Haiku Nook Continues to Provide Students a Space for Creativity and Expression
Haiku Nook Continues to Provide Students a Space for Creativity and Expression
If you are roaming the halls of the D. Diane Anderson Humanities Building, chances are you will happen upon a wall filled with framed haiku and sticky notes. The sticky notes are a true installment of student expression that include haiku about heartbreak, a typical school day or the perfect sunsets.
When English teacher Arlie Parker first interviewed for a teaching position at Sage Hill, he remembers talking about a great wall of haiku that his students crafted at his previous school. He wondered then if his interviewers would think that project was too “off the wall.”
Now, more than 20 years later, the Arlie Parker Haiku Nook was created and dedicated in Parker’s honor, thanks to the generous philanthropy of the Lowe family: Trustee Rick Lowe, wife Shannon, and daughters Julia (‘17), Olivia (‘19) and Sofia (‘21).
This cozy space has become a place of reflection, warmth and solace as students take time to write their thoughts and feelings and paste them to the wall in between and up above the Haiku Nook frames.
Parker recalls starting to write haiku when he was in high school and whole-heartedly believes that you can learn everything you need to know about writing from writing haiku, but he could never have imagined the true impact that it has had on his students.
“I teach these kids and to my never-ending surprise they remember years later these haiku that they’ve written and so do I!” he said. “I enjoy being able to reconnect with students over their writing.”
Parker now often starts his mornings by opening up the email account that is dedicated to the Haiku Nook as he fields a slew of haiku that have been written by students in hopes that their words will find themselves framed on the wall.
Sage Hill School
Sage Hill School admits students of any race, color, national and ethnic origin to all the rights, privileges, programs and activities generally accorded or made available to students at the School. The School does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national and ethnic origin in administration of its educational policies, admissions policies, scholarship programs, and athletic and other School administered programs.