Crane Country Day School Established 1928

Crane School Blog: Focus on Learning

Featuring articles written by Crane Staffulty

For more information about Crane Country Day School, please contact admission@craneschool.org or call 805-969-7732 x127.

Teaching Fellow Maddie
Maddie Davidian

Being a second-year teaching fellow at Crane, my time here is coming to an end. For the past two years, I have been given the opportunity to challenge, change, and create a vision for an educational philosophy to be applied in my future classrooms, and I am excited to see where it leads me.

I dream about my future classroom--what it will look like, who my students will be, the kind of learning they will love, and the way the desks will be arranged...

Being a second-year teaching fellow at Crane, my time here is coming to an end. For the past two years, I have been given the opportunity to challenge, change, and create a vision for an educational philosophy to be applied in my future classrooms, and I am excited to see where it leads me.

I dream about my future classroom--what it will look like, who my students will be, the kind of learning they will love, and the way the desks will be arranged. I hope to be able to build a classroom community as flawlessly as my mentor teachers have in their Crane classrooms.

Reflecting on my experience here, I have fallen in love: in love with teaching, in love with learning, in love with school, in love with my colleagues, in love with the Crane community! With the foundation Crane has provided me, I feel more than ready to take on a classroom of my own. I have taken the motto of rigor and joy to heart: rigorously researching new pedagogy to be the best teacher I can be, and joyously implementing best practices in my classrooms.

I know that I want to be part of a school community grounded in kindness, integrity, and experiential education. I love being a part of this community where others are so willing to help, willing to share ideas, willing to jump into projects with others and share their creativity, intelligence, drive, and sense of humor.

Being a teaching fellow at Crane has allowed me to study valuable teaching styles, teaching tools, and teaching lessons that I plan to take with me to my next classroom. I have sought opportunities to help my students find joy in learning, value in making mistakes, and to explore the relationship between creativity and advanced academics over the course of my fellowship.

While at Crane, I have learned about all of the things I want in a school. While I look for my next classroom, I am searching for a place that incorporates all that I celebrate at Crane: project-based learning, character building, freedom of exploration, the celebration of the authentic self, social-emotional learning, and a beautiful place to embrace academics.

I will always cherish my time at Crane as a Teaching Fellow. I will always remember the students I have worked with and the people I have met.

Maddie Davidian
Teaching Fellow, Fifth Grade

Most Recent Posts

 Focus on Learning-Logos Pathos Ethos

Crane's seventh grade English students found out that the simple question, "What is your favorite sandwich?" isn't actually as simple as they had originally believed. Little did they know that this question would lead them to the theory of persuasion and the study of Aristotle's three modes - logos, ethos, and pathos.

As English teacher Mrs. Lombardi shared with seventh grade parents, "Understanding how to persuade others and also how one is persuaded by others are both important tools to have in one's kit"...

Its just middle school photo

This image is prominently displayed on our seventh grade dean’s website. It’s a bit of comic relief to combat the bad rap that the middle school years get. And it is a perfect example of one of the goals of the new Grade Level Dean program in the Upper School (sixth-eighth grades) at Crane School - to add an element of fun to the social lives of middle school students.

The Grade Level Dean program focuses on the social aspect of the middle school experience at Crane. As a school we are constantly assessing what changes we can make...

Focus on Learning Gratitude

While gratitude may be a buzzword, especially in the month of November, we believe it is much more than a popular hashtag (#grateful) or a fleeting trend. Gratitude is a powerful tool that has proven to positively affect individuals and communities.

In an article titled, What is Gratitude and Why Is It So Important? from positivepsychology.com, Courtney E. Ackerman, MSc states, “Effectively gratitude can create social networks and help individuals work towards goals and challenges, and overall, simply have stronger coping skills for life’s hardships.”

At Crane it has been inspiring and heart-warming to see students of all ages learning the independent practice of gratitude...

Blog Image: How was your day?

In the past seven months, most parents have been more involved in their children’s academic lives than ever before. We know what sight words they have been working on, what the all-school art project is, and who presented in the Friday assembly video.

However, as Crane School students in all nine grades now have the option to learn on campus, the majority of parents are once again receiving less information about the day-to-day activities both in the classroom and on the playground.

We have all asked the question and gotten the dreaded answer. You know the one. Parents enthusiastically ask, “How was your day!?!” The response is an annoyed or indifferent, “Fine,” “Okay,” or possibly just an undecipherable grunt...