Galloping Gazette
A newsletter for the Faculty and Staff - Week of 3/23
Put Students First • Seek Growth • Be Open to Change . Do Great Work Together • Value Differences
Principal's Message
What a week! Who thought we would put in more hours into virtual learning than in the classroom? I bet you have asked yourself and your fellow educators this several times this week. I sit back in awe of the dedication that was demonstrated this week. Your perseverance to ensure that your families had what they needed, your tireless effort tracking down students who you haven't heard from yet and your ability to continue to produce creative and engaging learning activities is the all the good that this world needs right now. You really are undercover superheroes!
All this week, we have had several conversations around routines and procedures as we would if it was September. Now we move into the conversations around consistency and its importance. This week, take what worked well and stay with it. Keep it clear and simple. Now that your routine is set, stick to it. If you have been posting your morning message/assignment at a certain time, stay consistent. If you have been posting a daily to do lists, stick to that. Resist the urge to post a cool new idea that you came across late in the afternoon. Stick it in a file for the next day or next collaboration.
Lastly, I am relying on you to decide what needs to be done for your classroom. Some of you have started to revise the VL plans to fit your class's needs, and that is OKAY. Continue to have a perspective of balance as you determine what to do each day. Be realistic about your expectations for your students and for yourselves. Some of our families (including staff members) are still sorting out childcare, fighting illness, and dealing with other concerns, too.
We are in this together, lean on us to help you. You have a strong instructional team behind you to support you. Anything you need, just ask.
-Robyn
Shout Outs...
My awesome first grade team for continuing to work together through group chats and Facetime for our kiddos - you guys ROCK! - Karen Cooley
- Travis… for all his hard work making the transition smooth. - Robin Mounce
- Shout out to T&L for all the great lessons and resources they have added to help teachers and their students with their ongoing learning. - Anne Young
The First Grade Team... Everyone brings something unique and amazing to our group and I am so thankful for them! - Cindy Matney
Shout out to Nicole, Patti P., Patti C., and Abbe for successful SRT conference this week. Thank you for your support!
Edie
Thank you to Mr. Bowman for checking on us in Google Meet each morning! We are constantly learning ways to maximize this tool for student engagement. - Kelly Zajac
- Travis, Robin, and all the support staff who helped get our Chromebooks home with our kids with very little turn around time. - Karen Cooley
- Travis Bowman.. for helping me when I have a question or get stuck. His positive attitude and amazing videos are key to making this work! - Cindy Matney
- Thank you Patti P. for your comment to my students on my Schoology Morning Message. - Edie
- Shout out to Kelly M. and Travis for helping me set up my morning messages in Schoology. I'm loving it already! - Susan Cucuzza
- Shout out to Mrs. Kesner for being a great distance-learning/teaching counterpart. Sra. Dorbin
- Shout out to my first grade team.!! We keep in touch via phone throughout the day and are sharing tons of resources. We are definitely leaning on each other.❤️ Edie
- Shout out to Travis for all the great videos on digital resources. Sra Dorbin
News and Notes....
*If you are using any direct links from the T/L documents, you must open the sharing settings for all to view, not just vbschools. Then please follow these steps to force a copy --> *Force a Copy of a Google File*
*Mrs. Johnson and Ms. Jones will be placing activities in the student's Schoology Music and Art courses instead of pushing them to you. A great idea would be to add this in as an optional activity for them to complete on the day that you would have music or art.
*We will hold grade level collaborations next week with all instructional coaches on Tuesday and Wednesday. Your grade level chair will sign up for a time for your grade level.
*To help out with connecting with our hard to reach families and track assignment completion; we are asking for all teachers to fill out the three columns each week. Teacher Rosters to track communication and assignments
Have you joined our Google + CFES Community?
Travis has created a Google+ community for us. This is a great place to share ideas, issues, thoughts, successes and anything else you can think of. As it grows, it will be a great place to check if you are having issues as someone else may have already had that issue and had it answered here. It works kind of like facebook where you make a post and others can respond. You can even post links to items from the web or your Google Drive so we can easily share resources! Just click the link below to request to join.
Here are instructions on how to use the G+ group. See you there!
Digital Learning Summer Summit - Save the Date
Date: June 17-18 (Only)
- Be on the lookout for proposal requests
- More information coming soon
Morning Meeting Moment -
Below are two powerpoints that you could use within your morning meetings if you choose or just use as resources with parents. They have alot of cute, quick videos with questions for students to answer.