High School South’s Community Problem Solving Team created an afterschool program to teach the problem-solving method to fifth graders at Millstone River School. Through games, activities and projects, they follow steps to identify challenges, find an underlying problem, find solutions, make an action plan, and help students work on 21st century competency skills simultaneously.
Under the guidance of Joan Ruddiman, a teacher in Grover and Millstone River schools, and Melissa Pearson, a teacher at South, the group has been teaching students every Thursday and Friday. Their spring session will expand the program to include students from Village School as well.
The WW-P district’s new 21st century initiative includes teaching students to become practical problem solvers, self-directed learners, effective communicators, collaborative team members, information literate researchers, and globally aware, responsible citizens.
“It’s not enough just to learn how to take a test, you have to be able to take the knowledge you learn in school and apply it in the real world,” says Yamini Bhandari, a team member and a junior at South. The program was initiated because the team identified their problem as the school core curriculum not teaching students 21st century skills, and they felt that a problem solving program would best teach these competencies.
“The team hopes that this program will help teach students the power of the problem solving method, and help them become better, more self-driven students in and out of the classroom,” says Bhandari.
