{"monthlySchoolDonationEnabled":true,"callToActionDisplayName":"Worthington Hooker Middle School (3-8)","outOfStateSupporters":31.8,"allowSchoolLevelGiving":true,"hasFundedProjects":true,"projectGratitudeData":[{"teacherId":566706,"projectId":10492662,"letterContent":"Thank you so much for your generous support in bringing a kneeling chair into our fourth-grade classroom. Your donation has given my students something much more meaningful than simply another place to sit. You have helped us create a classroom where students can recognize what their bodies need in order to learn and have appropriate choices to help them feel comfortable, focused, and ready to participate.\r\n\r\nEvery child enters the classroom with different needs. Some students are comfortable sitting in a traditional classroom chair for long periods of time, while others learn better when they are able to change their position, move their bodies, or use alternative seating. A kneeling chair gives students another option without requiring them to leave the learning environment. They can still participate in lessons, conversations, independent work, and classroom activities while sitting in a position that may work better for their bodies.\r\n\r\nIn our classroom, we talk a lot about understanding ourselves as learners. I want my students to begin recognizing the difference between something they simply want and something that actually helps them learn. Alternative seating provides a very concrete opportunity to practice that skill. Students can ask themselves: Am I able to concentrate here? Does this position help my body feel settled? Am I getting my work done? Would another seating choice help me be more successful?\r\n\r\nThose are small questions, but learning to answer them builds independence and self-awareness.\r\n\r\nThe kneeling chair also contributes to my larger goal of creating a classroom that is responsive to the children who are actually sitting in it. A classroom does not need to look exactly the same for every student in order to be fair. Sometimes providing different options is what allows more children to access the same learning, participate fully, and feel that they belong.\r\n\r\nMy students were immediately interested in the kneeling chair, and it has become a welcome addition to our classroom environment. Beyond its practical use, there is also something meaningful about students seeing that people outside our classroom chose to invest in them. Your donation communicates that their comfort, learning, and success matter to people they may never even meet.\r\n\r\nAs a public-school teacher, I am continually trying to build a classroom that gives children the materials, experiences, and environment they deserve. I cannot always do that with the resources available through our school alone. Donors make it possible to add thoughtful tools like this one and to turn ideas about creating a more flexible and inclusive classroom into something tangible that students can actually use.\r\n\r\nThank you for helping me give my students another way to find the position in which they can do their best thinking and learning. I am grateful that you chose to support our classroom and, most importantly, the children who fill it every day.","fullyFundedDate":1786907219307,"projectUrl":"project/kneeling-chair/10492662/","projectTitle":"Kneeling Chair","teacherDisplayName":"Ms. Light","teacherPhotoUrl":"https://storage.donorschoose.net/dc_prod/images/teacher/profile/272x272/tp566706_272x272.jpg?width=272&height=272&fit=bounds&auto=webp&t=1458303112451","teacherClassroomUrl":"classroom/jessica-light"},{"teacherId":7653167,"projectId":8895171,"letterContent":"The New Haven students are so beyond appreciative to have the opportunity to enter an art studio and create art with actual art supplies. To have cabinets with glue, paint, pencils, erasers, markers, and more has been a magical experience. My students and I are so grateful for donors choose especially the match donors!!! Year after year to be supported by donors choose when New Haven public schools has not supplied anything to schools, appreciative does not describe the level of glee we all have! Thank you !!","fullyFundedDate":1731965669730,"projectUrl":"project/hands-on-art-steam/8895171/","projectTitle":"Hands on Art/ S.T.E.A.M","teacherDisplayName":"Ms. Steff Smelser","teacherPhotoUrl":"https://storage.donorschoose.net/dc_prod/images/teacher/profile/orig/tp7653167_orig.jpg?crop=1:1,smart&width=272&height=272&fit=bounds&auto=webp&t=1758053183447","teacherClassroomUrl":"classroom/7653167"}],"pageName":"schoolpage_94384","usesDonorsChoose":true,"infoPageType":"school","demographicsInfo":{"numStudents":200,"numTeachers":null,"percentFrplEligible":73,"percentAsian":4,"percentBlack":27,"percentWhite":9,"percentIndigenous":0,"percentLatinx":47,"showFreeAndReducedPriceLunchInfo":true,"showDemographicsInfo":true,"sourceTooltipString":"the National Center for Education Statistics","percentHawaiianImputed":0,"percentMultiracialImputed":3,"gradesServed":"Not specified","studentTeacherRatio":null,"demographicsDataSource":"MDR District Record","equityFocus":true,"titleOne":false,"metroType":"URBAN","ncesMetroType":null},"inStateSupporters":68.2,"schoolId":94384,"financialInfo":null,"twitterShareText":"Learn more about Worthington Hooker Middle School (3-8) on @DonorsChoose:","schoolName":"Worthington Hooker Middle School (3-8)","canonicalPageUrl":"schools/connecticut/new-haven-public-schools/worthington-hooker-ms/94384"}