Cat Tracks
Spring Shadows Elementary Wildcats Staff Newsletter
September 9-15, 2018
Girlstart Team Present to Governor Abbott @ Amazon Fullfilment Center
Our Vision
Our Mission
Core Beliefs
- Each student has unique intellectual, emotional, social, and physical qualities.
- We embrace a child’s individual values, interests, and personalities.
- Parents are confident in their child’s social and intellectual educational growth.
- Educators lead their craft by preparing learners in our fast changing world
Tour of Amazon Facility
Work hard. Have fun. Make History.
Governor Abbott tests student projects.
SSE ReDesign Team @ Texas Medical Center
Principal's Message
Dear Wildcats,
As we look forward to this week, I wanted to first thank you for being able to jam pack 5 days of work into 4 days! This week we look forward to our our Reading Rally Kick-Off, Our After School Registration, as well our Open House!
Partnering up with your parents and making the effort to establish good relationships is the first key to helping our children accelerate at the rates we know our scholars can! Take advantage of this opportunity if you have not met your parents yet. For those you have not met, take the extra time to make a phone call to welcome them to school to meet you.
Also, it's extremely important that this week we finish our final MAP testing. For those grade levels finishing, use your PLC time to review your data and reset goals. Remember we want to adjust goals from 1 years growth to 1.5 years growth for any students not performing on grade level. Jon Gordon in his book, the Energy Bus, not only discusses the ability of us to know we are in control (rule #1), but also that desire, vision, and focus (rule #2) help drive the bus in the right direction. Student ownership is a key to bringing our goals to fruition.
Later this week on Thursday morning between 8:00-12:00 p.m., we will have visitors from our ReDesign team. We will be making instructional rounds. There are no major adjustments for you to make, just know that we will be walking the school and this will inform our next steps. However, I do ask all teachers to have their instructional objectives on the board, anchor charts of what you are currently teaching, and either word walls, content or focus walls up. Students should be actively engaged in academic conversation, writing, or actively in the learning process. (These should already be in place in your classroom.)
This week, we have a new wildcat joining SSE. Please welcome Julia Falcon, she is joining us as our new literacy technology lab assistant. She starts Monday, so please welcome her with a warm Wildcat Spirit!
Wildcat Love and respect,
Rachel Martinez
Calendar
5th Grade Extended Planning (Group 5)
Specials Group 1
- Book Fair
- Reading Kick Off Grades 1-5 See time below.
- T-TESS Appraisal Window Opens
- 8:30-10:00 ILT Meeting
- 2:45-3:45 Team Leader Huddle
Tuesday, September 11, 2018
Kindergarten Extended Planning (Group 1)
Specials Group 2
- Book Fair
- Author Kat Kronenberg Visit
8:00-8:20 Kinder and 1st Grade
8:30-9:15 Grades 4 & 5
10:00-10:45 Grades 2 & 3 - 8:00-1:00 Rachel Off Campus
- 2:30-3:30 ReDesign Meeting with Jennifer Hickey
- 3:00-4:30 Nurse Meeting
- 4:00-5:00 After School Registration Meeting
- 4:00-5:00 Hooves for Hope Meeting
Wednesday, September 12, 2018
1st Grade Extended Planning (Group 2)
Specials Group 3
- Book Fair
- Fall Practice
- 8:00-11:00 Cindy Off Campus
Thursday, September 13, 2018
PLC Thursdsay (Group 4)
- Book Fair
- 8:00-1:00 Counselor Meeting
- 8:00-12:00 ReDesign Team Instructional Rounds
- 9:00-11:00 Cindy Off Campus
- 3:30-6:00 Open House
Friday, September 14, 2018
2nd Grade Extended Planning (Group 3)
Specials Group 5
- Book Fair
- Spiral Day
- Fall Pictures
3rd Grade Dictionary Project!
Shout Outs
- 3rd grade coordinated so that their students each have a dictionary from SBEF Dictionary Project! Woohoo!
- 1st grade - worked hard to complete their action plan and saw great results!
- 4th grade- MAP testing- started on time, trouble shoot early. Great job 4th!
- Kinder- all teachers were able to do the action plan! Way to go!
- SPED- Mindworks- up and running; Rocio & Adrian teamed up to create a Crisis Intervention plan for a student! Fine job putting your minds together!
- 3rd grade proudly had a productive planning session during their PLC!
- Team ReDesign (Laura, Elizabeth, Maria, Rachel M., and Noe) had an intense 2 day training to help kick off the ReDesign planning for 2018-2019. More information to come in a separate email to staff!
- Ann Parsons coordinated a spectacular time with the Amazon Fulfillment Center so that Stem Girls could demonstrate their projects to elected officials including the Governor Abbott!
- Front office & Cafeteria staff opened our doors so that Grandparents could eat lunch with their grandchildren!
- Gardner, Gentry, and Parsons teamed up to create a great dismissal process for walkers!
Library News
Lots Happening in the Library this week!
Monday - Grades 1- 5 will be coming for our Reading Kick Off. It takes about 20 minutes - to get the students excited so we can make 1,000,000 minute!! We want Unstoppable Reader this year! During the book fair there is no book return or check out as the fair is set up in the middle of the library.
Monday - Reading Kick Off
Grade 1& 2 Please come to the library at 12:30 pm
Grade 3 & 5 Please come to the library at 9:45 am
Grade 4 Please come to the library at 10:45
During this time.. PLEASE have your student sign a thank you card to Kat who is visiting our school for free.
Tuesday - Author Visit Kat Kronenberg (Any Book Orders? )
Kinder & Grade 1 - 8:00 - 8:20
Grades 4 & 5 - 8:30 - 9:15
Grades 3 & 4 10:00-1045
Book Fair - Monday - Friday
Each class is schedule for 15 minutes but those with money are free to come and shop. Please don't bring a class during the author visits. I hope to have helpers at the book fair while I have the author but I don't want big groups to be in there shopping.
Here is the link for next week's schedule
Heads up.. it looks like my Monday Sept 24 meeting - is Tuesday Sept 25 so I will have to switch Tuesday's schedule to Monday that week. I will confirm that with a week.
Let me know if you have any questions.
Thanks for your support!
Ann : )
Spring Shadows Elementary
Email: rachel.martinez@springbranchisd.com
Website: https://cms.springbranchisd.com/sse2/
Location: 9725 Kempwood Drive, Houston, TX, United States
Phone: (713) 251-7100
Twitter: @twitter_rachelmartinez4