Sask. teachers' summer project hoping to capture how youth are perceiving the pandemic

A project run by two Saskatchewan teachers is hoping to help kids express themselves and catalogue how youth are viewing the pandemic.

Danyelle Armbruster had been planning a students' camp for years. Armbruster has taught arts education and directed musicals in the White City area for about 10 years. 

She paired with Katlyn Redding, the musical director, choir and band teacher at Greenall High School in Balgonie, to create a program to help transition students from Grade 8 to Grade 9. 

The plan had to be put on hold when schools closed due to COVID-19 concerns. Then a different issue came up. 

"Teachers are all doing the online learning and just hearing from kids that they're just [having] so many emotions about what's going on right now and not really sure what to do about that," Armbruster said. 

The truly eye opening moment for Armbruster came when she was out for a walk with her two-year-old son. Armbruster said she saw a park with police safety tape around the swings and slide.

She thought of it as a sad place, but her son was different. 

"He just waves at it and says 'Hi swing,' 'Hi Slide,'" she said.

Armbruster realized that youths' experiences of the pandemic may be quite different than her own.

"How do the children who are going to be our future leaders, how do they remember this story?" Armbruster said. "So I went home and I talked to Caitlin and I said I think we need to figure out a way to do this now because this is the story that needs to be told."

The two teachers adapted their camp and created Curtain-19. 

The summer project is meant for kids going into Grades 6 to 12. Participants will meet weekly on Saturdays and have a topic about the time we're living in. They can respond to that topic with poetry, photography, drawings, monologues or scenes.

"It's that creative expression," she said. "We're just trying to give them a place to put some of those emotions — just a chance to see that you're not alone and nothing's wrong with you for feeling the way that you're feeling."

For youth to see that someone their age is feeling the same things and seeing the same things … that's really powerful for them to know that they're not alone.- Danyelle Armbruster

Armbruster said she hopes to eventually put all the works into one collection that tells the story of how the youth are experiencing this time. 

Registration will be ongoing so people can join at any time, she said. The meetings will start on July 18. Armbruster said the meetings will be broken down by age groups to limit the amount of kids on one call. She said she hopes it brings them together. 

"We keep saying 'We're all in this together,' but we really are. And so I think for youth to see that someone their age is feeling the same things and seeing the same things … that's really powerful for them to know that they're not alone," Armbruster said. 

Both Armbruster and Redding are based out of the Prairie Valley System, but students from around the province are welcome. Part of each registration fee is being donated to REACH — an organization that works to provide food to underprivileged areas. People can register at curtain19.com.