December 17, 2012

The students, families, and staff of Sandy Hook Elementary School have been on my mind all weekend.  Please be very present and diligent this week as we work to support students for whom this tragedy may have particularly strong effects.  Please be more visible in hallways and common areas during school and in these same areas and at building exits after school.  Click here to see a note I sent to the Hixson School Community via the blog.

Thanks to the social courtesy committee and to JoAnne Williams for planning and hosting our annual holiday party.  Taking time to be social with one another builds our relationships which are important to any community.  As we continue our work this year, we will continue to rely on our professional and social connections to support our work and our morale.  

Just four days left before break . . . There are different reasons we might look forward to time off: we might look forward to a break because we are exhausted, having been tried by any number of things at school or home, or we might look forward to break becaus we are satisfied, having felt success in any number of projects at either or both places.  Personally, I am feeling more satisfied than tired, but I know I will enjoy resting this break.  However you are feeling, I hope your winter break serves you well.

Please take some time to visit the holiday buffet in the library on Tuesday, December 18th, and have a great week!

An Example of Two Column Notes

I came across the following in a book I was reading recently.  I thought it looked like another way one might use two column notes in a classroom.

Use the following prompts to help students learn to think about what they are reading.  Have students divide their papers in half by drawing a vertical line down the middle of the page.  In the first column, ask students to respond to one or more prompts.  In the second column, ask students to elaborate on their response or answer the questions provided.  Allow students to share their responses in small groups after completing their charts.

What is important?	What is trivial?
What does the author say?	What does the author mean?
The heading for this section is	A better heading would be
The quote:	Makes me think:
The most important sentence in this section is:	Because
This paragraph	Could be summarized as
The big idea is	The details are
The problem is asking me to	The most important words in this problem are
This concept	Looks like this (illustrate):
What the character did (summarized below)	Is/is now what I would have done because
This event	Is more significant than others because
This happened	Because
I think the author has a bias	Because

Lent, R. C. (2012) Overcoming textbook fatigue: 21st century tools to revitalize teaching and learning. ASCD: Alexandria, VA.

December 10, 2012

Thank you for your continued focus, effort, and attention. It is difficult to see to December in mid-August when we begin, and I hope that all of us will take advantage of our well-deserved break (in just 9 school days).

Monday's Faculty Meeting

Mrs. Gavin's presentation at Monday's faculty meeting regarding students identified as gifted will be the last in our series.  If you have not had an opportunity to view her glog, click here.

November Discipline Data

I published the discipline data for November on Friday. Click here if you have not had an opportunity to take a look at it.  This is a good time of year to re-teach behaviors we expect so that students can continue to be learn and be successful between now and winter break.

Time

This is the time of year when we often feel as if we are running out of or as if there is not enough time . . . this year, in particular, it might be that there has not been enough time for the beginning.  Finding and managing time is challenging, particularly when we are responding to building and district level demands.  This is, in many ways, a learning year for Discovery, for The Art and Science of Teaching, for edline . . . learning is challenging and learning takes time.  

Monday's meeting will be the last building-level meeting of the month.  We will not meet on 12/17 and 1/4/13 will be dedicated primarily to your work (although if we receive new copiers, we may need some training).  In January, the department chairs and I will discuss how we might use faculty meeting time differently second semester.  Perhaps we can find some more time to do prepare and to do the work of schooling better.

 

November Discipline Statistics

Following are discipline statistics for November.  I hope they are useful to you.  One of the way to make them useful is to be thoughtful about what you observe, why that might stand out to you, and how you might respond.  I met with some teachers this week, and we discussed how now might be a good time to review PBIS expectations and to re-teach behaviors for the classroom learning and hallway safety.

Please consider thinking about this information as a team and/or department.  Students who are not in class miss valuable (and limited) instructional time, and it may be beneficial to discuss strategies with your colleagues.

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please let a counselor or principal know.

nov behavior.pdf Download this file

nov actions.pdf Download this file

Nov location.pdf Download this file

nov time.pdf Download this file

nov totals.pdf Download this file

12/10/12 Presentation Glog for faculty meeting

Here is a link to the presentation for Monday's faculty meeting. Every subtitle is a link to more information. 

http://slgavin.edu.glogster.com/gifted/

December 3, 2012

I know that things (behavior, impatience, excitement, snacking, etc.) can intensify in the period between Thanksgiving and Winter Break; I want us to rely on another as we remain focused on student learning and effective teaching. We are just 14 days away from a well-deserved extended break.

DQ 2: What will I do to help students effectively interact with new knowledge?

I have attached a list of the strategies presented at the faculty meeting. You'll notice the list has two sections: 1) the list that was generated for you to sort and 2) the list that we generated as a faculty.

Because effective teaching can be seen as a range, the variety of strategies under each component is valuable to us as we consider all of the ways we might help students effectively interact with new knowledge.  It is easy, perhaps especially during this time of year, to rely on habits, no matter how effective.  I encourage you to implement as many new and/or familiar strategies from the list as possible to deepen student learning, energize your practice, and practice the framework.  

Click here for the list of strategies.

I am also attaching two concept circles, one of which we used as a warm up at the faculty meeting, for your own reflection and as a model of another vocabulary teaching strategy.

Click here for the PowerPoint; the concept circles are the second and third slides.

The Hixson Network Blog

I sent out the link to this already.  Click here if you missed it.  I hope that this revised blog is more helpful and easier to navigate than the other sites.  Since this information is for you, please make sure you share any feedback with Jason or me.

The Hixson High Five Award

Nominations are coming in for this student award.  It's a great way to recognize students who might otherwise escape recognition.  Please contemplate how a student might value and benefit from the personal feedback I send from you.

This week, we'll have a department chair meeting on Monday after school.  I'll be out with TLA on Tuesday and Dr. Roberts, Ms. Evans, and I will be out on Thursday morning for some administrator PD.