As a photon, three-year-old Fenton Sallade was all business. When Peter Headington flashed the sun side of the poster, Fenton tapped each “electron” on the shoulder, the signal for those kids to run through the circuit Peter had laid out on the ground using rope and a pool noodle. As they careened toward the end of the circuit, each electron paused to chime a bell before returning to the start of the circuit, where they awaited Fenton the Photon’s nudge once more. But this time, Peter flashed the cloudy symbol—the photon didn’t tap anyone, and the electrons sat idle.
Peter’s solar-power game, debuting this past spring at HMS’s Spring Festival, is a product of the adolescent program’s (Upper School) educational process, founded on the “pedagogy of place.” In this approach, students tackle semester-long units on topics such as migration and justice beginning with the particularities of their own physical context. Upper School guides use the details of their school’s specific locality as a springboard for greater learning, encouraging students to question the world around them and contemplate the impact they will make on it.
This past year, the Upper School’s Earth and Human Studies unit on energy fortuitously coincided with the installation of 175 solar panels on the roof of HMS’s main building. Even though they were not yet turned on, just by sitting visible on the roof, the panels symbolized fiscal and environmental changes to the HMS campus. Initially, the HMS board pursued the installation because of the financial advantages of producing the energy the school community needs. The panels should certainly help achieve that goal; as we were told at the Solar Ribbon Cutting during the Spring festival, the panels can:
Brew 3,701,973 cups of coffee a year
Cook 208,236 bowls of mac & cheese in a year
Offset driving the perimeter of the United States 17.5 times
Cook 57,843 pizzas in a year
Light a home with LED lights for 26 years
Still, board member Eitan Zeira acknowledges the environmental impact, as well, explaining that the installation of the panels is about more than good economics, it’s also about “being a good citizen of the Earth. This is the right way.” The educational opportunities came later, at the instigation of the Upper School themselves.
While alterations in the physical context inspired an exploration of renewable energy, the Upper School’s earlier lessons on changes within their wider world also played a role. Dr. Elizabeth Burakowski, a climate scientist from the University of New Hampshire, had spoken to the Upper School about the current consequences of global climate change and the direct impacts in New Hampshire. Using an ice core from Antarctica, she demonstrated how climate scientists gather their data to study historical climate conditions, which are now changing at a rate quite different than that of anything Earth has experienced in the last 400,000 years.
So, when the solar panels were installed this Spring, the Upper School was already thinking about the environment and humans’ impact on it. To learn more about how the panels could affect the climate changes, they sent an invitation to Dan Weeks, co-owner of Revision Energy, the company that installed the panels. Dan echoed Dr. Burakowski’s lesson on the causes of climate change, adding information about the current breakdown of energy use in New Hampshire and the details of why renewable energy is so essential to our state’s, country’s, and Earth’s future.
With the background information in place and solar panels as a daily reminder, the four 9th-year students (Peter Headington, Quinton Bolton, Gustave Ewald, and Julian Jagentenfl) decided to focus on renewable energy for their Spring Colloquium. As in a traditional school, the students researched their subjects, studying recent news and the current bills in the NH legislature, but then the Montessori education, emphasizing hands-on learning and meeting with experts, went into play. Board member Frank Grossman got 9th-year students into the New Hampshire Energy Breakfast at the Grappone Conference Center in Concord with business owners, policy makers, lobbyists, and renewable energy industry specialists. At the breakfast, the students made connections with Christopher Skogland, the Climate & Energy Program Manager at the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services. This relationship led to a NH State House visit to attend public hearings on a number of renewable energy bills in the House and Senate. Just like in life outside of school, the students were learning how networking furthers their (educational) goals.
Once back on campus, the Upper School invited board member Eitan Zeira,who has years of experience working in the solar industry, to teach them the basics of electricity and how solar power works in more detail. In keeping with the hands-on Montessori approach, he guided the 9th-year students through the mechanics of circuits and solar panels. “You can’t take an online swimming course,” Eitan jokes. “At a certain point, you need to get in the water." Meanwhile, Upper School guide Sarah Sallade provided additional resources, support, connections to outside contacts, and access to resources to allow students all the knowledge and materials necessary to develop their individual projects.
While the 9th-years all decided to focus on solar energy, they approached their projects in different ways. Peter, the student who devised the circuit running game at the Spring Festival, says he was surprised by “how organized [solar power] is! Light comes down, and the panels absorb it. It flows through them to make energy. It’s simpler than you think it will be.” He focused his project on teaching the simplicity of solar, hence the running game. “My target was young kids,” Peter explained. “So, I needed a game to make it fun.”
By contrast, Quin Bolton focused on the complexity of solar energy. He says that he hadn’t originally known much about solar energy, and at first, it seemed pretty straight-forward, much as he would have expected energy to flow. But then he learned about circuits. “It’s easy at first,” he warns, “but then it quickly gets hard.” For his project, Quin, like Julian Jagentenfl, guided younger children (target age 7-12) through the process of building their own solar-powered circuits. They used a combination of a snap circuit kit called Junior Circuits and individual items such as solar panels, motors, LEDs, and connector cables. Quin and Julian helped the children notice how they were harnessing the sun’s rays (photons) through a photovoltaic panel the kids hooked up to their own circuit creations. Then they explained how the captured photons nudged the electrons through conductors they had built to spin a mini-fan or turn on a light. If the circuit wasn’t closed or a breaker was flipped the wrong way, the energy wouldn’t power anything.
Gus Ewald took his renewable energy research in another direction entirely, moving away from hands-on instruction to studying governmental energy policy. Presenting to a roomful of adults, Gus described New Hampshire’s House Bill 496, which aims to establish a committee to study the feasibility of setting a goal of 50% renewable energy by 2040. “The world is literally ending!” Gus stressed to his audience. He paused to make sure that sank in before urging, “but you can do something!” He advised his audience to write to state representatives and scan a QR code he had made to take their internet browsers to a list of all the energy bills in the N.H. state legislature right now.
Gus’s dire predictions encapsulate the end goal of the Montessori “pedagogy of place.” Beyond learning about one’s environment, the Upper School curriculum is designed to prompt students to question their own position in their society. David Kahn, the executive director of the North American Montessori Teachers’ Association, explains: “Place inspires belonging. Place inspires history. Place allows for responsibilities to arise within the perimeters of that place, where students develop ownership.”
HMS’s Upper School headquarters in a restored building on an old apple orchard provides the inspiration. It’s up to the students to figure out what their impact will be.