This past Monday, January 15th, 2018, we gathered with hundreds of families to honor and celebrate the legacy of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
Together we sang, danced, heard stories about those who have dedicated their lives to the fight for human and civil rights and shared with our children our hopes for a more just and kind world.
Kindness really was the key word to define this event, which depended on the kindness of many to happen:
Thank you to the 5th Prospect Park BPSA scouts for helping us set up, decorate and for designing the beautiful signs that covered our walls all over the building. Thank you to Fiona and Janice (for all you do), to Prajna, who was the amazing face painter to hundreds of excited kids basically on her own, to our amazing teachers and friends, Simba, storae, Lea, DuPree and Barry, who helped make the magic happen, to Tahra, who was there with me from noon to 10pm, decorating, welcoming people and cleaning and always with a smile, to the parents (and your kids) who showed up and helped us set up and staff our many stations, spread the word and made donations, such as Kymberly, Clyde, Stella, Columbia, Ted, Gus, Claude, Rachel, Lucy and many more in all kinds of ways. Thank you to the members who showed up to help us run the event, such as Nancy, Burt, Lisel (and the wonderful volunteer family you brought with you), to Jason for being so helpful when I asked for things to be changed and moved around, and the members and parents who helped us by coming to the event and helping us publicize it. Please forgive me if I have forgotten anyone or was not aware of what you have done. We thank you all.
Below a few photos from our event:
Singing with DuPree and Barry
Dancing
Picture by Audrey Kindred
Storytime with storae
Storytime with storae
Face painting
Raffle with awesome prizes
Crafts
Making musical instruments
Yummy food
Scouts helping decorate
Scouts planning the “I have a dream wall” and quote signs
Dear parents
We were so happy to see you all on our first class September 10th! It was exciting to meet so many new friends and to welcome our old friends back to Ethics for Children. Below you will find a short description of our classes and what is coming in the weeks ahead.
We have one more trial day scheduled for September 17th, so feel free to come back if you were trying a class, and tell your friends. To sign up for the trial class September 17th, please visit: https://bsec.org/trial-class-for-ethics-for-children/
Exploring Ethics (ages 3-6) Teacher Simba Yangala
Our first day of Ethics for children in Exploring Ethics. It was a fun Sunday morning to see all the beautiful children. Our high light was the story “A Sea of Pink”. It’s a story a boy who was told on his first day of school by other children who were not so nice to not wear pink t-shirt. Other children came to his rescue and made a day of children wearing pink shirts. He felt welcome and safe.Sea of Pink is the story that originated the Pink Shirt to School day, a worldwide anti bullying campaign. It’s about the power of kindness and getting together to do what is right. With our beautiful tangled up yarn, we made a web of friends together. Learn more about it by watching the video below. See you next Sunday.
Growing Ethics (ages 7-9) Teacher storae michele
The Growing with Ethics group created a roadmap of the year together! We discussed dates and holidays we were excited about and discussed what our journey into the future will look like. Afterwards, we wrote letters to our future-selves, that will be mailed at the end of the year. These messages included our personal hopes and dreams for the year.
Living Ethics (ages 10-12) Teacher Lea Bender After a sweet opening circle in the playground with all of the age groups, our Living Ethics group gathered in the Poly Prep library for our first meeting of the school year! Our theme this month is Welcome and Community. We shared times we felt like outsiders and also about places where we feel welcome. Gus said he felt like an outsider on the first day of EfC last year, but now EfC is one of the places where he feels safe and welcome. We also talked about times we helped others to feel welcome when they were new or felt left out. Later, we got on our feet with some get-to-know-you games and finished class by talking through the monthly themes for the year. Next week we will also be making creative maps of our lives. I’m already looking forward to next Sunday!
Taty and Lea here! Hope you are having a wonderful summer. We are looking forward to fall already!
There will be lots of new additions to our kids class this year, such as regular yoga and midfulness classes, permaculture and volunteering and service days and arts as regular part of our program for all the classes, but there are also some major staffing changes.
We will all be back in the fall and Simba will continue to teach the youngest children, but Taty and Lea are switching hats!
As many of you know Taty Sena and Lea Bender have both had two jobs at BSEC, Taty as the Outreach Coordinator and Lea as the EfC Director and both as EfC teachers. Starting in August, Taty will be taking over the role of EfCDirector and Lea will be picking up the teaching of the Evolving Ethics class. Lea has taught this age group at EfC in the past and is excited to return to do it again this year. This will allow Taty to be available to parents and visitors during class times and attend all platforms in her role as Outreach Coordinator, a job that is more streamlined with the role of EfC director than with that of teacher.
We also have an amazing and caring new teacher join our program: Storäe Michele. Storäe is a very dynamic teacher with over 10 years teaching experience and a very unique set of talents. we are so excited to have her join our team! Check out her bio at our teachers page HERE.
And to celebrate all the changes, we are offering a Family and Friends Early Bird discount. If you sing up for classes before September 8th this year, you can use the code EFC2017 for a 20% discount rate when paying for our semester or yearly fees. Just visit our registration page at: https://bsec.org/sign-up-for-ethics-for-children-classes/ and use the coupon on the bottom of the page.
And feel free to share it with your friends and family.They can also email efc@bsec.org, with subject “Subscribe” if they want to be added to our EFC mailing list.
We celebrated Martin Luther King Jr’s Day celebrating our community’s diversity and talents. More than ever, it was a good time to honor the cultural richness of our country and the power of peaceful action. A huge thanks to all who helped make this event so successful. All people who worked hard to put it together, the amazing volunteers who welcomed everyone with a smile and with willing helping hands, and all who came with their families to share this event with us.
Check out some of the pictures of the event below:
In times of darkness, we celebrate the Winter Solstice together to welcome the return of the light. Our inter-generational event focused on ancient South American civilizations and how they honored the sun. DuPree led the musical part of the event and the children answered questions about the seasons and helped distribute evergreens and welcoming the sun. The solstice the time to send wishes of peace and light into the world, particularly in times of great need, like now.
Big thanks to all who helped make this event such a success, and to all who brought food, came early and left late to help set up and break down at the end of the day.
Below you will find some pictures of the event:
