Blue Sky School

     The cardboard arcade was the third workshop for Blue Sky School. This was a very special workshop because we were partnering with this amazing business called Maker Junior. Blue Sky School Pioneers and Advisors are comfortable in the board room!      "Maker Junior combines arts, crafts and other creative concepts to teach kids about science and technology," says Hari, co-founder of Maker Junior." Maker Junior was helping kids out with their projects for the cardboard arcade. Alison and Nanik, the other co-founders of Maker Junior brought in many supplies for the kids to incorporate in their project. Digging through mountains of supplies for creative inspiration. We kept Alison, Nanik and Hari very busy for our entire workshop! Nanik ran a mini-workshop for builders about how to incorporate LED lights and conductive tape into their designs.      "This was a great opportunity for me to get creative and work with my frien...

When working in UI (User Interface), they say the magic number is seven. According to me, this applies to life. Seven days in a week, seven deadly sins, seven legs on an unfortunate octopus. Do you see my point? This blog post is brought to you by the number seven. (Brownie points if you get that reference.) The way the number seven will be used today is in the context of elevator pitches. An elevator pitch is basically a quick way to summarize a product, idea, or service. The concept is that you happen to meet an important business prospect in an elevator and the travel to your destination is all the time you have to get your idea across. Why seven? Well, in my opinion, that’s the maximum amount of sentences you must have in your elevator pitch. However, they can’t just be any seven sentences, they must be methodically written and well delivered. You may be wondering, how does this apply to Blue Sky School? It applies because we thrive to teach students in a manner that the i...

I'm a 12 (almost 13) year old in grade 7 and i n my opinion, everybody should be friends. Life's too short to hold grudges, especially with someone who you work with 5 days out of the week. The relationship between students and teachers is an important one and I believe that the ability to work together is a crucial skill.  Here's the problem; as a society it is common to look at school as something to hate and something to fear. People look at school as a prison, not a privilege. School teaches us about what we want to do and who we want to become. When the majority of kids (myself included) wake up in the morning, we don't want to go to school. Why? It's because school doesn't truly engage us. If teachers and students were friends, we would wake up ready for school. Spending a day with your friend sounds great, doesn't it? This is where Blue Sky School comes in. We work towards learning that engages students and has a friendly atmosphere. No mor...

Maddy is a young student who attended our Kanata Town Hall. She was so interested in Blue Sky School that she wrote the speech below to share with her class in a speech competition. "Consider how much technology has changed, a new car model comes out every year, and people pay thousands of dollars to renovate or update their houses. But none of these things are as important as our education. So, what can be done to improve and update the educational environment? What if you could decide when to start your school day? What if educators adapted to your style of learning rather than you adapting to the traditional classroom? Every child learns in a different way so does it make sense to teach them all the same way. Mrs. Powell and fellow classmates, all this and more is possible at Blue Sky School, an experimental prototypical school of tomorrow. This is a new and innovative school with a different way of teaching and learning, located right here in Kanata. Blue Sky Sch...

Imagine if school challenged me to think of the impact I have on the world. Imagine if I got to be independent and move my learning at my own pace. Imagine if school inspired me to achieve my most ambitious dreams and plans. At Blue Sky School, you don't have to imagine any more. Blue Sky School is the experimental prototype school of tomorrow. We are opening in Ottawa, Canada in September 2017 with an amazing class of 12 Pioneer students. We are offering a unique new type of learning experience for grade 4-12 learners. We are a school innovation centre built by, for and as a community. At Blue Sky School, students engage in passion projects that empower them to impact the world in a positive way. The issue with modern day schooling is that it is under a one sized fits all category. Students are told to sit down at the same desks day after day, with kids who are the same age as them, split their learning into chunks that are divided by the sound of a be...