Hindman Settlement School is pleased to announce it has received approval of a $40,000 grant from the Berea College Appalachian Fund for its 2010 Summer Tutoring Program for children with learning differences. The funds will provide scholarship assistance for children whose families are unable to cover the full cost of tuition.

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| Folk Arts Education Program Director, Randy Wilson, hauls instruments and recording gear for a class at Carr Creek Elementary. Visit “Photo Galleries” for more photos. |
During the 2007 and 2008 school years, Hindman Settlement School’s Folk Arts Education Program provided dance, theater and music instruction to 5th and 8th graders at five Knott County elementary schools (Emmalena, Jones Fork, Carr Creek, Hindman and Beaver) and to all grades at the Settlement’s full-time school, as part of each school’s Arts & Humanities curriculum.
According to the Kentucky Department of Education’s CATS test in Arts & Humanities from 2006-2008, the average score for 5th grade improved by 54.3% and the average for the 8th grade improved by 8.3%. CATS stands for the Commonwealth Accountability Testing System which is the standards-based test given to all Kentucky school children. Scores for 8th graders at Hindman Elementary were not improved. With Hindman excluded, the improvement for 8th graders averaged 16.36% (comparing 2006 to 2008 results.)
“The CATS scores are a validation that the Settlement’s Folk Arts Education Program has had an impact on student learning,” noted Settlement School Executive Director, Mike Mullins.
Lessons included introduction of the dulcimer and recorder for all the grades and teaching rudimentary skills in sight-reading musical notation. Everybody learned a tune or two on these instruments. Students also wrote and performed brief radio skits and stories based on their own experiences. Much of the students’ work has aired on WMMT’s Kids Radio, which is broadcast every Tuesday evening and Sunday morning.
The Settlement School’s folk artist continues to work with students this year, but because testing no longer focuses on 5th and 8th grades, he is working with additional classes. “I get 30 minutes to an hour a week with each class, so the lessons serve only to reinforce what they are learning. It is really up to the classroom teacher to use these lessons as a springboard to the broader curriculum,” commented Folk Arts Education Program Director, Randy Wilson.
“Teachers have told me this work serves the larger purpose of creating excitement, enhancing student creativity and providing hands-on-learning opportunities. These are the kinds of rewards that make students want to come to school and learn,” Wilson noted.
Fast-forward 20 years . . . During the Settlement School’s 32nd annual Appalachian Family Folk Week, another young musician benefitted from Drury’s skill and generosity. Gabe Dansereau, who is the son of Randy Wilson and Suzanne Dansereau, was presented with the 137th violin crafted by Gene Drury.
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| Alae Risse Leitch Photo by Lynn Wright |
The endowed fund was established to honor and celebrate Alae Risse Leitch, who has been an active member of DAR for 41 years. Mrs. Leitch served as Joseph Habersham Chapter Regent from 1972-1974 and is an Honorary Chapter Regent for life. She served as Georgia’s state Regent from 1986-1988 and is an Honorary State Regent for life.
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| Raffle winner, Brooke Calton Mulhollem, with Diane Gilliam |
Editor’s Note: This year marked the 32nd year for the Appalachian Writers Workshop, a weeklong workshop held each summer at the Settlement School. We asked Maurice Manning, a member of the workshop staff this year, to describe what it is like to take part in the workshop.
Hindman Settlement School has been in the communications business for many years, publishing its first student newspaper, The Mountain Echo, in 1925. In September the Settlement will be launching its first e-news broadcast. The goal is to provide more timely news of Settlement School programs and events to those who use the Internet.
"Several people have asked to be added to our e-mail list because that is their preferred method for getting news," says Jeanne Marie Hibberd, the Settlement's development and communications director. "With the redesign of our web site, we now have the ability to post information quickly. It just makes sense to use e-mail to keep people connected," Hibberd noted.
The Settlement contracted with Flying High Design, Marketing & Creative Resources to assist with the web site redesign. In addition to ease of management, the new site allows staff to post photo galleries, share audio and video files, and offer online registration for events. Flying High donated design services to enable the e-news broadcast.
While the Settlement will still be publishing a paper edition of its newsletter twice a year, the e-news broadcast will offer shorter and more timely news. The hope is this will reduce the number of newsletters mailed each year, saving paper, printing costs and postage.
Sign-up for the e-news broadcast is easy and you can unsubscribe if you change your mind. The Settlement School's privacy policy spells out the details, but basically the school will not sell or share your e-mail address with others.
Hindman, KY—Knott County Superintendent Kim King knows that helping young children achieve proficiency in reading is key to unlocking their educational potential. Hindman Settlement School has been helping children learn to read since it was established in 1902. For the past 28 years, it has specialized in teaching reading to children who learn differently.
The reading labs will employ a multi-sensory teaching approach, which has proven highly effective at the Settlement’s James Still Learning Center. Multi-sensory learning techniques require the simultaneous use of four learning senses: visual, auditory, tactile (touch) and kinesthetic (muscle movement).
For the child with learning differences, the emphasis on systematic development of reading skills has shown early and lasting success. These techniques concentrate on the process of learning and allow the student to use his/her strengths to achieve success and maintain motivation.
Teachers from the Settlement School and public school staff who are specially trained will work closely with students until they master reading skills. This instruction is in addition to the students’ regular classroom instruction.
Individual needs and learning styles will determine each student’s schedule and placement in a reading lab. Placement and schedule decisions will, in turn, determine the intensity and duration of the program for each student.
“We know that early identification, coupled with comprehensive early reading interventions, can reduce the percentage of children reading below the basic level in fourth grade from the current national average of 38% to less than 6%,” says Superintendent King.
“Through Hindman Settlement School’s emphasis on structured and systematic development of reading skill, students have experienced both success and lasting results. We are pleased to offer the same opportunity to students in the Knott County School District,” King said.
“It was a very difficult decision to discontinue our full-time school, but this partnership provides us with an opportunity to do what we do best—teach children to read—and reach between 100-150 students,” Mullins said.
In recent years, it has been a challenge getting students to enroll in the full-time school, Mullins noted. “This partnership allows us to go where the students are instead of them coming to us.” The new program is currently serving 138 students.
Knott County schools and Hindman Settlement School are providing funding for the pilot program. Mullins says the goal is to expand to other schools as resources become available.
Hindman Settlement School has provided educational outreach activities to public schools and surrounding communities for more than 100 years. This new initiative is another example of the Settlement School’s strategy of adapting its services to meet the changing needs of the community and region it serves.
Lexington Herald-Leader
Tom Eblen - Herald-Leader columnist
Ask participants at the 32nd Appalachian Writers Workshop what it's like, and they use the word "family" a lot. They come for inspiration and advice on the craft from some of the best writers these mountains have produced.
The workshop was started by two Knott County writers, novelist and folklorist James Still, and poet Albert Stewart. Others associated with the annual gathering have included poet Jim Wayne Miller and novelists Wilma Dykeman and Harriette Arnow, author of the 1954 classic The Dollmaker.
"It's a central part of my year that I never want to miss," said novelist Silas House, who was a participant from 1996 to 2001 and has been on staff ever since.
Participants apply and submit writing samples in May. There are always more applicants than spaces; the 102-year-old Hindman Settlement School's cabins can hold only so many people.
Each morning, participants gather in small groups according to interest: poetry, novels, short stories, non-fiction, memoir and children's literature.
When I visited the workshop Tuesday, poet and writer George Ella Lyon was in one room talking about the challenges of publishing books for children. In another room, novelist Karen McElmurray discussed using memoir to explore universal themes. In another, novelists Ann Pancake and Laura Benedict explained storytelling techniques.
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| Karen McElmurray signs a book |
Afternoons are for group readings and individual coaching from the staff of published writers. Everyone eats together, then washes dishes. There's writing time throughout the day, and bull sessions late into the night.
"It's an intense week," said journalist Jason Howard, who is here for a fifth year. "There's a great sense of family, and a lot of spiritual detective work going on."
Mike Mullins helped start the workshop in 1978, soon after he became director of the historic settlement school that now provides literacy and cultural enrichment programs. He marvels at the workshop's success.
"I think there's always a crying need for all of us to express ourselves, to tell our story or a story we've made up," said Mullins.
A few of this year's participants are college students, but most are much older — academics and blue-collar workers, business people, housewives and retirees. Some are beginners; others have published several books.
Mountain life has always been a popular subject in Appalachian literature. But many now write about the mountains themselves and what has been happening to them over the past half-century. Hundreds of thousands of acres have been leveled by mountaintop-removal coal mining or scarred by strip-miners.
"What we do to the land, we do to the people," said Don Askins of Clintwood, Va., whose poetry focuses on the coal industry's environmental destruction.
House and Howard, who both come from coal-mining families, recently wrote the book Something's Rising about opposition to mountaintop removal within the region. Howard also edited a collection of essays, poems and songs called We All Live Downstream.
Many writers here are women who have raised families or had careers. "They come with this full lifetime of experience and a passion to write about it," McElmurray said.
Benedict first came to the workshop 20 years ago. "I had only been writing for a year or so, and I was looking for a cheap vacation," she said.
What she found was a calling — and a husband, Pinckney Benedict, who was on the workshop staff. "We didn't start dating until after the conference, but I gather we scandalized a few people," she said with a smile.
The Benedicts were back this week as staff members. He is a novelist and short-story writer who teaches at the University of Southern Illinois and at writing workshops across the country. She recently published her second novel.
"There's a sense of community, a spirit of cooperation here," she said. "They read a lot, and they all take their work very seriously."
But unlike some other workshops, Benedict and McElmurray said, the writers here don't take themselves too seriously. There's no "staff table" at meals, no caste system based on publishing success.
But Benedict has discovered one advantage to being on staff: "I don't have to do dishes."
Reach Tom Eblen at (859) 231-1415 or 1-800-950-6397, Ext. 1415, or at teblen@herald-leader.com. Read and comment on his blog, The Bluegrass & Beyond, at Kentucky.com.
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