Planning

We spent a lot of time talking today and covered a lot of ground. We identified several themes to consider: Pressure (from expectations of school and community), Technology (and how it affects social interaction), Membership (as in what are social divisions visible at the school) and many others. We gravitated to the seating space under the lobby stairway as a possible site for our installation.

While spending time on the site, we examined the physical characteristics and discussed how this area was inhabited during a typical school day. Talk gravitated towards the childhood activity of fort-building. Students left with the assignment to interview siblings or family members about forts they had built.

We talked about many ideas that would and would not work in the space, including how we invite others to enter the space and what we ask them to do while they are present. We also talked about ways that efforts accumulate, such as in the growing piles of stones in a cairn, left one at a time, or the prayers in the Wailing Wall of Jerusalem, left in such numbers that no chinks are empty between the stones.

We will begin working with our hands on Thursday to see what we can discover in the properties of the materials we are considering.