OVS Weekly Update
September 7, 2018 Volume 80
Mark Your Calendars!
NO SCHOOL ON FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 14th and MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 17th
What does that mean? No online lessons, OVS staff is not on site, learners CAN STILL work online and learning coaches can still log attendance.
Learning Coach Training Next Week
Instruction Training: NWEA-MAP Scores- What do they mean?
9:00-10:30 Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday
1:00-2:30 Tuesday, ThursdayLearning Coaches will learn how to read and use the data that is gathered on the learners. Data is just numbers until we apply a narrative to it. We will be distributing learner MAP data results at this training.
Office 365, OneDrive, Outlook
Thank you to all the families that came to the training done by Eileen Heller. Eileen covered how to download the Office products for personal use computers, how to access and use OneDrive to store your work, and how to access and use Outlook for email. Click here if you’d like a refresher on any of those topics!
MAP testing-Make Up Sessions
All OVS learners took the MAP reading and math MAP assessments the week of August 27th. Mrs. Nommensen will be contacting you to make up the assessment if your learner was unable to complete it.
Open House
Thursday, September 27th--More info to follow
District Math Night!
Math Night!
Parents are invited to the District Math Nights to learn instructional strategies to help support their learners in math. Are you confused about how to teach math with manipulatives? Is your child frustrated with the traditional way of learning math? This workshop will teach you how to teach at home using proven instructional strategies.
Robotics
We continue to look for aspiring robotics engineers at OVS! Our robotics clubs will begin the week of September 10th. We will be running two nights for elementary and middle school robotics. Middle school (7th – 8th) will be on Tuesdays from 4:30 to 6:30. Elementary (4th – 6th) will be on Thursdays from 4:30 to 6:30.
All practices are at OVS in the robotics room. During the year up to two (2) Saturdays will be required for competitions around Omaha. Competitions usually last a full day at local schools.
If your learner is interested, please reach out to Mr. Gamble, our robotics coach, via email to express interest. He can be reached at thomas.gamble@ops.org. We look forward to working with learners and accomplishing great things with our robotics program!
Drop-Off & Pick-up procedures
Learners can be dropped off no more than 15 minutes prior to their session, so 8:45 for the 9:00-12pm, morning sessions and 12:45 for the 1:00-4:00pm sessions.
Please do not park in front of the front doors to drop or pick-up your learner. You can drop your learner off at the end of the curb in front of the building. Please enter the building to retrieve your learner at the end of the session. If you would prefer to stay in your car (if you have small children), park in a parking stall and staff will take learners outside once most of them have departed.
Please be on time to your learner's session and on time when picking them up.
OVS Synergy
OVS Synergy- Our non-traditional version of a parent teacher organization. All are included and invited to participate, donate, and engage.
OVS Synergy Mission: A collaborative Organization that Creates Engagement and Learning Opportunities for Teachers and parents to support Student success.
OVS Board: We are reviewing new board member applications. We will be announcing our new board members soon. If you are interested in serving, we are still seeking a treasurer, vice-president, and secretary. We do have interested parents, so thank you for engaging. More to come!
OVS Synergy Facebook Group
Connect with OVS learning coaches in a closed group on Facebook!This group is for those of us who are enrolled in OVS. The group focuses on questions as we begin the year, questions regarding the children's homework, technology related questions that pertain to OVS, field trip information and updates, and anything else that comes up that we wish to discuss. Click the below link to request to join and engage in the conversations!
https://www.facebook.com/groups/ovsfamilies/
Box Tops
We will do another Box Top Competition in the very near future! So be clipping those Box Tops. More information to come!
T-Shirts
T-shirts are in!! They are ready to be picked up and they look amazing!
Learning Coach Q & A Highlights
**Repeat from last week**
We had great discussions this week at the LC trainings Q & A. It was great to see LCs work and learn together to brainstorm solutions and sharing tips and tricks that they have learned already! Here are some questions that were repeated through the week.
Q: What do I log for attendance?
A: K-5 learners- LCs log ALL activity on K12 and Off K12
6-10th grade learners- LCs log only activity that occurs off of K12.com (reading a book, powerpoint, journaling, etc.)
Q: Can I just use the workbooks for my K-5 learner, instead of the online work?
A: NO! The workbooks and online lessons work in conjunction. The workbooks are for learners to practice what they learn online lessons. If learners are only doing the workbooks, they are not learning, they are just doing!
Q: When my middle/high school learner went to take a test, it asked for an admin username and password. What is this?!
A: This is Respondus, lock-down browser. The lockdown browser keeps the learner locked into the testing browser so they cannot go to other websites and find answers to a test. This requires the learning coach to enter the parent admin username and password. This was emailed to you by the learning facilitators. If you do not know it, please email your learning facilitator (teacher). Please do not ever share this username and password with your learner!
Q: What hours do I manually log for my middle school learner's attendance?
A: Learning coaches log ALL work that is done OFF K12, this includes the online lessons. These use a different program, and therefore need to be logged, whether they attend live or watch the recording. These are logged in the content area in which the lesson was for.
Q: The attendance log for my middle/high school learner does not show the total time he/she has spent on K12, it is only showing what I enter? What is wrong?
A: Nothing, the attendance that the learning coach logs for middle/high school students is only for work that is completed OFF or OUTSIDE of K12. The attendance log in K12 only includes what you have entered, not the learner's online engagement. The K12 system logs the online hours and is available within each course.
Q; Then how will I know how much my middle/high school learner's total attendance is for the week?
A: There is no place in K12 for the learning coach to get the total hours for the week. BUT, learning coaches can look in each course in the progress tab for the total hours spent in each tab.
K-8 Art with Mrs. Barry
I am so thrilled to begin another year at OVS!
K-8 Art will begin the first week of September. Students DO NOT need to complete any coursework before then. I will be emailing learning coaches and doing learning coach training about art in the coming weeks before the first face to face class.
If you have any questions or would like more information please contact me - shannon.barry@ops.org.
9th Grade Newsletter
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Mission Statement
Vision
Core Values
Positivity
Collaboration
Integrity
Self-advocacy
Accountability
Omaha Virtual School
Email: virtualschool@ops.org
Website: ovs.k12.com
Location: 4640 S 59th St, Omaha, NE, United States
Phone: (531)299-0269
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/OPSVirtualSchool/
Twitter: @OPS_Virtual