| Schools,
Programs, & Visit Reports - Aug, 1991 Issue
|
[This article is outdated.
Cascade School closed January 20, 2004.]
Cascade School
(916) 472-3031
Whitmore, California
Adms: Judy Tofflemire/Steve Hargis-Bullen
Headmaster: Michael Allgood
Lon Woodbury's Visit: June 14, 1991
"They are all teachers" was
the students' answer when I asked them how they saw the difference between
the teachers and the counselors. This answer told me the school has
done very well in their stated goal of integrating academic education
and therapeutics into one whole.
In explaining their school,
all Special Purpose Schools tend to describe first the therapeutic side,
and then the academic side. Cascade does this too, but the distinction
is artificial, and is used mainly as a convenience for explanations
only. In reality, there is much overlapping between therapeutics and
academics at Cascade, and the lines of distinction are fuzzy and blurred.
Both staff and students see academic classes as important elements of
emotional growth as well as academic growth. They also see therapeutic
activities, such as groups, as a learning process as well as therapy.
One good example was the math
teacher I talked to. On the surface, his goals were the same as any
math teacher in the country -- help the students increase their proficiency
in mathematics. The way he approached it, however, brought a strong
element of emotional growth into the classroom. He sees math as problem
solving, and the students' work in his class as practice in how to solve
problems. With support and guidance, a student's increasing skill in
mathematical problem solving can be transferred to problem solving in
his or her personal life. He also approached the class with an emphasis
on discovery and ownership. What this means is the teacher presents
a problem, and it is then the students' job to figure out how to solve
it using either new material or concepts the class has already been
introduced to. By treating it as a problem solving exercise, and putting
the responsibility to find the solution onto the students, the solution
and how it is found is truly owned by the student. Not only is the academic
learning more solid, but success builds self-esteem, and problem solving
skills are developed which can be transferred to the student's personal
life.
Another example came from
an English teacher. Again, the classroom looked like any of thousands
of English classrooms around the country. One difference was in the
teacher using drawing as a pre-writing exercise. She has the students
do a lot of writing, under the theory that the only way to learn how
to write is to write. The important wrinkle this teacher used is to
allow the students to attach drawings along with his or her written
essay. She found that 75% of the new students will attach drawings to
help express what he or she is trying to say. This percentage decreases
as the students' writing ability and emotional growth progresses.
The importance of this technique
is apparent when we look at the type of child Cascade enrolls. Their
typical new student has great difficulty in self-expression. Some of
them might be very verbal, but when those verbal students are asked
to tell what they are really feeling, they either give a blank stare,
or a verbal song and dance, showing they don't know what you are talking
about. By accepting drawings as part of an essay assignment, the students
are being helped to break out of their emotional isolation, and are
beginning to succeed in true self expression. This is a vital step in
the healing of emotional problems, as well as a vital step in success
at English academics.
One other thing I learned
in talking to this English teacher. I will never again look at Art and
Drawing in Elementary schools as just "play." The old time elementary
teachers knew what they were doing when they put Art and Drawing as
vital parts of the elementary curriculum. They were teaching self-expression,
which is a pre-requisite for both writing ability, and success as a
human being.
Headmaster Michael Allgood
was very insistent that the school's goal from the beginning has been
to learn how to use academics as the primary healing tool in working
with children with emotional problems. Some schools emphasize wilderness/outdoors
for healing, others emphasize structure, and still others emphasize
standard psychological techniques such as counseling, groups, time-out
rooms, and Individual Treatment Plans. All Special Purpose schools use
some of all these elements, but Cascade has gone further than most in
using academics as a therapeutic tool, and it seems to be working, judging
by the successes in their graduates.
Some professionals feel Cascade
enrolls softer and easier children than the other Special Purpose schools
do. I'm not sure that that's true. The day I was there, they enrolled
a girl who at one point threw herself on the ground in front of her
parent's car so they couldn't leave without her. She of course eventually
enrolled once she knew her parents were firm and that she had to be
there. That doesn't sound like a very soft or easy to work with child
to me. Actually, that is pretty comparable to anything I saw in my five
years enrolling children at Rocky Mountain Academy.
Copyright
© 1991, Woodbury Reports, Inc. (This article may be reproduced without
prior approval if the copyright notice and proper publication and author
attribution accompanies the copy.) |
