We're all connected

COEUR d'ALENE — Questions such as, "Would you shave your head for $1,000?" and, "Should students have to wear uniforms?" were asked during a frenzy of activity in the gym Tuesday afternoon as Lakes Middle School sixth graders stepped out of their comfort zones.

Prompted by Ovation Company founder Stu Cabe and Kevin Ozar of the Boomerang Project, the students were tasked with talking to people they normally wouldn't during an all-day session of Connecting the Dots.

"I think it really helps out the community to feel connected more," sixth grader Natalie Knutson said. "It really helps build community and build relationships with all the students in the school."

Connecting the Dots focuses on improving school culture and student relationships with kindness at the heart of the program. Through activities and exercises, students gain a better understanding of the impacts — negative and positive, big and small — they have on each other.

"It's really all about finding out who they are in the grand scheme of things as a person, their identity and how they don't need to conform," sixth grade teacher Jontie Meehan said.

Her fellow sixth grade teacher Kristin Odenthal said this program also gives students lessons in how to listen, how to make their own choices, how not to be followers and how to be considerate of others' feelings and opinions.

"That's a big part of it," she said. "How to listen, when to listen, being respectful, knowing that there's consequences for your behavior."

The interactive, interpersonal activities motivate students to talk to people other than their buddies, Odenthal said.

"They're having to go outside of the box," she said. "They've been kind of forced to have conversations with people they don't normally talk with."

Dominic Morales said the program was fun, except for the downtime when the students had to sit and listen. He said he enjoyed the activities and making new friends.

"I also learned that people don't like paying taxes," he said.

Ozar said as the day progressed with a focus on student relationships, the students transformed from who they were in the morning to who they were when they departed in the afternoon.

"It starts small and then it steamrolls," he said. "We know that kids want to do the right thing, it's just giving them the chance, the structure and the time. It's just really cool to see the relationships as they come out of their shells."

The Ovation Company is a school resource organization that promotes positive school climates and improved student achievement. A former classroom teacher, Cabe, of Coeur d'Alene, has spent the last 24 years working with educators across North America to help improve school climate and culture. The Ovation Company's main goal is to help students work hard, play fair and be nice.

The Boomerang Project reaches over 4,500 schools and 15,000 educators to make schools positive, safe and connected places for kids to learn. Ozar, of Detroit, is a 23-year classroom veteran who has focused the past 15 years of his work on how moving from one school level to another impacts students.

Lakes seventh graders will participate in the Connecting the Dots program today.

    Dominic Morales discusses his findings with fellow sixth graders during the Connecting the Dots program Tuesday at Lakes Middle School. The program focuses on improving school culture and student relationships through kindness and empathy.
  

    Ovation Company founder Stu Cabe listens for a response from Lakes Middle School sixth graders Tuesday during Connecting the Dots, a program to improve student relationships and school culture. Seventh grade will participate today.