Friday Focus - May 31

Great Things I've Noticed:
I have been in very few classrooms lately while completing summative evaluations, although I have really been enjoying this dedicated time to meet with each of you individually to reflect on the year and hear about the awesome student progress you are all seeing in end of year testing. Please make sure to take time to celebrate with your students on this amazing year you have had together!

"Nuts & Bolts" Notes:

• Do you want to use the Daily 5/CAFE Pensieve next year? If you do, please let me know HERE.
• There are quite a few books in the lounge to pass off into student hands. If you see any that you know your students may be interested please take them. Next week on Wednesday we will set out a table in the gathering area that you can send students to "book shop." If possible, please encourage children that you know don't have many books at home to "shop" for books. 
• A HUGE thank you to Mrs. Porter for allowing students to check-out library books over the summer if parents turn in the parent permission slips. Students will get to check these out next week. 
• Things to turn in to me by the end of next week: SAGE goals for K-3, reading benchmark data for K-5, any reading progress info that you would like to pass on to next year's teachers. Remember that some teachers use binders, folders or other methods, so as this comes to you next year, use what you find helpful and decide what you'd like to dispose of. 
• Student porftolio cards for next year's class lists will be put in your mailboxes.  You can hold on to these as long as you'd like (but they'll need to come out next May again) or you can give them back to me to keep safe until May. *I will ask Sarah and Marie help me remember where that safe place is this time. ;)

Reminders/Notes for Report Cards:

• Just a reminder that if a student misses a subject due to intervention, they should receive a "P" for pass (you must override to enter this) instead of the "*" symbol...if not, Mark will hunt you down for ;)  To do this right click in the final grade column and select "fill scores." in the box that will appear, check the "manual override" box, check and enter a P in the Grade box and hit "Ok."  Just a reminder to make sure you're saving as you type comments so you don't lose them and have to start over. 
• You will not have to make copies of report cards for the cumulative files...we will print a 2nd copy in the office and Sarah will be filing those.  
• There will be a yellow handout on summer reading tips/ideas in your mailboxes on Monday...please put this in the report card envelope. I'm hoping it might get noticed more being in the "official" envelope. 

Need some last minute ideas?

Classroom Book Awards

Chalk Talk - write a topic in the middle and have students comment around it. They cannot talk, only write! They go up twice. First they write something original, then they comment on it

Monday Musings - May 27

A great year is quickly coming to a close.  When we close our classroom doors on the 2012-2013 school year it will be a time to reflect, rejuvenate, and renew for the new school year. 

I hope each of you were able to gather feedback from our students with the added student surveys this year. Have the courage to listen and take to heart what they have to share. It isn't always easy to swallow the lumps dished our way, however, in order to grow and change we must listen because the students' perception is the students' reality. 

Just as you have all grown, this has been a year of growth for me as well.  I took feedback, both positive and negative, and used it to help me in my personal and professional growth. I spent a lot of time reflecting and reading about leadership and other education topics. I connected with other educators/administrators that I see as mentors and learned from their growth.  While I will still be in the building for most of the summer (for summer school), I am looking forward time to read, reflect and continue to grow before next year. 

While I have fun summer plans that include enjoying swimming and fishing with my family, I'm also looking forward to my summer reflection/learning plan.  My summer learning plan includes: attend two leadership conferences, attend the Regional Summer Teacher Academy, read several books (the top of the stack includes: Teach Like a Pirate, The Collaborative Administrator, Bringing out the Best in Teachers...don't worry, there's several books for pleasure reading on the stack too!) and follow the twitter hashtag chats to gain ideas to share for 1:1 iPads (if you want to check them out they are: #1to1techat and #ipaded).  As I find new ideas I plan to continue adding them to the "iPad Resources" page of this blog for you. Please let me know if you find a resource to share. 

What is your summer learning plan?

Friday Focus - May 24

Events Next Week:
Tuesday - Grade Level Meetings--creating class lists for next year
staff social lunch
Wednesday - Bike Safety Assembly with Officer Borchardt in the elementary gym at 2:00
Elementary staff meeting about 1:1 iPad initiative :)
Friday - Elementary Carnival 11:15-12:00 (3-5th grades), 12:00-12:45 (K-2nd grades) led by 7th grade students
Monday, June 3rd-grades due by 7:30 am

"Nuts & Bolts" Notes:
*Just a reminder to sign up for a summative evaluation meeting in the mailroom.
*Class lists meetings: please remember that the class lists that are created on Tuesday are tentative and should remain confidential.  Typically, few changes are made during the summer with new student registrations, but it is difficult when having to explain to a parent why a change was made if they find out the assigned teacher before Registration Day.

Blogs, Pins & Tweets...Oh My
*Great teacher blog post: Creating Great Summer Reading Plans
*Another idea to help students create their summer reading plans...have them create animoto book trailers like in this post.  If you need help...Sandy Porter is our Animoto expert!
*A great idea to think about for when you have all those iPads...using QR Codes, Padlet, and KWL. Click HERE for the teacher blog post on this.

Father's Day idea

End of year facebook memories on paper

Monday Musings - May 20

Celebrating Success

Grandparents/Students added Bucket Filler Drops to create flowers on our bulletin boards.

Friday was a wonderful day for Dodgeland.  Our Grandparents Day committee put in great effort to pull off another successful day with over 300 guests in attendance.  Each teacher worked with their students to prepare something to be shown during their classroom time, Mrs. Kopfer and Mrs. Battenberg prepared students to entertain musically, other teachers/support staff pulled together at the last minute to assist with lunch room clean-up/set-up for our guests, and Mr. Mane and Mr. Lange stood in the rain to direct parking. It truly takes our entire Dodgeland family (staff and students) to make such a day a memorable event.  I heard several positive comments from Grandparents throughout the afternoon and as they were leaving the building.  It is the days like Grandparents Day, days with our special traditions, that we get to celebrate as a Dodgeland Family and show community members and relatives how amazing our school is.  And by school, I do not mean the building itself; I mean the awesome staff and students!

Aside from our traditions that help create wonderful school memories in our students, I also enjoy the culture of success that we have created for our students.  Just last week I heard from several staff and students about progress being made in their reading and math this year.  The best part of the week for me was when a student came to my office and handed me a post-it note...

She couldn't wait to show me that she got a 405 on her SMI (she started the year at Emergent). Talk about growth!  

As we're trying to wind down the school year, I know that it is flying by fast with field trips and other special events.  Make sure to take time to reflect and celebrate with your students, because you have all worked so hard all year!

Friday Focus - May 17

Events Next Week:
Monday - Elementary Staff Meeting at 3:05 (agenda below in "Nuts & Bolts")
Tuesday - Title 1 Family Night
Wednesday - 4th Grade Field Trip
Friday - 1st and 5th Grade Field Trips (I will be out of the building on the 5th grade field trip)
3 Day Weekend!!! :) :)

"Nuts & Bolts" Notes:
*Staff meeting agenda - some end of year notes, information on summative evaluation meetings (the final piece of the Teacher Effectiveness Project), discussion/brainstorming on Themes for next year, and end of year reflection.
*We are beginning to recruit teachers to lead XPD sessions for next year. Our goal is to have these scheduled to start early in the fall so they will spread out more next year. Please let me know if you have a topic you would like to lead...you all have many talents/ideas to share with the rest of us.

Blogs, Pins & Tweets...Oh My!!! (all with end of year/Reflection theme for students and teachers)
*Jay Posick ‏@posickj

15 May

If you don't reflect on what you do, how can you get any better? #educoach

*KathyPerret ‏@KathyPerret  Reflection is really about looking in the mirror (rather than out the window), Isn't it? #educoach

*Fran McVeigh ‏@franmcveigh

15 May

 I love writing portfolios and an "I used to . . . but now I . . .reflection process for student authors! 

*Mirror Mirror on the Wall
*Great blog post on student behaviors at the end of the year: Remember Them

Teachers Pay Teachers Freebie

Create a writing assignment where students reflect on an experience where they have initially failed at something but eventually succeeded.

Monday Musings - May 13

Survive or Thrive?

Benchmark--check. SMI--check. SRI--check.  6 Traits--check. It's the time of year that we are already  checking our students' progress on end of the year assessments (or almost have), now what?  At this time of the year it is common to say we’re just “trying to survive,” but I challenge you with the question...is it possible to thrive until the last day of the school year?

You have all worked exceptionally hard this year and I recognize that it is no small task to maintain the same enthusiasm that you had on September 1st until June 6.  We have had many celebrations this year watching our students grow (while we’ve been growing professionally), yet I’m sure you can also each identify disappointments or set-backs that can wear you down.  In addition, I’m sure your end of year to-do lists are just as long as mine.  It is easy to just count this year as done and start making grand plans for next year; however, we still have 4 weeks to continue making progress with our students.  I know I’ve said it before, but can’t emphasize it enough---the more you stray from your routine/expectations with students or count down the days, the more they will too. 

So, as we make this final stretch of the school year, I challenge you to not just focus on getting things done.  Instead, enjoy the final stretch with your students as you prepare them for the next grade level. Focus on celebrating the successes of the year with them and with each other as colleagues.  

Friday Focus - May 10

Great Things I Noticed This Week:

• Wonderful music concert last night...our 1/3/5th graders did a great job singing and speaking parts about having good character and our 5th grade band blew us away! Kudos to Mrs. Kopfer and Mrs. Battenberg. :)
• Hands-on learning in science creating circuits to light up a light bulb. 
• Students reading to each other in partners and then working together to create a compare/contrast Venn Diagram. 
• A teacher having 1:1 goals conversations with students to review their academic/behavior goals they made at the start of the quarter to check in with them on their progress and make plans for the last month of school.
• Sense of urgency for learning during 1st grade snack...while eating their snack students watched a reading strategy video clip from "Into the Book."

Events next Week:

Today: Treats in the lounge (I promise this time...I said they'd be there everyday, but got busy with meetings yesterday and completely forgot!)

Tuesday: Grade Level Meetings (see details below)

Wednesday: Olympic Day in the afternoon (Mrs. Garland emailed the details a while ago)

Friday: Grandparents Day...please leave your jeans at home this day and dress professional for all of the guests in our building. You can swap your casual clothes for Wednesday's Olympic Day fun.  Thank you :)

"Nuts & Bolts" Notes

• With many field trips this month, please remember to check with Nurse Miller on students needing medications.  Some medications do require extra training from her. 
• Next Tuesday's grade level meetings will be open for your grade level planning. You had time for cross-grade level meetings on our PD day, now I'm sure you'll still need time to collaborate together on plans for the last stretch of the year...what CAFE strategies to focus on, what writing pieces are you working on, what are you doing with math?  I will not be in the meetings this time, but I know you will do a great job of keeping the discussions focused on literacy/math.
• CLASS LISTS FOR NEXT YEAR: We will be using our grade level meetings on May 28th to work on class lists for next year.  Before this meeting you will need to pull out your student profile cards and either add notes to it or get blank ones from the mail room (blue for boys, orange for girls) to staple on top with additional information.  I am putting a sheet in everyone's mailbox: "Information for Student Profile Cards." Please let me know if you have any questions. 

Blogs, Pins & Tweets...Oh my!

*Christopher Lehman ‏@iChrisLehman (Co-Author of Pathways to the Common Core)7 May

"Teaching writing can just be teaching writing or it can be giving voice, power, belief to kids and teens." #edchat

*Great blog post on Historical fiction Book clubs HERE

*

Lesson idea to "erase meanness" HERE

Happy Teacher Appreciation Week!

Happy Teacher Appreciation Week! The entire week is about celebrating ALL OF YOU who influence the lives of our students. I certainly appreciate all the little things you do, but what I appreciate the most is the safe, nurturing learning environments you create for our children. Our Dodgeland students LOVE coming to school each and every day.

I've previously written about how important it is to build and foster relationships throughout the school year with our students in order for meaningful learning to occur. I encourage you to take some time & watch the TED Talk Video below. Rita Pierson, an educator, speaks about the value of relationships & “how every child deserves a champion–an adult who will never give up on them, who understands the power of connection & insists that they become the best that they can possibly be!”

I hope you know how much I enjoy working with each of you and how proud I am to be a member of the Dodgeland family.  Thank you for all that you do here at Dodgeland. You are changing lives!

Friday Focus -May 3

Great Things I Noticed This Week:
*Students already creating with some of the new iPad apps we learned last week...Toontastic and Book Creator. I can't wait to see the end results!
*For a reading mini-lesson the teacher used a paragraph from a novel that a few students had read. They were able to practice applying the mini-lesson reading skill as a class, but the teacher also took a moment to "advertise" that book in their classroom library (the few that read it got excited and helped "sell" it) while just reading a paragraph together as a class.
*I joined in on a hallway book discussion on a book series and when the students learned I had only read book 1, one of them brought me his copy of book 2 the following day to borrow...I love how big our reading community has become!

Events Next Week:
Today - Yes, it's already mid-quarter! Send home progress reports.
Monday - Mentors/Probationary Teachers meeting 3:05 in the IMC
Thursday - Spring Concert (1, 3, and 5th grades) at 6:30 pm

"Nuts & Bolts" Notes:
* Please make sure to be out on time for your recess duty. My best tip is to let your students know it's your day for duty and they won't let you forget! With "spring fever" spreading, this is when our students need us to be active with our supervision out there. As I've said before...Move, Scan, Interact.

Blogs, Pins & Tweets...Oh My!
*Todd ‏@ToddWhitaker

1h

The secret to making sure students don't act like the school year is over is to make sure teachers don't act like the school year is over.

*Here's a new teacher blog I'm stalking for awesome 1:1 iPad ideas: http://www.mrswideen.com/
*A blog post on the power of Shared Reading
*A great list of favorite picture books for Shared Reading

Summer bucket list, description Here