Principal Walder's Monday Memo
For the week of September 30th
The Power of Belief
From Plato's Allegory of the Cave to Rachel Hollis' Girl Wash Your Face, there has always been a human desire to quantify inspiration in writing. If you walk through Barnes and Nobel today, you will find entire sections dedicated to rows of compilations of short stories, quotes and even an entire books dedicated to inspiring others. Admittedly, Plato's works required more interpretation than Rachel Hollis, there is a writer for any era in history that hopes to inspire a generation.
As many of the athletes and coaches on our staff can confirm, this power in the belief of oneself truly can tip the scales in an athletic contest. It is easy to ask ourselves as teachers, how can this belief in oneself help students do better not only on the volleyball court or soccer field but also in the classroom?
Fortunately for us, we do not have to reach too far to find out. Hattie analyzed the category of student "self-efficacy" and compiled 418 studies representing over 260,000 students' perceptions of their self-efficacy.
"Student Self-Efficacy" as defined by Hattie: First theorized in educational theory by Albert Bandura, “self-efficacy” refers to a sense of confidence or the set of self-perceptions that influence thought, actions, and emotional arousal by enabling people to make decisions about what course of action they intend to pursue.
Hattie's meta-analysis found that as student self-efficacy increases, there is a potential to considerably accelerate student achievement. As part of our Building Goal this year, both students and teachers will be completing self-efficacy surveys and our Student Achievement Leadership Team will be evaluating the surveys.
Our Student Achievement Leadership Team has met the last three weeks to review and create a survey for students to evaluate their current self-efficacy and school climate. The JK-2 surveys are very simple with happy and sad faces while the 3-5 surveys are more detailed with a few more questions.
JK-2 Teachers: The links will be sent as shortcuts to your iPads. I will email you when they have been pushed out.
3-5 Teachers: The links will be sent out the same day the shortcuts are sent to the iPads. The email will come from me when they are sent out.
We will complete the same survey in mid-April to see what our work this year has done to positively contribute to self-efficacy at Legacy.
Thank you for all you do!
Legacy PLC Topic for the Week
Agenda: We are finalizing our NWEA Goal Setting Documents this week in Grades K-5.
Please bring your computer and the following documents:
- Your reviewed Class Report from Meeting with Dr. Warzecha
- Your team's Goal Setting Document
Dr. Walder's Schedule
Monday:
- 9:20- 10:10 5th PLC
- 10:15- 11:05 4th PLC
- 1:00 pm Instructional Leaders Meeting at DEC
- 3:30 Crisis Team Meeting at DEC
Tuesday:
- 7:40 TAT Meeting in Conference Room
- 9:20 Teacher Observation
- 3:30 Khan Academy Mappers Review with Mrs. Ihnen in Meeting Room
Wednesday:
- 7:40 Khan Academy Mappers Review with Mrs. Ihnen in Meeting Room
- 9:20 Teacher Observation
- 10:50 Individual Teacher Meeting
- 11:50- 12:40 2nd PLC in Meeting Room
- 12:45- 1: 35 1st PLC in the Meeting Room
- 2:15 Monthly Library Meeting in Dr. Walder's Office
Thursday:
- 7:40- 8:10 Legacy Teacher Meeting
- 1:35- 2:25 3rd PLC in the Meeting Room
- 2:25- 3:15 JK/ K PLC in the Meeting Room
- 3:30 IEP at Legacy
Friday:
- 12:30 pm Intervention PLC in Meeting Room
- Bring Legacy Gold Classroom winners to Heather.
- 2:45 LEGACY GOLD Drawing - Send students to Mr. Binde's Room.
Contact Dr. Walder
Email: Samantha.Walder@k12.sd.us
Website: https://www.teaschools.k12.sd.us/
Location: Tea, SD, USA
Phone: 6058817381
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TeaAreaLegacy/
Twitter: @swalder7