The Hero Focus
Heritage Staff Newsletter - January 2, 2017
Dear Heritage Heroes,
I am so excited and ready for 2017! We have five very important months ahead of us with our little Heroes. As you know, every single second of instruction and relationship connection count for our children. I am proud of your commitment and passion for helping each child become their very best.
On News Years Day I found an Education Leadership article on Twitter called "3 Simple Ideas Every Educator Should Work on in 2017" by Peter DeWitt. He quotes John Hattie's effect size work in this article and highlights some great reminders. They include:
- Big Idea #1 - Relationships with students: The effect size is .72 in helping a student make more than a year's growth. Creating stronger relationships with students by having more positive conversations with them is crucial!
- Big Idea #2 - Implement engaging Instructional Strategies: Following is a summary of high impact instructional strategies with their effect sizes that the article highlights. Classroom Discussion (.82); Teacher Clarity (.75) Before students jump into the lesson they need to understand the learning intentions and objectives; Feedback (.75) Feedback that is always focused on the learning intention; Metacognitive Strategies (.69) Reflecting with evidence on the learning that took place - formative assessment strategies; Questioning (.48) The quality of questions teachers and students are both asking are very important to keeping instruction engaging and students progressing.
- Big Idea #3 - How we listen to other people is the third idea for educators to work on. These include: Don't multitask while talking with a child or peer, don't pontificate, use open-ended questions, go with the flow, if you don't know, say you don't know, don't equate your experiences with theirs, try not to repeat yourself, be brief, and listen.
Peter DeWitt ends the article by stating " The Big three strategies are sure to help deepen the relationships we have with others..." As a result, our students, our teams, and our community will be stronger, more positive, and more effective in 2017.
Looking forward to the journey!!!
Happy New Year!
Laura
RtI Update and Due Dates
- Jan. 6th - 2nd 6 Weeks Intervention Logs Uploaded to Aware
- Jan. 9th - Jan. 20th Middle of the Year AIMSWeb Window Testing 2-4
- Jan. 9th - Jan. 20th Middle of the Year ISIP Testing Window K-4
- January 20th Middle of the year reading levels due
January Character Quality - Respect
"We don't need to share the same opinions as others, but we need to be respectful."
Taylor Swift
Updates and FYI's
- Jan. 19th - Severe Weather Drill
- Jan. 12th - End of Six Weeks grades uploaded and finalized by 4:00 on January 17th.
- Jan. 12th - Rise and Shine Assemblies
- Be sure you have signed up for the January 2nd Sheltered Instruction/Collaborative Plannning PD
- Jan. 16th - MLK Day - Student and Staff Holiday
- Jan. 19th: Fire Drill 10:15
- Jan. 20th - CBA data due in Aware
- Jan. 20th: Report Cards Available in HAC
Upcoming Events to have on your radar:
- March 24th - 12 hours of EQ time due
- Check to see how you are doing on getting your 6 hours of GT update
Professional Development
- Jan. 2nd: Campus Professional Development 8:30-3:30 - if you are still needing some Sheltered Instruction hours, you will be able to earn what you need for district compliance on our first day back from the Holiday break. We will be working together to review the ELPS and ELL strategies (which are great for every child) to the lesson planning you started on your collaboration day.
- Jan. 5th and 6th: Kasey Smith on campus - please touch base with her on guided reading, reading workshop, writing workshop, and/or Letterland support.
- Jan. 5th: PLC's - PLC's were changed to Thursday this first week back so that we can work with Amber Richards while she was on campus. We will be continuing our work with the problem solving process.
- Jan. 5th: Staff Meeting 3:30 - Working Agenda:
- Daily Official Attendance data collection process and goal
- Progress Monitoring update for Tier 3 and SPED students
- Documentation of Accommodations
- Annual Dyslexia Update
- Jan. 6th: Teachers will observe Amber Richards modeling problem solving with students. We will create a schedule that will allow all teachers to observe Amber modeling problem solving strategies.
- Jan. 11th - PLC
- Jan. 12th: Amber Richards on campus - please schedule to have her come in to model and/or observe you teaching the problem solving process.
- Jan. 12th: VIP Professional Learning Meeting
- Jan. 13th: Writing Training and Scoring: The morning will be training and the afternoon agenda will include time for you to score your Writing Benchmarks. More information will come soon.
Personnel Update
- Please welcome Mr. Beck! He has officially joined Heritage as our STACC aide. You may have seen him in for several weeks as he worked with a friend. :-)
- Jamie has now moved to work in the Life Skills classroom.
- We are working on finding a long term sub for Drina's position. Stay tuned!
Letterland Training and Support Update for K-2 Teachers
The National Letterland Trainer will be visiting our campus on the afternoon of January 9th. The trainers will conduct walkthroughs for about 5-15 minutes each, while jumping in and supporting a teacher with a strategy or observing to coach teachers in the debriefing session. At 3:30 K-2 teachers will have a Q and A session with the National Trainer in the library.
EQ Time – Sign up in Eduphoria - 3:45-4:45
Monday 1/9/17 - Tips and Tricks
Tuesday 1/10/17 - Assessments
Wednesday 1/11/17 - Interventions
More details about January 9th and the Letterland support will be coming soon. Thank you!
Thank you!
- Thanks to those of you who have had Amber Richards in to model and observe you conducting Number Talks. She was so impressed with the Heritage Heroes working hard and continuing high quality teaching and learning right up to the winter break. Way to go!!!
See - Think - Wonder
Thanks to Tori for all the great ideas! Click below if you would like to review and use the information that she shared.