Head U Gator News
October 1, 2017
Grateful Heart
I am grateful for...
...Michael Maupin, for continuing to coordinate the Watch DOGS program. He took this on voluntarily and it is a great help for all of us.
....Kelly Jenkins (Arnold's long-term sub), Christina Hayes, Jayne Williky, Becca Adams, Devin Gardner and Cindy Felker who all pitched in to help get our first Lunch With the principal up and rolling Friday.
...Terri Freyou, whom we completely surprised and overwhelmed Friday when we showed up for LWP with no advance notice (Whoops!). She graciously welcomed us, helped us with the movie, and endured the ground-in crumbs in the library rug with grace!
....Jon Isaacs. (Yes, I know he doesn't work here anymore!) Jon came over Friday afternoon to help Devin with a few things and helped set up the webcam for the butterflies in 4th grade.
...Donna Waters for being cheerful about having to move her classroom in the middle of the year! Donna's allergies have impacted her health and so we've relocated her to room 209 for the rest of the year in the hopes that a change of rooms will eliminate some of the issues she's having.
Gatorville
I'll need to have selections ready for students by the 5th of October, so I need to have your class ideas by Tuesday at the latest. I know I need someone to supervise chess because Will is doing something different, so if you know anything about chess there's a ready-made class for you!
Lunch with principal feedback
We had conversations with students on Friday when they came into LWP. All of them could identify a goal they had set, which is good. When questioned further, however, the goal setting was uneven. For example, one student said his goal was "winning his soccer game." That's not really an appropriate goal for this purpose! Others were "have no incompleted work each week" "Read a specific book this month" "complete 100 acts of kindness" etc. which were very appropriate.
As your students work on writing goals, please talk with them about writing measurable goals and keeping data on their goal. Devise a process for talking with them about their progress, and keeping track of how they are doing on their goals. Lunch with the Principal can be a very powerful tool for teaching students the importance of goal setting, data collection and measuring achievements against a pre-determined standard. Or it will become a joke for the kids if they realize you aren't invested in the process of writing and measuring how they are doing on their goals.
If you have good examples of measurable goals students wrote last month, please share them in this form so that others can see them and help their students get better in their goal writing: https://goo.gl/forms/zdXKWT5bJ9Rqj1Jv2 I repeated the question so you can share as many as 6 or as few as 1. It will help your teammates and others if you share quality examples!
Student voice
Many of you have already incorporated some student voice into your regular practices, but I will be regularly prodding and highlighting examples to keep it visible for us during the year.
If you try something that works really well, please let me or Jeanette know so that we can share it with others. A Google form, a question or an activity that you design that gets more student input are just some of the examples you might share.
Here's a one question google form you can add to your drive (make a copy first, then add to my drive) and send to me when you remember to share something you tried. https://goo.gl/forms/oMldEw8W3IiYyA3g1
Progress Reports
You need to have their grades/standards entered in by Monday at midnight for Wednesday's progress reports.
Metro Tex Grants
Do you and your student leaders have a great idea that could benefit all the students in your school? If so we have an opportunity to help make it reality. The MetroTex Association of REALTORS® is offering grants in the amount of $3,000 to fund four school projects within our service area.
MetroTex Association of REALTORS® is a professional trade Association representing over 17,000 REALTOR® and Affiliate members who live and work in the North Central Texas Region. Our members support the communities they live and sell in, and understand that our future lies in our community's youth. With this in mind, we are proud to offer this opportunity for students and faculty to develop a proposal for a grant that will assist our local schools in various projects.
We are offering four $3,000 grants to fund projects that will be a permanent part of your school. The proposal for the funding should be a student driven project that with the help of the administration and faculty will be a benefit to the entire student body. MetroTex Association of REALTORS® would like the opportunity to name the finished project.
The application deadline is October 31, 2017 and the selections will be made in November. The project must be completed within one year of receipt of the funds. We hope that you will allow us to support the school districts in North Texas by completing the online grant application.
Teacher look at STAAR parent portal
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.
printers
Calendar
Monday, October 2
Stomp out bullying- wear jeans and Blue tops
Tuesday, October 3
CMT
Wednesday, October 4
Choir
Thursday, October 5
Friday, October 6
No students- professional learning. Here's the link to the proposed schedule: https://docs.google.com/a/gcisd.net/document/d/1v7i3dq-el0udhmd1q9dxGAp22bgvav0Uu2TYOWU8H64/edit?usp=sharing