ENSC Family Notes
September 29, 2014
Fall Break Begins Friday
Beginning next Friday, our first break on the extended calendar begins. I hope the weather is "fall like" and our students are able to participate in activities that that they enjoy and are relaxing. The week away from school gives our students an opportunity to relax and get caught up from the daily demands of school and the numerous activities they may be involved in. School will resume on Monday, October 13.
ENEA Hosted School Board Candidate Open Forum
Next School Board Meeting
ENHS Parent Teacher Conferences and Twitter Chat
ENHS is hosting Parent Teacher Conference on Wednesday October 1st from 4:30 – 6:30. Teachers will be spread throughout the main gym to make it convenient for parents to visit several teachers in one evening. Teachers are encouraged to keep the conversations limited in order to accommodate the high number of parents. If you would like to spend more time talking with a specific teacher, you are welcome to make an appointment for a private session at a time convenient to both you and the teacher.
At the same time Parent Teacher Conferences are taking place, ENHS Principal – Steve Peterson will be moderating the first ever East Noble High School Twitter Chat. Parents, students, alum, and anyone interested in ENHS are welcome to use the hashtag #ENHSTC to join in the conversation. Questions will begin at 4:30, and then they will repeat at 5:30 to give folks a chance to jump on and off as time permits. Twitter chat participants do not have to be at ENHS to participate, and can join from anywhere they have access to twitter. This is the first, in what the high school hopes to be a series, of chat nights dedicated to promote communication.
Check out this link for additional Twitter Chat Directions. http://tinyurl.com/ENHSTC
ENMS China Trip
Participants will have the opportunity to visit our partner school, Qingchun Middle School and see the teachers and students who visit ENMS this fall. In addition, they will be touring Beijing, the Great Wall, Shang Hai, visit the Terra Cotta Warriors and other sites. This is an amazing opportunity and a trip of a life time. Our students will experience a culture very different from ours and visit some historical sites that tell about a culture that dates back 4000 years. The price is $3,225 for students and $3,500 for adults. Students are working on fund raising events throughout the school year.
The group would like to have more East Noble people to travel with them. Students of all ages are invited as well as any parents who would like to attend. If you are interested, please contact Andy Deming, ENMS principal at ademing@eastnoble.net.
This Week's All Star is.....
This week’s All Star of the week is from the Alternative Learning Center, Ann Fraze. This is Ann’s third year with East Noble and we are glad she made the decision to join us. Ann is a retired teacher from Carroll High School and fortunately for us she wasn’t ready for retirement yet! Ann is the teacher in our Homebound Program. She is a wonderful asset to our building and students. Any time she has a free moment in her program she immediately comes out and joins in to help students in the ALC program. Her ability to learn from the students while educating the students, should be an inspiration to us all. On a daily basis, students will come and request to work with Mrs. Fraze. One day this week an ALC student stated, “Can I go work with Mrs. Fraze, ‘cause she helps me learn a lot.” This is monumental coming from this student, who when they arrived at the ALC wouldn’t ask anyone for help, which is what caused them to be behind in credits and need our program. Ann Fraze is truly an All-Star in our building and we appreciate what she does for students and our district! Thanks, Ann!
Building and Curriculum Notes
Curriculum
Essential Tech Skill for New Tests
On the new ISTEP and ECA tests scrolling will be an essential skill that students need to master. For younger students in K-4 they need practice with vertical scrolling vs. the swiping movement needed for turning the pages of a digital book. K-4 teachers can help by turning reading passages into PDF and allowing student the opportunity to become accustom to see reading passages as often as possible in this format. Students also need to learn to go back and find things in the text when scrolling is involved.
For students with laptops, we know that the students will have double scrolling columns on the tests. In left column they will see the reading passage and in the right column they will see the questions. Teachers can mirror this by having students open two documents at the same time and snapping them to the center point of the screen. Have students drag the first document to the far right side, almost off the screen, until they see a flash at the top. After the flash if they release the document it will “snap” to the right half of the screen. Taking the second document to the left will snap the document to the left side of the screen. Voila! Now, students can take notes or answer questions while also viewing the reading passage.
The more practice our students have on the new style of questions, the more that our students will have an advantage on the assessments.
Alternative Learning Center
The ALC celebrated College Go Week! throughout the week by having Indiana College Trivia for the AM group and the PM group each day. The students were able to win college themed prizes for answering the trivia questions correctly. Everyone supported their colleges by wearing college gear on Friday. As a closing to College Go Week!, the ALC had a guest speaker from the ASAP program at Ivy Tech, Kim Myers. She discussed college admissions, online classes, the ASAP program, and general information about college. The students had very good questions and were interested in the information she had to share. Incentives for perfect attendance and credits earned is keeping students at school regularly and focused on their academics. It didn’t feel like fall this week outside, but a reminder, Fall Break begins Friday, October 3rd , for students!
Avilla Elementary
OUR students and staff are gearing up for a very exciting week! On Tuesday, OUR students will have the opportunity to be a part of a NED convocation regarding bullying. OUR K-3 students will be going to COLLEGE on Wednesday and OUR 6th graders will be visiting Biz Town. The students and staff have been working very hard in preparation for these trips. We cannot thank OUR families enough for all the help they have been providing us so that these trips can happen. OUR community is supporting us with over 30 family members spending the day with OUR kids for these two trips. On Thursday, we will be hosting Grandparents’ Day! We can’t wait to show OUR grandparents and friends some of the cool things that we do here at Avilla.
We are fortunate to have several community volunteers come into Avilla to read with OUR students. The volunteers are here five days a week and each read for about 20 minutes with several students in grades K-6 that need to have some extra reading help or just need another adult to make a connection with. Some of OUR volunteers have even begun eating lunch with students. The students are enjoying it and have stated that they like having another person to read with!
East Noble High School
English teachers have been working to flip their classrooms for grammar instruction using a variety of online sources including NoRedInk.com. This website provides instant data to teachers and students on a variety of topics relating to writing conventions. This is an exciting addition to the 6+1 lessons and activities we have already been implementing throughout the year.
After attending workshops at Region 8 on Depth of Knowledge and Close Reading, we have also been modifying tests and classroom activities to include questions that reach levels 3 and 4 within the DOK range. Students are also learning strategies for Close Reading that will help students learn to use their critical thinking skills in addition to improving scores on the new test this year. Opportunities are provided for students to practice this kind of close reading online through the use of PARCC.
Some 11th grade classes are studying Huck Finn and were asked to delve deeply into a topic about slavery. They were asked to find 1st hand accounts and incorporate those into their presentations. We then did a walk about and viewed everyone’s presentations at our own pace. Here is a wonderful example: https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=75FA08DC098C32B4!3732&authkey=!AI1ke3pRq1MPLLc&ithint=video%2cmp4
Some classes are working on poetry projects where the students will be the teachers. Each group will prepare a lesson and activity on their assigned poetry terms and techniques. They will teach their lesson and give a quiz afterwards to see how effective their lesson was.
After reading Tuesdays with Morrie, some 10 Honors classes have worked diligently on a persuasive essay/project to entice others in a challenge to support of their chosen organization (similar to the Ice Bucket Challenge). Students are showing great improvement in their persuasive writing, use of media/technology, and listening/speaking skills. Their challenges have been amazing! Each class will vote on one challenge to participate in and actually collect donations and raise awareness for that organization.
East Noble Middle School
It is College Go Week at the middle school. In addition to spirit dress days, students worked on activities that asked them to explore high school and college classes that match their personal and career interests, to understand the difference in high school diplomas, and how to plan and pay for college. Parents can also learn about the opportunities that are available by going to the website LEARNMOREINDIANA.org.
Items sold for the Club Choice fundraiser were sent home with students on Wednesday. Students need to deliver items and collect the money. Money is due to school no later than Thursday, October 2.
Believe it or not, Thursday, October 2, is the last day of our first grading period. Grade cards will go home with students on Wednesday, October 15. Parent teacher conferences will be held on Thursday, October 16, in our gymnasium from 4:30 – 6:30 P.M. This is a wonderful opportunity for parents to meet and talk with all the teachers.
All 7th grade language arts classes are reading The Hunger Games and discussing what a dystopian society is like. Science classes on the orange team are wrapping up their study of the Earth structure, plate tectonics, and volcanoes. Students will begin exploring rocks and minerals in the upcoming weeks as they apply their knowledge to what they can find in their own backyards. Math classes are preparing for the first round of Acuity which will occur when they return from fall break. Everyone is anxious to see how the test has changed and what we will need to focus on for the rest of the year. Mrs. Allison Joy, 7th grade orange team social studies teacher, will return following fall break after spending time with her new baby girl. We will say good-bye to Mr. James Gardner, who did a wonderful job with our students. We wish him in success in his next endeavor.
Don’t forget to come out and support ENMS sports teams. Volleyball, football, and cross country are still going strong!
North Side Elementary
This week at North Side was all business as primary students wrapped up taking mClass assessments to measure their ability in reading and math and intermediate grades are preparing for the Acuity assessments. Staff at North Side use these assessments to inform their instruction and deliver purposeful lessons. Analysis of assessment data is an important part of the North Side culture.
Students are looking forward to this coming week as there are three exciting events. On Tuesday the Ned Show is coming to NSE to teach about building character and dealing with bullying. Also on Tuesday the sixth graders are heading off to Biztown as they learn how life in the "real" world is. Wednesday is a big day with all K thru third grade students visiting Huntington University as a part of the Walk Into My Future campaign. A big thank you to the Noble County Promise initiative and Huntington University for helping make this exciting trip a reality for our kids
Rome City Elementary
Rome City was full of college talk this week. Flags were hung all throughout the building to finally give the building a college feel. Afterschool on Monday staff members and parents worked together to hang flags. Tuesday morning students came in the building with big smiles on their faces. College was definitely the talk as we started our day.
Kindergarten students went to Orchard Farm on Friday. The students had a wonderful time learning about apples and all of the things they can make with apples.
On Wednesday Miss Haley from the Limberlost Public Library came to first grade to help make some ooey gooey science. The first graders learned about what happens when solids and liquids are mixed, along with using their 5 senses for the experiment. They had a great time, even if it got a little messy. Here is a quick video of the great time we had.
South Side Elementary
South Side’s National Elementary Honor Society raised $987 for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society through their Light the Night fundraising. Our top money raisers were Walker Leamon with $100, Cole Schupbach with $125, Lacie Stanley with $220, and Drew Sillaway with $295. Also walking with the team Tuesday night were: Holly Butler, Sydney Miller, Alondra Loera-Gomez, Hayley Kline, Spencer Denton, Canaan Gamble, Brenda Rodriguez, Hannah Hartman, Sophia Gruszczyk, Andrew Johnson, Jasmine Evers, and Katie Clark. Great job, Trailblazers!
Our grade level update this week comes from 2nd Grade: We are excited to have our iPads up and running! Second graders have been using Show Me lessons to sort their spelling words and take their test at the end of the week. We also had a second grade Sumdog contest this week. All three second grade classes competed against each other.
Students in second grade have been learning how to respond appropriately to a blog. We used paper blog posts before getting iPads. The students practiced responding to a blog by writing a specific comment or compliment, making a connection with the writer, and engaging in a conversation by asking the blogger a question. Students are now starting to use Kidblog to share their ideas with each other.
Wayne Center Elementary
Fourth graders at Wayne Center have been working hard learning about statistics and how to track data during Math. Students have been given a player from their college football team that they will be tracking throughout the whole season. They are looking at rushing yards, field goals, passing yards, and much more! As we collect the data, we are discussing different trends that we see. When the season wraps up, students will work on creating graphs to represent their data and be able to analyze it!
To top it off, the students also wrote friendly letters to their football players. They got to tell the players all about our project and everything we are learning about at school. We can’t wait to hear back from them!
We were excited to have receive our iPads this week! Students were so ready to start exploring new apps! We are working hard to learn how to be a good, responsible digital citizens!
East Noble School Corporation
Email: alinson@eastnoble.net
Website: eastnoble.net
Location: 126 West Rush Street, Kendallville, IN, United States
Phone: 260-347-2502
Facebook: facebook.com/eastnoble
Twitter: @ENobleSchCorp