Every once in a while we run across a program concept which stands out as really unique. While we were in China with a group of students in March, we ended up on a visit to a classical Chinese Garden. While there, one of boys remarked “Look at all of the Bonsai Trees.” Not thinking much about it I commented, “Yes”, at which point he went on to say that he had a tree like this since he was a young child, and indeed had one in his dorm room at Valley View.
I sort of filed this away in the back of my mind, and when we returned home after the vacation I got the bright idea of taking him and another student to visit a nearby Bonsai Nursery in Massachusetts where both boys ended up buying (with some subsidy) a small tree.
I thought that this might be the end of it, but to my astonishment other boys proclaimed that they also wanted some kind of Bonsai tree. I felt “Why not?” and thus the Valley View School Bonsai Project was hatched.
At this point (August 2011) no less than twelve boys have a tree of their own to nurture. Gerry Theroux has volunteered to be the Valley View Bonsai mentor, has studied about Bonsai growing techniques, and meets weekly with each of the two groups of boys around the trimming and care of these plants, complete with the sound of soft, New Age Music playing from a boom box.
Where is this going to end up? Who knows? But with the extreme care these trees seem to be getting, assuming they all continue to survive, we may have just stumbled onto something.
One could write an erudite clinical paper about the significance of caring, nurturing, and indeed being a part of shaping and identifying with the growth of a living organism. Or, it may be that this sort of thing is just fun for our youngsters and is by the way, a lot less expensive than equine therapy.
Phil Spiva