The Tiger Times
Week of October 2 through October 6
Hello Tiger Family!
Happy Sunday!
I hope you've had a wonderful weekend! With the exception of Tech and Dallas football (boo), mine has been filled with laughter, love and making memories with my family as we celebrated the marriage of someone in our adopted family.
I had no idea really, until this weekend, just how much of an impact I'd had on this very special young woman. And that impact wasn't because of some grand gesture at some point in time but many small moments over the years that hadn't seemed that significant to me at the time. But they were significant to her.
That's the thing about being in a position to have such an impact on someone's life. We just never really know how what we say or do today will change that person's trajectory forever, even if in a small way. All of this made me think of a video that tells one of my favorite "remember why you get out of bed, Shelley" stories.
And it made me think of you and the impact you're having each and every day on each and every one of your students. It's a huge responsibility but such a huge gift. We change the world...not just someone's today but also their tomorrow:)
Blessed and blissed to be your principal,
Shelley
Looking Back on Week 6
2nd Grade Circle Up Builds Community
Big Leaders Meets Little Leaders!
Lead Measures Lead to Reaching Our Goals
Important Dates
10/2 Tiger U - Paraprofessionals only in Learning Commons at 3:30
10/2 New Kinder and 3rd Grade Meet the Teacher 5:30-6:30
10/3-4 Vision & Hearing Screening
10/3 Extended PLC for Second Grade
10/4 Regular PLC time for 1st Grade
10/5 Extended PLC for Kinder
10/5 Sunshine Gathering at Rio Mamba 4:30
10/6 Campus PD 8:00 - 4:00
Upcoming dates:
10/9 Staff Holiday - wheeeeeeeeeeeee!
10/13 Picture Day and Dad's Campout
Happy Birthday!! We're Glad You Were Born!!
10/5 Claudia Montemayor
10/7 Rocio MontaƱo
Welcome New Members of Team Tiger!!
And not new to us but in a new role, Lala Hines will be joining our SPED/RISE team beginning Monday. Talk about a WIN-WIN!! Be sure to introduce yourself to Julia, our new daytime campus facilities lead. You'll recognize her right away because she might just be the tallest Tiger team member we have!
Abbe Laessig
LaLa Hines
Tori Tyson
Shining Our Light on Relationships
We all know in our hearts that building ongoing relationships with our students is the right thing to do and spend time on. But what does the research say about this? John Hattie synthesized over 800 studies focusing on student learning!! He identified the things we do in classrooms and the impact they have on student learning and success in schools. Using strategies with "effect sizes" of .4 or greater is what is recommended in order to get the most bang for our buck (effort, time, sweat and tears:). Student-teacher relationships have an effect size of .72!! That is a HUGE impact that falls completely within our circles of influence!
The Leader in Me - Habit 2: Begin with the End in MInd
"Your most important work is always ahead of you, never behind you." -Dr. Stephen R. Covey
If your ladder is not leaning against the right wall, every step you take gets you to the wrong place faster. Habit 2 is based on imagination--the ability to envision in your mind what you cannot at present see with your eyes. It is based on the principle that all things are created twice. There is a mental (first) creation, and a physical (second) creation. The physical creation follows the mental, just as a building follows a blueprint. If you don't make a conscious effort to visualize who you are and what you want in life, then you empower other people and circumstances to shape you and your life by default. It's about connecting again with your own uniqueness and then defining the personal, moral, and ethical guidelines within which you can most happily express and fulfill yourself.
One of the best ways to incorporate Habit 2 into your life is to develop a Personal Mission Statement. It focuses on what you want to be and do. It is your plan for success. It reaffirms who you are, puts your goals in focus, and moves your ideas into the real world. Your mission statement makes you the leader of your own life. You create your own destiny and secure the future you envision.
Connections: What relationship does Habit 2 have with our campus focus on Learning Targets? How do you grow this Habit in your students?
Nuts and Bolts is our "virtual faculty meeting". Please read all information carefully and reach out if you have any questions or need clarification.
If you are out for personal leave, ill or for professional development, please make sure to leave clear Sub Plans with directions for where students go at dismissal.
Extend PLCs are coming up! Please make sure you work with Daniela about what you need to do to get subs secured for your class. She will be sending an email with all the information you need about extended PLCs!!
Irene will be checking BOY data in Eduphoria. Please make sure all BOY data has been entered. The deadline for completing BOY assessments was Friday, September 29th.
Jade sent out an updated duty schedule last week. There are some adjustments she made to duty times and locations to better ensure the safety of our students. If you have any questions about your duty start time or location, please reach out to Jade and she'll be happy to get those answered for you!
From our KidzU coordinator: KidzU always has camps for student holidays/teacher PD days. There is a one-time registration fee for the 2017-2018 year of $25 dollars. Camp days available from 6:30 A.M. to 6:30 P.M. for $24. Once a teacher has their child registered with KidzU they also have the option to use us for any day a teacher may work late or have meetings. The'Drop-In' rate for teachers on a school day is $20. This offer is available for GCISD employees only! Please remember district guidelines don't allow for us to have our children at school during work days, PD days, etc.
In conjunction with the upcoming Global Math Week, Prodigy is hosting an in-district tournament for all 1st through 8th grade math classes that will run from October 1 through November 16. The prize for the winning school is a trophy and bragging rights . The prize for the winning class is a pizza party on November 17! Prodigy swag will also be delivered to the 1st and 2nd place classes. Jennifer Hylemon will send a printable flyer to teachers directly with this same information, since the teacher's class code will be needed. Watch the #gcisdmath Twitter feed for updates during the tournament!
Eduphoria will be unavailable October 6th-8th as it undergoes an update. Please do not plan to utilize Eduphoria during this time. If it becomes available before the 9th, a notice will be sent out.
Flex Deadline: Since Eduphoria will be undergoing updates on October 6-8, the deadline for Flex modules to be completed has been extended to Monday, October 16 for most employees. The courses for late hires need to be completed within 60 days of the start of their contract.
Technology - Special Ed classroom and Student Device Request: In order to help ensure we are providing the necessary devices for our special needs students, the Technology and Special Ed department have created the following process. If a student is in need of a device change (i.e: needs an iPad instead of Chromebook), that request must first go through Claudia Wyngaarde. She will collect the needed information and have access to a Special Ed ticket within the help desk to request these devices. The same would be if the additional technology is needed in the classroom as well. By following this process, it will ensure that the Special Education department is aware of the need and validates that it meets the proper requirements before a device is placed or switched out.
STAAR Parent Portal Access For Educators: Have you received any questions or comments recently about the brand new TexasAssessment.com website or the data portal that was made available to families regarding their children's performance on STAAR? Are you curious about what parents are experiencing on the site so you can help answer any questions or concerns they may have?
The Texas Education Agency has just released sample parent credentials so that educators across the state can take a look at what family members and students are experiencing on the brand new TexasAssessment.com. Click the following link to see a list of credentials for multiple grades and subjects and use them to login to the student/parent portal below.
It's also possible that parents might come to initial parent-teacher conferences with their child's STAAR results top-of-mind. To help with this, we've also released an FAQ 1-pager to help you answer some of parents' most commonly asked questions about their child's test scores. It will help you have a more meaningful discussion with parents and help them to understand what their child's score means, and how to use information from the STAAR test to support their child at home.
Volunteers - All volunteers will check in at the office and then head to the Parent Center. Marie-France needs to be able to document who our volunteers are throughout the year. If these are visitors who work directly with a student - PALS, tutors, etc.- they will go on to classrooms from there. If they are working on materials -cutting out lamination, making copies, ToT prep, etc.- they will either work in the Parent Center or in the TES workroom. Volunteers doing this don't work in classrooms due to FERPA considerations and also to protect learning time. Please provide clear instructions along work you'd like volunteers to do so Marie-France knows exactly what you need completed and how you'd like it done. In order to protect student learning time, she doesn't want to interrupt your teaching time to clarify.
Smart Snacks in Schools: Guidelines for Foods and beverages provided and sold during the school day: All food items and beverages provided to students in grades Pre-K to 8 during the school day must meet USDA Smart Snack guidelines. Exceptions include exempt days limited to 5 event and 6 fundraising days per campus and school year. During these exempt days, food and beverages that are provided and/or sold to students may not be done so in competition with breakfast and/or lunch service. In addition, the items should not be consumed in areas where reimbursable meals are sold and or consumed.
The following new district information will be provided to parents this week regarding birthday celebrations and food. This is a GCISD guideline. Please click here to read this important information and plan to include in your upcoming newsletters with this distinction.
Please click here to sign the virtual faculty meeting sign -in sheet for the Nuts and Bolts information this week!
Eye of the Tiger!
Thank you Heather for helping me find specific strategies to help a student with reading fluency. -Kari
Stephanie, Lacey, Kari, Zoila, Yesenia, and Rocio for being a great "safety net" for Abbe as she joined the team last week. We know she's in good hands! -Shelley and Jade
Thank you Lisa B. for helping me get a student to the cafeteria for lunch this week. -Kari
Melissa, Nancy, Jeyleen, Yessica, and Haley - you have done a fantastic job of modeling for Tori the importance of teamwork and how kinder "lives" it. -Shelley and Jade
A great big THANK YOU to Lisa Brisendine, Audra Harms, and Mariana Portillo for coming out to be trained as dismissal texters! You all look great!--Irene
Julie, thank you for being a teacher whose room you can accidentally walk into with another principal and the learning doesn't change one bit. -Shelley
Thank you Gabriella Garcia for doing an amazing job at morning duty and being prompt. I appreciate you! - Jade
Thank you very much Candace, Sloan, Nancy, Camille, Valeska, Maritza, Stephanie, Jennifer, Rachael, Haley, Britt, Lacey and Robert for representing Timberline so strongly during the first instructional rounds. You are the hilltop dancers! -Shelley
Ms Huda, thank you so much for attending a parent conference after school. -Jade
Jade, Daniela and Shelley, thank you for spending your morning making our morning! With all the business of school and life, you took your time to brighten our morning with sparkly soda, smiles, and the music on Tuesday. . THANk YOU! We totally enjoyed our soft drinks! -Second grade team
Kari, thank you for providing feedback on the feedback :) Your feedback helped us get better at.....well, giving feedback!! -Shelley
Shout out to Gaby and Sloan: "Torres has a GREAT class! VERY well behaved and engaged. Can't wait to come back!" -one of our subs last week
Candace - Awesome job joining a 2nd grade humanities collaboration group and volunteering to host the first meeting at TES! -Daniela
Thank you, Lighthouse Team, for staying late Tuesday thinking about ways to support teachers and spread the Leader in Me to more kids! -Shelley
Ways and Where the Tigers Tell Our Timberline Story
Email: firstname.lastname@gcisd.net
Website: http://www.gcisd-k12.org/Domain/2032
Location: 3220 Timberline Drive, Grapevine, TX, United States
Phone: 817-251-5770
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TESleads/
Twitter: @TimberlineNews