Full day on Mayne!

We completed our last day of Exploratories for this term and then had our first OIMY plus day. These days allow for our students to experience each of the islands our students represent in the OIMY  program. The program we develop for each island is place-based and focused on local history and ecology often including local experts as facilitators. For example, on this afternoon students rotated through four different learning experiences. One station was run by local experts from our Mayne Island Conservancy: Michael and Stephanie. They shared information about mushrooms now starting to pop up in our forests and students went on a mushroom hunt and practiced identifying species with their help. Mayne Island teacher, Megan Cameron, led students in creating beautiful beach art. Local artist Annette had students create a found sound orchestra and teacher Jess Willows led students in forest games. Here are some photos from this exception afternoon:

Robotics!

This is the first opportunity we have had to teach Robotics in the OIMY program, and we're also the first middle years students to get to learn about Robotics in our school district!!

Thank you to Gulf Islands Secondary and particularly Rachel FitzZaland who started a Robotics program in our district and offered to lend us enough kits for an exploratory and train a teacher!

Here are the students building, programming, and then engaging in a challenge:

OIMY for 2016/17

We are starting our OIMY program for the new school year this week. Mayne School will be our campus for the next three Thursdays as we explore the following exploratories: robotics, photography, fibre arts, cooking and art.

Galiano students will take the water taxi to and from Mayne: leaving at 7:15am and returning at 5:15pm.

Pender students will take the ferry to and from Mayne: leaving at 7:05am and returning at 12:20pm.

Our first session runs at these times on these Thursdays: October 6, 13 and 20th.

Our Saturna Adventure!

Catching up on the news on our journey to Saturna!

The four brave volunteers (way down at the waterside in this picture) who undertook an epic journey to collect seawater to then distill it into fresh water to complete one survival challenge. 

Another survival challenge successfully completed: building a fire.

In the process of distilling seawater to freshwater:

OIMY is heading to Saturna!

Our next adventure takes us to the lovely island of Saturna where we will be greeted by our SEEC students. They have planned a wonderful day of ecological learning! Here are the travel details:

Travelling to:
Galiano students will depart on the 6:45am ferry to Swartz Bay
Mayne students will depart on the 7:20am ferry to Swartz Bay
Pender students will depart on the 7:45am ferry to Swartz Bay

We will all meet and then board the 9:10am ferry to Saturna. We will work on our mapping project during this ferry ride. You will have the opportunity to add important features to your maps.

Return trip:
Galiano and Mayne students will board the 4:10pm ferry on Saturna, arriving at Mayne at 4:45pm and Galiano at 5:45pm
Pender students will board the watertaxi on Saturna and arrive at Pt Washington at 5:45pm.

See you all Monday morning!

Next session

Our next OIMY adventure is an all day event on Pender Island. We will be working with the amazing coach Tim as he leads us in an exploration of the sport of wheelchair basketball. Students will also get the opportunity to prepare a lunch for everyone. Then, we will travel by bus to a local farm and be lead through some learning activities with one of our Pender School classes.

Here are all of the travel details:

Travelling to Pender Galiano students will leave on the 7:15am watertaxi and Mayne students will leave on the 7:25am water taxi.

Returning to our home islands Galiano and Mayne students will take the 4:05pm ferry from Pender, arriving on Mayne Island at 4:30pm and arriving on Galiano Island at 5:25pm.

Our last exploratory session!

Next session Feb 1 on Galiano

Our next OIMY gathering will be a full day on Galiano on Feb 1st. This is our first "OIMY +" day where we will be focusing on leadership and community building, local knowledge, and start building a geography project that will continue across four islands and four months!

Here is the travel info:

Travelling to Galiano: Pender students will leave on the 7:05am ferry (meet at the terminal at 6:45am); Mayne students will leave on the 7:45am ferry (meet at the terminal at 7:15am)  - arriving at 8:15am)

Return: Students will leave at 2:50pm; Mayne students will arrive at the Miners Bay dock at 3pm; Pender students will arrive at 3:35pm at Port Washington

Final Day of our First Exploratory Session

Photos from our Media Arts group

Thanks Sarah and Laura!

Exploratories in action!

OIMY Program for 2015/16

This year the Outer Islands Middle Years Program will focus our exploratory activities on one campus: Mayne Island! Mayne is the ideal setting to offer sessions in woodworking, cooking, fibre arts, and media arts. Our large shop is up and running with new projects, the teaching kitchen is sizzling with lovely odours, the sewing machines are humming away, and students are learning new skills in photography as they explore our campus. Our exploratories will take place over three sessions with three classes in each session:

Session 1: Jan 11, 18, 25
Session 2: Feb 22, 29, Mar 7
Session 3: April 4, 11, 18

Each class runs from 8:40 until 11:30am. It is really important that students attend all three classes in each session to ensure they give themselves enough time to complete their projects. All of our students are signed up for three sessions of their choice.

TRAVEL INFO for Galiano and Pender families: Galiano students will travel to and from Mayne via the water taxi: meet at the water taxi dock at 7:15am; arrive home at 5:20pm. Pender students travel to and from via the ferry: meet at the ferry terminal at 6:45am; students then travel to the Pender school on the noon boat and are dismissed at the regular time.

To continue with our place-based learning and to meet the goals set by our parent communities, we will also be holding OIMY Plus days. These will be full days spent on each of our islands. On these dates students will learn leadership skills, natural history and geography of our region, and physical education skills. These dates are set for Feb 1 on Galiano, Mar 7 on Mayne (afternoon only), April 25 Pender and a date in May (TBD) to work with our SEEC students.