CRIMSON COMMENTS by Rose McGlew
Anyone who has spent a significant time in school as anything but a student, will tell you the real key to success in the classroom parental involvement has to be at the top of every teacher’s educational wish list.
Having parents interested in their child’s progress is great. Having one as a partner in the process is a dream come true.
Last Saturday involved parents had the opportunity to shine at the state championships for Destination ImagiNation (DI), and Washington Township did well!
Destination ImagiNation enables students to put their critical thinking skills to creative use. Teams are formed early in the school year and each team selects a challenge from a set of choices presented by the DI administration.
The team spends several months formulating a solution, or plan, for their challenge. The challenge requires cooperation among team members and a strict hands-off approach from the team managers. This is where the parental involvement plays a part.
The teams have to meet at least on a weekly basis to strategize, brainstorm and collect ideas into a cohesive blob of possibility. The meetings can be held in the school if the team manager is a teacher, or in one of the team member’s homes, with Mom or Dad as a coach.
The meetings aren’t bad, until the frenzied week or two before the competition.
My husband decided to take up the mantle with another first time coaching parent, Saritha Krishnamoorthy.
I’m not sure about Saritha’s reasons for coaching but Paul’s were purely due to peer pressure.
"Come on," I said. "You need to be more involved in his school activities and this won’t be too much of a time commitment. You can do this."
I admit to crossing my fingers about the lack of time promise.
Every week for the past several months, five to seven fourth and fifth grade students gathered in our basement to research fairy tales, practice voice projection, manufacture props from newspapers and eat snacks.
The challenge their team selected was "Once Improv A Time."
They selected 10 fairy tales in which they would have to become familiar, and then incorporate several aspects of each tale into one. For instance, they might have the characters of "Little Red Riding Hood," the setting of "The Three Bears" and the moral of "King Midas" and would weave them into one new fairy tale and present it onstage.
They would have 30 minutes to work on their story. I tried to stay out of the basement as much as possible, but from all the screaming, I assumed cooperation was not always high on the kids’ agenda.
Saritha and Paul would emerge from a practice session sometimes smiling, sometimes shaking their heads and I wondered if they doubted the kids’ abilities, or their own sanity. I even noticed one or two extra gray hairs during that last week of practice.
The day of the competition they left Sharon School about 6 a.m. They performed, and we heard nothing. Lunch came and ended with still no word to home.
Finally, about 4 p.m., our intrepid warriors walked in with glowing comments about their performance.
When Paul received the call letting us know that we placed second, relief and pleasure shined on both their faces. They both were subdued about what I considered a great coup. Their team had been so amateur last year and now they had actually placed. Impressive, I thought.
So this is a big pat on the back to all the students, parents and team managers who participated in DI this year. Thank you to veteran team coach, Sonja Walter, who gave our team terrific insights, references and encouragement.
Another person who deserves to share in our team’s victory is Amy Fuchs, the drama teacher at Sharon School. Mrs. Fuchs wasn’t a coach but she took much of her own time after school and on weekends to help them perfect little nuances that led to their performing so well.
Thanks to all the parents who take the time and energy to make your child’s time in school a memorable one. It may seem like just another task for you to do, but to them, it means the world.
Rose McGlew, a resident of Robbinsville, contributes a weekly column to the Messenger-Press.

