June 2, 2014

By Allan  

Hello Howard Staff,

Be sure to check out the new locations of our school garden beds! Allison and the School Garden Project folks worked all Saturday (minus the frat boys who didn’t show up) to move and transplant our fabulous school garden!

Twelve items of note this week:

• Job Expo Updates and Placements! – More good news for next year’s staffing. Paula and Robin will be returning next year to the kindergarten team and Jessy will be returning as our third 1st grade teacher! I’m super excited to be keeping our entire staff intact for next year. This is the first year in my entire educational career where no one is leaving the building due to bumping, layoffs or retirements. This is pretty cool that we’re able to keep the entire gang together for another year!

• Building Design Updates – The design team met this past week to give feedback in a few areas the district and architects have been finalizing before going out to bid. One was the parking lot and tree out front. As I shared earlier, the county is requiring a type of asphalt that is porous, which raises some concerns, though doing so would allow for the tree to potentially stay since there would not need to be as big of a storm drain runoff along the road. The county also wants the bus entry to line-up with Grove St. and for the parking lot entry to line-up with Linwood St, which is directly across from our big old tree. However, if they conducted a traffic study, I’m sure they’d quickly discover that Linwood is not a through street and that cars entering and exiting our future parking lot would not use this road, in which case, we could move the entry away from Linwood and save the tree. Architects and district reps are going to present the situation to the River Road Community Organization at their next meeting on June 9th. My feeling on the tree is that I’d like to keep it if at all possible, but I also understand the practicalities of the situation.

Another topic was an update on the track. It is scheduled to be installed this summer, with a completion date of September 23rd. It’ll be a six lane track with and all-weather turf field, so we can potentially let students use the field for soccer all year long if we’d like.

I’d let the architects know earlier that our PTO was interested in doing a buy-a-brick fundraiser that could go in the front entry or courtyards. One concern raised is the district’s policy around advertising, although the district plasters baseball fields and other places with advertising, but we’ll have to get an official okay on this before it can proceed. The architects suggested we take a look at the John E Jaqua Academic Center for some alternatives to bricks for displaying donor names.

The idea of including permanent student artwork, such as painted tiles or tiles with fused glass, was also brought up by the architects at the meeting. I missed this part of the meeting to attend the Job Expo, but I was told building reps were not impressed with the quality of artwork on the tiles currently installed at Holt, Chavez and in the cafeteria at Howard, and were not very excited to have sloppy looking art permanently installed.

Lastly, the library wasn’t discussed at this meeting, but will be discussed at our last meeting on June 12th. However, Julie and one of the DOWA architects have been emailing back and forth different configurations of the library shelving and layout. Here is the latest library layout. Also attached are the latest building design, which now are being more drawn more for architects and contractors, so they do look more technical than previous plans.

And don’t forget about the Howard Pinterest Page. Just follow all the boards and I can give you access to share any cool ideas you come across, ranging from furniture, to technology, to outdoor space, to most any other design elements.

• PBIS Focus: Celebrating Your Success – The June PBIS monthly focus is Celebrating Your Success, so remember the PBIS/CFK Cheat Sheet, which matches our monthly themes with Caring for Kids class meeting lessons. This is an easy way to tie the two activities together.

• Last Days of School Calendar & Schedule – To help make sure everyone knows what’s happening the last three weeks of the schools year, attached and below is a calendar of events from June 2 – June 19. I’ll include an updated one in next week’s announcements if anything is changed or added, which I’m sure will happen.

• Year End Checklist – With the school year winding down, I’ll be putting the end-of-year checklist for teachers if teacher mailboxes early this week. I need to check in with a couple folks before printing up the final draft of the checklist. This is list of tasks to complete before you leave for your well deserved summer. It’ll likely be pretty much the same as last year’s end-of-year checklist, but please let me know if you have any questions.

• 2014-2015 Class Lists Due Friday – Class Lists are due to the office by this Friday. If your grade level team hasn’t already completed this, attached is the class placement form for next year (PDF and MS Word).

• Field Day Sign-Up – Field Day is next week, so any staff who are not working with student 10:00-11:15 should sign-up to help run a station for the 3rd-5th grade Field Day. I’m double checking the stations with my sister, but I’ll be posting a sign-up sheet in the mailroom early this week. My sister also told me she’ll be sending out field day directions to staff very soon.

• Staff Summer Book Picks! – If you would like to participate, let’s compile a list of Howard staff summer book picks and recommendations. Email me a book or books you’d recommend or ones you’re planning to read this summer. Feel free to include a review or description if you’d like. I’ll share the list at the end of the year. This is certainly not a “have-to-do,” but I thought it was fun last year to hear what all people were planning to read or had to recommended. Send me your picks by the end of next week!

• More District Admin Updates– Casandra Kamens will be the new principal at North Eugene High School next year, replacing Eric Anderson, who was hired to be the new principal at Fox Hollow. Cassandra has been at North Eugene since 1998 as an administrator, a Small Schools Coordinator and a World Languages teacher. This still leave admin vacancies at Awbrey Park, Spencer Butte, South Eugene, HR Director, Technology Director, Teacher Quality Administrator and the Federal Programs (Title 1) Coordinator.

• Standards for a Better World – Backward map for social justice! Teaching Tolerance’s new Anti-bias Framework provides the anchor standards and grade-level outcomes you need to build activism and social emotional competencies into your curriculum. This could be something to discuss as a staff next year if we wanted to somehow incorporate it into Caring for Kids class meetings.

• How game-based learning brings lessons to life – Game-based learning enables teachers to present lessons in unique and engaging ways, writes Justin Eames in this article, a technology teacher in Maryland. Video games in the classroom can prompt discussions while offering students hands-on experience in topics such as engineering and design, city building and business management, he writes. Eames uses the classic video game Oregon Trail as an example. “Rather than just reading about the experience of pioneers and the principles of Manifest Destiny, students were forced to take on those roles and experience the Trail for themselves,” he writes. In a related article that came out last week, a 5th grade teacher wrote about how she incorporates Minecraft into her history and literacy lessons to deepen learning. She has her students create and lead virtual states based on the historic and literary events they study, such as building factories during the Industrial Revolution or decadent houses during the “roaring” 1920s. “Technology is a tool,” Palmer said. “It’s the human element and engagement that makes it work.”

• Schedule of Events for the Next Three Weeks – See the Google Calendar for future events, but here are the events of note for the next three week:

June 2 (M)
Carnival Tickets Pre-Sale Begins
PBIS Focus: Celebrating Your Success
Library Book Return Week

June 3 (T)
Last Day for BEST
8:30-10:30, Kirk/Groshong Buddies Bowling Trip
2:30-3:30, PBIS Meeting (Room 21)
2:30-3:30, Allan to IEP Meeting

June 4 (W)
8:50-9:00, 5th Grade Class Photo
3:00-4:00, Allan to IEP Meeting

June 5 (H)
8:45-1:45, 1st Grade to Mt.Pisgah
2:30-3:30, TLT Training (Room 6)
5:30-8:00, Howard PTO Carnival!

June 6 (F)
Grading Day – No School
Class Lists Due to Lori

June 9 (M)
EasyCBM Reading Progress Monitoring 14
2:30-5:00, Allan to Elementary Principals’ Meeting

June 10 (T)
9:00-10:00, 4th Grade Play (Cafeteria)
11:00-12:30, Birthday Lunches with the Principal
2:30-3:30, IPBS Meeting (Room 4)
6:00-7:00, PTO Meeting (Library)

June 11 (W)
Last Day of Title Groups
All Library Books Due
10:00-11:00, End of the Year Kindergarten Celebration (Gym)
3:00-4:00, Allan to IEP Meeting

June 12 (H)
9:00-1:00, 3rd, 4th, and 5th to Splash
1:30-2:30, Allan to IEP Meeting
2:30-4:30, Howard Design Team Meeting (Library)
2:30-3:30, Collaboration Time
6:00-7:00, 4th Grade Play (Cafeteria)

June 13 (F)
8:30-9:45, Field Day, K-2 (Gym/Playground)
10:00-11:15, Field Day, 3-5 (Gym/Playground)
1:30-2:00, Tail Feather/water balloon launch (Baseball Diamond)

June 16 (M)
Last Day for Kindergarten and 5th Grade
1:00-2:00, 5th Grade Graduation (Gym)
2:00-2:05, Clap Out (East Wing Hallway)

June 17 (T)
Last Day for Students
“Grab & Go” Sack Lunch (see times below)
11:05, Dismissal
11:30-12:00, Staff End-of-Year Ice Cream Celebration (Cafeteria)
12:00-4:00, Staff Checkouts with Allan

“GRAB & GO” SACK LUNCH SCHEDULE
10:00 1st grade
10:15 2nd grade
10:30 3rd grade
10:45 4th grade

Students will enter the cafeteria through the doors closest to the office. They will put together their own sack lunch, assembly line style. As students pass through the line, they should form a new line at the doors exiting to the breezeway. Once all the students have gotten their lunches, the class can leave the cafeteria. This process should take 5-8 minutes.

If staff, not supervising students, are available to help during this time, that would be terrific ☺.

June 18 (W)
Last Day for Staff (Classified and Licensed)

June 19 (H)
Budget Reduction/Unpaid Furlough Day

June 23 (M)
8:00-4:00 Being A Writer Training (Ed Center)

June 24 (T)
8:00-4:00 Being A Writer Training (Ed Center)

June 25 (W)
8:00-4:00 Being A Writer Training (Ed Center)

Only 11 days to go!

Allan

 

Click on the image below if you’d like to watch or share the Oscar winning animated short film I shared at Friday’s meeting. :)