AMCMS Principal's Office
What is going on in the Principal's Office?
My Challenge to You
As the video says, we come into this world needing each other. We are not born with the ability to take care of ourselves. We have to be taught. We learn from others. Yet, as we grow up we are expected to become independent. We are expected to be able to solve everything on our own. It's braver to go it alone. Independence is the way to accomplish. We are viewed as stronger when we succeed without assistance. We may even be viewed as weaker or less intelligent when we cannot succeed on our own.
Is that true? Does anyone ever really achieve success on their own?
Why am I asking you this? Because I do not what you to think that I expect you to go it alone as a teacher. In fact, I expect the opposite. I expect you to collaborate with others. I expect you to bring your ideas to the table, share, and be open to the ideas and suggestions of your fellow educators.
Don't take my word for it, read about the importance of teacher collaboration here, here, and here.
Collaboration does not have to be specific to content. It can be about teaching strategies, approaches, planning, and classroom management. When we open up to fellow educators and ask for a peer observation/coaching to provide us feedback or peer conversation over a topic in which we are struggling we aren't admitting defeat. Instead, we are recognizing that we just not have mastered something, yet, and we are learning from each others that have something to help us grow and improve.
When we do that, we all succeed.
Think. Achieve. Succeed.
Jeff
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AMCMS SPED Tip of the Week
Differentiating can be difficult!
Try these tips to up your differentiation game!
- Pre-teach to a small group - try pre-teaching to a small group the day before you start a new topic
- Arrange students’ seating - arrange student seating so you can more easily interact with your struggling learners
- Keep a visible record - visual learners benefit from seeing the steps of the lesson.
- Craft questions carefully - try these 2 types: split question & build-on question.
- Split question: ask 2 questions of different difficulty - have students answer according to their level of understanding
- Build-on question: give a task, and give a follow-up step for those who finish the first part of the task
- Be active during turn and talks - when students are talking to their neighbors, pop in to those conversations in order to support, push, or get students back on track.
- Give more wait-time - don’t call on the first student to raise his or her hand, wait a little longer for the student who needs a little more time to process
- Use a student assistant - pull up a student to help with tasks (even if the tasks aren’t necessary) in order to engage a struggling learner before they tune out or to give a thriving student extra responsibility.
- Vary an element - give the students options for texts. Let students choose topics when possible.
- Allow a head start - give students some time to work on a task independently, and let them know you’ll follow up with guidance shortly.
Technology Tip of the Week
New Kahoot Mobile App
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Kahoot released a new mobile app this morning. The new mobile app will let students participate in Kahoot games both in the classroom and at home. The Kahoot mobile app offers a "single player mode" which will let students see questions and answer choices on the same screen. You can now send "challenges" to students to complete in Kahoot.
Challenges are quizzes that you assign to students to complete outside of your classroom.
You can give challenges to students by sharing a link via email, sharing in Google Classroom, or by just sharing a game PIN assigned to the challenge. Find more here.
Formative Assessment vs Summative Assessment
Formative assessment is done as students are learning. Summative assessment is at the end (like a test).
What is the difference between formative assessment and summative assessment? Why should you care? How can you best utilize the two different approaches to assess student learning? Read the article below to learn more!
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Check out some of the great things going on at #AMCMS this past week!
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Here are some articles and blogs that I read this past week from Twitter.
TAMU Game Day Parking -- Saturday
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Grades are due by 4pm MONDAY!
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Don't forget to share why your peers are so awesome! New tags have been suggested and added!
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Week at a Glance
- Morning Tutorials 7:50-8:20
- Be at your duty station-- 7:50
- Be at your duty station-- 3:50
- Afternoon Tutorials 3:55 - 4:30
- Campus Leadership Team Meeting 4:30 Lecture Hall
- Football Games -- White Teams at home VS Brenham
Tuesday October 3
- Morning Tutorials 7:50-8:20
- Be at your duty station-- 7:50
- Be at your duty station-- 3:50
- Afternoon Tutorials 3:55 - 4:30
- Football Games -- Maroon / Black vs SFA. 7th grade @ SFA ; 8th grade @ AMCMS
- #CSISDChat on Twitter -- 8pm -- Personalized Professional Development
Wednesday October 4
- Morning Tutorials 7:50-8:20
- Be at your duty station-- 7:50
- Be at your duty station-- 3:50
- Afternoon Tutorials 3:55 - 4:30
- AVID Site Team Meeting 4:30
Thursday October 5
- Morning Tutorials 7:50-8:20
- Be at your duty station-- 7:50
- Be at your duty station-- 3:50
- Volleyball Matches -- vs Brenham @AMCMS -- Wear Jeans with Volleyball shirt
- Afternoon Tutorials 3:55 - 4:30
Friday October 6
- Morning Tutorials 7:50-8:20
- Be at your duty station-- 7:50
- Be at your duty station-- 3:50
A&M Consolidated Middle School
Email: jmann@csisd.org
Website: http://amcms.csisd.org/
Location: 105 Holik Street, College Station, TX, United States
Phone: 979-764-5575
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AMCMS.Home.of.the.Cats
Twitter: @AMCMSCatPRIDE