a consistent ¼ inch seam line to sew the project into a four-patch block. Most quilters know this as a simple starter unit for patchwork beginners and it fit the students range of skills and languages very well. The best part was looking around the room and seeing every student working and talking (even teaching each other!) as they sewed. I was busy attending to individual students but I was honored when I looked up and realized the principal of the school had snuck in and was snapping photos too! This was an authentic hands-on learning opportunity that was also rich in somatic healing and socio-emotional support.
But the best part is about to be delivered! Another colleague at SWS was expecting a baby and Eva’s students were in her English class and agreed to contribute their blocks to a baby quilt project. I had made several baby quilts for other staff at SWS and it made me very happy to make one last one. Here is a photo of my presenting it to the teacher the day she went on leave. I am finishing the binding this week and will update with a baby photo when I make the delivery to their new one month old baby!
mildly gifted 