Teaching & Learning Newsletter
June 3, 2016
C2E
Distraction control refers to focusing through distractions or not letting distractions interfere with the quality of your performance or the success of your mission. Some distractions are external, arising from other people and their expectations or from specific circumstances in your environment. Other distractions are internal, arising from you own thinking, doubts, worries, fears or expectations. Regardless of what kind of distractions you face, maintaining a positive connected focus before, during, and after performances is important. Distraction control is especially important when you feel stressed, crowded, pressured, uncertain, or unappreciated, or when you are performing in demanding circumstances.
Terry Orlick, PhD, In Pursuit of Excellence
Affirmations
Coaching Tip
We often underestimate just how much impact we can have on others. A person with an infectious personality can profoundly affect others, and simple actions can have far-reaching implications.
Jim Knight, Focus on Teaching
Action Required Items
Important reminders regarding SSI and Summer School deadlines. Click here to view action required items
All Principals
Summer School
Principals if you are available to help with the first day of summer school it would be much appreciated. It is also helpful if principals continue to visit summer school to encourage students and teachers throughout the duration of the summer program.
All Principals & Coaches
Resources
It's that time of year! Teachers move, change grade levels, and transfer to other schools. Don't forget to collect district resources (ex. curriculum books, manipulatives, campus issued materials) so they will be ready for the next teacher.
Curriculum Revisions
Curriculum revisions are underway as we prepare for the 2016-2017 school year. This means that this year's curriculum documents will be modified. The new curriculum documents will be uploaded this summer into Eduphoria. We will notify you when that process has been completed so teachers can begin working on their 2016-2017 plans.
IC Coaching Dates for 2016-2017
IC Calendar for beginning of school:
Aug 1 - District Day - Peter Dewitt
Aug 2 - District Day - Bernabei for ELA Coaches/IC with Coordinators
Aug 3 - District Day - Seidlitz training for coaches
Aug 4 - District Day - ICs with Coordinators
Aug 5 - District Day - ICs with Coordinators
Aug 8 - District Day - Morning with Coordinator, 12:45-4:00 - PBIS training BHS Blue
Aug 9 - IC Campus Day
Aug 10 -District Day ICs at Campus with new teachers
Aug 11 - ICs at Campus (teacher workday)
Aug 12 - IC Campus day
Aug 15 - IC Campus day
Aug 16 - AM Convocation, PM at Campus
Aug 17 - ICs involved in delivery of district-wide training
Aug 18 - ICs involved in delivery of district-wide training
Aug 19 - IC Campus PD Day
Summer School Program Information
Thank you in advance if you are hosting summer school on your campus! If Summer School Facilitators need keys for your campus, he or she will follow the Summer School Key Procedures. Please share this information with your secretary.
Campus, location, and facilitator information is located at this LINK.
High Schools
High School EOC Acceleration
In continuing efforts to promote student attendance at EOC Acceleration courses during summer school, high school campuses, with the assistance of the Campus Testing Coordinator, will send out an EOC Retest Letter along with Summer School EOC Acceleration Information by June 3. Campuses are also asked to send out a Parent Link call. Please access Summer School Procedures for High School for more information.
Middle Schools
Summer School Student Information
Provide student summer school information to the summer school campus on June 6. LINK to list.
7th Grade Early Notification of At-Risk Students
According to the SSI manual regarding Early Notification of At-Risk Students (p. 40), parents must be notified that their student has been identified to be at risk of failure on the first administration of a reading assessment in an SSI grade. There is a sample letter for this located in Team Connect. Please send this letter out with the Confidential Student Reports to the 7th graders who did not pass STAAR Reading.
SSI and GPC Reminders
Aware forms for 2016 GPC meetings and Accelerated Instruction Plans are now available in Aware Student Forms under the GPC heading.
After Round 2 results arrive, be sure to complete the student list for failures on the 2016 GPC 8th Results Spring/Summer spreadsheet. There is a procedures tab on this spreadsheet with reminders for documentation. Also, schedule the July/August GPC meetings using the 2016 Summer GPC Schedule.
After Round 3, these spreadsheets will need to be updated.
2015-2016 Algebra Pre-Entry Program
Important deadlines are on the horizon. See the link below to ensure your campus is on the right track. Click here
Elementary Schools
New PreK Curriculum for 2016-17
We are excited to announce that OWL (Opening the World of Learning) is our new state mandated curriculum for our BISD PreK program. Click here.
Summer School Folders
This is a friendly reminder that summer school folders are due to the summer school campus facilitator by 10am on June 6. Teachers will use this information to inform grouping and instruction for students on this staff development day. Be sure to include all items on the checklist from eSchool, such as any student supplemental aids and the DRA testing booklet for each child. Please contact Kristen Beesaw or the Summer School Facilitator for your campus if you have any questions.
End of Year Procedures for DRA/EDL and Writing Portfolios
· DRA/EDL Tests: The final test copy for DRA/EDL will be placed in each student’s writing portfolio. If a child has made progress during the last month of school in K-2, a running record of the child reading at the new level will be stapled onto the top of the EOY DRA/EDL test. This will help communicate with the teacher in the upcoming year about the student’s progress.
Writing Portfolios: The writing portfolios will be collected by the campus and saved for the upcoming school year. They will be sent to new campuses if a child moves within BISD. Fifth grade portfolios may be sent home with the child.
TEA Reading/Math Academies: We would like to finalize the list of our attendees this week Please make sure to send names to JoLyn Bricker and Mary Russ as soon as possible. Do not have your teachers sign up with the service center until you hear back from JoLyn Bricker or Mary Russ because of the limited number of slots available for Bryan. Thank you for your help in filling these spots.
Kindergarten Literacy Academy - 8 BISD attendees - full
First Grade Literacy Academy - 12 BISD attendees
Second Grade Math Academy - 14 BISD attendees
Third Grade Math Academy - 13 BISD attendees
TEA Math Academies click here
TEA Reading Academies click here
4th Grade Early Notification of At-Risk Students
According to the SSI manual regarding Early Notification of At-Risk Students (p. 40), parents must be notified that their student has been identified to be at risk of failure on the first administration of a reading assessment in an SSI grade. There is a sample letter for this located in Team Connect. Please send this letter out with the Confidential Student Reports to the 4th graders who did not pass STAAR Reading.
SSI and GPC Reminders
Aware forms for 2016 GPC meetings, Accelerated Instruction Plans, and the Primary Reading Success Plan are now available in Aware Student Forms under the GPC heading. While the completion of a GPC form for non-SSI grades is not required, you are encouraged to use this for documentation.
After Round 2 results arrive, be sure to complete the student list for failures on the 2016 GPC 5th Results Spring/Summer spreadsheet. There is a procedures tab on this spreadsheet with reminders for documentation. Also, schedule the July/August GPC meetings using the 2016 Summer GPC Schedule.
After Round 3, these spreadsheets will need to be updated.
Primary Reading Success Plan GPC forms and EOY parent letters
- EOY Parent letters for PRSP plans are provided in English and Spanish for campuses to send home.
- The completed profile sheets for each child are to be placed in the academic folder in student permanent folders. Please contact JoLyn Bricker if you have any questions.
High Quality PreK Grant
We are excited to announce that the High Quality PreK Grant was accepted this week by BISD. The purpose of the grant is to provide a high quality Pre-K program.
Pre-K Centralized Registration
REMINDER: Please add the following to your campus marquee:
"PreK registration at Kemp 7/27"
PreK Changes
The following changes have been made for the 2016-17 school year. Milam will NOT have Pre-K. Bowen Elementary will gain a monolingual PreK Classroom with an AM and PM session.
Pre-K Centralized Registration
The BISD Centralized Pre-K Registration will be held July 27 at Kemp-Carver from 8:30-6:30.
Pre-K Family Literacy Night
The Pre-K Family Literacy Night will be held June 23 at Kemp-Carver from 5:30-6:30. The first 100 Pre-K families will receive a backpack filled with books and a parent guide for summer activities. To support the event, the Pre-K Dept. request flyers to be sent home with all PreK students. Flyers will be delivered to the Pre-K campuses.
Professional Development
Principals & APs
T-TESS
Please take just a second and register for the T-TESS session you are attending this summer. Register for June 7-8-9 HERE and for June 14-15-16 HERE.
TE Days for Principals & APs
I know that it is sometimes a struggle to find quality PD to secure your TE Day credits during the small window of time that you are off-contract. We do have a few things available to you during the time that our 220s are off, but I have another opportunity that I want to share with you! I am going to create an online training for our administrators that will be designed to equip you with more tools to lead a campus that has students and families from poverty. If you do not already have 3 days planned for your TE Day credits, this will be something in which you can participate. I will release more info about the online class in the coming weeks. Hopefully this will help you in more ways than one.
Principals
TE Day Requests
Each of you has ownership of your TE Day Request Form, as does your secretary. Please use the green "export to spreadsheet" button to push all of your responses into a spreadsheet. This will allow you and/or your secretary to make edits as needed. Once your staff returns in August, they will show you the certificates for their TE Credits that they acquired this summer and at that point, your secretary can go into your spreadsheet and update each person with the correct amount of TE Credit. I will send more explicit instructions about this process once everyone is back on contract.
Admin Meeting
The final admin. meeting will be held on Tuesday, June 14. Please mark your calendars.
Advanced Academics
Scholars Academy
This June we will be offering Scholars Academy to 9th and 10th graders who wish to succeed on the PSAT exam in Fall 2016. We are trying to drive more participation in this program and really need your help. Please communicate to your teachers and students about this opportunity. Click here
Bilingual Education
All Principals
ESL Certification Resources
For teachers interested in taking the ESL Certification Exam - TExES #154, TEA provides a study guide online. This guide has been helpful to many of our teachers in preparation for the state exam. Teachers who take and pass the exam will be reimbursed for the cost of the exam, a pre approved preparation course, and the fee for posting the certifiction with SBEC. For more information please contact the Bilingual and ESL Department. Click here
Instructional Practices
Instructional scaffolding is the support that teachers provide to students that leads them to independence. For ELLs, the first step in scaffolding during whole-class instruction is to make sure the teacher is providing comprehensible input when giving directions or explaining academic concepts. It is also important to maintain a classroom environment with low levels of anxiety for ELLs where students are comfortable taking risk in making mistakes. Seidlitz, J., Base, M., Lara, M. & Smith, H. 2016. ELLs in Texas, What teacher need to know. San Clemente, CA: Canter Press.
Curriculum & Instruction
Email: leslie.holtkamp@bryanisd.org
Website: www.bryanisd.org
Phone: 979-209-1049
Twitter: @bisdambassador