In the Montessori world, where I am from, classrooms have real glass glasses available for the children to use, even the three-year-olds, which they are then taught to wash and care for. A lot of learning happens from this: how to be careful, how not to spill, how to clean it up if you do, how to wash your glass, and the dawning understanding that washing your own glass is your responsibility. I was excited to introduce glassware into our North Star environment with the thought that some of the same benefits may come to our members. Furthermore, North Star tries, and I personally try, to be as green as possible. I dislike the idea of endless paper or plastic cups and dishes being thrown out everyday in our space. So I put out the call for real plates and glasses and so forth, and, as usual, the community responded. Soon we had enough of everything to manage entire potlucks without using disposable stuff.
Awesome. Except that there are many differences between the North Star environment and the Montessori classroom. Our space is much bigger than a single classroom and our teens move freely around carrying their cups and plates with them, which are then sometimes forgotten all over the building. There also isn't always someone near the sink in the hallway to remind people with dirty dishes that carrying them to the sink isn't good enough, you have to wash them, too. So while the majority of our teens were responsible dish users, we still ended up with a sink full of dirty dishes nearly every day. And that sink is a big sink. Since the whole enterprise was basically my idea, the problem was basically my problem, and dishes became a daily chore for me at North Star. For some time I felt that this was part of my environmental mission and was willing to wash the dishes myself because it meant that so much trash was kept out of our dumpster and landfill. I sometimes had help from other staff and parents. We were given a dishwasher, and that helped in some ways.
Eventually, however, it occurred to me that 1. our teens were not learning the hoped-for lessons about responsibility and in fact were being shown that they did not need to deal with their own debris because I was there to do it for them and 2. my time as Program Director could be much better spent. We began the following year with all of the dishes put away except when we were having special potluck events with our member families. We ordered and distributed North Star water bottles which every teen was requested to bring and use for drinking water and they were told that any other utensils must be brought with them from home. This has been the mandate for the last two years. However, water bottles get lost or forgotten, dishes from homes get brought in and left at North Star, and dishes that are put away for potlucks get dug out and brought into circulation on other days. We find ourselves once again with clean dishes in the cabinet and dirty ones in the sink, and a new complaint: teens want glasses and mugs available in the space.
This is the main topic that we discussed this week at community meeting and that was the back story I told. Lots of ideas and suggestions were shared and considered, and eventually the group settled on this: North Star would provide a small number of glasses and mugs for teens to use. Ideally they will care for them responsibly. Any dirty ones left at the end of the day will become the responsibility of that day's teen cleaning crew.
Managing dirty dishes within a community is not exactly a riveting topic. However, there is a lot within this that is totally worthwhile. As you know, North Star does not insist on any particular course of study for any of our members. However, I think we do have what I sometimes refer to as a hidden curriculum, and you can see part of it here within this issue. By hidden I don't mean, surprise! we're tricking you into learning things, but rather that certain beneficial understandings and personal developments are often natural consequences of taking on self-directed learning at North Star.
For example, through this process regarding the dishes our teens are learning how to be part of a community, how to share space and resources, how to be responsible for their own debris and why that is important, how to share their thoughts and opinions in a group, how to solve group problems, how to be both environmentally and practically minded.
I don't know whether our new dish solution will be successful in the short and long term, but for me, that's not the most important point. If it's not, we'll reconsider it and create another solution. Like so much concerning learning, the process can be more important than the outcome. It's also not quantifiable. What each teen took from this discussion will vary considerably, which is fine and expected because for some of them, it's all incredibly basic and obvious, while others may have never engaged in a group process before because they have never been part of a community where their opinion mattered or had any power. Some who were present may not ever use dishes at North Star or be called upon to wash them, while others were very concerned and invested in the issue. It's not possible to say what each teen takes from any single learning experience. But we don't have to. Over time we see our teens grow and change and mature in their abilities. We know this kind of real-life learning is valuable. If not today, then maybe tomorrow. It takes time, but luckily we have time, or rather, we make time.
Are you familiar with the book How to Talk So Teens Will Listen and Listen So Teens Will Talk by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish? It's excellent. Thinking about how to handle this situation with the dirty dishes reminded me of it. Main points in the book are depicted in cartoons. I've included one series below for your enjoyment, though I definitely recommend taking a look at the whole book.
