We have 2 weeks under our belt! I am looking forward to having a rain free week (hopefully...). We have started to get into a routine and a rhythm both throughout the school and in each classroom. As all of us get more comfortable in our routine (kids included), it's a lot easier to let our guards down in terms of relaxing our safety expectations. With all that is going on around us, each day, each minute is critical for us to ensure we are adhering to the guidelines that are designed to minimize the risk of spreading the virus. We've sent a couple of students home already first thing in the morning after a teacher asked questions after noticing a student not well. Face coverings, maintaining 6 feet of distance, not letting students mix with other cohorts, and staying out of school when symptoms are present remain critical to our efforts to educate our students while they are in the physical school building. I appreciate your help and diligence in ensuring that we do a great job of this school-wide. Hopefully, we can maintain what we started in terms of keeping the virus out of our school.
Close Contact
As we continue to learn more about how the virus spreads and quarantine/isolation guidelines, it's critical that we all have a firm understanding of the definition of "close contact". In the event of a positive case, close contact will determine who needs to be quarantined. Literally, anyone could be carrying the virus and we have to try really hard to keep that in mind as we go about our daily operations.
Close Contact is defined by the CDC as:
"someone who was within 6 feet of an infected person for at least 15 minutes starting from 2 days before illness onset (or, for asymptomatic clients, 2 days prior to positive specimen collection) until the time the patient is isolated."
Additionally..."includes persons with direct physical contact with a probable or confirmed case, direct care for a patient with probable or confirmed COVID-19 disease without using proper personal protective equipment"
Resource of the Week
A couple of resources within the Google Suite to share this week. The first resource is a description of a chrome extension that is helpful in Google Meet. More information below (Thanks Mrs. Morrissey for the contribution this week). The second is a feature found in Google Calendar that utilizes the "appointments slot" (Thanks to Mrs. Rogness for sharing this contribution!)
Chrome Extension: Dualless
Split your screen to see both your students and what you’re presenting.
This Chrome extension allows you to split your screen so you can see your students as well as what you are presenting in your Google Meet. Once you have added the Dualless extension join your Google Meet, click on the Dualless icon, and choose how large you want each split-screen window to be.
Now that you have selected your size windows, you can click “Present Now” in your Meet and select “A Window” and only choose the window you would like to share with students. When you are done presenting you can close out of the presentation or end the meeting.
Want to use it now? Click Dualless Chrome Extension Link to go right to the extension and add it.
Want to watch a video tutorial of how to use Dualless? Just click the video tutorial link to see how it works.
Appointments Slots within Google Calendar
"You basically open a slot or slots of time and can designate how long they are, then you can share the entire appointments page with families and let them sign up for a slot of their choice. Then it automatically generates and sends a google meet reminder/invite with meeting codes (and they can use the call in feature instead if they want).
I wanted to share an update about our weekly planners. Each team is sending home a copy each week through Campus Messenger, but each week is also visible on our website. I have received numerous emails from parents who expressed appreciation for this tool...I included a couple of quotes from some of those emails below:
"I just wanted to say that I really appreciate the Weekly Planner documents you shared! It's great for us parents that have kids transitioning from elementary to middle school. I want XXXXX to be independent and accountable on her own, but it's great to have this as a backup, especially on Wednesdays!"
"I am finding it a bit tricky to know as a parent what needs to be done and how involved I should be with middle schoolers. The video was helpful to see on the website where I can go each week to get an idea of what they are doing and what assignments are due."
"Thank you so much for posting the Grade Level Weekly Planners. I appreciate those so much. I was looking for a way to stay on top of assignments with the boys, but didn't want to bother the teachers since they are incredibly busy. These are great!!"
Extended Time Periods of Virtual Learning
If we are ordered to close our school for a period of time, we will need to have a plan/schedule ready to go for students. I have gotten the chance to talk through this scenario with at least one member of each grade level team (except 5th) during some BW Meetings. Once teams have discussed and are on the same page, we really should be sharing with students and even practicing on Virtual Wednesdays. I am hopeful we can continue in-person for the rest of the school year...however, preparation is critical for the continuity of learning and our operations...we need to be ready to implement in a day's notice.
Collaboration
As we have gotten comfortable with the format of our day to day operations, we need to now look for ways to be creative about how we can get more collaboration opportunities for our students while adhering to safety guidelines. If you have found some success in this area with your students, or are ready to try some innovative approaches, please reach out to me, so we can continue work to spread these important practices in all classrooms throughout the building.
Building Tight-Knit Communities in our Homebase Groups
It appears that our groups have gotten off to a great start in terms of building community. Just watching the groups interact during their lunch break and while visiting classes, it's evident most kids feel comfortable in their groups. We must continue our efforts in this area. I am re-sharing the bank of activities we have collected as a resource with many ideas for how to be special in this area.
Homeroom Greetings, Shares, and Community Building Activities
Homeroom Picture/Class Color Day on Friday
During Homeroom early this week, each Homeroom should vote on a representative color for your group. On Friday, we'll ask each Homeroom to wear a shirt that has their color as the primary color. The Homeroom with the highest percentage of participation or every Homeroom that has 100% participation will be rewarded with donuts next Monday morning. Please add your Homeroom's color to this DOCUMENT. We'll be coming around on Friday to take socially distanced photos of each Homeroom group to be displayed on a bulletin board in the school.
Family Bulletin Board in Office
The black bulletin board that is outside of my office is designed to share about our lives outside of school. Our lives outside of school are very important, and I thought having a space dedicated to share your family photos would be a way for everyone to get to know each other better. Feel free to post a photo of your family, you with special people or pets, or of you doing something you enjoy. I envision that more may go up around the holiday season, but feel free to add if you'd like.
Images from the Week
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