Students free to create at Lighthouse Charter

June 5, 2005

Students free to create at Lighthouse Charter

By JASON KOLNOS
Staff Writer
ORLEANS - Neither Randy, Paula or the ever-opinionated Simon could've picked the winner of this latest round of ''Organelle Idol.''

[IMAGE CAPTION: Lighthouse Charter School student Devin Hossfeld, front, tries his hand at timber framing. About 10 students have signed up for the course with instructor Josh Stewart, shown taking measurements for the base structure of a climbing wall that the class is working on.]

Crowd applause, though, indicated a tossup between Rachel Lake and Alex Cook's ode to chlorophyll and a trio of sixth-graders who glamorized the nucleus.

Lake and Cook wowed the adolescent onlookers in Brian Bates' science class with their song and dance about the green pigment of plants, which was set to a tune that resembled ''YMCA.''

Not to be outdone, Alex Papetsas, Nate True and lead singer Jeff Nevers brought the house down with an edgy, heavy-metal-tinged vocal performance that highlighted the importance of the cell's ''brain.''

The middle-schoolers' act was based on one of their lessons at the Cape Cod Lighthouse Charter School.

''This place is great because there are lots of interactive activities, which is better than just being lectured,'' Nevers said.

Compared with ''traditional'' middle schools, the Lighthouse school, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary today, is not typical.

Wedged between a Chinese restaurant and a dentist's office, this tiny schoolhouse is home to 180 sixth-, seventh- and eighth-grade students and about two-dozen teachers and staff.

Students from Sandwich to Provincetown, selected through a random, annual lottery, attend the public charter school. The popularity of the school is obvious - about 32 students are on a waiting list to get into the 2005-2006 sixth-grade class - according to Executive Director Sean O'Neil.

Obvious differences

Inside the school, it's easy to notice the differences between this charter school and a public middle school.

There are few corridors inside the main building, where colorful murals of seascapes and forests are painted on the walls. Traveling through classrooms to get to other classrooms is the norm.

Students are allowed to wear hats in school and don't have to ask permission to go to the bathroom.

Since there are no lockers, backpacks and jackets are strewn across hall floors or dangle from open shelves. O'Neil said there is little or no theft because students trust each other.

''The students prove that they can be responsible and still focus ultimately on their work,'' O'Neil said. ''We give them an opportunity to develop their own talents and abilities.''

The facility is not big enough for a cafeteria, so students either bring their own lunches to eat in homeroom or buy takeout for $3 at places like The Box Lunch.

Teachers say they aren't overly restricted, thus allowing them to foster a more creative and independent environment.

While typical homework and tests are given in every subject from math to social studies, hands-on activities and group projects flourish.

Students and teachers alike use the words ''freedom'' when describing the best quality the charter school affords.

''You can get swamped with projects, but teachers give us individual attention because the classes are smaller,'' said eighth-grader Chris Kassarjian of Dennis, referring to the average class size of 20 students.

Learning and pop culture

The curriculum each day except Tuesdays and Thursdays focuses on the basics. But instead of straight lecturing or rote memorization, teachers try to give students the material they are supposed to learn.

The words ''Yo no tengo voz hoy, tengo laryngitis'' was scrawled on the blackboard in Sandra-Hemeon-McMahon's Spanish class this past Thursday. Students were teaching some of the class while their teacher's voice recovered. They were told not to speak their native language.

To study for an upcoming vocabulary quiz, students played a game in which they tossed a rubber ball to the person quickest to translate an English word or phrase. Hands shot up when they were asked to talk about their favorite television show in Spanish.

''Mi programma favorita es The O.C.,'' said Morgan Noyes, 13. Noyes said her teacher's willingness to integrate pop culture with foreign language helps her learn and focus better.

Next door, in a classroom shared by science teachers Paul Niles and Peter Trull, students were busy working on a ''Body Project.'' Eighth-grader Marianna Kennedy-Kavouras was studying the relationship between exercise and performance while a dozen other students did Internet research on 10 portable computers.

Later, students in Susan Lyman's art class built and painted abstract, polychrome objects out of scrap wood. Next door, Daniella Garran's class took a 45-minute test about the Crusades, the rise of Islam and the Byzantine Empire.

Perhaps the most unique feature of the charter school is the twice-weekly seminars. Here students participate and learn about ''off-the-beaten-path'' subjects for an hour-and-a-half every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon.

Bates and Trull teach students the basics of fishing, and they go to Cliff Pond at Nickerson State Park in Brewster to practice.

There are also seminars on scrapbooking, in which students document their lives, moviemaking, garden building, timber framing, ultimate Frisbee and treasure hunting.

In Jennifer Oliver's create-a-culture seminar Thursday, students were busy brainstorming how to make their own societies. They have to create maps for their cultures and figure out how the residents should talk, live, work and have fun. It's like a real-life The Sims.

''I just made up my own language. I can speak it and write it and everything,'' said Jackson Renaud, a very proud seventh-grader from Wellfleet.

Jason Kolnos can be reached at jkolnos@capecodonline.com.

(Published: June 5, 2005)