Letting Loose

Last night, I was feeling pretty down--long week of study duty, the student council was away, teachers had once again left me with running the Saturday night program, and I had once again decided a movie was just the easiest thing to do, so that's what we were going to do.  I was not a happy camper, even bordering on pissy adult.

But then, something magical happened.  Two of my grade 8 learners were playing music while we waited for all of the learners to trickle in, and our fantastic lab technician decided we needed to have some kids welcome us all to the movie night.  He had the "DJs" put on some really good dance music, and invited kids to come up and dance.  A few did, and every time anyone stood up, everyone in the hall cheered, despite it often being quite clear they were just getting up to change their seat or go talk to a friend.  Everyone thought that was hilarious.  Spur of the moment, added some liveliness to the evening.  Really gave kids a chance to laugh and dance and let loose before watching Rise of the Planet of the Apes.  Since so much of the movie is animals interacting, and not so much language-based, it was easy to understand, even without very good speakers in an echo-y hall. 

Halfway through the movie, the student council arrived from their conference, and a quick cheer erupted through the hall.  They ate the dinner we had saved for them as they watched the rest of the movie with us. 

After the movie, the boys went first this time (we always release the learners girls first, then boys in the evenings to help make sneaking away together more difficult), and the girls stayed to stack up the chairs.  After that was finished, I released the girls and was packing up the speakers and projectors. 

THEN the screams came.  Plethora girls were SPRINTING back towards the dining hall, yelling.  I thought there was a rabid dog, or snake in the path, but bravely ran out to protect my girls.  Turns out, it was a whole big group of grade 8 girls who had hidden behind a wall and ran back at the rest.  Everyone was laughing, when I looked closer! Everyone went to bed smiling and laughing, and I think we're more well rested today because of it. 

Even with the lack of moment-to-moment planning, we managed to bond quite well as a school last night, and it was a pleasure to be reminded that fun, even in a group of 240 learners, ages 12-25, can be spontaneous.  This afternoon, we're planting trees around the school, which may help build some ownership of the grounds for the learners.