Nov. 27th

Nov. 27th 

Giving Thanks 

I hope everyone had a restful and thankful Thanksgiving break. Me and my wife Hope, spent the majority of the week traveling and visiting family in Arkansas. We enjoyed catching up with family, eating a lot, belly laughing, and eating some more. The only down fall of this break is my Arkansas Razorbacks lost to the Missouri Tigers on Friday. I am fully aware that for most of you, Missouri winning was a good thing. Despite that, Thanksgiving break was great but I look forward to seeing everyone of you and our students on Monday. 

Instructional 

PLT Team Meetings:

We are moving from Question 1 to Question 2 of the PLC Questions. 

1. What do we want our kids to learn? (Essential Standards, Guaranteed and Viable Curriculum)  

2. How do we know they learned it? ( Data, Common Formative Assessments, Formatives, Summative) 

3. What do we do when they don’t?  (Interventions-Tier 2 and Tier 3) 

4. What do we do when they do? (Extensions and Enrichments) 

This week's instructional focus will be on learning objectives and how are we chunking our students learning to maximizes mastery of standards. We are also looking for positive reinforcement of learning. 

Objectives should be posted somewhere permanently in the room and those objectives should be referred to often to maximize student learning.  

Staff Meeting Slides - Oct.  HERE 

                                       Nov. PBIS SLIDES 

Team meeting with Rachel Bodoin

Meetings with Rachel will resume this week.

MOY Galileo 

The MOY Galileo benchmark assessment window is open from Nov 28th  through Dec 16th.   Middle school teachers will be giving the ELA portion of the assessment on Wednesday, November 30th and the Math portion of the assessment on Thursday, December 1st.  This allows for students who may have missed any or both days of the assessment their first make up opportunity is on Friday, December 2nd. Please reference an email from Megan Lannholm for more information. 

Building D/F Building Expectation 

• Progress Reports will run on Thursday Dec. 1st. If a student is failing your class with a D or F, you should make contact home with the parents via phone call first. Email should be a secondary method. This is a great opportunity to make a personal connection and get them set up with Home Access Center so they can monitor grades regularly.  

HERE is a link about the importance of making parent phone calls as well as a template of how to do that.

ELD Grading 

If you have an English Learner (EL) student who is at risk of receiving a D/F by mid-quarter (November 18th), reach out to our ELD Specialist, Hannah Swearengin, so she can collaborate with you about grading guidance.  As a reminder, per federal law, it is required that teachers of EL students provide accommodations and modifications to enable students to succeed in the classroom. Documentation of accommodations/modifications is recommended. The ELD department has created a form that will guide these conversations and provide a way for you to document the evidence of accommodations and modifications. 

 

We want to make sure we provide support for you and your students prior to semester grading.

Operational 

Alice Training and Mental Health will take place Dec. 1st 4:30-6:30 right after school in the cafeteria. 

For those you can not make our Alice or Mental Health here are some other options. At this time we are the only Tier 3 School having this training until the end of the year. 

Remind 101- Please take a moment to look at the graphic below and sign up for Pershing Remind. This is the platform we are going to use to get out quick information to staff. All you have to do is send the message below to the number below. 

PTSA Homeroom Challenge: 5 Star 

Room Temperatures 

If your room is super hot or really cold please let Ms. Amy know so she can put in a work order. We want both you and students to be comfortable. Also, do not alter or place bags, lamps or any other object around/on the thermostat.

Copy Machines 

After months of waiting, the copiers have finally been moved into the halls for teacher convenience. Below are the names of the printers for teachers to connect.

 

8^th grade hall: per-work-tosh2

7^th grade hall: per-work-tosh

Workroom: per-work-tosh1

Events 

        Nov 21-25- Thanksgiving Break

        Nov 30 and Dec 1 - MOY Galileo

        Dec 1- Alice and Mental Health training (4:30-6:30pm)

        Dec 9- Picture Re-takes

        Dec 15- Elementary Winter Concert

        Dec 16- Dr. Lathan Pershing Visit

        Dec 19 - Pershing Choir Concert (Glendale)

        Dec 20- Staff Meeting (7:50-8:50)

                       Band Concert 6th Grade 6pm

                                              7th & 8th: 7:15 pm

        Dec 23-Jan 4 Winter Break Begins

        Jan 3- End of Quarter (Teacher Workday)

        Jan 4- Students Return

Staff Birthdays  

11/1 Megan Ebert 

11/18 Kevin Kleiner 

11/28 Lindsey Mitchell 

        12/1 Susan Griffith

        12/9 Beth Hailey and Krysten Muench

        12/18 Kathy Null

        12/25 Jennifer Teal and Matt Campbell