On a winter Monday morning at Audubon High School in Milwaukee, three ninth-graders huddled and fussed over an egg named Billy Bob.
Amber Sengsourisack used a marker to draw the egg’s anxious facial expression. Her childhood friend, Sophia Duong, and a new friend, Nathaly Alvarado, scrunched scraps of paper and cotton balls into a plastic cup, which would be the egg’s nest for a 3-foot drop.
Billy Bob cracked on the first drop. The students memorialized him: “R.I.P. Billy Bob. A very chill cowboy and princess.”
The egg drop wasn’t for science, but for something that can be a greater achievement in a high school classroom: building relationships, and ultimately a sense of safety.
In a class called “Restorative Practices,” the activity came minutes after the students were asked to write in a journal about what makes relationships healthy or unhealthy, and just before they watched a video about the process of forgiveness.