Monday Morning Message
Week of March 4, 2019
We have another big event coming up on Thursday evening with Wellness Night from 6:00-7:30. I know many of you have offered to help Alyssa fill volunteer spots. Thank you so much! At last glance, I believe we still have a few stations in need of an extra set of hands. Let Alyssa know if you are available.
- Eagle students take 1st and 2nd place at the region science fair competition this weekend!! Off to State! Pictured above to the right are our 4th graders who competed including Olivia and Arleen (1st place) and Mina (2nd place). Way to go!
Newsletter at a glance:
- Spheres of Influence and Control/PLC/Upcoming PD Work
- Dates
- Teacher of the Year Nomination
- Disability Awareness Week
- Book Room Spring Cleaning
- Think Tank Opportunities
- PLC Dates and Plans
Have a great week!
PLCs and upcoming Professional Development with Dr. Stephanie Loane
Interested in seeing what other grade levels have discussed or refreshing your memory from your own grade level's PLC? Check out this shared document that Beth and Molly put together to capture our conversations. The graphic above is the one that we have used over the past couple of weeks and serves as a nice personal and professional reminder for me.
The link here is a working draft of the moving pieces for the day, including some shifts for related arts team members. I'll update details as we get closer.
Upcoming Dates
March 4-8 - Disability Awareness Week (More information below)
March 4 - ILEARN Mtg in Design Lab @ 2:45 (3rd, 4th and SPED); 1st Grade Field Trip to NIFS
March 5 - No Staff Meeting (Rescheduled to March 12)
March 7 - Wellness Night 6:00-7:30
March 12 - Staff Meeting @ 2:35 w/ Dr. Stephanie Loane (See info below)
March 14 - 4th Grade ZWest Transition day 9:30-11:00, 1/2 Day PD Sessions (See info below)
March 19 - Staff Share @2:45
March 21 RtI Check ins
March 22 - 4th Grade Dad's Club Breakfast @7:15; Eagle Play Dress Rehearsal for student body 9:15-10:15 (Switch Thursday and Friday RA Schedule)
March 26 - PTO @ 1:15
March 29-April 5 - Spring Break!
April 10 - Kindergarten Round-Up 12:00-6:30
May 15 - STEM Night 6:00-7:30
Teacher of the Year Nomination
Each spring, we pause to recognize those among us who represent the very best in our profession. Please take a few moments this week to honor a colleague (or more than one, if you so choose) who is worthy of being nominated as Eagle Elementary's Teacher of the Year. All nominations will be shared with staff next the week of March 18 for voting.
Click here to nominate a deserving colleague!
Disability Awareness Week
Zionsville has recently partnered with Special Olympics to become a Unified Champion School District. Unified Champion Schools is a 12 week program focused on providing different physical activities leading to improved fitness and skills to students in preschool through 8th grade with Intellectual Disabilities. The goal of Unified Champion Schools is for all students to be afforded equality, access, opportunity, respect, and acceptance. Unified Champion Schools focuses on the commitment to all students, throughout the course of their development, to participate in physical education and activity that promotes learning, achievement, and enjoyment.
This year ZCS will host the Preschool Unified event on April 26th at PVE. There will be a morning and afternoon session. Students that attend Developmental Preschool at Eagle, West, and PVE will be bused to PVE and participate with partners from UP classrooms.
The theme for Disability Awareness Week this year is “To Include.” We will have announcements each day during the week to share special messages. The announcements on Wednesday and Thursday provide instructions for students (and staff) to sign banners that remind students of their pledge “To Include.” (The week's announcements are on the document below)
We will also be sending home flyers on Monday, the 4th sharing information about Crazy Hair/Hat Day. On Friday, March 8, students and staff can wear Crazy Hair or a Hat of their choice to school that day. A $1 donation is appreciated if you are able. If our school raises at least $250 we will be a Special Olympics Unified Champion Banner school and will receive a Banner to display proudly in your building!!
Book Room Spring Cleaning
It’s time to re-inventory the book sets we have in the “book rooms” around the building! Our teams are carefully thinking about which books will be the most engaging for book clubs and for libraries, which shows how much we value student voice and choice. With new grants being requested and funded, it will be important for us to critically take a look at the many book sets we currently have in the book room (library) and in the third and fourth grade storage area. We have closets, shelves, and baskets full of partial/full book sets in both areas that will support clubs for all grades. Some were purchased for particular classes, some were purchased by teachers no longer teaching at EE, some were purchased for the book room specifically, some were cleaned out of back room storage areas and relocated years ago, and some were purchased with our own personal dollars. Because storage is becoming tight, and it is important for us to be responsible stewards of our existing resources, we must work together to determine what we no longer are using and make some room the new resources we are finding to be more valuable.
Each team will be given a specific color of post it note (ex/ third grade = teal). Before spring break, we are asking that each team work together to really spend some time in the book room (library) and book storage (3/4 storage). If your team determines that a particular text set is one that you’ve used in the last year or two please write the title on the post it and mark it with a “+” indicating that it is one that is frequently used in our rotations. If you notice a book set your team has NEVER used please mark it with at “-“ indicating that it should be listed on our consideration for movement. **Nothing will be thrown away, distributed into classroom libraries, or given away at this time – this is just our first step into improving our resource spaces.**
Once we have the sticky notes completed I (Beth Brent) will take all the sticky notes and compile a list of book sets in three columns. One that lists books heavy in our rotation, books that are infrequently used (but used some), and books that don’t get used anymore. From there we will make plans as a team on what to do with the infrequent and unused books.
THIS DOES NOT INCLUDE THE SHORT GUIDED READING BOOKS IN THE ZIP LOCK BAGS in the library book room that are leveled by guided reading level and sorted by topic or level. We can tackle/rearrange those to fit needs at a later point in time if needed. Our focus now are the MANY book sets that are used for book clubs or small groups.
Beth Brent
PLC Corner
Reminder: we are switching the Thursday and Friday RA schedule to accommodate the Eagle Play dress rehearsal on Friday. Therefore RtI check ins for grades 1-4 will be on Thursday and Kindy will be on Friday.
- 3/8 - No PLC
- 3/15 - No PLC (We will have just had our 1/2 day PD the day before)
- 3/21 (This is a Thursday) - RtI/MTSS Check in 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th
Kindy (Alternating Thursdays):
- 3/7 - (Identifying Data Trends, part II)
- 2/22 (This is a Friday) - RtI/MTSS Check in
Future Think Tank Opportunities
- First, here is the link to the recorded Think Tank from before winter break. The sound is excellent!
- Talk with your team and sign up here!!!
MTSS (Multi Tiered Systems of Support) for Behavior
Diane will be our point person and first layer of support. As we move through the process, teachers will have the opportunity to bring the students in need to our MTSS Team for further collaboration, support, and brainstorming.