Optional knowledge

Electives push students beyond required boundaries

By LINDA SIEVERS
Special sections editor

In the current school district budget crunch, there is a temptation by some to look for savings in the elective corral. Here, it has been said, are a number of non-essential subjects easily cut from the herd of classes.

Look a little closer at the individual offerings, however, and you’ll find some gems that go a long way toward furthering a youngster’s potential career, artistic talent or practical survival skills.

The point of elective coursework is exposure.

‘‘Our philosophy of electives is that they do two things: They assist kids to do better in their regular coursework and they assist them in broadening their perspectives academically,’’says Gail Opalinsky, the Anchorage School District’s executive director of middle school education.

While elementary school students have room for one elective period per day, middle school offers two periods.

‘‘It means more children can participate,’’ says Mears music teacher Chuck Nagel. ‘‘That’s what I love about middle school. It opens up these opportunities.’’

‘‘We’re seeing a more diverse group of kids,’’ Carole Johansen at Clark Middle School has discovered.

Nagel is expecting 200 seventh graders to show up for one of his five band classes the first day of school on Aug. 30.

The course selection is broad and varies from school to school.

Music, computer technology, leadership, consumer science, writing labs, career technology are just a few of the classes available district wide.

‘‘We try to expose them to something that might interest them in high school classes or maybe even a career,’’ Opalinsky explained.

At Mirror Lake, for instance, the entire school is wired in to a video system which the video production class uses to full advantage. ‘‘They have a class that produces the news every day,’’ said Opalinsky.

On the survival skills level, youngsters still can choose quarter-long sessions of consumer science, i.e. home economics and shop.

‘‘They’re much more up-to-date than they used to be,’’ Opalinsky noted. And they get into the science of things, like why bread rises, which Opalinsky says was underplayed in the home ec of yore.

Carole Johansen, family consumer science teacher at Central Middle School, has found most of her seventh graders have no cooking experience because their parents wouldn’t allow it. Some have never even seen a sewing machine.

‘‘Some of them have no clue,’’ she said about basics like measuring ingredients. One student, when told two tablespoons of butter were needed, proceeded to scrape the required amount from a stick into the measuring spoon. ‘‘Now I teach them that at the beginning,’’ Johansen laughed. ‘‘I show them the markings on the butter stick.’’

Another misconception some students have is just how easy learning to cook really is. ‘‘They get in there and realize they’re using math skills,’’ Johansen said.

The same thing happens in the three-week long sewing unit. Here students have to complete one project, in Johansen’s class a pillow or fleece hat.

Seventh graders come away with the basics in sewing, cooking, food safety, care-giving (including babies, pets and the elderly) and handling money. The course also prepares them for more in-depth courses in high school.

Those that opt to continue in the 8th grade get an entire semester of what Johansen described as ‘‘more like a junior achievement course.’’ They learn about the cost of living when, after getting a paycheck, they must shop using the newspaper to buy a car, find and furnish an apartment and buy groceries (plus cut out coupons).

Johansen also throws in budget wild cards like unexpected bills for a broken leg or extra cash from a winning lottery ticket.

‘‘It’s funny to watch. A lot come in with the attitude that, if we need money, we just go to the machine,’’ Johansen said. They didn’t realize parents were actually subtracting money from their checkbook.

‘‘The first time I did this, I had so many parents come in and tell me, ‘Wow! This is the best thing that ever happened to my child!’ ’’

Just as home economics has evolved and computer classes have been added, the district continues to look at other elective possibilities.

‘‘We just got a federal grant to teach Russian in our schools,’’ Opalinsky said. And there’s a new national pilot project reading program called Second Chance.

‘‘We’re part of the project with some schools in Texas, California and Florida. It started last year at Mears and Clark and we’re going to add a few more schools this year.

‘‘This is for kids who are behind in reading at middle school level,’’ she explained and one of the very few that is successful among adolescents.

Youngsters are tested for phonics and taught how to comprehend and get the most information out of their reading.

‘‘Our experience is that kids who have gone through the district know how to read really well,’’ Opalinsky added. ‘‘It’s youngsters that have moved here from somewhere else that have problems. This program helps us help them overcome that.’’

©2000 Anchorage Daily News