Clif Notes 9/16/19
Preparing Students To Be Career & Post Secondary Ready
DATES TO REMEMBER
This Week
Monday - 8am Start for Extra Help
Tuesday - CTE PLCs
Wednesday - Academic PLCs; Extra Help
Thursday - Academic PLCs; PARENT NIGHT-6:30 pm
Friday - School Spirit & ROAR Committee Meetings
Upcoming:
9/23 - Governor's Construction Career Expo at Chase Center-Riverfront
9/27 - Steering Committee Meeting, C100
10/4 - PD Day/ No School for Students
Birthdays this Week
September 16:
Petra Carre
Audrey Hansen
Denise Maslanka
September 18:
Hadassah Lynch
September22:
Kim Denhardt
Mike Lemon
For all staff interested in joining the Spirit Committee:
The Spirit Committee will have their first meeting on Friday, September 20th, at 7:35 in Room C107. Please come and share your ideas for how we can build spirit at the Castle. New members are welcome! ~ Horgan
Device Regsitration and Insurance
You will need the serial number for your laptop (on the asset tag on the bottom of your device) in order to complete the registration. Most staff do not have district-issued tablets or phones so you can either skip those non-mandatory fields or write N/A. The second portion of the form indicated your option regarding insurance for your device. Staff members who chose to insure their device can pay Ms. Ramsey directly or may use PayPams. Please see Dr. Olsavsky with any questions.
State-Mandated Trainings
Non-Academic Mandatory Training
Introduction
Delaware Code requires school personnel to complete 12. 5 hours of approved non-academic training over a three-year period. There are specific requirements related to new employees, certain positions and an annual requirement for suicide prevention training as explained below. The requirements fall into four (4) categories areas:
Child Abuse and Child Safety Awareness, Prevention, Detection & Reporting (NAMC-CSA)
- Competed once every three years
- New Hire: Course 2516
- Refresher: Course 28380
- Competed once every three years
- Course 25170
- Any new Administrator, Counselors or Nurse (if they haven’t completed it within a year of hire or at all): Course 24185
- Or, Competed once every three years
- Yearly for all staff: Course 26530
Note: Teen Dating Violence & Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention (NAMC-TD) is not required by all school personnel.~ Olsavsky
Former Student Visits
Procedures for earning and banking snow hours
Guidelines
A teacher or paraeducator can earn additional hours that can be added to the end of the school year, only if the regular teacher calendar has been extended due to the necessity to make up days due to inclement weather or unforeseen circumstances that would close the school for both teachers and students. These hours are referred to as Snow Hours . Teachers and paras can earn and bank hours by participating in professional development opportunities outside of the instructional day or on the weekend. This is a voluntary program. Below are guidelines:
100% of hours banked must be earned by participating in professional development activities related to the employee’s main position within the school/district
100% of hours must take place outside of the instructional day
Documentation must be maintained by the teacher or para
A teacher or para cannot trade or waive compensation for hours or hours for pay
Earned hours cannot be carried over to the next school year
Teachers/paras may not earn hours while on medical leave, disability or FMLA
If a teacher or para is being compensated for the PD the staff member may not earn snow hours (double-dipping is against the procedure)
An audit may occur if deemed necessary by the school, district or State
Documentation
Teachers and paras are responsible to track their own hours and maintain documentation of participation
If teachers/paras are unsure if the PD will “count” toward banking hours, he/she must complete the Google Request Form that has been created for each school and receive electronic written confirmation or denial of the PD from the supervisor
Participants are expected to keep a record of their hours and provide documentation of completion with supporting documents. Examples include:
Certificate of completion/participation from vendor
Attendance verification via PDMS (Professional Development Management System)
Completed assignments via Schoology
Email from vendor that verifies your completion of the course/activity
Teachers/Paras MUST show evidence of their participation in the PD via a timestamp in Schoology, PDMS, email from a district/school administrator or a certificate from the presenter. The timeframe and evidence that you completed the PD MUST be present on documents.
Calculating Hours
7.5 hours equals one work day
Snow hours are determined via the presenter, program/activity coordinator or as stated on PDMS per the presenter
Snow Hours can be earned during an actual snow day (inclement weather, unforeseen closure)
Timelines for 2019-20
July 1, 2019 - April 3, 2020 - Accrue hours
April 3, 2020: First Opportunity- submit to supervisor documentation of hours and supporting documents
April 6, 2020-May 1, 2020: Second Opportunity to earn hours
May 4, 2020 - Submit to supervisor documentation of hours and supporting documents
Teachers/paras who do not participate must come to school on the additional days in June to complete teacher/para contract
Teachers/para who do not attend the additional days to complete the teacher/para contract will be required to produce a doctor’s note to support absence or the employee will be docked pay
Workflow
In order for this process to work smoothly and efficiently, teachers, paras, supervisors are to follow the workflow listed below:
Teachers/paras - submit documentation to supervisor
Supervisors create spreadsheet and track members and provide to principal's secretary
Principal's secretary creates a master list of all teachers/paras and adds earned snow hours into DSC for participating teachers/paras ~ Villa
Parent Night
Parent Night
Below are some other tips that are helpful for conducting a successful Parent Night:
· Greet parents as they come into your class!!!
· Have a sign in sheet available for parents:
Parent name/Student name/ Email/ Phone Number
· Make the classroom/ career area inviting and reflective of the great work being accomplished. Make sure your classroom celebrates Cougar Achievement (class work, news article, etc).
· Be enthusiastic—people have a tendency to remember body language and tone more than words.
· Have your name, school number, extension, and email on the board.
· Have course descriptions and syllabi available if parents want them.
· Always thank parents for attending and remind them of the important role they play in their child’s education.
*Please let your supervisor know in the event that you are unable to attend parent night. We ask that you leave a note on your door that contains your contact information and a place for parents to leave their information if follow up is needed.*
Things to Remember
Presenters Needed
The NCCVT Fourth Annual Tech Conference is on October 4th at HVT. Want to present what you know or what you have learned about the use of tech in your classroom? Please sign up to be a presenter – you get a free t-shirt too!
Grade Book Reminder
Emergency Lesson Plans
Looping in Your LSC is a MUST!!!
Do you use Google Assignments in Schoology?!? Do you have an LSC?!?
If the answer to both questions above is yes, please be sure that you are sharing the Schoology Google Drive folder with your LSC so they can view your students' work!!!
The very short video below shows you how to do this...
Discipline Corner -Browning & Hollis
Dress Code: As the year progresses please remember all students should be in dress code. If a student is out of dress code, please refer the student to the Student Advisors’ Office. (Student parent handbook pg. 23-24)
If you are uncomfortable or if you are in question about a student’s dress; some quick statements to tell students are:
- “I am not sure if that outfit is in dress code, can you go to Student Advisors office to get cleared?”
- “The outfit you have on is not in dress code please report to SAO for clearance.”
- Make the call! Call your parents early with a positive phone call. The first contact is always easier when it’s positive.
Read more about contacting parents here- Ed Week article link
http://blogs.edweek.org/topschooljobs/careers/2017/07/classroom_management_and_disci.html
We need your help too! Stand in your doorway at the change of classes to monitor students. The data shows that students get into trouble more often during a transition.
o Link for- Study finds supervision in hallways is effective
Focus
Teaching the Core Skills of Listening & Speaking - By Erik Palmer
Listening and Speaking in Life Beyond School
Listening and Speaking in Instruction for Students with Disabilities
Consider these sobering statistics from the National Council on Disability (2004): more than 40 percent of U.S. secondary-age students with disabilities do not attain a high school diploma at the end of high school, and dropout rates for youth with disabilities are three to four times higher than for students without disabilities. To what extent does this reflect the failure of one-size-fits-all instruction to meet the needs of these students?
Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a promising avenue for ensuring that every student in our schools can access content and demonstrate understanding. UDL takes its cue from the universal design movement in architecture—the idea of which was to make physical environments accessible for everyone. The classic example is the curb cut: equally beneficial to people in wheelchairs, parents pushing strollers, cyclists, delivery people with hand trucks, individuals with mobility issues, and your run-of-the-mill pedestrian.
UDL is guided by three principles:
Principle I: Provide Multiple Means of Representation
Learners differ in the ways that they perceive and comprehend information that is presented to them. For example, those with sensory disabilities (e.g., blindness or deafness); learning disabilities (e.g., dyslexia); language or cultural differences; and so forth may all require different ways of approaching content. Others may simply grasp information quicker or more efficiently through visual or auditory means rather than printed text.
Principle II: Provide Multiple Means of Action and Expression
Learners differ in the ways that they can navigate a learning environment and express what they know. For example, individuals with significant movement impairments (e.g., cerebral palsy), those who struggle with strategic and organizational abilities (executive function disorders), those who have language barriers, and so forth approach learning tasks very differently. Some may be able to express themselves well in written text but not speech, and vice versa. …
Principle III: Provide Multiple Means of Engagement
Affect represents a crucial element to learning, and learners differ markedly in the ways in which they can be engaged or motivated to learn …. Some learners are highly engaged by spontaneity and novelty while others are disengaged, even frightened, by those aspects, preferring strict routine. Some learners might like to work alone, while others prefer to work with their peers. In reality, there is not one means of engagement that will be optimal for all learners in all contexts; providing multiple options for engagement is essential. (CAST, 2011, p. 5) [emphasis added]
How do the principles of UDL connect to the topic of this book? High-stakes testing has had the effect of focusing instructional intention on reading and writing (assessed subjects). UDL reminds us to consider how else students might access content and demonstrate understanding: by listening to the text rather than reading it, by recording a presentation rather than word processing a written report, or by reading and discussing with a partner instead of reading and reflecting alone. Our schools adequately address the strong reader and the strong writer; following the principles of UDL will help us address the strong listener and the strong speaker at the same time that we use listening and speaking to accommodate students with unique needs.