EAGLE MOUNTAIN NEWS & NOTES #11
OCTOBER 26, 2015
EAGLE MOUNTAIN ELEMENTARY
Email: bmclain@ems-isd.net
Twitter: @bmacEME
REAL QUICK:
I can hardly believe today marks the beginning of the second nine weeks! Our days are full, & I truly respect & appreciate the atmosphere of LEARNING you are working hard to further & sustain. I was in a classroom last week where I saw a truly “Quad D” lesson that was powerful. I am seeing some great things!
This is Red-Ribbon Week, so we also have a lot going on in conjunction with that.
I want to thank each of you very much for a successful Club day on Friday. The feedback I received thus far from students & parents has been overwhelmingly positive.
In this week’s Bulletin I’m sharing some thoughts from our friend Angela Maiers on the importance of tweeting that I hope you’ll enjoy.
I also want to share the rationale behind having a Teacher Design Team so am including an article about that.
Important Information this week!
- We will begin Eagle Mountain 25 today with EME #1 being: When responding to any adult, answer by saying “Yes, ma’am” or “No, sir.”
- The technology committee meets in the library this afternoon.
- Please make sure you send out your Canvas letters this week.
- I am starting PDAS appraisals this week.
- Here are a few important points about effective LEARNING TARGETS:
- Kelli & I are excited about the beginning of our Instructional Rounds this week on Thursday with our team leaders & teacher design team. (You will need a sub for the entire day.)
- At our faculty meeting this week I will share more information about our school goals & focus for the year. I will also give you detailed information about the “Mini-Rise” presentations we’re asking teachers to do, so you’ll have PLENTY of time to prepare. We sincerely hope that you will not stress over this – the format is a little different than what you’re used to, but we want it to be more of a conversation as well as an opportunity for you to highlight the great things that are happening in your classrooms. I will give you detailed information on Wednesday!
- Our focus this nine weeks with our technology will be primarily on using Twitter & Skyping – we will have fewer tech do’s, but we will go deeper which we think will be more productive & meaningful.
- Below are some statements from Angela Maiers on the importance of using Twitter & the purpose for doing so. Many of her statements resonate with me, & I hope they will with you as well:
AMEN STATEMENTS on Tweeting & Using Social Media by Angela Maiers:
· We took an OATH to prepare kids for THEIR future!
· We have an OBLIGATION as educators to be informed.
· Social Network is the new reading – it’s the new literacy. With every new form of communication, comes a new literacy.
· It’s not “informational overload” – it’s “filter failure.”
· We were created for significance & one of the most dangerous things that can happen to us as individuals, organizations, & communities is the feeling that we don’t matter.
· On the web everyone’s contribution is equal.
· Social Media IS & will continue to be significant to our students’ lives.
· PURPOSE of Twitter: To inform parents, to be globally connected, professional development, networking, it’s Professional Development, It’s Science…It’s a source of relevant information…
· It’s important that we UNDERSTAND how the WORLD perceives Twitter.
· Twitter is the news – Twitter keeps you informed.
· Twitter is about igniting a community.
· Twitter EMPOWERS us & PREPARES us.
· Twitter is Science, History, Empowerment, Power
· Twitter is a chance to push humanity to new levels.
· We have the power to change lives in 140 characters.
· Twitter is the most powerful medium in the world to change the world.
· Twitter is Articulation of what is happening in REAL TIME.
· Twitter is TALENT AMPLIFIER.
· It is through the mundane that the deep emerges.
· Your success is defined by who you’re surrounded by!
· The depth of how you sort & filter is defined by the depth of what you do.
· A new conversation is happening every second on Twitter.
· Our kids are brilliant & their genius is being denied!
· The future of your students will be judged by their digital footprint.
· We’re asking you to understand the significance of Twitter in your child’s space.
· It may NOT be your “THING”, but it is still your responsibility!
· “NOW WHAT” should be our driving question.
· Perception is reality – or reality is based on our past experiences.
WORDS OF THE WEEK
EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT VOCAB IS IN THIS SMORE
HIGHLIGHTING SOME GREAT TWEETS OF THE WEEK!
GREAT TWEET!
GREAT TWEET!
GREAT TWEET!
SOMETHING TO READ ABOUT:
Schools Need Design Teams
By Jill Berkowicz and Ann Myers on October 20, 2015
Is change really essential inside the school walls? If we were to stop and consider what schools were like when each of us attended them, truly, for a reflective moment, what would we describe? In elementary classrooms, desks or tables, a teacher's desk, depending upon our age perhaps a few computers on the side of the room, a communication device on the wall, perhaps a blackboard, a whiteboard, or a interactive white board, books on shelves, work and lesson reminders on the wall, a bulletin board seasonally decorated. In secondary classrooms, desks, most likely in rows, a teacher's desk. How similar is that to what we see in today's classrooms?
What about the schedule? In the elementary classrooms maybe a circle time to begin the day, time for language arts, reading, and math every day and science and social studies less frequently; maybe library, music, art once a week and physical education twice a week. Time for play practice or a science fair, seeing a play or taking a field trip during the year can break the schedule. On the secondary level, periods of the day are arranged to fulfill academic expectations in science, math, English language arts, social studies, physical education and electives like art, music, maybe computers, and technology (sometimes replacing the old shop class). How similar is that to what we see in today's classrooms?
...and Today
Now what if we hold those visions in our mind and compare them to what we see today? Likely the major differences will be related to the technology. Either it wasn't present in our past and now is or it was present in our past but its presence is more pervasive. What has also changed are some methods and manner of teaching in classrooms across the country. But, what teachers may be prepared to do intersect with school buildings and structures and find limitations.
There are schools in which teachers have been trained in methods that challenge even the architecture of schools. Classrooms designs often can't accommodate the flexibility required for students to work together in groups, learning and making meaning together, researching alone, writing alone, come back as a group to present what their have learned and discovered.
One such framework followed is the Buck Institute's Project Based Learning. There are schools in which shop class has become an extended program created by Project Lead The Way. Others have created elective courses called MST (math, science, technology) in which students use all three subjects together to learn and create. Others have been extremely successful in creating school-business partnerships. These partners share expertise and ideas that inform real life ideas for the application of subjects for teachers. Partners work alongside teachers helping to create learning opportunities that reflect the real-world application of the concepts and skills that are the learning objectives in the course.
The world in which news was delivered in newspapers, and once a day on the television isn't even the world in which the current school design was developed. In those days, there were daily newspapers, and if you went to the movies, there was a newsreel delivering the news that was essentially dated. There were no social media outlets other than the conversations that may have taken place at the grocery or the gas stations. There were fewer competing views. Wars were won or lost and didn't last for decades. Innovation was left to and expected from the elite few. Manufacturing, and perhaps sales were the workforce outside of the declining farming industry. Not only is it different today, but it is changing so quickly, we can hardly be secure in our advice about what is important for students to know and be able to do beyond the capacity to research, work well with others, make objective decisions, be well prepared to manage change, to think with an innovative eye, and to work well with others. What was memorized as facts about Mars and Pluto are now changing as we write.
A Call To Leaders And Teachers
School leaders in this century have the enormous task of turning a ship in turbulent waters. The organization of schools must be in sync with the world in which they are situated, and the one into which students will graduate and become a work force. The design, the mental picture of a system that can do that is already in the minds of some, beyond the imagination of others, and not even in the thoughts of others.
What we truly need is support for the creativity, time and resources to design and pilot local options that fulfill the standards and expectations on a state and federal level and allow for localization and partnerships and vision as well. For example, in New York State, there are the age-old regents exams that are the required exit tickets for graduation. They are subject based. In a school that has the capacity to choose to blend history and art, or science and math, or math and banking, or music and art and English, measuring the alignment with the subject-based curriculum standards, in order to be able to confidently offer the blended courses as alternatives is a huge undertaking. The subject based assessments call for subject-based classes, not what today's classrooms truly need. On the same hand, we need to be sure that students know and are able to use information we teach in meaningful and correct ways. If we are truly dedicated to the rebirth of a leading edge educational system for this century, something must be done.
Advocacy for new school designs must organize. Educators have to become change initiators or it will continue to be forced upon us. When speaking to legislators and those with the resources to influence education, the message must be that raising standards must be accompanied with new designs and delivery options. Latitude must be given, if even only to a select group of districts or states, in order to design, pilot, and assess the value of the changes. If people like Laurene Powell Jobs, or Bill and Melinda Gates want to dedicate millions of dollars to improving schools, let the money be spent in this way. Let their conviction and generosity include what educators know, and that is, the design and demands of today's schools prevent true innovation as long as the structure remains. There are many who have tinkered within the system and have seen extraordinary results with unlikely students becoming engaged, attendance rates rising, and overall student achievement rising as well. This century not only needs graduates who "know what", it needs graduates who are interested, motivated, engaged, and "know how." That starts in our classrooms. Let's gather around these ideas and call out for funding design space and design teams. Other entrepreneurial organizations have them in their budgets...schools need them too.
TECH DO'S
1st WEEK – TWITTER – We all have accounts & need to be tweeting out what is happening REGULARLY in our classrooms. . I EXPECT this to be happening weekly & regularly..We have told our PTA as well as other parents that our teachers are tweeting & that they should follow us on Twitter in order to see what is happening in our classrooms. I understand that not EVERY parent will follow us, but that's ok - we need to do a better job of educating our parents about the benefits so they will WANT to follow us! We are beginning to move away from just purely INFORMATIONAL tweets to more genuine LEARNING tweets which is exciting to see! IT's a PROCESS!!!
For those of you who are new to our campus, I understand that this is something new to you & that there's a learning curve involved. I do! EME started tweeting as a campus in the second quarter of last year, & we will continue tweeting - this is not going away! If you are still learning or need additional support or help by all means LET US KNOW! I do completely understand & recognize that it will take some time for some to catch up, but thank you for working to get where we NEED to be!
I think you will be pleased to know that during the second nine weeks there won't be nearly as many Tech Do's - instead, we will take a few & delve DEEPER into those such as TWEETING & SKYPING which will be more effective & productive for us in the long-run.
We're all busy & you're doing a great job, but please know that we've committed to tweeting REGULARLY with our parents, so I do expect us ALL to be doing that! I'm very proud of the strides we've made with technology - the best is yet to come!
THIS WEEK AT A GLANCE:
Monday – Red Ribbon Week - Wear Red, Pledge Day, PLC’s meet, Grades are due to the office this morning, Technology committee meets – 3PM
Tuesday – Wear your sunglasses &/or Neon colors for Red Ribbon, Fire Drill, Colleen Clower will be here this afternoon for Math GVC;s (Walk-Thrus),
Mad Science Club begins
Wednesday – Team Jersey Day, 3rd grade Field Trip to Casa Manana, Tim out in the morning for math PLC, Faculty Meeting – 3 PM - 4:15
Thursday – Instructional Rounds
Friday –Eagle Mountain University Clubs – 7:50 – 8:40, Eagles of Character 1:45, Tim out for ALI 2,. Monthly Staff Luncheon & Crazy Sock Day
NOTEABLE QUOTABLE:
“Every day you are in the power of an opportunity.”
-Angela Maiers
SHOUT OUTS:
- Kudos to Donna Bell for doing a PERFECT job on an audit we went through. Her paperwork is always accurate, detailed, & everything was in order, so I want you to know what an outstanding job she does! We appreciate Donna very very much!
- A COLOSSAL thanks to Drew as well as Angela Cathey for their work in organizing Clubs. Getting everything balanced & organized takes time & effort, & Drew & Angela did a lot to ensure that our kids would be ready for a great experience. Thank you for your attention to detail & for going the extra mile to give our kids such a great opportunity!