Dodgeland Middle School News
September 27, 2020
8th Grade Health - Learning First Aid/CPR:
Grading Changes for Middle School
First of all, thank you for your patience if you have been checking PowerSchool and wondering why you did not see grades as we are transitioning PowerSchool to our new grading system. For the past two years, Dodgeland faculty have been working on curriculum and assessment alignment to have a better system to grade for learning. We want to provide students with clear learning targets in each class, be able to provide better feedback aligned to learning targets, and give students ownership of their learning.
PowerSchool is now ready for teachers to begin entering target based grades to accurately communicate how students are progressing academically. In addition, students will receive a separate grade that will be reflective of their individual Work Habits. This means that a student’s academic grade will truly reflect what they know and can do aligned to the learning target. If a student has behaviors that have previously affected their class grade (i.e. lack of participation, late assignments, tardy to class, rude, etc.) those behaviors will be reflected in the Work Habits grade. You can see the full description of the Work Habits HERE.
What will be different: While progress reports will continue throughout the year, we will only have report cards at the end of 1st and 2nd semester (previously each quarter). Grades on formative and summative assessments will look different and will be aligned to the proficiency criteria of Needs Support (NSP), Developing (DEV), or Proficient (PRO) for class learning targets. Each class learning target will have a rubric to help students understand what it means to perform at each level of Needs Support, Developing or Proficient with the goal of all students having ownership of their learning to progress to Proficient.
Weekend Snack Pack Program
Once again, the Dodgeland School District is working in partnership with The Gathering Source to provide Snack Packs for our students. The Snack Pack program provides students with a bag of food items that get distributed weekly. Once a family is signed up, snack packs will be delivered to Elementary students’ lockers every Friday, (or before a school break). This will include any sibling from Middle and High school as well. If a Middle or High school student does not have a younger sibling, they can pick up their snack pack in the Student Development Center. Initial delivery of Snack Packs on Friday, October 2, 2020.
If you are interested in participating in this program, please complete the following link: Link for weekend meal pack form Please contact Lisa Breselow, School Social Worker (Phone 920.386.4404 Ext. 1026 or Email Breselow@Dodgeland.k12.wi.us) with any questions.
Student Absences/Logging in for Live Instruction
We ask that students continue to complete this daily self-check each morning: https://bit.ly/DSDscreener We want students to remain home if they have possible symptoms of COVID-19, however, we want learning to continue. The BlueJeans platform for blended learning is for students to continue learning while sick or quarantined. ALL students have been taught how to login to BlueJeans and how to find the code for each teacher. In order for us to mark a student’s attendance as present, the student must follow their daily schedule by virtually attending each class in BlueJeans. This is a new attendance process that we are continually working on, so we appreciate your patience. Some notes for parents to know about this:
Some notes for parents to know about this new process:
We still need you to call the office in the morning (or email attendance@dodgeland.k12.wi.us) to notify us that your child is staying home and for what reason.
The office will keep track of this list each day, however, the absence will not be put in powerschool yet. Teachers will check BlueJeans during each class period to see if students are in virtual attendance and mark it appropriately.
If a student does not login to BlueJeans, they will be marked absent.
A student does not need to login to BlueJeans for a Study Hall, they should just use this time for school work. If a student has been virtually present in other classes, we will mark them as present for Study Hall.
If a student has tech issues during a class, the student should email the teacher to inform them of their attempts to get into class. However, please know teachers will not see this during class, but can follow-up with the student later about how to catch up.
Automated Messages from School
We continue to utilize an automated system, School Messenger, to send out mass phone calls, text messages and emails to our families. When parents aren’t receiving this information, we often find the following:
Emails are going to your email address, but are going to spam/junk. These emails may come from the email address of a school administrator (i.e. johnsonj@dodgeland.k12.wi.us, modaff@dodgeland.k12.wi.us) or from schoolmessenger@dodgeland.k12.wi.us. Please mark this as “not junk” so you aren’t missing out on future emails.
If you did not “Opt In” to the original text message from school then your phone will never receive a text message from us. But you can change this now by simply texting the message of “YES” to the phone number 67587.
Need Technology Help?
Contact Dodgeland Technology Department through the Help Desk Ticket: http://bit.ly/DSDHelpDesk.
About Dodgeland Middle School
Email: johnsonj@dodgeland.k12.wi.us
Website: http://ms.dodgeland.k12.wi.us/
Location: 401 S. Western Ave. Juneau, WI 53039
Phone: 920-386-4404
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DodgelandSchool/