05.08.16 Staff Update
A Communication Tool for the Seven Hills Staff
Personalized Learning at Seven Hills: Finishing STRONG!
End of Year Assessment Predictions:
Our campus instructional focus this year was that all students would demonstrate a full year's growth. We have been very intentional this year about using data to drive instruction, intervention, and enrichment decisions, and preliminary data indicate that we are on track to meet our goal. Highly effective people carefully examine practices to refine their craft. To help guide your work as a reflective practitioner, I am requesting that all instructional staff complete end of the year assessment predictions.
Please complete this Google Form by Friday, May 13: http://goo.gl/forms/lmo8KZdWqx
Your responses will be combined with middle of the year predictions and reflections.
Next Steps for The Leader in Me:
- Read chapters 9 and 10 by the staff meeting on May 19.
- June PD for ALL Staff: June 6 -8 (This is the only scheduled opportunity for this training. Remember, The Leader in Me requires the adults in the school to work on themselves before they can implement with students.)
- Continue to record all of the wonderful brainstorming ideas in your Leader in Me notebooks! Great ideas are popping up everywhere!!!! We need to make sure we remember them all!
"Leadership is communicating a person's worth and potential so clearly that they are inspired to see it in themselves"
STAAR Testing Information
Campus STAAR Reminders:
- Please remind all students of the importance of maintaining a testing environment. Testing will be occurring around the building, including the office. Please make notice of testing signs in the hallways.
- Remember that noise travels through the ceiling. If your classroom is next to or in close proximity to a testing room, please be mindful of the noise level in your classroom.
- Remind parents that the building is closed to all visitors and volunteers on testing days. This included field trip volunteers. We will set up a volunteer sign in table outside for any parent volunteers to sign in before leaving on field trips. K and 1, please exit the building for the field trip by the Pre-K classroom.
- The lunch and specials schedules have changed. Please make sure you are aware. , We appreciated those of you who opted to eat in your classrooms to support the testing environment during the last administration.
- Please keep everything covered in the halls and classrooms through Friday in case we have make-up testing.
- Test administrators and testing support staff, we will be ordering out lunches Monday - Wednesday. Orders must be placed with Wilma by 9:30 am each testing day, and all orders must be paid for in cash.
- The breakfast and snack bar will be provided for testing staff Monday - Wednesday in the workroom.
- All staff may participate in the designated jeans days to show their support for our STAAR test takers.
Staff Member of the Week:
Jen Morales:
LaWanda Henry:
Learn more about LaWanda and Jen when you stop by the Star Staff board in the Teacher's Lounge this week!
What's Happening Next Week at The Hills?
- Monday, May 9:
-STAAR Math 3 - 4, 5th grade math re-test - CLOSED CAMPUS
-Staff wear jeans and "Emerald City" shirt to support our STAAR Test Takers
-Parent letters regarding class placement information for 2016 - 2017 are due. (Please do not hold these in your classrooms. They need to be turned in to the front office.)
- Tuesday, May 10:
-STAAR Reading 3-4, 5th grade reading re-test - CLOSED CAMPUS
-Staff wear jeans and "Seven Hills Forever" shirt to support our STAAR Test Takers
- Kindergarten Field Trip
-All PDAS summative evaluations must be returned to the appraiser. Please contact your appraiser if you have questions.
- Wednesday, May 11:
-STAAR 5th Grade Science - CLOSED Campus
-Staff wear jeans and "Yellow Brick Road" shirt to support our STAAR Test Takers
-First Grade Field Trip
- Thursday, May 12:
-Lunch provided by 1st American Pension
- Friday, May 13:
Save The Date: (please add these dates to your calendars)
- May 16: Volunteer Appreciation Breakfast - make sure you have your items ready on or before Monday morning at 7:15. Thank you.
- May 17th: JA in a Day K-5 Grades - JA should have already reached out to you regarding your volunteer, etc. If you have not heard from your volunteer, please check your junk email, as some of the Sabre emails get caught in the filters. If you have not heard from your volunteer, please let me know.
- May 19: Staff Meeting instead of ILT meeting
- Million Word Challenge Zoo Field Trip: May 25th - Call for chaperons was sent out last week and will be in this week's Constant Contact. Please make sure you are organizing chaperons for this field trip. Class sets of permission slip packets will be placed in teacher boxes this week.
- May 27th: Star Carnival - more details coming later this week.
Happy Birthday To:
Leslie Russell 5/13
Updates and Information
Campus and District Updates:
- Active Monitoring During Duty Assignments: Safety of students, staff, and visitors is a priority. Please make sure you are actively monitoring during all duty assignments. This includes monitoring all areas of the playground, not using cell phones when on on duty, holding students accountable to campus expectations, etc. This is especially important as we enter into the last few weeks of school when drivers, students, etc. become less cautious and compliant. Thank you.
- End of Year Writing Assessment Window: Our end of year assessment window begins this week. Please note that the EOY writing prompt is “ Write a composition about something that makes you happy.”
- End of Year DRA Window: DRA copies are in the workroom. Please refer to Tanya's email for more information about these assessments. K- 2, please let Wilma know what days you would like the 1/2 day subs so that we can get these scheduled.
- Volunteer Appreciation Breakfast: Seven Hills Staff will host a Volunteer Appreciation Breakfast on Monday, May 16th from 7:30 - 8:30 am. The campus will provide a gift of appreciation to each volunteer. The staff will provide breakfast foods, OJ and creamers. A sign up sheet is posted in the Teacher's Lounge - please make sure you sign up to bring something to make this a special event for our volunteers. If you did not receive invitations for your volunteers please ask Lecia and/or Dora.
- Summer School: Tanya Ledger is the point of contact for Summer School. If any parents have questions regarding Summer School, please direct them to Tanya.
The link below will direct you to all of the programs that will be offered this summer. A flier will also be placed in teacher boxes this week. If you have any questions, Tanya is your girl! http://www.nisdtx.org/summer
- Summer School Teachers: If you are interested in supporting summer school as a sub or a STAAR Test Administrator (10 hours pay), please contact Hayley Sample.
- June 2 Awards Assembly Schedule: (please communicate with your parents, even though it has been in Constant Contact for the last 3 weeks, we are receiving lots of phone calls and questions in the office)
- 1st Grade: 9:30 - 10:00
- 2nd Grade: 10:00 - 10:30
- 3rd Grade: 10:30 - 11:00
- 4th Grade: 11:00 - 11:30
- 5th Grade: 6:00 pm
SST/RtI Meetings: With the time remaining in the school year, we are going to try a new approach to SST Meetings/RtI Updates. We have discussed as a campus group that the RtI/SST system needs reorganizing. Should this approach yield positive results, we will consider continuing next year. Meetings will be scheduled on Fridays and a few Thursdays for the remainder of the year. This schedule will allow us to meet with teachers two more times prior to the end of the year. The format will be, the teacher listed will bring all SST and progress monitoring data to the meeting. We will begin with students that are in RTI. We will focus on students that are in the homeroom only. If teachers are departmentalized and your partner teacher has concerns as well, then both will need to come to the homeroom teacher's assigned time. We will focus on four questions: What interventions are you using? How often are you using them? What is their effectiveness? Next steps? The schedule is outlined below. Please let Leslie know if you have a scheduling conflict or questions.
Friday May 13 - Harris, Tucker, Hall, Blanchard, Vann, Wolf
Wednesday May 18 -Brittain, Sammons, Franks, Dial, Davis, Stewart
Thursday May 19 - Hladky, Tindel, Moron, Reyes, Goosey, Heady
Thursday May 27 - Twa, Brister, Gill, Rusin, Pate, Mitchell
Friday May 28 - Zeigler, Willis, Any one else who needed more time
End Of Year Communication
- School Supply Packs: Order forms for EPI school supply packs were placed in boxes last week. This is an optional way for parents to go ahead and take care of collecting school supplies for the 2016 - 2017 school year. To order school supplies: www.educationalproducts.com/shoppacks. School ID: SEV001. Order now through June 20, 2016.
- Online Registration for Returning Students: Due to a programming issue with Enrollment Online, the returning student Enrollment Online services have been temporarily suspended until the NISD Student Information Systems vendor can apply a fix. NISD will notify staff and parents on the website when Enrollment Online is available for returning students.
- Kindergarten Registration Continues: Parents can still register their child for Kindergarten. Parents should stop by the front office between 8 and 2 daily to complete the registration process. There are no additional evening events planned.
- Pre-K Round-Up: This year we will host a Pre-K Round-Up on May 24 from 8:30 - 11:00 and 12:30 - 2:30. More details will be shared soon.
- Class Placement Letters: Letters were sent on Monday, May 2, communicating their opportunity to write a letter sharing important information about their child, situations to avoid, circumstances their child will be more successful in, etc. This is not an opportunity to request a specific teacher. When forms are returned to school, please give them to the front office. All letters will be due on Monday, May 9.