Ram Nation News
Week of February 18, 2020
Vision
#EXCELLENCE, Back At It Again
This week, our students will be taking their common assessments.
- Let's be very intentional to provide a great learning and testing environment for our kids.
- Let's be very purposeful and have a laser focus as we work on having double digit gains across all subjects in all buckets and ensure our students are meeting their goals!!!
Our students need to know up front what good work looks like, along with the expectation that they can achieve it. We know that each one of our students are capable of learning; however, they all learn at different pace and in different ways. Our goal is to accelerate transformation and ensure our kids have access to quality education. We must be beacons of hope for our students and our community. On Friday, during our beads SEL activity, Mr. Salazar said, "I want to make sure that I do everything possible so that I can help my kids fill the missing beads." These words of reflections were very powerful that helped us to remember of our "WHY." Let's be the light that shines in the dark moments of our students' lives. Be the light that helps our students see there is a bright future ahead of them. Light up our students' path as you show them to have the courage to be the best they can be so that our students can achieve their highest potential.
As I shared before based on an article read, a great deal of student achievement lays on the level of motivation students have and teachers play a very important role in encouraging and motivating students.
- Let's encourage our students, get them involved, offer incentives, be creative, and make connections to real life.
- set some time aside to make sure our students know that we are very proud of them and we appreciate all the efforts they have made so far and look forward to their successes.
- MOTIVATE our students to do their very best so that they would not miss the opportunity to be and feel successful.
Attendance
- 6th Grade - 97.25%
- 7th Grade - 97.13%
- 8th Grade - 95.09%
6th grade steps up and takes the lead!
Let's continue to encourage our students to be present and on time on a daily basis. It really makes a huge difference when our students are present learning.
As a reminder, our school attendance goal is to achieve 97.5%; therefore, grade levels will be recognized with a popcorn party or other incentive when they reach this goal on a given week.
Aggressive Monitoring (AGMO)
Here's a Twist to Aggressive Monitoring
Prompting students will allow students to grapple with the text themselves and push each other to a deeper level of comprehension. Use Universal prompting when students need to explain their thinking to the teacher. Strategic prompts are wonderful tools to have when you are helping individual students make their way through a text or to check on how well students are understanding the text. These strategies include: Self-monitoring, Making Predictions, Asking Questions, Inferring, Understanding Author's Purpose and Summarizing.
Instructional Practices
8th Grade Review
6th Grade Review
Valentine's Celebration
Learning and Collaboration
- We continue to have more people willing to learn and grow as educators supporting our English Learners as we learned and calibrated on TELPAS; we had over 75% success rate in the first calibration attempt.
- Shout out to Ms. Rendon, Ms. Cagle, and Ms. Reeves for their collaboration and presentation on Focus Note Taking and Culturally Relevant Teaching. We will provide some opportunities to follow up on the latter topic.
On a Mission....
Deep Analysis
Collaboration
Climate and Culture
Our goal for our climate survey is to rank in the 4th and 5th quintile in all areas. This means that all of our areas of our climate survey will be green!!!
- We made great improvements as we moved at least one quintile from Fall 18 to Fall 19.
- We want to provide a welcoming and collegiate working environment for each person who comes to make a difference in our community.
- Our goal is to improve morale knowing that pressure is on and our students must be the priority.
Ms. Scott
guides staff members in a bead SEL activity to continue to know each other building trust among staff as well as providing us an opportunity to reflect about our privileges and how this awareness impacts our work.
Building Trust
One of the ways in which we build trust with each other is by knowing individuals at a personal level. Shout out to Ms. Perez and Ms. Wells for putting together our team building activity where we were able to relax and enjoy of each other's company in a different way. We know it is important to build relationships and know how to interact with each other in order to improve our team effectiveness.
Celebrity Calderon
REMINDERS FOR THE UPCOMING WEEK
- Our Remarkable Rams will begin testing on Tuesday and will continue testing through Friday, February 21, 2020. Remember to incorporate the testing message/script you prepared for your students. During testing, we should be intentional as we actively monitor and provide accommodations to identified students. Please refer to the handout provided during PLC - Testing Expectations.
- We must have 100% presence in the hallway during transition times. Our students notice when there is a lack of adult presence in the hallways and will take advantage of it. (TEI 3.3 and 3R Positive Attitude/Enthusiasm).
- It is critical to be prepared with lessons and materials to avoid having issues with students. When we are not prepared, our students can tell and will find their own way of entertainment.
- As we work on documenting the progress our students are making, remember our policy regarding failure rates and the various opportunities needed to ensure our students are successful. EIA (Regulation) (TEI 2.2, 4.2, 4.5)
- Be very consistent in the effective implementation of various practices discussed during our TEI orientation and lesson alignment conversations. With regards to Alignment (learning objective), the proficient rating states: Focuses students at the beginning and throughout the lesson, by clearly stating (TEI 2.1)
- What they are learning
- Why it is important
- What mastery looks like
- How to connect it to prior knowledge and their own lives and explaining to students
- During 8:00 a.m. - 8:20 a.m., students must be engaged in meaningful activities: homework support, Grade checks, organizing binder, CNN news with reflection sheet.
- Submit lesson plans by Thursday at 8:00 a.m. (TEI 4.2)
DAILY EVENTS
Monday, February 17-
- No School - President's Day
- B Day (2 days).
- Math Common Assessment. We will be looking for teachers actively monitoring with the tracker. Also, teachers will be using the exemplar generated at the beginning of the six weeks to compare with the work produced by the students.
- During planning, work on scanning all bubble sheets into All in Learning. If needed, complete scanning after school.
- TELPAS Writing - RLA Past Tense Writing Sample - RLA teacher responsible for administering and collecting the writing samples. See Mrs. Mooty if you have questions or need support.
- 4:30 p.m. After School Program Continues. Let your appraiser know who will be staying for tutoring to plan for after school meals. As a reminder, students do not have the option to opt out; if you need assistance with parents, please let anyone from the leadership team know.
- Remember to clock out at or after 6:00 p.m. during the 2 days that you will stay after school.
- 5:15 p.m - 6:45 p.m. 5th Six Weeks SWAG at Adamson High School for Algebra I - we'll dive deeper into the previewing the six weeks and spend time sharing best practices across campuses! Separate invites sent. - Mr. Martin / Ms. Guerra
- B Day (2 days).
- 6th and 8th Reading Common Assessment; 7th Writing Common Assessment. We will be looking for teachers actively monitoring with the tracker. Also, teachers will be using the exemplar generated at the beginning of the six weeks to compare with the work produced by the students.
- During planning, work on scanning all bubble sheets into All in Learning. If needed, complete scanning after school.
- TELPAS Writing - RLA Past Tense Writing Sample - RLA teacher responsible for administering and collecting the writing samples. See Mrs. Mooty if you have questions or need support.
- 4:30 p.m. After School Program Continues. Let your appraiser know who will be staying for tutoring to plan for after school meals. As a reminder, students do not have the option to opt out; if you need assistance with parents, please let anyone from the leadership team know.
- Remember to clock out at or after 6:00 p.m. during the 2 days that you will stay after school.
- 4:45 p.m. - 5:45 p.m. - Teacher Focus Group to discuss instructional practices (Look Forward PLC, Data Meetings, Aggressive Monitoring) - Ms. Molla and Ms. Winton at Lang MS, 1678 Chenault Street, Dallas, TX 75228
Thursday, February 20-
- All Periods
- 6th and 8th Science Common Assessment; 7th Reading Common Assessment. We will be looking for teachers actively monitoring with the tracker. Also, teachers will be using the exemplar generated at the beginning of the six weeks to compare with the work produced by the students.
- During planning, work on scanning all bubble sheets into All in Learning. If needed, complete scanning after school.
- TELPAS Writing - RLA Past Tense Writing Sample - RLA teacher responsible for administering and collecting the writing samples. See Mrs. Mooty if you have questions or need support.
- 4:30 p.m. After School Program Continues. Let your appraiser know who will be staying for tutoring to plan for after school meals. As a reminder, students do not have the option to opt out; if you need assistance with parents, please let anyone from the leadership team know.
- Remember to clock out at or after 6:00 p.m. during the 2 days that you will stay after school.
- 5:15 p.m - 6:45 p.m. 5th Six Weeks SWAG at Robert T. Hill Middle School - we'll dive deeper into the previewing the six weeks and spend time sharing best practices across campuses! Separate invites sent. At least one person per grade level per subject will participate; let me know who will be in attendance.
Friday, February 21-
- All Periods
- 6th and 8th Social Studies Common Assessment; 7th Science/Social Studies Common Assessment. We will be looking for teachers actively monitoring with the tracker. Also, teachers will be using the exemplar generated at the beginning of the six weeks to compare with the work produced by the students.
- During planning, work on scanning all bubble sheets into All in Learning. If needed, complete scanning after school.
- TELPAS Writing - RLA Past Tense Writing Sample - RLA teacher responsible for administering and collecting the writing samples. See Mrs. Mooty if you have questions or need support.
- Deadline to submit fund raisers proposal and field trips - Ms. Gomez and Sponsors
Saturday, February 22-
- AIM Super Saturday Summit - Campus Leadership Team at Samuell Building – 5151 Samuell Blvd. Dallas, TX 75228
- Saturday School Continues - Adults 8:30 - 1:00; Students 8:45 light breakfast. Session is from 9:00 a.m. - 12:45 p.m.
Upcoming Events
February 25
- TELPAS Writing - Science
- 9:00 - 11:00 a.m. - Texas Real Estate Council visit
February 26
- TELPAS Writing - Math
February 27
- 9:00 - 1:00 p.m. - AVID Showcase
February 29
- Garcia MS Invitational Track Meet at Wilmer Hutchins Stadium - 8:00 a.m. - Coach Bey/Clark/Martin/Harris
March 2-3
- TELPAS Online Reading - 8th Grade
March 4-5
- TELPAS Online Reading - 7th Grade
March 6-9
- TELPAS Online Reading - 6th Grade
March 12
- Career Day
Open Transfer Period (updated)
The Open Transfer application for regular schools will be available starting March 6, 2020. There will be a special open transfer window for ACE campuses that will begin on February 25, 2020. Eligible employees must apply via the open transfer application online at https://www.dallasisd.org/careers within the time frame established. Principals will have an opportunity to submit open transfer recommendations no later than April 10, 2020. Transfers are not final until an approval email notification has been sent from Human Capital Management. All notification will be completed by April 24, 2020. While I have sent a form in the Fall, I will be sending another form where you will have an opportunity to let me know of your plans for next year. However, if you know that you are planning to transfer or leaving the district, please let me know as soon as possible so that we can plan accordingly. As we are working on having a solid and effective team, transfers will not be approved after the April 10 deadline. In previous years, I have tried to be flexible and supportive allowing staff members to transfer; however, we have found ourselves in a bind trying to fill vacancies for transfers approved after the deadline. Therefore, while I want to keep as many of you as possible, I know that life happens and some of you will be transferring. Please, plan accordingly and let me know of your next steps.
- Application window is Monday, January 13 – Sunday, March 22, 2020
- All Dallas ISD educators are eligible to apply
- Projects span all grade levels (K-12) and across all subject areas
- Educators may request funding up to $2,500 for innovative teaching projects
- Application can be completed using the fillable format attached and submitted electronically
- Projects MUST be completed within the allowable time frame of September 1, 2020 – April 1, 2021.
Happy Birthday -
We want to wish you the best and many blessings for the years to come.
- Ms. Mooty 2/2
- Ms. Gray 2/5
Athletic Events
Rusk Middle School
Email: jcordoba@dallasisd.org
Website: www.dallasisd.org/rusk
Location: 2929 Inwood Road, Dallas, TX, United States
Phone: 972-925-2000
Twitter: @RuskAllTheWayUp