The Learning Alliance - June 2017 Recap Spotlight on the Moonshot Moment

Keeping you informed on the latest TLA activity supporting the Moonshot Moment!

Your Monthly News & Updates

"What does it take to create a Moonshot Community with caring, compassionate, curious,
literate citizens who will improve our world?"
- This is the framing question behind everything we do at The Learning Alliance!

Upcoming Events

July 13 - National Summer Learning Day

July 13: Moonshot Moment Summer Learning Free Family Pizza Party at the Heritage Center 6pm - 8pm

RSVP - CLICK HERE

July 18 - Moonshot Rocket at McKee Botanical Gardens

July 17 - 21 Moonshot Summer Institute Professional Development

July 24 - 30 Conscious Discipline Summer Institute Training - Orlando

The Learning Alliance Success Stories: Mary Chavers

The Learning Alliance continues the journey to reach the Moonshot Goal of 90% of all students reading on grade level by the third grade. In doing so, one of our primary strategies is to facilitate professional development for teachers, administrators, and community partners . Each of our signature professional development series provide educators with proven, evidence based techniques that they are able to learn, develop, and utilize in their classroom that cultivates their skill set and assists in fostering positive academic outcomes for students.

Indian River County Awarded 2016 Pacesetter Award

Indian River County and 47 communities across the United States were awarded Pacesetters for being a recognized community collaboration that addresses one or more challenges that can undermine early literacy - school readiness, school attendance, and summer learning. The Pacesetter Award is a platform for the Campaign for Grade-Level Reading to honor the civic leaders, organizations, philanthropists and agencies in communities who are working collaboratively for the futures and success of children.

THANK YOU - to our Moonshot Community Action Network (MCAN) comprised of school district personnel, community leaders, agencies, nonprofits, private businesses, foundations, philanthropists, and concerned citizens who have worked diligently beside one another to make a difference in our local community.The Moonshot Moment continues to be a beacon of hope for other communities to follow!

Transforming Lives through Literacy

Allison Biandis, teacher at Indian River Academy shares how her conscious discipline professional development training has led her to foster children. Through the CD principles she has learned and embraced, Allison and her husband have made a commitment to imprint love, hope, and belonging in the lives of children who are in desperate need of a loving, safe home.

Summer Moonshot Academies: Connecting Literacy to Math & Science

Many locals have heard The Learning Alliance and Moonshot Moment's tagline, "Reading is the gateway to all learning." As an organization dedicated to literacy, we know this statement to be true. However, the goal of the Moonshot Moment is more than just creating "good students" who are literate. We desire to create compassionate, literate, lifelong learners who will improve our world. Thus, we have found that inter-connected disciplines, specifically math and science, in conjunction with problem-based learning grounded in literary text is the breading ground of creativity.

This summer The Learning Alliance extended learning opportunities to four elementary schools Citrus Elementary, Indian River Academy, Rosewood Magnet, and Vero Beach Elementary, through our Moonshot Academies (MSA). The instruction at the academies infused our rich literary curriculum with rigorous, interdisciplinary science and math concepts. For example, we had the opportunity to introduce 1st - 3rd grade students to 5th grade science and math standards. The purpose of doing so was to challenge our students to work collaboratively, while being consciously creative in the work they produced.

Clink, a book about a one time state-of-the-art robot with the dazzling ability to make toast and play music at the same time was the foundational text for the Moonshot Academy.

Students made robots from repurposed materials.

Student showcasing a robot he made

Students explored the world of understanding and creating simple machines

Students coded robots to navigate different challenges and maneuver through

obstacle courses.Students creating drawing robots

The Moonshot Bookmobile: Providing the Gift of

Literacy to Families in Indian River County All Summer 2017

The Learning Alliance, in conjunction with School District of Indian River County, launched its Moonshot Moment Bookmobile summer reading and book distribution program serving four locations throughout Indian River County. The goal of the Bookmobile is to provide children with age-appropriate literature to children, many of whom do not have books in their home at all.

The Bookmobile locations for the rest of the summer are:

Tuesday - Dasie Hope Center (through July 7th)

Wednesday & Thursday - Gifford Health Center, 9am - 11am

Friday - Fellsmere (Grant Park or City Hall), 9am - 11am

Call 877-548-7323 for more if you would more information on the Bookmobile

Conscious Discipline Training for Early Educators: A Collaboration to Equip Early Educators in CD Best Practices to Improve Learning Outcomes for Children

The focus of education has to be on more than just core subjects such as English, math, literacy arts, and science. We have to educate "the whole child" in such a way that we instill life skills that include empathy, building and maintaining positive relationships, conflict resolution, and compassion for others. Conscious discipline (CD) allows teachers and students to develop and practice those skills that foster positive attitudes, behaviors, and thinking processes, which directly lead to both social-emotional competence and learning.

Therefore, to meet the demands of high academic standards and the social-emotional needs of students, providing teachers the necessary tools through professional development is the gateway to success. Childcare Resources the lead agency secured funding to host year long workshops for their staff in addition to five other collaborators: Big Brothers Big Sisters, EOC/Headstart, Little Rising Stars, School District of Indian River County, and The Learning Alliance. On June 17th, the Conscious Discipline training kicked off with a boot camp training for 100 early educators, thanks to sponsorship from The Learning Alliance. The boot camp training will be followed by four additional trainings, personal coaching, and a deeper dive into routines and rituals for a 25 person cohort from the initial group of 100.

Below are pictures from the training. The teachers received intensive small group training that included rituals and routines, classroom management, conscious discipline resources, and self-management.

Liz Woody of The Learning Alliance was the lead facilitator of Conscious Discipline bootcamp

Indian River Academy staff led breakout sessions

Participants enthusiastically absorbed a plethora of rich, insightful information provided by facilitators

Taking the Show on the Road: The "Voices:

A Community Tapestry Project"

The Campaign for Grade-Level Reading invited the Moonshot Moment to bring the Moonshot Reading Rocket and the "Tapestry" project to the week-long Grade-Level Reading conference in Denver, CO.

Ralph Smith, Managing Director for The Campaign for Grade-Level Reading providing accolades

to the Moonshot Rocket Bus at the Pacesetter Awards.

The arts-literacy project, "Voices: A Community Tapestry of Stories" is a community outreach experience in which all community members are asked to share their "story," by adding to a collective "Tapestry/quilt." The Moonshot Reading a rocket team traveled over 2,200 miles back to Florida, stopping in a new Pacesetter community each day to set up a shared "Tapestry" experience in their community.

The Moonshot Reading Rocket collected Tapestry stories during the week of June 12,

in front of Union Station in Denver, CO.

Over 850 students joined us at the "Turn the Page Kansas City" literacy event

held indoors at the Sprint Center.

Kansas City, MO Mayor Sly James with our Rocket Team, Marie O'Brien,

Bridget Lyons, and Barry Tatem

In Birmingham, we collected dozens of beautiful, touching stories from staff and students

participating in their summer academy.

Some students shared stories of hope...

And others shared stories of despair...

This lovely girl thought the Rocket bus artwork had specifically included a painting of her. The "dream" she shared on her tapestry piece was to be the first American girl to go to Mars.

The project was wildly successful, and several other GLR communities will be launching it, with the ultimate goal of presenting our shared Tapestries in a national literacy rally.

We are grateful to Jim Kelly, UPS, and the Annie E. Casey Foundation for supporting the Tapestry Rocket road trip! We will continue to collect stories throughout the coming months, so stay tuned for details on the locations where we will display this mobile art installation.

We received significant media attention at each stop including being in the front page of CNN.com, sharing our Moonshot message with the nation!