The BEST UPDATE
January 19, 2015
CALENDAR
Weekend Accessibility
The building will only be accessible on Saturday ( 17th from 9:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m.) The building will not be available on either the 18th or the 19th.
Jan.19- MLK Holiday (Building not accessible.)
Jan. 20 - PLC/ASC
- tech Tuesday
Jan. 21 - Admin classroom walkthroughs (Small groups of GCISD Elem. Principals will be conducting classroom walkthroughs - watch your mailbox for more information. We will be here in the a.m.)
Jan. 22 - Fire Drill - unannounced time
Jan. 23 - 3 wk. progress reports
Jan. 23 - Play it Safe
Jan. 23 - Off Campus - Hosted by Sp. Ed. & 3rd Grade
Jan. 26 - CEC 3:15 Library (reschedule from Jan.13) - note this is a Monday
Jan. 27 - PLC/meet with Raschel
Jan. 30 - Spirit Day/Grab & Go (SUPER BOWL 49 THEME) - wear a BES Spirit shirt or wear your super bowl team colors!!!
Feb 3 - GCISD Employee Satisfaction Survey available on campus website from 7:00a.m.-6:00 p.m. ( watch the Update for further details.)
NOTE: The BES PTA Talent Show date has been changed from January 30 to March 27
- Tryouts will be held on 3/3 and 3/4
- Dress rehearsal will be held 3/25
- Talent Show 3/27
TECH TUESDAYS TO ADD TO YOUR CALENDAR
Feb. 17
April 14 ( brief and during faculty meeting )
May 5
Meetings will begin at 3:15 in Lisa's room, unless otherwise specified.
YOU ARE AWESOME
Tamela thinks that Becca is a super teacher. Becca took Tamela's morning duty after Tamela had been out with bronchitis
Tamela thinks that Hayden is an awesome teacher. Tamela writes, "Hayden's short four minute writing activity was so creative. She shows the students a picture and gives them four minutes to write about it. They can write a paragraph,poem, rap, etc. If they can think of nothing to write, then they have to write about nothing! It was very interesting to hear what the students thought and so many wanted to share. YOU ROCK Hayden!"
Sarah thinks that Tonya, Abbey & Lisa are AWESOME team players. "I have heard rave reviews about their goal setting training for 3rd, 4th and 5th graders. What a fabulous team! We are lucky to have their expertise here at BES!!!" - SH
Susan thinks that Carolyn Duke and Judy Hockenbrough are awesome because they really care so much about their students and were amazing is a recent parent conference!
Tamela thinks that Joelle is a super teacher.While Tamela was absent, Joelle stepped in to help a student during lunch time. Special thanks to Joelle for her flexibility
WELCOME TO BES
Ben Bache -PBL project ideas/partner site
Greetings from the PBL Project, and I'm excited to present another Problem-Based "Weekly Warm-up"! As always, these are completely free (I hope it's a great way to share our PBL Project), and are created each week based on current events.
With Martin Luther King Day coming up in just over a week, I decided that had to be the focus of this exercise. In the spirit of MLK, your students will be asked to consider something at the school that can be changed or improved upon, and decide how they as students can help bring about that change. Obviously, they won't need to organize a major bus boycott in the city of Montgomery, or march through the streets of Washington... but it's a good start and the spirit is the same.
Here's a link to this exercise: http://pblproject.com/page.aspx?pageid=PBL-ww-Change
As always, the Teacher Instructions, Classroom Discussion sheet, "Stimulus Items" (videos, articles, etc.), note-taking sheets, and grading rubric have been provided.
Also, please check out our partner site "Step Away from the Textbook!" ( http://www.stepawayfromthetextbook.com/ ) There's a whole new set of "teacher humor" there each week, so it's a good way to relieve some stress!
Again, these exercises are used to promote PBL strategies, and will pay off when students are asked to put all of their knowledge to good use. I hope you enjoy! Please let me know if you have any questions or comments, or if there's anything else I can do.
Thanks,
Ben
Ben Bache
The PBL Project, manager
Greenville, SC 29615-1442
REPRINT FROM LAST WEEK New Email System is on the way!
Over Spring Break we will be transitioning our current email service from Office365 to Gmail. This is not the consumer Gmail that everyone uses at home, although it will look and feel the same as that service. It is an enterprise-level email service that will offer additional integration and flexibility unavailable through Office365. Currently Gmail is the only Google service we do not use. Switching to Gmail makes sense for GCISD at this time because of our heavy use of Google Drive and Google Apps throughout the District. Advantages to moving to Gmail include:
It will integrate notification and email services into Google Classroom, which more and more of our teachers are using.
We are already using Google services so Gmail will simply be another icon in the same place, eliminating the need to navigate to another website and login again.
Your email address will NOT change.
No existing email will be lost. It will be migrated to the new Gmail inbox over the course of Spring Break. If you should need something from the “old email account” (Office365) before your new one has completely migrated, you will still be able to access your old mail.
The first phase of the migration will begin with student accounts over the Martin Luther King, Jr., holiday weekend. On Friday, January 16, we will begin moving accounts on the gcisdstudents.net domain. We currently have less use on the student domain so moving them first will help us more efficiently manage the staff/faculty migration. Then, on Friday, March 6, we will begin migrating staff and faculty accounts. We have timed this migration to occur during Spring Break to minimize disruption, and we have enlisted a third-party vendor that specializes in migrations between Microsoft and Google to facilitate the process.
Below are the key talking points/FAQ's about the switch to Gmail:
Your email address will NOT change.
No existing email will be lost.
Your individual user calendar and contacts will be migrated.
District- and campus-level shared calendars and contacts will be recreated manually by Technology staff.
Online help files are currently available on the Technology Services website found here: http://www.gcisd-k12.org/Page/37562. We will be adding to this documentation over the next few weeks.
Assistance will be available from HelpDesk personnel.
Training will be available in the Tech Center labs and on campus as needed.
Student email will migrate beginning Friday, January 16, over the Martin Luther King, Jr., holiday weekend.
Staff/faculty email will migrate beginning Friday, March 6, over Spring Break.
Lane Hunnicutt, Ph.D.
Counselor Corner
The Little Book of Restorative Justice
By Howard Zehr
Goals of Restorative Justice
Restorative justice programs aim to:
· Put key decisions into the hands of those most affected by crime
· Make justice more healing and, ideally, more transformative
· Reduce the likelihood of future offenses
GREAT OPPORTUNITY FROM THE ED. FOUNDATION
NOTE: Check with Brittany Chapman - she won one of these last year!
See Sarah if you want help getting this completed.
January 13, 2015
Dear GCISD Elementary School Teachers,
Dr. Jesse Schroeder of Schroeder Orthodontics, one of the GCISD Education Foundation’s official corporate sponsors and supporter of many schools, is proud to announce a Teacher’s Grant Contest. For the second year, he will be sponsoring five $1,000 grants each year as part of his five year $100,000 commitment to the Education Foundation and our school district. The grant will be given to a teacher in each grade, first-fifth. These are the key points to enter:
- Have your students write or draw a one-page idea of what he/she thinks the teacher could do for the students with the $1,000 grant.
- The teacher is to select the one that he/she thinks best expresses a good use of the grant; the selections must be completed by Friday, February 6th and immediately sent to the Education Foundation.
- The Education Foundation will deliver the submissions to Schroeder Orthodontics for selection of the five winners.
- The winners will be announced with check presentations to the teachers at the annual GCISD Council of PTAs Founder’s Day luncheon and program in February. The winners will be the guests of the Education Foundation.
There are no rules as to how the one-page drawing or writing should be done so be creative! Please make sure that your students have their name, grade, teacher’s name and school’s name on the submission.
Through the Education Foundation, Dr. Schroeder is providing an exciting opportunity for additional support for our teachers. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me.
Sincerely,
Janice C. Kane
Executive Director
ALERT**CONSTRUCTION NEAR THE PLAYGROUND**ALERT
RETIREMENT RECEPTION IN HONOR OF PHIL JIMERSON
Wednesday, January 21, 2015 at 3:30 p.m.
GCISD Construction Portable - next to water tower
3051 Ira E Woods Ave.
Grapevine, TX 76051