UCDS was featured on a KING 5 News segment highlighting its curriculum on oracy—communication and discourse. Building communication skills is a long-standing pillar of the UCDS learning community. This approach grew in 2021 when, as part of a capstone research project through the UCDS Graduate School of Education M.Ed. program, 1st- and 2nd-grade teacher Mackenzie Hasenauer designed a curriculum to provide students with directed practice in these oracy skills. In the years that followed, the entire 1st- and 2nd-grade collaborative teaching team expanded and enriched the curriculum. Mackenzie noted that when oracy really took root at the team level, “It was immediately not my baby anymore. Teachers took what I’d tried and found, adjusted it, individualized, and just got creative. It’s exciting! We’re a learning school.”
UCDS is a learning school. UCDS’s unique design as a place where both teachers and children learn, where early career teachers develop their practice, and where experienced teachers research and design curriculum, gives rise to its innovation. In line with its mission, UCDS uniquely serves to prepare teachers, educate children, and develop innovations in curriculum and teaching. If we are raising the thinkers, problem-solvers and citizens equipped with the skills to work together and lead in the future, we believe the best way to instruct those children is to model inquiry, design, excitement, and collaboration. Critical to our school culture is that everyone views themselves as a learner, a leader, and a teammate.
One of the ways that UCDS facilitates its learning culture is through its Graduate School of Education (GSE). The UCDS GSE is truly a one-of-a-kind graduate program in Washington state, offering a master’s degree in education that emerged from and is situated in a practicing school for children, with a faculty composed of highly experienced teachers. The UCDS GSE takes a progressive educational approach that emphasizes the teacher’s role as a designer and leader, the child’s uniqueness as a learner, and the critical importance of a shared learning culture in effective schools.
Throughout its schools for children are GSE faculty who, by designing, researching, and facilitating graduate-level classes, are staying current in the field of education. As well, there are graduate students working side-by-side with mentor teachers in the classrooms for children; these adult learners are asking questions, reflecting on their teaching practice, and bringing innovation, modeling, and energy to the classroom. And through this learning culture, innovations such as Mackenzie’s oracy curriculum take root and have a broad, positive impact on learning throughout UCDS.
