Wildcats Roar & Titans Soar
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
"Students don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care."
John Maxwell
Ring in 2020! Goal Setting
Once students become proficient in goal setting, they begin to own their learning. Students can use this ownership to improve themselves and foster an intrinsic drive for growth. Specific strategies can assist students in setting goals and developing self-regulation. As with learning anything new, students can find scaffolds helpful. Over time, teachers can remove the scaffolds as students become more independent in goal setting and cultivate a growth mindset.
Here are four effective strategies to teach goal setting
Step One: First, teachers assist students in creating goals based on specific and challenging standards. Then, teachers share the grade-level performance standard with students in the form of an "I can" statement.
Step Two: Focus on goals within small, homogeneous ability groups. This way, teachers can quickly assess students individually on their goal and give direct and immediate feedback relevant to all the learners in that group.
Step Three: Help students understand where they are in the learning process by explaining what skills they have mastered and then using that information to help them create a goal for future learning. This strategy engages students in the learning process and encourages them to take control of it. For instance, some students may decode well but need to work on sight words to increase their oral reading fluency. So, setting a goal of learning five new vocabulary words a week, in addition to teaching specific strategies to learn vocabulary, helps students learn to set and work toward a goal. This interaction of student and teacher in the goal-setting process allows teachers to leverage student motivation when implementing intentional remediation and enrichment strategies.
Step Four: Teachers can also use goal setting to enhance student learning by promoting cooperation. Creating a classroom goal in which everyone contributes to one another's growth could generate excitement among students
Monday Meetings
JAN. 13- WIN Meeting
JAN 27 Articulation Meetings
Curriculum Corner
Save the Testing Dates
Feb. 18- April 10 WIDA ACCESS (K-5 ELL students)
April 27- May 15 NJSLA Testing Grades 3-5
Welcome Mrs. Merves
Supporting ELL Students
Have you or your colleagues ever lowered expectations for immigrant students? Reflect on what you've seen and heard.
➛ In what ways could you better recognize the strengths of your immigrant students?
➛ How could you encourage students to maintain and develop their native language skills in your school or classroom?
Please read the following article: Seeing Their Strengths
Reading Units/ Writing Units
- Kindergarten- If Then/ Writing for Readers
- 1st Grade- Learning About the World Nonfiction/ Creating Informational Chapter Books
- 2nd Grade- Reading Nonfiction/ Information Writing
- 3rd Grade- Read to Learn/ Information Writing
- 4th Grade- Making Meaning from Poems/ Literary Essays
- 5th Grade- Argument & Advocacy/ Research Based Argument Essay
Small Group Literacy Instruction
Small group instruction whether a Guided Reading lesson or Strategy lesson is an essential component of a balanced literacy program. This is a non-negotiable practice that should be occurring in every class.
The Next Step Forward in Guided Reading by Jan Richardson that was provided last year is a good resource. Sample lesson plan templates can be found in the Guided Reading folder of the Team drive. We will review further expectations during upcoming PLCs.
Small Group Lesson plans will be collected Jan. 13
Health Curriculum
The Heath planning team recently met and is in the process of creating supporting documents for teachers and families based on feedback received. It was also determined that Unit 2 will be taught in January. In the meantime please continue to:
· Review the Health Curriculum in Rubicon Atlas
· Become familiar with the NJ Health Standards
· Take a look at upcoming unit lessons
· Continue implementing Yoga4Classrooms
· Continue having class meetings
Upcoming Events
Jan 3 WD/TJ Spirit Day
Jan. 6 TJ Student of the Month Assembly @ 9:30
Jan. 7 WD HSA Meeting @ 9:30 in TLC room
Jan. 9 TJ PTO Meeting @ 9:30 in Book room
Jan. 10 WD Kindergarten Parent Visitation
Wee Deliver @ Woodland begins.
Jan. 20 MLK Day- School Closed
Jan. 21 I-Ready Diagnostic window opens
Jan. 29- Pennies for Patients Assembly 9:30 (WD) , 10:45 (TJ)