Blue Ridge Middle School: Get Up! Get Out! Get Moving!

Adventures in Learning bulletin board
displays unit connections to the outdoors.

Students at Blue Ridge Middle School are on the move in Spectrum and getting a double dose of the great outdoors! The bulletin board outside our classroom depicts our mascot (bulldog) zipping his way throughout this year’s curricular line-up and the vast opportunities to connect with nature. Since attending the TTEC sessions, I have enhanced the units I teach by incorporating hands-on, engaging activities into each unit of study to get the students I teach outside.  I want to send a shout-out to Sara Bolen, who is also busy across the hall (Health & PE) getting the same students outside.

Questing island tourists combing the green sand beaches 

A  Quest for Treasure on Paradise Island! September arrived, and the students in 6^th and 7^th grade Spectrum embarked on their first outdoor adventure known as, A Quest for Treasure on Paradise Island. Students, portraying tourists on a fictitious island (school campus), were divided into small groups and provided with a map of Island Management Crew to supervise and assist our tourists along the way. Our tourists, donned in grass skirts, hats, and sunglasses, had a great time combing the green sand beaches (grass), collaborating as a team to decipher each rhyming riddle to help them locate the treasure, and documenting what they discovered before heading off in search of the next item. The journal reflections from the students clearly revealed their enthusiasm for this activity and their unanimous desire to get back outside for another activity. I think they are hooked!
the island (school campus) and the first of many challenging riddles to take them out of the hut (school) and onto the island. Parent volunteers were eager to play along as our

 “A Quest for Treasure on Paradise Island!”

Tourists “walk the planks” on their island

adventure to locate the next treasure.