This Week at AES
2/8 - 2/12
This Week at a Glance
Monday 2/1
- $2 Jean Day Fundraiser Order Forms are due
- Whole Group Lighthouse meeting
Tuesday 2/2
- Christ Club
- Staff Meeting: PLC Time: WLES/AES Meeting has been postponed. We will have a staff meeting.
- Audubon Spirit Night at Chik-Fila 4pm – 8pm
Wednesday 2/3
- K to RiverPark Academic Team
Thursday 2/4
- Read Aloud Training
- Bring a bag of books Jean Day
Friday 2/5
- 2nd Grade to Museum and Library House Meeting for a brief time then an assembly
#care
#motivate
#educate
Notes for the Week
This Week is an Intermediate Guidance Week
- We will have a House Meeting and an Assembly on Friday at 1:30. Valentines Celebrations can take place from 1:00 - 1:30 (or earlier if you have issues with specials).
- As a PLC start working on your timeline to complete these items prior to April 30th : Please refer to past Memos for the list
- On Wednesday, February 24th is World Read Aloud Day. We will have numerous guest readers in the building. In addition to the guests, I would also like us to stretch our skill-set and thing Out of the Box. I would like for every lesson that day to be tied to a read-aloud. As you work with your PLC Teams, please start planning how your reading, writing, math, social studies, science, language, music, PE, and other content will be taught through read alouds on the 24th.
- The memo serves as a list of upcoming events for the week. For a comprehensive list, please refer to the shared calendar.
- As we get closer to the Spring fun in our classrooms. Please review our School Behavior Plan. Following the consistency of this plan is a great way for us to keep behaviors in check.
Audubon Discipline Plan
Positive: Praises, 3 positive comments/recognitions to every 1 negative
Proactive: Setting Expectations-establishing supports for struggling students
Instructional: Second Step, Teachable moments, and Focusing on teaching choices not penalizing behaviors
- Each K-2 classroom will use the following clip chart as a visual reminder of student choices throughout the day. 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade are welcome to use the clip chart as well, but will also track behavior using the clipboard system.
- Students will start the day on Blue (Ready to Learn). 3rd-5th grade students will start the day with no Marks.
- When a student has been extraordinary, they will move to Purple (I’m Proactive). Students will receive a special note from the teacher and be sent to the office for recognition. 3rd-5th grade students will have a star placed next to their name on the chart and receive the same recognition. Please know that most of us are only extraordinary 10-15 days a year. A student should not be on purple every single day.
- If a student makes a hurtful choice, they will move to Green (Put First Things First). 3rd-5th grade students will receive a mark on the chart. At this time students will be reminded of expectations. Teacher, “Remember our CHAMPS expectations is level 0? Why do you need to clip down?”
- If a student makes an additional hurtful choice, they will move to Yellow (SEEK First to Understand, Then to be Understood). 3rd-5th grade students will receive a second mark on the chart. The student will complete a reflection sheet/conference with the teacher. There should also be a parent contact so the student can talk with the parent.
- If a 3rd hurtful choice is made, they will move to Red (Think Win-Win) a Behavior Note/Office Referral will be completed in Infinite Campus and students will be sent to the office. 3rd -5th will receive a 3rd mark on the chart. For the 1st and 2nd Behavior note; parent contact will be made by the teacher. Office Referrals and 3rd behavior note or more; parent contact will be made by the office.
o Students who are on red (3 marks) 3 times in a 4 week period will need a parent/teacher conference.
Please remember to try to have a 1:1 Negative to Positive contact with parents.
Hot Links
- Information on the Sessions with Sarah and Barbara can be found here.
- Please be mindful of your printing. When possible, always print to the copy machine and not actual printers. Printer printing costs 5 times the amount of printing to the copier. Reports of our largest printers can be found here.
Remembering vs. Understanding
You guys know that I love to debate on certain topics. I love to be challenged and challenge others thinking. This past week, I was in such a conversation with one of our teachers. We were discussing the value of Accelerated Reader. The teacher shared that AR has provided great information about the progress and ability of her students. I was excited to hear the amount her students were reading. She then went on to tell me about a student who just wasn’t comprehending. He would read and reread texts, but still couldn’t pass the test.
Comprehend comes from the Latin word comprehendere, which means to grasp. When we comprehend text, we are going much deeper than just remembering the text. In his book, What Really Matters for Struggling Readers, Richard Allington talks in-depth about the difference in Remembering and Understanding. As adults we never discuss Facebook articles by asking our friends recall questions, “Hey did you read the article on Facebook about the atomic cat? What was the professor’s name that created the plutonium for the cat to eat?”
Instead, we use thinking strategies and have meaningful conversations about text. Our understanding of the text is not measured by what we remember; instead it is gauged by the depth of conversation we have about the topic. We use strategies like Metacognition, Determining Importance, Questioning, Inferring, Visualizing, Synthesizing, Developing Schema, and Determining Importance to grasp text and then converse about it. We do this naturally as adults, but it is our responsibility to teach and model these for our students. In fact, I believe it is more important for our students to master these strategies than any Common Core Reading Standards. In reality, our students cannot master Common Core Standards without these strategies.
The need to measure comprehension is why we have stressed 1:1 reading conferences with students. It is only through these conversations that you will be able to determine whether a student is remembering or understanding text. After all, if a student is only remembering; are they really reading?