Upcycling (Isabel Miller)
In Up-cycling, we’ve been focusing on how to take clothes and fabrics that are unappealing for wearing or garment making, and turning them into beautiful and useful things that we want. We started with Braided-In Rug Making, and had Kathryn Swanson, the person who taught it to me, come in and lead a class. We then moved on to up-cycling second hand clothes into garments we’d enjoy wearing.

Anatomy and Physiology Is Just the Beginning (Ylva Perry)
This spring we have been exploring the head and neck which are absolutely packed with anatomy! This includes several guest lectures by David Dredge, MD who is a pediatric neurologist. Most recently, we started looking at bones, starting from the feet and moving our way up. We have looked at lots of x-rays and students have been amazing radiologists, picking up on subtle fractures!

Let’s Build a World (Aaron Damon-Rush)
In Let's Build a World, we are putting the finishing touches on our fantasy world, inventing deities and fleshing out towns and cities with new background information. Next week, I will send every participant in the class a copy of the map we made together and a document containing all the information we came up with.

Band (Cauli Williams)
North Star Band has been meeting weekly on Mondays from 10-11:30. We have spent the past couple months preparing for our concert at the Shindig. We have been rehearsing "Psycho Killer" by Talking Heads, "Mamma Mia" by Abba, "Heart of Glass" by Blondie, and "Blister in the Sun" for the concert.

Living Well With Your Emotions (Katie Norris)
The Living Well With Your Emotions class usually just has one student, so we have gone through a lot of content quickly. But we are also able to go more in-depth on topics.

Bread (Loran Saito)
As the year ended, our wonderful group continued to grow in their confidence and skill. In this time period, we made Beignets, Sourdough Starter (and Whole Wheat Sourdough Bread), Chocolate Rolls, Maple Scones, King Cake, Irish Soda Bread, Bambrack, Brazilian Cheese Bread, Triple Ginger Muffins, Focaccia, Lemon Bread, Skollerboller, Miso Banana Bread, Scottish Morning Rolls, and Strawberry Bread.

Hiking Group (Loran Saito)
We continued hiking, with a reduced group, throughout the cold and snowy winter months! In this period, we hiked High Ledges, East Leverett Meadow, Macleish Field Research Center, a lovely trail in South Amherst, Sunderland Caves, the Williamsburg Dam, Arcadia Sanctuary, a trail in Shutesbury, Fitzgerald Lake, Saw Mill Hills, Sunderland Town Park, and Mt. Tom.

Food and Culture (Loran Saito)
In this period, our explorations touched on Tuscan food (Inspired by Loran’s sojourn in Florence, Italy and “Salt Fat Acid Heat”), Indian food (inspired by “Ugly Delicious”), Miso (inspired by “Salt Fat Acid Heat,”), dumplings around the world, and more. We had a field trip to UMass Dining Services for a tour and to explore how they feed a diverse student population. We made homemade pasta and sauce, schiacciata alla fiorentina, miso soup, miso caramel, three kinds of curry, and gyoza.

Social Issues (Ken Danford)
It’s been a long winter and spring, following the war in Ukraine, the return of Covid-19 in higher numbers, the impending overturning of Roe vs. Wade, inflation, and more. While we try to keep up with the basic facts and events, we also try to find some diversions as well. The New York Times Weekly News Quiz for Students has been helpful.

Games (Ken Danford)
Learning how to play Poker is a lifetime skill. Along with Taboo, Oh Hell!, Clue, Yahtzee, and other classics, we are ready for any party.

Math (Melanie Dana)
We continued working with ratios and graphing linear equations using the online graphing calculator Desmos. Since we have enough Macbooks for everyone in the class, we made accounts on desmos.com and explored the activities on teacher.desmos.com. We spent the remainder of the year on self-guided Desmos activities as well as paper and pencil work on ratio and proportion word problems.

Community Stewardship (Melanie Dana)
The bulk of our meetings for the past few months have been spent exploring the various ways we could set up a Minecraft server for the North Star community. We have investigated paid subscriptions as well as using a dedicated computer in the North Star building. We also wrote a community agreement for the server based on the one we wrote last year for the North Star Discord. Recently, we planned a dance to follow the Shindig in June.

Open Maker Room (Melanie Dana)
Teens and small groups have done woodworking, building repair/maintenance, painting, collage, beading, hand- and machine-sewing, science experiments, and worked on individual projects. We recently acquired a 1953 Singer sewing machine and a small group of teens have been rehabbing it.

Science (Melanie Dana)
Recently we completed our certification through the Schoolyard Habitat Program of the National Wildlife Federation, culminating a year-long study of the plants and animals that live on or near the North Star property. As part of this project, we installed tree ID tags, put in a raised perennial bed of pollinator-friendly plants, mitigated invasive species, and created a water feature. In preparation for putting in the perennial bed, we studied soil and tested the nutrients in ours, learned about the nitrogen cycle, researched native pollinator plants and garden design, and constructed a raised bed of native hardwood.

History of Rock and Roll (Melanie Dana)
We finished the last part of the year with a deep dive into Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” video and the ways in which it was ground-breaking and changed MTV. Following that, we focused on topics of particular interest to class members. These included: music of the Cold War, Taylor Swift rerecording her earlier music in order to regain the rights to it (which led to a further exploration of ASCAP, royalties, and other contractual issues), lesser-known genres such as math rock, nerd rock and yacht rock, feminism and rock music, covers/remixes/samples, tribute albums, and the power of rock music to make change in the world.

Philosophy (John Sprague)
Philosophy has a been a small, but very enjoyable class, including brief lectures, and thoughtful discussions on a range of philosophical topics, most recently with a focus on ethics.

Writing Your Life (Susannah Sheffer)
For much of this support report period, the teens ran Writing Your Life themselves while Susannah was out recovery from eye surgery. Their ability to continue the class during this time, and their desire to do so, says a great deal about what a cohesive group they had formed and how much they enjoyed having regular time to write and share their work. In the last few class meetings, we were able to bring together various threads from our work over the course of the year and, notably, to experiment with revising pieces that had gotten their start months ago. In the very last group meeting, the teens were self-aware and thoughtful as they engaged in the exercise of listing three things (words, images, topics) commonly found in their writing, three things not commonly found in their writing, and then challenging themselves to draft something from the “not commonly found” category. We also went around the circle and expressed specific appreciation for the group and intentions for how to continue our writing after the class has ended. All in all, this was a wonderful group, all of whom grew as writers from the first meeting to the last. 

Acting Adventures (Ellen Morbyrne)
In Acting Adventures this spring we've dived into textwork and voice work. We explored various techniques (from Rodenburg, Bogart, Linklater, Suzuki, yoga, and singing) for increasing lung capacity, honing enunciation, making bold choices with our voices, and tapping into the power of our breath and vibration. We learned about rhetoric as a tool for effective and persuasive communication. We explored the Stanislavski techniques of Objectives and Tactics. We learned more about operative words and about dictionary work. We read & discussed a short play The Astonishing & Dangerous History of Mazefield the Frog by Jen Silverman), we went on a truly fun field trip to see Metamorphoses at the Drama Studio in Springfield, and we spent the bulk of the second half of the semester reading and discussing monologues from an eclectic selection of playwrights (Chuck Mee Jr., Gracie Gardner, Jen Silverman, Jean Anouilh, Ian McWethy, Clare Barron, Sarah Ruhl, David Foley, Kimberly Bellflower). Each student selected two monologues and we worked on memorizing them, applying our textwork techniques to them, and on layering in context and character exploration. Each student in this class took impressive risks of bravery and creativity, and the group did a fantastic job of supporting each other. Thanks for the adventures everyone!

Sex is a Funny Word (Kizzi Collier)
Sex is a Funny Word ended in early March. From January until then we went over a few topics together. In this class, I do like to update what is going on in the world in terms of the laws around sexuality, bodily autonomy, trans rights, etc. We have also watched a few Queer YouTubers together who discuss things like Queer baiting, Queer catching, and even down to how Disney deals with Queer representation. I was happy that all of us could watch Turning Red together. Teens had fun during the class when we got to play games like Jeopardy or STI/STD Clue and I am happy to have returned this class even with an early end. The mature discussions are always delightful and I thank everyone who loyally came each week.

Consent in the Romance Novel (Kizzi Collier)
This class has been so lovely for me! I am thrilled with all of the wonderfully diverse books that we have gotten to read together and see the ways in which the romance novel has changed throughout the years. The books we read this year are as followed: Red, White, and Royal Blue, One Last Stop, Get a Life, Chloe Brown!, Howl’s Moving Castle, Honey Girl, When the Moon Was Ours, Felix Ever After, and Lakelore. One thing that the group found quite incredible, in many modern romances, is the couples are going to therapy and working out their issues together as a team! We always continue to point out moments of consent and there is so much more in these modern romances we read together. I am happy that I was able to read my favorite genre with everyone who was able to be present and keep up with the readings every week.

Herbalism 101 (Kizzi Collier)
Herbalism Class has continued to have lots of fun outside or in the kitchen together. Weekly we have often been making something together. More items that we have made throughout these weeks are little herbal sachets and even pendants made out of my snake’s skin that she shed! When it comes to the kitchen, we have made new things like lavender ice cream, herbal teas, herbal honey, dandelion fritters, face masks, and even a blackberry sage limeade! I am always happy to see how some of the recipes we research go as we have certainly learned a lot along the way and made a few mistakes here and there. And certainly quite a few delicious treats as well!