Making it work with what you have

Check out our latest podcast episode about distance learning! You can also check out a version of the story below.

Anyone who's had to figure out how to make an ad-hoc dinner out of pantry leftovers during quarantine knows the value of creativity within constraint. Mary Catherine’s band of seven and eight year olds learned this lesson while transitioning their stop motion project to a distance learning exploration. 

“Their first reaction was like, well, I guess I can't do it,” Mary Catherine said. But just like at school, the kids have had to figure out how to work with what they have at home.

“Right now they can't get anything they don't have,” she explained. The kids were forced to find materials at home to do the project. When they came back to her and explained that they were having trouble, she challenged them with questions: “How can you substitute something? Where can you find flexibility in it?” she said. “Seeing them lean into that challenge and sometimes see their toys in a new way or see the objects they have in a new way has been really neat.”

The stop motion biographies also brought up important questions beyond what they could use at hand. Essentially, how do you tell stories about real people when all you have to use are Lego figures - and they’re all yellow? When Atticus realized they didn't have any black Lego characters, he had to build the Obama family with Legos, in order to show their story. Sylvester didn’t have any female Lego characters to represent Houdini’s wife in his movie. These moments helped everyone realize that there’s little to no representation for those kinds of characters and people. 

In trying to engage seven and eight year olds in conversations about equity, Mary Catherine discovered that the tools she needed were implied in the toys themselves. 

The conversation became that much more meaningful because these are the toys that they play with every day. Mary Catherine was able to ask what this tells us about the larger context for where our toys come from. “There are so many constraints we're not aware of until are forced to be aware of them,” she said.

Making it work with what you have is about more than just making your own stop motion animation.  For Mary Catherine, it’s about spotting learning opportunities every day - even from a distance.