Sipley School Weekly Howl
Week of March 17, 2014
St. Patrick's Day is an enchanted time - a day to begin transforming winter's dreams into summer's magic.
The Five Essentials Survey Begins on Monday
The Illinois 5Essentials Teacher Survey is to be completed by certified teachers whose primary responsibility involves teaching students for the majority of the school day and year. Certified staff, please complete the survey starting on Monday. We are looking for 100% participation.
Individuals in the following positions, who also teach, are among those encouraged to participate:
· Media specialists
· Speech/language pathologists
· Counselors
· Social workers
The following positions are ineligible to participate in the survey:
· Teacher aides
· Substitute teachers
· Tutors
· Instructional coaches (who do not otherwise teach)
· Student teachers
This list of eligible participants is set by the state.
Taking the Survey
1. Everyone (students, parents, and teachers) will go to https://illinois.5-essentials.org to take the survey (please see #2 under Resources below)
2. There will be a “Take the Survey” button in the upper right hand of the screen (the button will not appear until the survey opens Monday, March 17th at 6:00am).
3. Once that button is clicked, survey participants will click the appropriate ‘Student,’ ‘Teacher,” or ‘Parent’ button. A unique login screen will appear.
4. All surveys must be completed in one sitting.
5. Once the survey is complete, the responses are not recorded until the ‘Submit Survey’ button is clicked.
Monday Meeting
Arrival to School
Principal PLC Updates
We have grade levels that are doing a variety of things.
- Grade 4 is working on a unit that they created with Shelli. They created a pretest and are using that to determine next steps (Unitlizing data to inform instructional planning). They are working on helping readers notice main characters and what characters say or tell us about other characters. They are asking students to cite evidence demonstrating what a character shares about another character.
- Grade 5 is going to work on a Task Rotation with a writing prompt as a culminating activity that pairs with their DEB book, Because of Mr. Terupt.
- Grade 6 is working on comprehension related to a story that they are reading. We spent time talking more about FOCUS and going through a presentation Mr. Wolcott sent to staff.
- In a grade 2 meeting we spent time introducing ourselves to Ms. Garza and allowing her to introduce herself to us.
- In grade 1 we talked about Task Rotation. We are developing a Task Rotation based on a read aloud during our next meeting.
- Grade 3 is going to focus their next meeting on math. We are going to bring an upcoming lesson in and cocreate the best lesson that we can come up with.
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Here is a Glance at the Week Ahead
Monday - The 5 Essentials Survey Opens
Monday - Greg will meet with certified from 11:20 - 12:20. All Mid-day Collaboration is cancelled. Support staff will be outside for supervision.
Monday - I will be out for a portion of the afternoon to attend a meeting
Monday - 3:00 - 3:30 meeting for anyone who missed Officer Bean's presentation
Tuesday - I have an admin. meeting in the morning
Tuesday - I will leave early to meet with my dissertation committee
Wednesday - Gifted seminar (Zei, Curry, Dorsey, Bradford)
Wednesday - STP Meeting
Friday - I will be attending a Teaching and Learning Team meeting with coaches and principals