Northside Elementary School
May Newsletter
Thoughts
Geneseo Public Library's Summer Reading Program will start June 4 and last 6 weeks. There will be a prize bucket kids draw from weekly when they show progress on their reading log. The following programs are also being set up: Absolute Science on June 7th at 10 AM and a monthly visit from a Figge instructor who does Art-To-Go. A glow-in-the-dark dance party will end the program. Registration begins May 21.
Northside Spring Music Program
Program schedule:
4/5 Grades 9:00 am
2/3 Grades 10:15 am
K/1 Grades 2:15 pm
All Unit Choral Concert
A friendly reminder that this is a no student attendance day.
Northside PTA Meeting
PARCC Updates
Dear Northside Families,
You may have heard that changes are coming to PARRC, the Illinois state assessment for students in grades three through eight. PARCC has dissolved and New Meridian is now managing this assessment. The state assessment remains essentially the same, keeping the core features of PARCC, as well as having already been approved by the Department of Education as a tool that meets federal standards.
So what are the differences between PARCC and the New Meridian PARCC-like test? Illinois will continue to use PARCC questions to maintain the same level of rigor that we have come to expect from the PARCC exam. The assessment will continue to include complex tasks in reading and math that require strategic reasoning, extended investigation, and writing. The intention of PARCC’s more complex questions is to give teachers information not only about what a student knows, but also what they can do with that knowledge.
At the same time, we are also committed to making improvements to our test. We plan to give educators, students, and families a more useful understanding of where students are in their learning journeys and how ready they are for the next level. To this end, ISBE developed a Request for Proposal (RFP) that gives test vendors a chance to revise and improve our state assessment tool. Based on feedback from Superintendents and teachers we are committed to making additional improvements.
The specific improvements we are targeting include:
- Returning results more quickly, providing teachers with time to adjust instruction;
- Providing a model that informs educators how much growth a student makes within a year’s time.
- Building assessments from the ground up in more languages to increase accessibility and allow all students to demonstrate their true level of mastery;
- Reporting results on a common scale across all assessments, including local assessments, so educators can engage in deeper dialogue with each other and with families and students;
- Reaching full online assessment to support equity of access to rigorous instruction and return results faster; and
- Transitioning to a computer-adaptive format, meaning the test items become more or less advanced depending on the student’s performance as they progress through, so we know not just whether a student meets the standards for their grade level but the upper and lower bounds of their mastery.
Illinois will phase in changes, as improvements are identified, carefully and slowly. Because the statewide accountability system focuses heavily on student growth, accurately measuring students’ growth is incredibly important. A growth measure allows us to identify effective teaching practices.
The review of the timeline and specific details for all changes depend on the proposals potential vendors submit to the Illinois State Board of Education. There will be no changes to the formats of any assessments students taken this spring.
Sincerely,
Alex Kashner
Principal
Northside Upcoming Calendar
May 7 - No School (Teacher in-service)
May 7 - All Unit Choral Concert
May 8 - PTA Meeting 3:30 PM
May 11 - Field Day (3-5 grades) 9:15-11:15 AM
May 11 - Field Day (K-2 grades) 1:00-2:40 PM
May 11 - Middle School Transition (5th grader) 11:15-3:00 PM
May 14 - Recorder Concert (5th Grade) 7:00-9:00 PM
May 16 - 2nd Grade Putnam Field Trip
May 18 - Camp PreSchool
May 18 - Reading Fair (5th Grade) 8:30-11:00 AM
May 23 - Spring Music Program
May 24 - Isaac Walton Trip (4th Grade)
May 25 - PreSchool Last Day
May 25 - 5th Grade Lee's Lanes 10:45 am - 12:45 pm
May 27 - HS Graduation
May 30 - Last Day of Student Attendance (11:30 dismissal)
Northside Elementary School
Email: akashner@geneseoschools.org
Website: www.geneseoschools.org
Location: 415 North Russell Avenue, Geneseo, IL, United States
Phone: 309-945-0625