During the month of September our school community participated in a collective heartifact mural project to build belonging and strengthen literacy skills.

The focus of this year’s mural was inspired by several anchor texts (In a Jar & Wilfred Gordon MacDonald Partridge), as well as a video clip from the show, The Repair Shop. Staff spent time exploring CASEL’s Social and Emotional Learning Signature Practices Playbook and Shane Safir’s latest book, Pedagogy of Voice. All texts, clips and resources supported this work.

Families, students and staff received an invitation to bring in a heartifact.

Students shared why their heartifacts were important to them & responded to prompts during our Community Welcome event. Families also participated in story sharing with their heartifacts. Students completed a written response which is on display on the back of each heartifact.

All heartifacts are now part of our whole school mural. Students walk by, flip the pictures and read the story on the back. They talk together about the collection of images, heartifacts and stories.

This work was extended on our first Professional Development Day when staff also participated in story sharing and considered how learning could be extended/deepened as we work to build community and strengthen literacy skills.