CANNON LEGACY
A Newsletter For Cannon Staff 2017-2018
Principal Points - 4/2-4/6
As you know, school safety/security has been a big topic in the news recently, both nationally and locally. Within the last few weeks, Dr. Ryan has sent out open letters to our GCISD community about district safety practices and incidents that have occurred within the district. Also, several of our GCISD school administrators have had to share specific communication with their school families about isolated incidents at their own campuses. I can't remember a time in my 21 years of employment in GCISD, in which reports to parents about school safety have been this prevalent.
In response to this heightened need to focus on school safety/security, we will be reviewing and assessing the effectiveness of our own campus safety protocols and procedures and we need your help! It is critically important that if emergencies do happen, we are well-prepared, know how to respond appropriately and are able to recover as quickly and effectively as possible.
LOCKED DOORS All classroom door handles should be in the locked position and closed at all times. Don't forget to use the small magnet to allow students to be able to enter the classrooms easily. These magnets allow staff to quickly secure a room if needed!
SAFETY DRILLS - Safety drills are supposed to be a means of practice for students and staff in case of a real emergency ever occurs. Effective immediately, safety drills will no longer be announced in advance. Additionally, we will be altering the times of some of our drills to occur at "inconvenient" times of the school day, in order to allow staff and students the opportunity to practice how to respond when they are in locations other then their classrooms. These may occur during lunch, recesses, arrival/dismissal, etc... Please review all safety drill information with your scholars this week and discuss how they will respond if drills occur in a variety of locations, as well as secondary routes, if primary routes are blocked.
DON'T QUESTION IF IT'S REAL - Please get in the habit of treating all drills/alarms as if they are "real". In the recent Parkland school shooting, it was reported that many staff and students did not treat the warning/signals they received as "real", since they had just recently completed a drill earlier the same day. If alarms or safety warnings are issued, don't question them, just follow the safety protocols we have in place. Period.
DEBRIEF WITH STUDENTS After we have drills, it is critically important that teachers take the time to debrief with students. Discuss WHY the drill was practiced and observations made about how students responded. Ask students to share what they noticed and how they can improve in the next effort. Extend the discussion to ask them what they would have done differently if they had been at lunch, in the library, at recess, etc... at the time of the drill. If we don't take the time to talk about the importance of these efforts, many of our students may not fully understand or take seriously what they would need to do in a real emergency.
HEAR SOMETHING? SEE SOMETHING? SAY SOMETHING! Adhering to this mantra is truly the only way we can make an impactful difference on our response to threats. It is the collective responsibility of students, staff, parents, and other campus/district stakeholders to respond and report if a threat is made or heard. Thanks to student efforts to report about threats they have heard or seen posted on social media, the recent incidents in our own school district were managed swiftly and effectively! Help our scholars understand they are part of the solution AND that all threats will be treated seriously.
Thank you for helping us "reset" and prepare for how we will respond in all safety situations - drill OR real! We will be hosting an information meeting with parents about campus safety/security, along with GCISD Director of Security, Allen Smith, on 4/12. See information below.
Proud to be your principal,
Tona :)
Safety & Security Parent Meeting
Cannon will host an informal parent meeting to provide information, answer questions, and explain the safety and security measures we currently have in place. The meeting will be held on Thursday, April 12th at 8:00 a.m. in the Cannon library. Cannon administration and district representatives look forward to discussing our current safety procedures, as well as answering any questions that parents might have.
Safety and Security Parent Meeting
Thursday, April 12th 8:00 a.m.
Cannon Elementary Library
Lisa's Coaching Corner
Spring has Sprung
Since temperatures are getting warmer, plants are blooming and our scholars are playing their springtime sports, it is becoming harder to capture their attention in class!
So, as you plan your lessons, it is even more important to plan an engaging way to begin a lesson. Here is a great reminder of ways to begin a lesson to "HOOK 'EM": play a song, start with vocab, blackboard purge, challenge, story, analogy, poem, media, or incomplete diagrams. Take a look at the graphic below to read the specific ideas.
This would also be a great thing to Tweet to show your colleagues the fabulous ideas you continually come up with!
DATES TO REMEMBER
4/02 Light It Up For Autism Day - wear BLUE & jeans! Encourage students to wear blue!
4/02 STEM Leadership 3:00 - Special guest - SMU Maker Visit
4/03 PLC Week A - Kindergarten - 2:15-3:45
4/04 Special Olympics - rescheduled date from last week
4/04 Global Day of Engineers
4/04 National American Heart Association Walk Day - Staff Walk after school! 3:30 -4:00- participants wear red shirts and jeans!
4/04 PLC Week A - 1st grade - 2:15-3:45
4/05 PLC Week A - 2nd grade - 2:15-3:45
4/09 PLC Week B - 5th grade 2:15-3:45 (date change due to STAAR testing on 4/10)
4/10 STAAR testing - 4th grade writing & 5th grade math
4/11 STAAR testing - 5th grade reading
4/11 PLC Week B - 4th grade 2:15-3:45
4/12 Parent Safety & Security Information meeting - 8:00-9:00 - library
4/12 PLC Week B - 3rd grade 2:15-3:45
4/13 Campus site visit - TEPSA team
4/14 Cannon Country Family BBQ @ Nash Farms - 4:00 pm-6:00 pm
4/16 UCAN - 3:00-3:45
4/17 PLC Week A - Kindergarten - 2:15-3:45
4/18 Author Visit - Shelley Brown - 3rd - 5th only - 8:00-9:00 am cafeteria
4/18 4th grade field trip to Parr Park - 9:20-12:30
4/18 PLC Week A - 1st grade - 2:15 - 3:45
4/19 Early Release - 11:45 am
4/20 5th grade field trip to Arboretum 9:00-2:00
4/20 PLC Week A - 2nd grade 2:15-3:45 (date change due to early release on 4/19)
4/23-27 Kindergarten Registration!
4/23 STEM Leadership 3:00- pm in library
4/23 Kinder Meet & Greet - 4:00-6:00 0m
4/24 PLC Week B - 5th grade 2:15-3:45
4/24 Cubs Night Out @ Spring Creek BBQ
4/25 PLC Week B - 4th grade 2:15 - 3:45
4/26 Principal Panel Lunch 11:45-12:30
4/26 PLC Week B - 3rd grade 2:15-3:45
4/27 Student Holiday - inclement weather make-up day
SPOTLIGHT ON LEARNING!
This week's SPOTLIGHT is on our 3rd & 4th grade teams for their work to engage in a POWERFUL book study together! These teams, led by Lisa Brown, are diving into Patterns of Power: Inviting Young Writers Into the Conventions of Language by Jeff Anderson. The teams are reading sections of the book, implementing strategies learned, and sharing student work with each other as they continue to meet throughout the remainder of the school year!
Teaching grammar and conventions in writing has always been one of the most challenging aspects of effectively teaching writing to students. It is also an aspect of writing in which it can be difficult to create high levels of student engagement. But, we all know how important it is that these skills are mastered! Kudos to these teams and Lisa for their participation in this effort to improve their skills in this area through collaborative thinking! Jeff Anderson even retweeted Lisa's recent tweet about the book study and offered up some additional resources for their use! #TwitterFriendsNow
CAMPUS REMINDERS AND UPDATES
GCISD LEARNING INSTITUTE will be held again at the beginning of the school year in 2018-2019 to offer a variety of presentations for teachers to select and attend as part of the professional learning model in August. We have several staff members that would be excellent presenters at this event! Please keep an eye open THIS WEEK via email for information about submitting a proposal for this! We will be speaking directly with several of you to encourage you to consider this!!
ELEMENTARY SCIENCE CURRICULUM SURVEY The science department would like to consider needs for curriculum revisions. Please click here to take this survey now. This needs to be completed by April 3rd.
JOIN THE STAFF HEART WALK ON WEDNESDAY, 4/4!! In recognition of National American Heart Association Walk Day, Kendra has organized a 30 minute staff walk in our school community neighborhood after school on Wednesday 4/4. Please join our staff in front of the school at 3:30 for a walk with your colleagues to support a great cause! For those that participate, please feel free to wear jeans and a red shirt!
GLOBAL DAY OF ENGINEERS Global Day is THE annual celebration of engineers.
On April 4th, post photos (#GlobalEngineer) of:
- A favorite engineering project.
- Engineering activities with students.
Take the pledge to recognize this special day by clicking here!
READY ROSIE is a wonderful new parent engagement tool that will be utilized by Kindergarten-3rd grade staff and families for the remainder of the year. Thanks to our K-3 teachers who attended training last week! Please continue communicating to your parents about Ready Rosie and share information about how to get started accessing this great resource, in English & Spanish!
SHARE INFORMATION ABOUT THE NEW WEBSITE The district has asked all school staff for their help in communication about the new website! Please share this information in your newsletters/communication with parents. Note that the URL has changed for all websites and if a parent or community member bookmarked the page on the old site, it no longer works.. Please help us communicate this change to our families!
GCISD - http://www.gcisd.net/
Cannon - http://can.gcisd.net/
VOYA TEACHERS GRANT: VOYA is offering teacher grants for projects that are innovative creative and positively influence students. Each year, 100 finalists receive a $2,000 grant and three are selected for additional grants. Check out the information here and apply today! You will notice that a LARGE percentage of the projects that have received grants are STEM related!!
NEWS FROM THE LEARNING COMMONS
Reminders From Mrs. Wagner
MARCH & APRIL BOOK OF THE MONTH INFORMATION We are so excited about the TWO great paired books and design challenge that are being promoted for our BoM for March & April! After reading a wonderful story about a character who lived in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina & a non-fiction book about Extreme Weather & natural disasters, our Cannon Cubs can participate in the 2018 7th Annual Global Spark! Lab Invent It Challenge, by designing an innovative way for people to prepare BEFORE a natural disaster, stay safe DURING one, or recover AFTERWARDS. Check out the BoM resources below and share with your scholars!
WORTH A READ...OR A LISTEN!
TEACHING STUDENTS HOW TO EDIT THEIR OWN WRITING can be challenging! Check out this great blogpost with some suggestions on how to improve this practice in Kindergarten-2nd grade classroom! For ideas on this topic in 3rd-5th, check out this video as a model for peer editing.
THIS GCISD LEAD WTH TECHNOLOGY BLOGPOST on the power of storytelling was great! Check out some of the wonderful resources shared that reinforce the value of sharing our experiences with others as a way to learn and make deeper connections.
CURRICULUM & INSTRUCTION CORNER
TWITTER REMINDERS FOR @canSTEM
Please help us reach our campus goal for all staff to participate in a 5-minute a day communication plan, as stated in George Couros's quote shown here. It's truly a simple way to SHARE & LEARN from the best minds in GCISD! I am going to be highlighting our school twitter account HEAVILY with parents & our school community, to help create our own "outward culture of celebration"!!
As a reminder, please include our school's handle, @canSTEM, in all of your tweets, so that they can be automatically retweeted on our school account. At the end of the day, simply go to @canSTEM and scroll through our school's tweets for 5 minutes and see what your colleagues are sharing! If you want to learn more from them about an idea they shared....you will only have to walk across the building to get more information firsthand!
Please click here to see our staff list of social media accounts. Please add/update any information so that we can make sure we follow each other!
About This Background Image...
TO-DO LIST
- Set a timer and complete daily attendance ON TIME!
- Don't forget to show daily KCAN announcements every Monday-Thursday!!
- Wear BLUE & jeans for Light it Up For Autism Day on Monday, 4/2.
- Review all emergency drill procedures with scholars & be prepared!
- STEM Leadership members meet in library for our special guest presentation on Monday, 4/2!
- Join the staff National Heart Walk on Wednesday 4/4 from 3:30-4:00 in the neighborhood around Cannon! Participants wear red & jeans!
- Communicate to parents about our new campus/district websites.
- K-3 teachers - continue to communicate to your parents about Ready Rosie!
- Complete the Elementary Science Curriculum Survey by 4/3.
- K-5 teachers - please communicate that NO PARENTS can be on campus to volunteer or have lunch during upcoming STAAR testing dates on 4/10 & 4/11.
- Share the March/April Book of the Month information with your scholars!
- Take your scholars out to the back of the school to see the construction progress!
- Review the information in this newsletter about the 5-minute a day communication plan. Tweet & blog about all of the great things you are doing in your classroom/grade!
- Update teacher website, blog and other social media.