Bailey Bear News
November/December 2017
BSE recognized as a REWARD SCHOOL for Performance by the State of TN!!!!
We are excited to be recognized as a Reward School for Performance by the State of Tennessee. This honor goes to all the hard work the teachers and staff at BSE put in every day to make sure that our students are prepared academically and to our community of parents and students who support what we do as a school and work so hard to grow and learn every day! AT BSE our kids come first no matter what and that culture supports the hard work we do every day!
Here is a part of what the commissioner said:
NASHVILLE — Education Commissioner Candice McQueen announced Tennessee's 2017 Reward schools today, which include the top 5 percent of schools for academic achievement and the top 5 percent for student growth. These 169 schools span 60 districts across Tennessee.
"These schools represent what is possible for students in Tennessee as they exemplify excellence in performance or progress and in some cases, both," Commissioner McQueen said. "We want to replicate this success across the state and continue to celebrate the hard work of our educators and students happening in classrooms every day." Of the 2017 Reward schools, 59 are being recognized for performance, 85 are recognized for progress, and 25 schools are Reward schools both for performance and progress. The complete list of Reward schools is below and is also posted on the department's website.
Only 59 schools were recognized for performance! That is a huge honor for all of us and the hard work that has been put in every day in K-5. We started this journey about 5 years ago. We looked at our practices, met with other grades to look at vertical alignment, got rid of lessons that we had done for years, looked at writing and started in Kindergarten to improve our writing skills, learned how to read data better and conduct PLC's so that they are about the students, made sure that we are actually teaching to the rigor of the standards and creating lessons that engage our students....and the list goes on! We are now looking at making sure that our students have a growth mindset and can learn to persevere no matter how hard learning might look to them! I am very proud of our school and cannot thank everyone enough for sticking with me and doing the hard work. We will continue on the course we are on because we were never about taking the "test", we were about students learning and it worked!
We celebrated as a school on November 10th! The school provided breakfast donuts from Donut Hutt and lunch from MOE's for our teachers and staff. We celebrated our status as a reward school and all 5's in growth!
Commissioner Candice McQueen explains the new TNReady results
NASHVILLE—Education Commissioner Candice McQueen announced TNReady results for students in grades 3-8 today, following an extended scoring and review process led by Tennessee educators. With these results, elementary and middle school students have set a new baseline for future growth, now aligned with our high school reset last year, based on the Tennessee academic standards that will better ensure all students are on track for the next step in their education journey.
TNReady results help teachers, students, and parents learn about students' strengths and areas for growth, and it provides specific feedback that can help parents understand how they can best support their child. TNReady replaces the old TCAP and is better aligned to Tennessee's academic standards, which were developed and set based on a comprehensive review process. It looks for what students know and are able to do in each grade, with a particular focus on students' problem solving, critical thinking, and writing skills.
"TNReady allows us to see how Tennessee students are mastering our state's academic standards as we transition to higher expectations at all grade levels," McQueen said. "Students have now set a new baseline for future growth that reflects the higher bar we are holding for all of our students. This is a key moment for our state, as we are now transitioning to the point where we have a true understanding of where students are from elementary through high school, and we can use that information to better support their growth."
Overall, students' performance on TNReady reflects the readiness they show on national tests like the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP), which is known as the Nation's Report Card and is a gold standard for assessments. In previous years, Tennessee's TCAP results did not match what exams like NAEP and the ACT showed, which earned the state an "F" from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 2007 for "Truth in Advertising" about students' true readiness. The 2017 TNReady results reflect a similar level of performance to what Tennessee sees on national exams, and we know more students are now going on to be successful in college and the workplace.
TNReady scores fall into one of four achievement levels: mastered, on track, approaching, and below grade-level expectations. The new categories aim to help teachers and parents more easily identify which students may need additional support and which students are ready to excel—which is the goal of state assessments. Along with the new achievement levels, families and teachers will receive new score reports to help them support each student's individual needs.
This was the first year of TNReady for grades 3-8, and achievement results for English and math cannot be compared to prior TCAP scores. Instead, they set a new baseline for future growth.
Student Testing results to be coming home soon!
TNReady Score Report for Parents
Bailey Bear Boogie was a great success! Thank you PTA!!!!
BSE received $13,000 for school grants from Collierville Education Foundation!
Terry Henson, Julie Meluskey, Crystal Williams, Jennifer Boren, Misty Barnhart, Angela Pearson and Ashely Neugebauer!
Veteran's Day Program at BSE!
Veteran's Day at BSE
Veteran's Day at BSE
Kelli McClain and her Grandfather
Growth Mindset for Parents
We will continue our school book study using the book, Mindsets in the Classroom! One of the hardest parts for parents and teachers is understanding that failure is a part of learning! Students learn from failure to reflect and redirect so that they can approach a challenging task in a new way or with more effort! We have many parents that are just looking at grades and believe if their child does not make A's and B's that they are not good students. Children do not all learn at the same time and in the same way. When a summative is given in class the teacher has spent time and effort teaching the concepts on the summative and has differentiated to help reach the students in their class as well as working in small groups and one on one with students. Some students will do well on the summative and some will not. Those that did not do well are just not at mastery level yet but will get there! The grade should not define the student! The effort the student continues to put in to learn the subject matter that is difficult should be praised!