Wren’s Nest Construction Company and Brown Middle School Outreach

We’ve got two new programming ideas we’re considering, and we need your help! Please let us know what you think. Ready?

1. The Wren’s Nest Construction Company

Our successes with wren’s nests, both long ago and recently, may lead you to believe that we are experts at building birdhouses. You would be wrong–but we’re working on it.

Here’s our first programming idea, in list form:

1. Kids come to the Wren’s Nest.
2. We teach them how to build functioning birdhouses that look exactly like our mailbox, the original Wren’s Nest.
3. We also teach them about the subtle architectural differences between the Wren’s Nest (Queen Anne Victorian home of Joel Chandler Harris) and their own wren’s nests (home of birds).
4. They construct said birdhouses.
5. We help them place it along the Beltline Arboretum, while discussing both the nesting habits of birds as well as the historic evolution of West End.
6. They periodically check up on their nest, and the progress of the birds that have nested there with the help of, say, someone like the Atlanta Audubon Society.
7. We call it something cute, like The Wren’s Nest Construction Company.

Fledgling, you say? Well that’s why we’re looking to you for suggestions!

Is this a good idea that promotes hands-on education of the Wren’s Nest through architecture, preservation, and Atlanta history? Or is it a bad idea?

2. Brown Middle School Educational Outreach

We’ve been given permission to start an after-school program at Brown Middle School, approximately three blocks from here. Here’s our idea, again in list form:

1. Go to Brown Middle School.
2. Have our storytellers teach a weekly class on storytelling to 6th graders.
3. Have our staff teach a weekly class on newspaper publishing to 7th graders.
4. Have our staff teach a weekly class on blogging to 8th graders.
5. We call it something cute, unlike Brown Middle School Outreach.

All of these would be very hands on with the students, a la the Wren’s Nest Publishing Company.

Too ambitious, you say? What if we had a three year roll-out? So we’d start with storytelling in year one, then add newspaper in year two, and finally add blogging in year three.

We’re assuming that newspapers will still exist in two years. While that may not be a safe bet exactly, I’m willing to go out on a limb.

Now: if you’ve read this far, you probably thinking along these line: (1) these ideas are terrible; (2) these ideas are the best thing I’ve ever heard; (3) these ideas need some work, and here’s how.

Please, enlighten us, and don’t be afraid to hurt our feelings!