Collins Staff-CUB COMMUNICATION
Weekly Update ISSUE #6 September 15, 2023
IMPORTANT DATES
SEPTEMBER
9/15: GLP Lunch in the Lounge Provided by GLP
9/17: CONSTITUTION DAY
9/18: Constitution Day Activities continued (if you did not do them on Friday).
9/18-10/9: Begin Little Ceasar's Pizza Kit fundraisers.
9/18: K-3 Reading Window Opens
9/19: 6th Grade SMART begins 9:15-10:55
9/19: Staff Meeting #3: 3:30-4:30 SAFETY TRAINING Michelle Oakie
9/20: NO SCHOOL FOR STUDENTS-Professional Development
9/22: Ice Cream Social
9/23: K-6 Math and 4-6 Reading NWEA Window Closes
9/26: TORNADO DRILL #1 2pm
9/26: 6th Grade SMART
9/27: FIRE DRILL #1 1:30pm
9/27th- Art Teacher & K-5 ELA Pilot Teacher Sub Paperwork Due To Laura Sala Please see Jessi!
9/28- MAP Reading Fluency After School PD @ Walsh 4:30-6:30
9/29- 1/2 Way Through 1st Quarter- Grades in PS Up To Date
9/29: MSTEP Letters should be sent home by this date.
9/29: Staff and Climate Culture Surveys Completed (Time was provided at staff meeting)
OCTOBER
10/4: Student Count Day!
10/5: Art Teacher PD at Browning 12:30-3:30
10/6: K-3 Reading Window Closes
10/10: SAFETY STAFF MEETING 3:30-4:30 in MEDIA CENTER with SSO Michelle Oakie
10/10: K-5 ELA Pilot Teachers PD @ Walsh 8:30-3:30
10/10: Patterns of Wonder After School PD @ Walsh 4:30-6:30
10/12: Picture Day
10/17: Literacy Coach PD @ MISD
10/18: NO SCHOOL FOR STUDENTS-PD
10/19: MAP Reading Fluency After School PD @ Walsh 4:30-6:30
10/24: Fire Drill #2 9:30
10/24: Staff Meeting 3:30-4:30
10/27: Elementary Student Half-Day- End of Marking Period 1
10/31: Elementary Student Half-Day
10/31: PHASE I EVALUATION MEETINGS COMPLETED!!
STAFF WEEKLY UPDATE
Greetings Collins Cubs-
What a great first full week together at Collins. Thank you for your attention to our students, their families, and for communicating weekly with your Collins Cubs. All the attention you spend in making sure our students receive a balanced education with a heavy focus on academics, certainly does not go unnoticed. Watching you greet your Cubs in a Character Strong way or in your own way to empower your students, is certainly making a positive impact for our families. Thank you!
SPECIALS SCHEDULE UPDATE:
We are thrilled to have Mr. Michael Baker joining us at this time! It was lovely to hear music coming from the music room. Thank you for welcoming him to our building. We are still working on a Media Center teacher at this time. I am in continual contact with HR regarding our needs and we had a substitute teacher that was able to fill this position until this week. We will continue to post it on AESOP. A BIG THANK YOU to our Monday/Tuesday AM Media Center teacher for creating lesson plans for any sub that may be filling in at Collins. All lessons over the past two weeks have been planned by a Media Center teacher. Thank you for assisting us. As soon as I have an update to share, I will certainly do so. The position has been posted both internally and externally.
MISSED PREP TIME:
I was very excited to have the ability to offer a prep time to each teacher in-spite of our absences and lack of media center teacher on Friday. Thank you to our 1-building sub and ISM teacher, gym, and music teacher for help with this matter. Once again, my concerns about our allocation of 1 building sub has been shared, numerous times with the appropriate parties. Please continue to document your missed prep time. I am doing so as well in my own documentation. We are working diligently to try to make sure all get as many prep periods as possible.
LUNCH/RECESS UPDATE:
The altered lunch/recess schedule was a major success! We are working on recruiting families to volunteer for the recess duties and/or assistance with our first lunch for Kindergarten friends. If you have an exceptional parent that you feel would be helpful for these roles, please communicate this in your newsletters. The background check is required and the document is available in the parent SMORE communication.
We have only made 2 minor changes to our schedule for this week. If you have not been notified by me already, then your schedule is a go! The only changes we made were to help our gym teachers and custodial staff to have at least 20 minutes to clean the floors prior to the start of 6th grade gym specials. As always, we are in need of additional hands/resources in the lunch room. If you would like to do this position for paid compensation, please let me know. A BIG thank you to Melanie and all others that had to step into the lunchroom as I dealt with investigations this week.
DUTY SCHEDULE and STAFF MEETING UPDATES:
After discussing the duty schedule at our staff meeting, we will continue to follow Quarter 1 at this time. Should the team prefer to continue with this schedule going forward in Quarter 2, we will certainly adopt this schedule. Thank you again for your diligence to be sure you have all areas covered and have reported to the posts 10 minutes prior to the start of the day and 5 minutes after. This coming week, we have our SAFETY staff meeting on Tuesday after school from 3:30-4:30 and our PD in the afternoon at the building. An agenda will be shared with you on Monday!
EVALUATION PHASE I MEETINGS
I will be sending out invitations for your to sign-up for your Phase I Evaluation Meeting. More details will be presented to you this week and possibly on WEDNESDAY during part of our PD.
Wishing you all a lovely weekend ahead!
Warm regards,
Meghan Ciacchella
Principal
INTRODUCING OUR STAFF CUB HUG!
I am very excited to begin celebrating our staff with Collins Elementary's very own CUB HUG!!! Sending a great big CUB HUG to Mrs. Oltersdorf!! Our students and staff would like to celebrate you for many reasons. Students enjoyed making a special paw print of how your show your P.A.W.S. to them and we at Collins would like to thank you for assisting our Music Teachers in a pinch!! We appreciate you and we think you are PAWS-itively PAW-some!
Xo-Collins
DPPD-DISTRICT PROVIDED PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT 9.20
The District Professional Development Day (DPPD) is scheduled for Wednesday, September 20, 2023. This day has been planned by the Teaching and Learning Department and System-Wide Chairs. Attached is the PD chart for elementary, secondary, and special services PD sessions occurring on this day. Administrators have been assigned to all sessions. Teachers should report in the morning to the building as indicated by the attached (1A) charts. Please share the appropriate charts with staff members.
8:00 a.m. - 11:00 a.m. Morning sessions, teachers report according to charts
11:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. Lunch
12:00 p.m. - 3:15 p.m. Afternoon sessions, general education teachers report to
home school, special education teachers and SETAs will
follow the special services professional development
schedule for the day
OLD MATERIALS REMOVAL WORK ORDER
AESOP ABSENCES
Just a few reminders:
- HR asked us to remind staff that when putting in absences in AESOP that teachers can ONLY put in ½ day or full day absences. NO custom times should be put into the system. Thank you.
- We have one building sub allocated to Collins this year and she has been very busy! I have communicated our needs numerous times as I know you had 3 allocated to the building last year. Please know that I am not in charge of our allocations but will continue to advocate for our building's needs. Thank you.
PARENT TEACHER CONFERENCES
SCHOOL SOFT CONFERENCE MANAGER IN-PERSON and VIRTUAL
CONFERENCE WINDOW November 6-12 and November 9th afternoon conferences.
Similar to last year, we will be using school soft conference manager to schedule parent teacher conferences. Each building must allow options for in-person and virtual conferences. If parents are not able to select their preferred format due to what is available, they should use the notes section to inform the teacher so that an adjustment/accommodation can be made. More information will be presented to us at our Principal meeting on September 28th.
CULTURE AND CLIMATE SURVEY
PLEASE COMPLETE THIS SURVEY BY 9-29-23
Click this link to access the survey: Educator Culture and Climate Survey .
Please note: you will have time at our staff meeting to complete this survey on 9-13-23. It is due by 9-29-23.
TEACHING AND LEARNING UPDATE
*TAKEN FROM OUR PRINCIPAL COMMUNICATION UPDATE*
K-5 Student Teachers- Student teachers are welcome to attend the PD with the specials teachers at the Henry Ford PAC on September 20th. They are not able to attend the Amplify science training.
K-6 Teachers should bring their laptop to their PD session on Wednesday, September 20th.
Young 5's Referral Process- If you have a student that you or your team think may be a candidate for a moving to Young 5's please email Catherine. She will arrange for someone to observe the student and give a final recommendation on placement.
To streamline the flow of grant related communication and ensure that paperwork is being processed in a timely manner, moving forward Grants@uticak12.org will be used to request and collect information from buildings. Examples of requests may include, timesheets, sign in sheets and agendas when requesting subs for meetings, proof of attendance for conferences, etc.
The Teaching and Learning wellness consultant, Catherine Livingston, has developed a folder with suggested classroom wellness activities for students in grades K – 12. Directions for each activity, printable document, or video demonstration, can be accessed via the Wellness folder in Inside UCS.
TEACHER EVALUATION
UCS TEACHERS
All Utica Community Schools teachers will be evaluated during the 2023-2024 school year using the authorized District performance appraisal system. The Charlotte Danielson Framework for Teaching and related rubrics will continue to represent the pedagogical component and expectations of the system. In addition, all teachers are required to be evaluated on student growth, recognized as defined locally through domain 5 of the system.
At this time evaluators should begin scheduling Phase 1 pre-conferences which are to be completed on or before Tuesday, October 31, 2023. A pre-conference must be afforded to each teacher as a valued process component promoting professional inquiry and discussion, reflection, planning and goal setting. The Student Achievement Growth Analysis document should be used to guide the development of the personal goal(s).
In instances where an educator works between multiple buildings, the principals should first connect and attempt to determine the evaluator. Please contact Human Resources for support.
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UCS COUNSELOR and ITINERANT
Utica Community Schools counselors, psychologists, social workers, speech and language pathologists, occupational and physical therapists will be evaluated during the 2023-2024 school year using the authorized district performance appraisal system. The applicable Charlotte Danielson Framework and related rubrics will continue to represent performance expectations of the system. At this time evaluators may begin scheduling Phase 1 pre-conferences which are to be completed on or before Tuesday, October 31, 2023. A pre-conference must be afforded to each educator as a valued process component promoting professional inquiry and discussion, reflection and planning.
In instances where an educator works between multiple buildings, the administrators should first connect and attempt to determine the evaluator. If a decision cannot be made, contact Human Resources. Please note that in accordance with the collective bargaining agreement, certain members may be on an off-cycle year for evaluation.
SETTING UP MEETINGS!
In accordance with the superintendent's bulletin. We will begin to set up meetings in the coming weeks. Please look for additional communication and refer to the Superintendent's bulletin
PROBATIONARY TEACHERS and MENTOR TEACHERS
EMERGENCY SUB PLANS
Tis the season for flu and colds!! Yuck! In an effort to prepare in advance, we are asking all staff to have emergency sub plans available for all specials and classroom teachers. We are asking you to create a file to include some emergency plans for the office staff to have accessible up front.
IF you would like to share these emergency plans in the SCHOOLOGY page as well, please feel free to do so!
If you would like a folder, please see the office. :) THANK YOU!
TUMBLE BOOKS
The Macomb Intermediate School District has renewed the K-6 access to TumbleBooks and TumbleMath:
- TumbleBookLibrary is a curated database of children's e-books, available by subscription to elementary schools and public libraries around the world.
- TumbleMath is a comprehensive collection of math picture books with animation and narration, like other TumbleBooks. Also includes lesson plans and thousands of quizzes. These resources are for grades K–6.
The 2023-2024 access information for TumbleBooks and TumbleMath is as follows:
TumbleBooks TumbleMath
Username: macomb1234 Username: macomb1234
Password: reads Password: reads
ATTENTION K-3 TEACHERS!
Teachers, please be sure to check your email message from me that was forwarded along from our eSpark representative. In case you have not already done so, please be sure to set this up in advance. If you need additional support, please let me know!
eSpark Launch Instructions:
We invested in eSpark this year to help personalize content for our students! To get started, login with your same teacher credentials as last year to see your roster -- and if you're new to eSpark, you can use the credentials below that they have created for you:
- URL: mc.esparklearning.com
- Username: Your school email address
- Password: lastname12345678
If you want to get up to speed on some of eSpark's newest releases like Choice Texts, click here for their self-service PD option. You can contact their team directly at support@esparklearning.com with any questions, too.
Michael Wagner (he/him/his)
Manager, Customer Success | eSpark Learning
C: 314.258.3557 / O: 314.350.4541
CHARACTER STRONG
We had a lot of valuable resources shared for character strong and a special thank you to 3rd grade team for sharing their positive slides with kindness that coincides nicely with our Character Strong initiative. I will be sharing the LOGINs for you next week for our TEAMS folder with lots of valuable information.
UCSCOLLINS
COLLINS2022
PICTURE DAY 10.12.23
BUILDING SUBSTITUTES
We will have 1 allocated building sub this year. Please see the changes below:
- Building substitutes need to be aware and agree when hired that they may be pulled to other buildings on occasion.
- Building teachers cannot pre-arrange building subs. Principals cannot pre-arrange building subs.
- Classroom Teachers MUST ALWAYS put in for a sub, even with district PD.
- If a building has a sub job unfilled and the building subs are already assigned the building principal MUST reach out to colleagues (at elementary or secondary level) to have an open building sub assigned to their building for the day.
- If a building sub is not being utilized as a sub, they should be utilized to work with students in a meaningful way.
SCIENCE MATERIALS
SCIENCE MATERIALS
We continue to receive our Amplify Science materials for teachers and students in grades K-5. They are being housed in the hallway of the SAM suite. You are NOT expected to dive in and will be trained. Your materials will be housed in each classroom. Teachers will be receiving teacher manuals, student notebooks, and kits per each unit. This will be a large number of materials being delivered to your building and a large number of materials for teachers to store within their classroom or your Science Room. Teachers should begin to think through the storage aspect. Teachers are getting trained on Amplify on September 20 so they do not need to start using the materials until after the initial training. With the purchase of Amplify Science, the district/buildings will not be purchasing Mystery Science this year.
NWEA
NWEA
You will note from the assessment calendar that the fall NWEA window opens sooner than it has in the past. This year it opens up the day after Labor Day for math for all and reading for grades 4-6. I will be working with LC and EL on accommodations. Please send me the dates and times you plan to test by Friday, September 1st so we can try our best not to disrupt your students' testing environment.
Our Specials Team is working on Accommodations.
NWEA has a new look. Below are tutorial links on how to navigate the new NWEA website.
Support Video- https://youtu.be/UNSMAVk0Fgg
Iorad Tutorial-https://www.iorad.com/player/2238391/ACCESSING-THE-NEW-NWEA
Iorad PDF-https://www.iorad.com/player/2238391/ACCESSING-THE-NEW-NWEA#print
NWEA FALL TESTING WINDOW
The NWEA Assessments provide information on student growth and are used for placement into courses and programs. The testing environment for NWEA should replicate the testing environment for M-STEP, PSAT, SAT, or AP testing. A student directions script (6A) has been provided for proctors to read prior to each testing session. In addition, the NWEA proctor guide (6B) is attached to support proctors with any testing questions or testing issues.
NWEA is providing text-to-speech accommodations for students taking the MAP 2 - 5 and MAP 6+ assessments. Please use the accommodation worksheets (6C, 6D) to determine if text-to-speech should be provided and how it should be implemented. Please understand that text-to-speech should always be a team-based decision that includes the principal and teacher. There should be no blanket statement that a certain population receives text-to-speech.
The NWEA fall window for K-11 math and 4-9 ELA will open on Tuesday, September 5, 2023, and close Friday, September 22, 2023.
ASSESSMENT CALENDARS
A committee of secondary and elementary teachers worked with the Teaching and Learning Department to create pacing guides to support secondary and elementary teachers in planning their instruction for the 2023-2024 school year. The pacing guides are available in the Teams accounts for each secondary content area, elementary grade level (K-6) and specials (art, media center, music and physical education).
For elementary teachers, within each grade level Teams is a channel for each core content area, ELA, math, science, and social studies. Teachers can post ideas, suggestions, materials, resources, assessments and/or questions specific to the appropriate content area within each channel. Teachers should be mindful of copyright regulations when sharing lesson ideas and resources. Elementary specialists that need access should contact their system-wide chairperson for support.
If teachers did not do so last year, teachers are invited to join their appropriate TEAMS account. Below are the codes for each specific content area and grade level.
Grade Level Teams Account Code
Kindergarten 3zbqgcz
First Grade v503i03
Second Grade ifccuv7
Third Grade 0pbi9yv
Fourth Grade 1s8vt66
Fifth Grade p1wboew
Sixth Grade jauoc0f
ELEMENTARY CORE CURRICULAR BLOCKS
LANGUAGE LINE INFORMATION (IF YOU NEED AN INTERPRETER)
BREAKFAST AND LUNCH
Breakfast Is To Be Served From The Cafeteria (Not Classrooms)
Early Entry – Allow students to enter 20 minutes prior to start of school day
Communication about early entry for breakfast to your community should be done once you have secured your staff
- Teachers Should Count and Input Into PowerSchool Daily:
- Who Is Ordering Breakfast For Tomorrow
- Who Is Buying Lunch For Today
- Who Is Ordering Lunch For Tomorrow
Bruce Collins Elementary
Email: meghan.ciacchella@uticak12.org
Website: https://www.uticak12.org/Collins
Location: 12900 Grand Haven Drive, Sterling Heights, MI, USA
Phone: (586)797-4200