Hilcher Herald
GES Staff Update-Week of 9/14/15
Curriculum Showcase
Thank you for your hard work and efforts to share information with our parents on Thursday night. I received positive feedback from many parents as they were leaving. They definitely appreciated the information they received and liked the format this year. Please be sure to attach your presentations to your weekly parent newsletters on Monday so your families have access to the information you shared. Thanks again for making our Curriculum Showcase a success!
Pep Talk
Learning Teams
In order to get a head start on Tuesday's time, please preview the Blendspace in our Google classroom. Please watch one of the posted video clips, read over one of the articles and preview one of the graphics. *Make sure you've joined our Google classroom prior to Tuesday afternoon at classroom.google.com using class code 672bx5. See Nancy Hale if you have any problems accessing our GES faculty & staff classroom.
Friendly Reminders
- Fridays will be jeans days for those wearing GES shirts or Rachel's Challenge shirts. Special spirit days are the exception. If you have a jeans pass, feel free to wear whatever shirt you'd like...no spirit shirt required!
- If you have students working in the hallways, please remind them they must stay close by and your door should remain propped open for monitoring purposes.
- The GES Campus Calendar should be added to your gmail calendars. Please check it regularly! See Josh or Nancy if you need assistance with adding this calendar.
Supervision Expectations
Supervision of Students – For student safety, under no circumstances should a classroom or students be left unsupervised. If a teacher needs to leave a group of students, or even one student, you must prop your classroom door open and ask the teacher next door to supervise students in your absence. The teacher next door must prop her door open as well and stand where he/she can physically monitor both classrooms at once. Never leave a student in charge of a classroom.
- Students are not to be sent to classrooms unattended or left alone in the classroom and/or hallway to finish work. If a student(s) is working in the hallway the student must be in close proximity to the classroom door, and your door must be propped open where you can physically monitor student(s) while they work outside.
Where We Will Be...
I want you all to be aware of the office staff and leadership team's whereabouts as much as possible. I will do my best to list where we will be each week. Here is our week:
Heather off campus Sept. 14 at 11:30
Kim Ray off campus the morning of Sept. 15 ; Sept. 16-afternoon (DMAC training)
Angela off campus Sept. 15
Liz out Sept. 16 for principal’s meeting
Heather off campus Sept. 16 at 12:30
Angela off campus Sept. 17 for Counseling PLC
Robin will be off campus on Sept. 18
Flu Shots
Please consider getting a flu shot this year. We want to keep all of our GES faculty, staff and students as healthy as possible. Flu shots will be offered at GES on Friday, 10/9 7am-10am. Please see the attachments to this email for more information.
Information sheets can be found within our Faculty & Staff Google Folder~Health & Safety folder. https://drive.google.com/a/gcisd.net/folderview?id=0B_KDSCrTvc9XfmRKRGNUMDZabjZJU0RsMGpRTWk3eGZJenV6ZDl4NC1yU0xJX1R3NXJvMHM&usp=sharing
Attendance Reminders
Telling our Story
Nancy Hale is working very hard to update our GES website. Please be sure that your personal pages are updated. Please update your personal & contact information, remove old links and deactivate pages that aren't relevant to your class this year.
Parent Newsletter
Dismissal
If you are out front, please do your part at dismissal to keep students and parents from crossing in front of the car riders. It has been much smoother when teachers/staff remind car riders to sit quietly and to listen for their names. When you hear me call for Liz Hilcher, please look at the H line and if little Liz isn't getting up, please look/ask for Liz Hilcher. This will speed up our dismissal process immensely. Thanks for your help!
Duty Times
Literacy Symposium Information
Upcoming Dates
Tuesday, 9/15 Learning Teams-instructional staff only (3:00pm in the LIBRARY)
Thursday, 9/17 PTA meeting & Spaghetti Dinner (6:30pm)
Monday, 9/21-Friday, 9/25 Scholastic News money collected (more info to follow)
Wednesday, 9/23 Dyslexia Training for all instructional staff-(3:00pm in the LIBRARY)
Friday, 9/25 GES Rachel's Challenge Rally
Tuesday, 9/29 Campus Excellence Committee (3:00pm)
Friday, 10/9 Flu shots offered at GES (7am-10am in the Science Lab)
Monday, 10/12 Student Holiday; Campus Professional Learning Day at GES
Friday, 10/16 PTA's GLOW DANCE! (6:30-8:30pm)
GCISD Book Challenge Updates
Updates from Dr. Newell: (sent in an email last week)
I'm writing to send you a friendly update/reminder about the launch of our GCISD Book Challenge. By now, you know your students and are hopefully establishing some routines for independent reading. If you have not yet launched the 2015-16 Book Challenge, please do so! Here is the link to all the resources you'll need:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B0Pjat6z0vkVWlJuWHpfa196dm8
A couple of updates/reminders for you:
1. The folder now contains updated, translated Spanish parent communication documents for both the 25 Book Challenge and the 100 Book Challenge. Please distribute these as you see fit.
2. The folder also contains the letter we started using last year pertaining to struggling readers. The MAIN OBJECTIVES of this book challenge is to help students fall in love with reading and to feel successful with the books they choose. Teachers are STRONGLY encouraged to adjust the Book Challenge (discreetly) for students who struggle in reading in order to provide a pathway to success for ALL students. There is a letter to this effect in both the English and Spanish folders.
3. The document entitled "2015-16 Book Challenge Flyer" contains all of the basic ground rules for the book challenge. The genre recommendations are just that. If teachers wish to adjust them according to the needs of their classroom, I do not need to "bless" this change. However, it's important that one of the things that makes this initiative a "Challenge" is for students to expand their horizons beyond the genres they might ordinarily read.
4. As a reminder, grades should not be tied to students' reading associated with the challenge. However, students' independent reading CAN be used for instructional activities that are graded. I just want to be sure to avoid the scenario where the Challenge becomes punitive in any way. That undermines the spirit of fostering a love of reading.
Remember to model book talking FREQUENTLY in class. That is the best way to generate interest in books. I'll model this now for my reading friends who are adults :).
1. I just finished reading the Young Adult novel entitled Thirteen Reasons Why by Debra Wiseman and Jay Asher. Wow. It's an intense, sometimes dark, novel about a suicidal teenage girl and the "thirteen reasons" that she's in this emotional place. This book isn't for all, but I'd actually highly recommend it for school counselors and teachers of adolescents.
2. I also am reading The Martian by Andy Weir after several people I respect urged me to do so. This is not my normal cup of tea, and it does have some colorful language (especially on the first page), but I'm halfway in and can't put it down. I never thought I'd have a deep interest in the NASA program, but something about the main character getting abandoned on Mars with no initial hope of rescue has led me to be a bit more curious.
Important Links
Restorative Practices: Circle Up topics for six weeks https://drive.google.com/folder/d/0B22DUqRJvjL1fk81bnNpT0dmSTU1M3VrTUh3WThERS1XSHpYUHdDVkhCM3dJTDRNTy1OUEU/edit
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0BxlRLSbpU4dtS2VfeTBZd045cGs&usp=sharing
Digital Citizenship document:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1v4sfIYgmXSrR6zwb5Ug-mKCQe2HQiLynt16A7FkZA9Q/edit?usp=sharing
Google Links
- Lesson plans, or links to your plans, should be saved to our Google drive folder in the GES Faculty and Staff folder: https://drive.google.com/a/gcisd.net/folderview?id=0BzaMxFimFa8sfjNJWTkwS3ZrYkJXQi10STViT3lLaHJtY3JqcGFkaWJSTzBhU21fQjFzMnc&usp=sharing
- Newsletters, or links to newsletters, should be saved to the Google drive folder in GES Faculty and Staff: https://drive.google.com/a/gcisd.net/folderview?id=0B90_DLAhTR6MQUVGMUlZdGx1VWc&usp=sharing
- IF you haven't completed the Staff Favorites form...please fill it out today! Here is the link: https://docs.google.com/a/gcisd.net/forms/d/1H1j-CToHZ3dWqcSLFZhX3CtpEaN0JVUYQEcagC2pIn0/viewform?usp=send_form
GES Club Applications Deadlines
NEHS student applications are due by 3:00 on Sept. 21
Running Club - Basil or Greene by Sept. 23rd
Choir - Lambert ONLY accepting Sept. 21st - 29th