Federal Hocking High School students and area residents did some not so dirty dancing Friday at the Federal Valley Resource Center.
The event was a culmination of an enrichment program offered the first two weeks of school after winter break for Federal Hocking High School students.
Before
students would have homework projects to do over Christmas vacation and we've all been students before and when you put work on kids over Christmas vacation
it's hard for them to do it
said Jim Patsey, Federal Hocking Local School District Superintendent.
But this year, the high school students finished their first semester before winter break, and upon returning to school Jan. 3, spent two weeks attending their choice of enrichment classes ranging from History vs. Hollywood and Mock Trial to Yoga and the Art of Journaling and Liquid Nitrogen Milkshakes
which was a class on the chemistry behind cooking, said George Wood, Federal Hocking High School principal.
One class Patsey himself taught with Bonnie Lackey of the Federal Valley Resource Center was Not So Dirty Dancing. The class was visited by members of the Ohio University Jitterbug Club who taught swing dancing, a professional dance instructor from Columbus who taught versions of ballroom dancing, and a local woman from the Dairy Barn who taught contra dancing, Lackey said.
The class ended with the dance, which had been rescheduled from Jan. 14 to this past weekend due to weather conditions. At the dance, area residents came to receive dance lessons between 6 p.m. and 7:30 p.m., and then danced with the help of students until 11 p.m., Lackey said.
Other classes also involved area residents and guest speakers. For classes on woodworking, local craftsmen visited the high school. Local horse trainers spoke at the enrichment class on horsemanship and people who have struggled with mental illness came in to talk to the enrichment class on psychological disorders.
One high school science teacher, Ben Warner, came to school dressed in a different costume from the Middle Ages every day for his class on medieval arts. Even Wood taught his own course on fly-fishing.
The enrichment classes came about as a way to solve the problem of students being forced to take their exams after winter break.
Usually the semester ends right before Martin Luther King Jr. Day. It was hard on everyone
Wood said.
Another reason for the enrichment sessions was that school is often canceled the first few weeks of January because of weather, Patsey said. By having the intersession, students do not miss their normal classes when school is canceled.
The classes offered and the time provided for them did not require the school to go any extra days. The classes do not take away from the school's usual curriculum because, according to the Ohio Education Association, schools can do enrichment programs that follow the state's curriculum guidelines, Wood said.
The enrichment classes being taught are not graded, which allows students to develop better connections with teachers and take classes they otherwise would not take because of the pressure of having to receive a grade, he said.
You find out that kids work hard at lots of stuff they are interested in that they don't receive grades at
he said.
Some of the students helped to teach courses on topics such as French and graphic design, Wood said.
Seniors got first pick of which classes to take; each student by grade level chose two enrichment classes they were interested in -one for mornings and one for afternoons, Wood said.
Some students, with approval from their parents, took the time to work on their senior projects required by the high school for graduation. Other students in the internship program elected to spend the time at their internship.
There's a lot of advantages. One is we get to offer (high-interest courses) we normally wouldn't get the opportunity to offer
Wood said.
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