PMS News & Notes 12/19/14

As the year winds down, this blog post will be more about planting seeds for some things to consider as the new year begins...I wish each of you a Happy Holiday!

Budget Time

As the first part of 2015 rolls along, please start considering the items that you will need for next school year. When thinking about your budget, consider the items that you will need to improve the amount of students that are achieving at high levels, and what we need to raise the achievement level of our highest achievers. Teacher requisitions for next school year will be due to me by March 13, 2015.

Summer School

Now is also the time of year to consider teaching summer school, and look at the courses that we offer in the summer. If you have an idea of something you'd like to teach during summer school, let's start talking about those ideas. We would like to beef up our summer school course offerings. More on this to come...

Concert
The MS Holiday Concert was outstanding last night.  Congratulations to Mr. Hazard, Mrs. Graeve, and Mr. Ferkovich for a job well done.  The gym was packed, and the talents of our students were on display for many members of our community to see.

Quote to Ponder over the Break

"Did the students learn it? And, if they didn't, how can we teach it so that they do?"

     - Paul Bambrick-Santoyo in Leverage Leadership: A Practical Guide to Building Exceptional Schools

Twitter Find of the Week

This post should make us feel good...from Dr. Justin Tarte @justintarte
CLICK HERE

Duty

Morning Duty - Anderson, Barnett
Bus Duty - Vian

Data
2nd Quarter Behavior Referral Data
13-14 - 66 Events, 52 Students
14-15 - 61 Events, 38 Students

PMS News & Notes 12/12/14

Greetings!
Poynette is a great place to be.  I am excited to be a part of the work that we do here with our students on a daily basis.  After I get the opportunity to collaborate with people from other districts, I always come away with feeling good about the work we are doing here in Poynette.  After a solid week of educating our students, it is vital to enjoy the weekend! 

Rigor in the Classroom

At our last staff meeting, we started to self reflect on the rigor level in our individual classrooms.  A natural progression of the rigor conversation is "Authentic Learning".  As we work on analyzing our lessons, looking for ways to build activities in our classrooms that naturally lead students to "advanced" level work, I encourage you to brainstorm ways to bring authentic tasks to your classroom.  There are many of these activities happening in classrooms all across the building already, and I would like to come in and be a part of these authentic activities.  There are many creative ways we can make small tweaks to our lessons that can have a big impact.

Communication of Student Progress

Since our mid-term message went out, I have had a couple of encouraging conversations with parents about the progress of their student.  After our staff survey during our last staff meeting, our self assessment score for overall communication at about a 6.7/10.  My goal for us is to get in the 9,10 range. Continue having those conversations in the classrooms about each student's progress in relation to our rubrics.  Your feedback was very helpful as we plan to get the most out of our communication efforts.

Baraboo Presentation Update

We sent a small team over to Baraboo on Wednesday to present "Assessment, Grades, and Reporting" to their Grading and Assessment team that consisted of about 18 middle and high school teachers. It was a lot of fun, and we they were very interested to hear about the way we are putting theory into practice. It sounds like we will be invited back to present to their entire staff in the near future.

PPG's

The PPG process has been a lot of fun for me this year. It gives us an opportunity to breakdown a component within the Danielson framework to focus on during the year. I have had bi-weekly meetings scheduled with most teachers, and would like to get everyone on my schedule. If we have not set up these meetings yet, shoot me a quick email and we'll get the time set.

Holiday Concert

I don't know about you, but I love the holidays, and I cannot wait for the upcoming band and choir concert on Thursday, 12/18 starting at 7:00 in the 1-8 Gym. What a great way to showcase the hard work, dedication, and talent of our music department. Hope to see you there.

Data

Click HERE to check out our performance on state assessments.

Duty
Morning Duty - Rogness, Vian
Bus Duty - Anderson

Twitter Quote of the Week
"Mistakes are just proof that you are trying." @TeachTrainLove

Improving Instructional Practices Vol. 9

Thanks to Mrs. Morrissey for this Ms. Niemeyer for these short, weekly tips for effective instruction.

Instructional Rounds: Part 1 of 2

Danielson’s Domains:  4a Reflecting on Teaching,  4d Participating in a Professional Community, 4e Growing and Developing Professionally

Learning walks or Instructional Rounds are all names for the same idea, observing and learning from fellow colleagues.  The focus of the round  is determined by the teacher(s) observing.  They are short observations with a brief concluding discussion after about what ideas are taken away for  implementation. The whole process takes less than 30 minutes of time, but has been shown to have positive impacts.  Click the link to see how one school has implemented this strategy.  https://www.teachingchannel.org/videos/the-learning-walk

Want to know more?

Click on Instructional Rounds Q & A

PMS News and Notes 12/5/14

We find ourselves at the end of the first week in December on a crash course for Winter Break. With a focus on moving our students forward, school is a fun place to be.  I appreciate the hard work and effort that each of you put into making each day a positive learning environment for each of our students.

IE Advisory Wednesdays
Making connections with each of our students is so vital to building and maintaining a culture of hard work, empathy, kindness, and high moral character.  If you have an Enrichment period, taking time to meet one on one and having conversations with each student is an opportunity to capitalize and have conversations that can have an impact on a student.  Please review the IE Lesson Plans for Wednesday details.  We should meet with all students, and you most likely will not get through all of them in a day, so keep a list, and pick up where you left off from the following week.  Starting this coming Wednesday, please show students their initial STAR scores in Reading and Math, and explain to them that we will be taking the STAR assessment again at the end of January.  It is easiest to show them their score on the STAR website.  It would be helpful to share with students the expected growth charts, and set some sort of goal of where they'd like their score to fall in January.  For those with bigger sections, feel free to use Silent Reading Mondays to meet one on one with students.  These conversations are also an opportunity to check in with students about Grading for Learning, hear their perspective and work to further our communication goal.  If you have any questions, please contact me or Katie Morrissey.

Mid-Quarter Grades
This is a reminder that the Mid-Quarter date is today, Friday, 12/5. Please have Mid-Quarter grades posted by end of day Monday, 12/8.  I'll send a messenger notification to parents on the following Tuesday 12/9.  If you have any questions about this process, please let me know.  Also, remember that if we did not assess a standard in the Mid-Quarter, keep it blank.  If you have concerns about this timeline, please let me know.  We will not mail out mid-term progress reports, but if you or your team feel that some students should have a progress report mailed, we can send some via mail.

Staff Meeting Review
During our staff meeting this past week, we focused on Communication of Student Progress and Rigor in our classrooms.  I will have more to share based on your feedback coming soon...Also, as you plan your lessons, think of ways to incorporate those higher level thinking questions and activities for our students.  I really enjoy the collaborative nature of our group.

Fire Inspection
Very soon, the fire department will be conducting an inspection of our building.  A couple of items of note regarding fire code.  We cannot have anything hanging from the ceilings.  Also, anything on the walls should be 18-24 inches away from the ceiling if possible.  Please survey your area, and adjust accordingly.  I appreciate your attention to this housekeeping item.

Duty Next Week
Morning - Lendobeja, O'Connor
Bus - Barnett

Twitter Quote of the Week
"90% of sound grading practice is mindset" - Dr. Ryan Smith, Principal, Norwalk HS, California

Data
2nd Quarter Behavior Referrals after 4 weeks.
13-14 - 41 Events, 32 Students
14-15 - 47 Events, 33 Students