Week of September 29

Calendar of the Week’s Events

September 29 (M)

8:00-8:40, Joel in 504 meeting.
8:00-11:30, Being a Writer Training for all teachers.
12:00-3:00, Joel at Being a Writer Meeting (Ed Center)
2:45-3:45, September Site Council (Conference Room)
3:45-4:45, Meeting with Kerry Delph about our Camino Facebook page.

September 30 (T)

Kathy Larson Visit
Life Touch Picture Day (Gym All Day)
8:00-8:45- Joel visiting morning meetings.
9:00-9:45, Joel meets with new Chief of Staff, Charis McGaughy
2:40-3:00, Joel Meeting with Risk about Hilliard Traffic

October 1st (W)

8:00-8:45- Joel visiting morning meetings
1:40-2:40,Collaborative Planning Time
2:45-3:15, Dia de Los Muertos Planning Meeting in Room 9.
6:00-8:00, Curriculum Night- Plan de Estudios de Noche

October 2 (H)
Joel in Portland at Coaches and Principal’s Meeting
3:00-5:00, Design Committee

October 3 (F)
Academy Day- No School
8:00-12:00, Maravillas Training with a McGraw Hill PD Consultant
12:00-4:00, Teacher Planning Time in relation to Maravillas.

This week on duty:

Inside lobby: Olivia
Front of school: Erin Reckers
Bus area #1: Marcy
Bus area #2: Erin Piper
Bus area #3: Nancy
Please remember to take your class a few minutes early if you are on duty.

Here are 16 items of note for the week:

• Design Update– On the evening of September 25th we had a turn out of about 30 people.  The majority of people attending were neighbors from the surrounding community.  We presented an East option and a West option. The discussion was heated and clearly, specific neighbors feel they will be adversely effected by the West option.  We will be debriefing again Monday by phone to land on an East or West siting option. The East option has benefits of providing more open space. Unfortunately, it will cost money to tear down classrooms to make an east option work. This will cost 750K and means less money put into the building itself. The West option is also attractive and can be built with a slightly larger budget since there will not be tear downs. The West option also will mean less disruption and no loss of capacity as we need more kinder classrooms in 2015-2016. Most likely, the team will move forward with a site decision in the next week either way. The cons of the west plan are related to the outside play options and clear separation of traffic and play. The team is working on other options this week to share more ideas about the West option to come up with ways to solve these problems. Here is the latest  presentation provided by our architect team. There are also plans in my office on poster board which I will put up in the staff lounge this week.

• PBIS Assembly on October 9th- Get a small skit prepared with your grade level team or specialist team. The skit should be fun and short. Each piece should be 10-30 seconds.

• Next Parent Group Meeting is October 14th- Consider coming to the next parent group meeting. Our new parent group president wants to help families to hear from teachers about what is happening in classrooms. Drea wants to see if teachers want to do a short sharing of a particular grade level.  It makes sense for us to start with kindergarten this month.  Maestra Bucklew and Maestra Fleming, can you come to this event?

Copy Counts and conserving copies- I know many staff have been feeling the pressure of limiting copies in the IMC.  Please understand that I am working hard to conserve our general supply funds. Last year, our school overspent these funds by over 8,000 dollars and we had to cover these costs with reserves from fleet funds. This is why Edna and I are watching the counts closely. It may be that we need to up the quota for all staff sooner than December.  Also, please use Instaprint as much as possible. A little thinking ahead can make a big difference in reducing costs. Also, there is currently no limit on Instaprint orders. In addition, we are looking into limiting the office copying by using a hybrid online/paper system to cut costs there.  At open house next week, please ask parents for their latest email address so we can make sure that system is as accurate as possible.  Edna will provide a sign up sheet for you next week. If we could deliver our newsletter to a quarter or even half of our families via email, it would drastically reduce our copy costs in the office.

• Northwest Conference on Social Justice October 18th– Jill Torres is helping to organize staff who are interested in going to the Northwest Social Justice Conference.  There will be a bus provided to 4j employees who want to go. It will be in Portland this year. It is 8-4:30 on October 18th, 2014 at Madison High School 2735 NE 82nd Ave. Portland, Oregon 97220

• Operation School Bell – Alicia wanted to inform you that tthere are Operation School Bell envelopes in your boxes. If you got some, please make sure to send them home with the student on Monday, September 29. The envelope contains time sensitive information. Please let Alicia know if you have any questions. Thank your for your assistance.

• Safety Week Continues – This week is Safety Week, where we’ll practice all of the most common safety drills. The schedule for the week is below. Of course, if it rains, we will have to adjust the schedule.  Staff did an excellent job getting students outside for last week’s fire drill.  I have included a link here if you want to read more about earthquake safety and preparedness.

• Monday, Sept. 29– No Drills.
• Tuesday, Sept. 30– Room Clear, time decided by teachers
• Wednesday, Oct. 1 – Earthquake/Fire Drill
• Thursday, Oct. 2–   Lock Down (Code Blue and Code Red)

All of these drills are listed in the “Emergency Procedures Manual” which is the rainbow tabbed notebook that should be hanging in every classroom (let me know if you don’t have one). I won’t be making any announcement before the drills, so it’s okay for staff to prep your students before these drills take place. For the Lock Down drill, please review the Code Blue and Code Red procedures, which include steps that are specific to River Road and are more detailed than the general ones in the Emergency Procedures Manual. I will probably have Karen or Edna run this drill since I will be out of town that day. Please let me know if you have any questions.

• Sub Folders to Edna – If you haven’t already, be sure to give your completed sub folders to Edna. For licensed staff, EAST, the substitute teachers union, provided a list of what information is most useful for them when they go into a classroom, which teachers may want to take a look at before completing your sub folders.

• Eugene/Springfield NAACP Resource Center – The Eugene/Springfield chapter of the NAACP just had their Resource Center Kick-Off Event and I wanted to highlight some resources staff may want to recommend to students and families. There are a couple programs aimed more at secondary students, which are the Academic, Cultural, Technological and Scientific Olympics (ACT-SO) and the Youth Council, but the program that would most benefit our students and families is the Back to School/Stay in School (BTS) program, which offers free tutoring, computer lab and academic/Parental assistance and counseling every Saturday (beginning Oct. 4) from 10:00-12:00 at the LCC Downtown Campus.

• Language Link Interpretation Services – For individual parent meetings and phone calls requiring translation services (including Parent/Teacher Conferences), the ELD Office is highly recommending that staff use the Language Link phone service (see attached document for details). This is a company the district contracts with who are well versed in education jargon, can translate multiple languages and are quite experienced in translating for schools. The ELD office will still try to schedule an in-district translator for conferences, but just know that this is also an option and in some ways might be better for connecting with families since you’d be able to better avoid having everyone talking to the translator instead of talking to each other. Of course, during our conferences, most classroom teachers will conference in the language of the parent since we have bilingual teachers.

• Ed Center Artwork Display – The Ed Center has two glass display cases begging for student artwork. It needs to be either 8×11 flat or three dimensional no larger than 8 inches on any side. If you are interested in participating, please let me know. This is a great way to help kids fell empowered and proud of their artistic skills.

• Papa’s Pizza Student Incentive Award – Papa’s Pizza is offering achievement awards that can be given to students for good behavior or reaching other teacher set goals as an incentive. The students receiving the awards can redeem them at Papa’s Pizza for a free mini pizza. If you you’d like some of these for your class, please let me know by end of the week how many you’d like. Papa’s said they can provide them all school year long. I already received 25 last week to begin this program.

• City of EugeneTeaching Resources – The City of Eugene offers a wide range of K-12 resources that teachers can use to add interest and local content to lesson plans. This brochure offers some examples of these great opportunities for students, including RiverPlay/Discovery Village Field Trip, Hunting for History, Snow Plow Art, the annual Public Works Day and many others.

• UO International Cultural Presentations for Classrooms – The International Cultural Services Program is once again making their student ambassadors from across the globe available for the 2014-2015 school year. Since the program’s inception almost 30 years ago, ICPS participants have brought cultural diversity to our community through group presentations, panel discussions, and demonstrations of regional dance, music, food and many other forms of cultural expressions. This program is K-12 and is offered free of charge. If you would like to invite an international student to speak to your class, you can submit a request by filling out this online request form. If at any time you have questions or concerns, please feel free to contact the ICSP Coordinator, Lindsay Pepper, by email icsp@uoregon.edu or phone (541) 346-7429.

• VIDEO: “Hey White People: A Kinda Awkward Note to America by Ferguson Kids” – A radio station from Ferguson, MO made a pretty smart and snappy video highlighting common detours to discussing and addressing racism in America, our local community and even in ourselves.

• Hispanic Heritage Month- Check out the UO Hispanic Heritage Month Celebration organized in part by Jessica Zapata

Ten un buen semana de escuela!

Director Joel

Week of September 22

Calendar of the Week Plus

“An artist is above all a human being, profoundly human to the core. If the artist can’t feel everything that humanity feels, if the artist isn’t capable of loving until he forgets himself and sacrifices himself if necessary, if he won’t put down his magic brush and head the fight against the oppressor, then he isn’t a great artist.” Diego Rivera

September 22 (M)
8:00-11:00, Joel to Skillful Teacher Co-Observation (Ed Center)
1:30-2:30, Title Coordinator & Principal Meeting (Ed Center)
2:30-5:00, Joel to Elementary Principals’ Meeting (Ed Center)

September 23 (T)
Kathy Larson visit. (All day)
9:00-10:00, Data Meeting Analysis of General Trends before Data Consult Day
2:45- 4:45, Staff Meeting with PD on Effective PLC Practices
4:30-6:30, Joel to 4J Equity Committee

September 24 (W)
1:40-2:40, Grade Level Collaborative Planning Time (Library with support from Sarah, Aline, Karen and Joel)

September 25 (H)
12:30-2:30, Joel to Skillful Principal Being A Writer Training (Ed Center)
4:30-5:30 Design Committee (Library)
5:30-7:30, New School Design Public Meeting- Camino del Rio (Library)

September 26 (F)
Regular Day

September 29 (M)

8:00-11:30, Being a Writer Training for all teachers.
12:00-3:00, Principal Being a Writer Meeting (Ed Center)
2:45-3:45, September Site Council (Conference Room)

September 30 (T)
Kathy Larson Visit
Life Touch Picture Day (Gym All Day)

October 1st (W)
1:40-2:40,Collaborative Planning Time
6:00-8:00, Curriculum Night- Plan de Estudios de Noche

October 2 (H)
Joel in Portland at Coaches and Principal’s Meeting
2:45-4:45, Design Committee

October 3 (F)
Academy Day- No School
8:00-12:00, Maravillas Training with a McGraw Hill PD Consultant
12:00-4:00, Teacher Planning Time in relation to Maravillas.

October 6 (M)

2:45- 3:45, PBIS Meeting, Classified encouraged to come in exchange for an hour of comp time.

October 7 (T)

2:45-3:45, PLT Meeting

October 8 (W)

1:40-2:40, Grade Level Collaboration Time

2:45- 3:45, IPBS Meeting

October 9 (Th.)

2:45-3:45, Design Committee

October 10 (F)

No School, Statewide In-service Day- non-contract day for teachers and EA’s

This week on duty:

Inside lobby: Alexis

•  Fire Drill Practice and Details: Later this week, you will find a daily instruction packet in your box about Safety Week.  Craig and I spent some time redoing the classroom order outside.  The numbers will be repainted on Monday. This year, due to classroom changes, there will be  new order along the track lines. Please rehearse and practice lining up on the fire drill lines once or twice this week so you are familiar with the location of your line.   Inserted here is the updated fire drill map including the classroom line placements.

•  Design Committee Update: This week, there will be an evening event on Thursday, September 25th from 5:30- 7:30. You are invited to attend to see the proposals that will be posted for viewing.  We will be presenting 2 main concepts. One on the East of the Site and one on the West of the site. In general, what we are discovering is that overall costs before construction will be less if we build on the west.  There are some proposals that have been put up for us to discern that describe demolition of classroom wings or the gym before building. Our design team has discouraged these because of the costs that could be incurred.  Avoiding demolition saves funding to be put into the final building and saves disruption to our classrooms and learning.  After this week’s open meeting, the team will process the public’s feedback and we will make a final decision on the site of the new building. Here is the presentation from last Thursday’s session.

October 3rd PD on Maravillas: I have spoken to the McGraw Hill Representatives to plan our October 3rd PD.  They are bringing in a professional development expert to help us get a good overview of the Maravillas Program.  The professional development will run from 8:00-12:00 on October 3rd. The main topics planned will be:

• How to use these materials in a Dual Language Program.
• How to integrate English Language Materials into the ELA block that relate to the themes, concepts and objectives  in the Maravillas materials.
• How to structure Tier 2 instruction using Maravillas Materials.
• The use of the online features of Maravillas.

Your afternoon will be planning time. The Maravillas team will provide you with some tasks to become more familiar with the materials that afternoon that you can work on with your grade level team.  I expect that the EA staff, SPED Staff, and ELL staff to attend the AM session as it will directly benefit our students if you understand this program.

• Change in the date for Rosa: October 20th is the new date that Rosa Molina will be coming to Oregon.  She had other engagements on the 13th of October so we have pushed it back a week.  I will update you on the topics and use of that day after further conversation with her next week.

•  Good Behavior Game Free Training – Trillium Community Health Plan & Lane County Public Health is offering free trainings for the “PAX Good Behavior Game.” You can read more about The PAX Good Behavior Game here and here. Subs will be provided and and trainings will be held at the Lane ESD Oct. 8th for teachers new to the program and Oct 9th for a booster training for teachers who have been previously trained.

•   SELCO Educator Mini-Grants – SELCO Community Credit Union accepts Mini-Grant requests each fall from K-12 educators in the 26 counties they serve. Mini-Grants of up to $500 are awarded to educators to implement creative education projects and to help fill in the gaps left by school budget shortfalls. The SELCO Mini-Grant application process is simple – please carefully read the funding criteria to be sure your project is eligible for a SELCO Mini-Grant and use the online application form to tell us about your classroom project. The deadline for applications is October 3rd and recipients are announced November 19th.

•   Facilities Use: Use of 4J Schools – Annual Reminder –   Facilities sent their annual reminder that as public employees, no person may use district property for personal financial gain or offer it free to the community, or for use that is inconsistent with districts public purpose, or in a manner that will discredit the district. It occasionally comes to their attention that 4J employees are using the school buildings for, music lessons, sports, exercise and many other types of classes/meeting. Please see the attached 4J School Board Policy on the use of district property.

All 4J schools are public property and are subject to public scrutiny.  The District has established Board Policies to address staff and outside groups wanting to use 4J facilities.  In order to establish fairness to all groups, including 4J staff, Administrative Rules have been written to address these issues.

If employees wish to use 4J Facilities and/or equipment for private instruction or for non-school community group meetings, or any other reason, they will need to (1) get approval from the Superintendent or his designee (i.e. Facility Scheduler: Natalie Medina) and (2) they will need to complete the online Facilities Request Form and Online Scheduler

•    TalentEd Update – TalentEd has now been updated for the 2014-2015 school year. This link provides the “home” page for you to click on TalentEd for login and Quick Start Guide. This link can be found on our 4J web site under Human Resources Teacher Effectiveness and Growth Systems. We will discuss school-wide goals and expectations at the staff meeting this week.

•  Latino Heritage Month:  Yes, it is Latino Heritage Month! I do not have a bunch of materials to share with you at this point, but I will point you towards one of my favorite bloggers, Larry Ferlazzo. Larry makes lots of great resource links to support ELLs and they are good for all learners! This set of links  is focused on one of my favorite Mexican artists, Diego Rivera.

•  Math Teaching Methods- Great example of a strong math discourse:

Reasoning in Multiplication and Division  Take a look at this excellent video of a teacher using number talks and math discourse.

Have an excellent week!

Joel

Week of September 15

Where will we fly to? Only our student’s imagination can say!

Calendar of the Week Plus

September 15 (M)
Tier 2 Groups begin
10:00-11:00, Joel conducting walk through observations for general dual language characteristics.

September 16 (T)
8:15-11:30, Joel to CICO Training (Lane ESD)
12:00-12:30 , Joel in meeting in office to discuss bible group program.
1:00-2:00, Joel in meeting with  Julie Heffernan on Transgender Resources in the Community
2:45-3:45 TLT Meeting to approve Technology Plan (Library)
6:00-8:00 Latino Advisory Committee at NEHS

September 17 (W)
Tier 3 Title Interventions commence.
1:40-2:40, Grade Level Collaboration –  1st through 5th grades, please meet with your team in the library and plan amongst peers. Karen and Sarah, and Aline will provide support for your planning.
Kinder and ELL will meet in Room 6 with Lavin, Fleming, Bucklew, Lauer, and Schaal.
2:45-3:45, PBIS Meeting Conference Room- need one or two classified representatives.

September 18 (H)
2:45-5:00, Design Committee Meeting

September 19 (F)
Regular Day
September 22 (M)
8:00-11:00, Joel to Skillful Teacher Co-Observation (Ed Center)
1:30-2:30, Title Coordinator & Principal Meeting (Ed Center)
2:30-5:00, Joel to Elementary Principals’ Meeting (Ed Center)

September 23 (T)
Kathy Larson visit. (All day)
9:00-10:00, Data Meeting Analysis of General Trends before Data Consult Day
2:45- 4:45, Staff Meeting with PD on Effective PLC Practices
4:30-6:30, Joel to 4J Equity Committee

September 24 (W)
1:40-2:40, Grade Level Collaborative Planning Time (Library with support from Sarah, Aline, Karen and Joel)

September 25 (H)
12:30-2:30, Joel to Skillful Principal Being A Writer Training (Ed Center)
4:30-5:30 Design Committee (Library)
5:30-7:30, New School Design Public Meeting- Camino del Rio (Library)

September 26 (F)
Regular Day

September 29 (M)
2:45-3:45, September Site Council (Conference Room)

September 30 (T)
Kathy Larson Visit
Life Touch Picture Day (Gym All Day)

October 1st (W)
1:40-2:40,Collaborative Planning Time
6:00-8:00,Curriculum Night- Plan de Estudios de Noche

October 2 (H)
Joel in Portland at Coaches and Principal’s Meeting
2:45-4:45, Design Committee

October 3 (F)
Academy Day- No School
8:00-12:00, Maravillas Training with a Maravillas PD Consultant
12:00-4:00, Teacher Planning Time

This week on duty:

• Safety Week-ish, Sept. 26 – Oct. 2 – Safety Week changes due to Being a Writer. Craig, Edna and I are still working on new maps. We will get those to you soon along with updated procedures.

• Friday, Sept. 26– Fire Drill, 9:00

• Monday, Sept. 29– No Drills Many Staff out due to Being a Writer

• Tuesday, Sept. 30– Room Clear, time decided by teachers

• Wednesday, Oct. 1 –  9:00, Earthquake/Fire Drill

• Thursday, Oct. 2–  8:30 Lock Down (Code Blue and Code Red)

• Shiniest Stars of the Week- There are so many!

Cathy- Thanks so much for your amazing efforts to get Maravillas up and running. This was a great help to many teachers and to the office.

Aline- Thank you for working on so many schedules and documents for the start of the year. Your organization, leadership and vision for data team and IIPM support for our kids is greatly appreciated.

Karen- Your work on data team, easy CBM testing, and overall positive upbeat mindset have been so helpful in the last thee weeks.  It is truly amazing that we have finished KRA, Easy Cbm and are now moving into a new era of Spanish Summative assessment with your support.

Sara and Nancy-   Wow! ELL Powerhouse. It is so fun to watch how quickly and efficiently you both work together to help our English Language Learners. Your flexibility and innovative approach are so supportive of our whole program.

Sarah- Puzzle master and visionary.  I am so impressed with your great thinking and clear vision for SLD supports, Dual Language Fidelity and Programmatic Support. Thanks for helping to redesign so many schedules so that everything we do fits together so well.

Edna- Our school is just humming along, thanks to you.  Our families react so positively to your support.  It is such a pleasure to know that our kids and staff can rely on you to help us in so many ways. You rock!

 • All Meeting Minutes will now be on Zimbra Briefcase and on this Blog-

You will be able to access all minutes and structural documents via my blog and the the briefcase on Zimbra. Peggy can support you to access the briefcase if you need support in that area.

 • Website Updating and Media Request-

I need your help to update the website.  Please pass on ideas of content you’d like parents and students to see on there. Share photos with me that we can put on there.  Also, look for errors  that you see on there.

• EEF Grant Applications – The timeline is a bit later than in the past, but the EEF grant application process is now posted on their website. EEF aims to award $5000 to each school, but every year the amount available in their grants fund varies so they cannot guarantee award amounts. Schools can submit two $2,000 and two $500 grants, or they can combine grants to create one $5,000 grant. This year, we are submitting an entire $5000 grant  proposal towards getting high quality authentic Spanish language books. This will include fiction and non-fiction.  Grants are due to EEF by November 13th. This was approved in June.

• Technology Skills Practice for Smarter Balanced (and practice test) – Here is a nice  site that demonstrates tech skills for SBAC from Vacaville School District in California. They have created a site for teachers to support students becoming proficient in using the keyboard and mouse/trackpad/touchscreen for the tasks they will be asked of by the Smarter Balanced assessment (highlighting, clicking and dragging, etc.). It’s organized by grade level and has direct links activities for each of the skill areas.

• Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) Resource – Here is a link to the official Smarter Balanced practice tests. This website also has FAQ’s, teacher information and other resources with options to download. Here is how to try out the practice tests. They are not run of the mill and I must admit that the one I tried did give me pause:

• Click on the box near the bottom of the page labeled, “Take The Practice and Training Tests”
• Once there, click on the green box labeled, “Student interface….”
• Then, click on “Sign in” leave all of the boxes blank
• Finally, select a grade level and click “yes” under “Guest School”

Now go forth and show your math and reading prowess!

Color Printing:  Remember, color printing is very expensive.  Please be mindful that if you need to do color printing to be prudent how much you need.  We can make copies in the main office in a pinch during off hours but not during the busiest portions of the day. Also, consider using Insta Print and plan ahead as this saves a significant amount of supply funds and precious time for office staff.
Food Reminder-

Bring the student’s number cards EVERY time they go to lunch.  Hand them their cards and pick them up at the end. There is no need to hang around with the students in line. Rene and the cooking staff will appreciate it.  This seems to work very well for 1st grade right now and they are trying to learn their numbers quickly.  Please do this at all grades.   Kinder will continue to use their method of pick up of grab and go lunches.

• Synergy New Student Reminder – A quick reminder that if you have had new students added to your class, teachers will need to move them over from the column on the left of the main Teacher VUE screen into where the pictures of all your students are located. There is a red alert triangle at the top of your Synergy screen that will notify you when you have new students added to your class, but be aware you need to move them onto your roster before you will be able to see them for attendance and other Synergy purposes.

• Teacher Effectiveness & Growth Update – HR has let principals know that they have almost transferred all of the necessary information over for teachers to begin using TalentEd for the 2014-2015 school year. I’ll let teachers know once it’s ready to go and will schedule goals meetings at that point, as well as sending out the building goals if you’d like to use them. Also, here’s a link to the district Teacher Effectiveness and Growth Systems website, which can likely answer any questions you may have about the system.

• Camino del Río Staff Handbook Review – Attached is the updated Staff Handbook for 2014-2015. All staff must review the handbook and sign & return the  acknowledgement form  to Edna by Friday, September 26th.

• New Teaching Tolerance Curriculum for Teachers – Three years, 300 texts and 20 anchor standards in the making, Teaching Tolerance’s K-12, literacy-based, anti-bias curriculum is finally here! Start exploring Perspectives for a Diverse America today.

• 2013–14 OAKS results: District-wide analysis & key points – You may have seen the recent article in the Register Guard, but OAKS were released last week by ODE. In terms of measuring growth, Howard held pretty steady, though our overall scores dropped, as did most of the district and state, particularly in math. Attached is a district summary of scores, some of it broken out by school, along with an email that was sent to principals with an analysis of the results.

• Curriculum Night will be October 1st – Aline, Karen, Alicia, and I have been working on a plan to create a passport style curriculum night.  More details to come.  The ad will be sent home on Monday with our first mailer.

Here are some ideas  for sharing on curriculum Night (October 1st from 6:00-8:00)

• Parents want to know what their students are expected to learn this year and how they can help them succeed. Think about creating a handout or packet that gives an overview of your year’s scope and sequence. Bonus points for including information about how parents can help with each big topic/project.

• Explain the standards. If you’re teaching the Common Core, the PTA has put out a great collection of parent guides. These guides are a great way to teach parents about the CCSS.

• Include examples of student work. If you have copies of projects that students have done in the past, show these as examples of the kind of work students will be expected to do this year. Alternatively, show a few (nameless) examples of student work from the beginning of the year. Talk about the work students have been doing and where you will go from there.

• Take a few minutes to preview areas where kids might struggle and how parents can help. For example, your students might use a different strategy to solve math problems than their parents and that might make homework challenging. Or, talk about how the rhythms of a classroom have highs and lows — say, how you’ve noticed that every December your students start to get antsy for the holidays and are easily distracted.

Explaining the Common Core in Spanish to families. Need help explaining the CCSS to families?  Here is a nice video.

Have a good week, everyone!

Joel

Week of September 8

Weekly Schedule

September 8 (M)
Fall Benchmark Testing  and KRA Continues

8:30, Reading to Piper’s Class

9:15, Reading to Nikita’s Class

10:30, Reading to all of first grade.

1:30-1:45, Website Design meeting with Peggy (Principal’s Office)

1:45-2:30, Joel to BEST Principals’ Meeting (Ed Center)

2:45-3:45, IPBS Meeting (Conference Room)

2:30-5:00, Joel to Elementary Principals’ Meeting (Ed Center)

September 9 (T)
Fall Math Benchmark Testing and KRA

9:00-9:30, Family Night Planning Meeting (FRC Rm. 9)

10:15, Joel reads to Recker’s Class

12:00-1:00, Meeting with Federal Programs Director, Tasha Katsuda (Principal Office)

2:30-3:30, PLT (Conference Room)

4:00- 5:00, Joel meets with Kerry Delph to set up Facebook Page.

6:00-8:00, Parent Group Meeting (Library)

September 10 (W)

8:30-9:00, Family Resource Center Meeting (FRC Rm. 9)

1:40-2:40, Grade Level Collaboration  Meeting (Objective and Unit Planning in classrooms together)

4:30, Joel to United Way Meeting (Ed Center)

2:45-4:45, First Design Committee Meeting with Staff (Library)

September 11 (H)

Joel begins walk through observations in classrooms.- Personal notes taken on iPad. No notes will be added to the Teacher Effectiveness and Growth System.

2:45-3:45, Staff Meeting (Library)

September 12 (F)

Joel begins walk through observations in classrooms.- Personal notes taken on iPad. No notes will be added to the Teacher Effectiveness and Growth System.

 

September 16 (T)
8:15-11:30, Joel and IPBS Team to CICO Training (Lane ESD)

September 30 (T) Life Touch Photo Day

Hi Everyone,

We did so well our first week back and the school year seems to be off on a great start thanks to everyone’s hard work!

Some items of note this week:

• Skillful Teacher (Cohort 3) Camino Rep – 4J is starting a third Skillful Teacher cohort and is reserving a spot for each school to send a rep. Speak with Karen and Megan can let you know their experience with it, but the first session for Cohort 3 will be Friday, September 26th. Attached is a calendar of Skillful Teacher Trainings for the year. There is a possibility of multiple teachers from our school being able to attend if other schools do not fill their spots. If you are interested in being part of Cohort 3, let me know by the end of the week.

• Safety Week, Sept. 29 – Oct. 2 – I’d like to again hold a Safety Week this year and schedule it for the end of this month so we can practice all of the most common safety drills (and also take care of the September and October fire drill requirements all in the same week). Craig and I will be reviewing the previous year’s drills and will update manuals in the next week or so. We are also working with Matt Cornwall from downtown in order to ensure that our evacuation routes are clear. This is a good way to bring awareness to staff, students and families about the various safety procedures right at the start of the year. The schedule for Safety Week will be:

• Monday, Sept. 29– Fire Drill, 9:00
• Tuesday, Sept. 30– Room Clear, time decided by teachers
• Wednesday, Oct. 1 – Lock Down (Code Blue and Code Red), 9:00
• Thursday, Oct. 2– Earthquake/Fire Drill, 8:30

It’s not for another three weeks, but I wanted to let staff know now to help with planning. All of these drills are listed in the “Emergency Procedures Manual” which is the rainbow tabbed notebook that should be hanging in every classroom. I won’t be making any announcement before the drills, so it’s okay for staff to prep your students before these drills take place. For the Lock Down drill, please review the Code Blue and Code Red procedures. These steps are more detailed about our lockdown procedure than the more general ones in the Emergency Procedures Manual. Please let me know if you do not have a manual or if you have any questions.

• Principal Visits to Classrooms – If you haven’t already set up a time for me to come read to your class, let me know a good 15-20 minute block for me to come in this week or next. I’ll read a favorite story to your class and chat with the kids a bit. Thank you!

• Being a Writer Training for Teachers – On September 29th, representatives from the Developmental Studies Center will be conducting a Being A Writer Training for principals from 8:00-11:30 here at the Ed Center in the Auditorium.

• News Crew Starts This Week – Megan will be training some 4th graders in News Crew this week, which means we’ll be starting morning announcements this week! We will make the bilingual announcements short and they will begin at 8:30 so we do not disrupt morning meeting.

• Copier Codes  – The copy code for teachers is the last 4 digits of the teacher employee number in case you need that.

• Please take attendance early. –It is very important that you input attendance IN SYNERGY before 9:00 AM.  This is a safety issue and parent communication issue.  All classroom teachers should have Synergy up and ready to input attendance before class begins. Please make this part of your regular routine.

• Confidentiality of Free and Reduced Lunch Information.– The district expects that the Food Service Coordinator will not share any private information with staff.  The only person who is authorized by the Superintendent’s office to use this information would be the administrator. Please do not request this information of Rene as it puts her in a difficult situation.

• District Mandatory Policy Review for all Staff – Attached and linked here is the District Back-to-School Memo, which ALL staff must review and sign & return the acknowledgement form to Edna no later than Friday, September 26th.

• Title 1 Newsletter – If you’d like to know what’s happening in Title 1 from the district perspective, here is the September Title 1 Newsletter that went out to all Title 1 Coordinators and principals. This month’s issue is mostly a lot of coordinator business, but here it is if you’re curious.

• Supporting ELL Students Under New Standards (Free Online Course) – This eight-week online course is designed to help teachers support English Language Learners in meeting new, rigorous standards. Specifically, the course will focus on a key practice within both the Common Core State Standards and new English Language Proficiency Standards: constructing claims supported by evidence. Endorsed by the Oregon Department of Education for Oregon K-12 teachers, the content is also open to teachers outside of Oregon. I signed up. Won’t you join me?

• Oct 10 Statewide In service & Professional Learning Opportunities – This is a non-paid day, so staff are under no obligation to work or attend any of these trainings, but if you are interested in knowing what is being offered this day, attached is the 2014 Oregon Inservice Bulletin and also a flyer from Educational Explorations, which had paid classes offering credit through PSU.

• Visitors and Volunteers  –  We have many families who have been wandering the halls  during pick up. We need to be very careful about this.
Please follow this procedure:
a.If a parent or adult is helping volunteer in the classroom, they should go through the volunteer criminal background check process before helping in class.
b. If you have a visitor in your class, they need to sign in daily.  If they are visiting, they need to state their purpose, to observe, to share a skill, or to communicate with a teacher. Please ask your visitor if they have signed in each day and make sure they have a visitor sticker.
c. If you have a regular volunteer in your class please communicate with staff what their regular schedule is. Sometimes, there are custody conflicts which you may or may not be aware of.  We can help you work through these if both parents want to volunteer in the same classroom.

Some resources for Morning Meeting – Below are some great resources on Morning Meeting if you are looking for ideas on how to integrate language skills in the meetings.  I was really impressed with Ms. Noonan’s class.  Using sentence frames and a word wall can be great strategies to support our students in morning meeting.

Developmental Studies Center You Tube Channel for your Caring For Kids Ideas

http://youtu.be/PH3vTEKiSTs?list=UUibvNgcTZQ02PucorqcTvLg

Article on Engagement – This article explores the several factors to help teachers know they are actually increasing engagement amongst students in the their classroom.  I really liked it because it does not sugar coat engagement.  Many times, having fun or seeing students working are described as engagement. This article dispels much of that perspective.

Effective Engagement in the Classroom- “the 7X Effect”

Week of September 2nd

Week of September 1st Schedule of Events

Monday, September 1st

Labor Day

Tuesday, September 2nd

Teacher Planning-8:00-2:45 PM

Open House 2:45-3:45 PM – See note below.

Wednesday, September 3rd

First Day of School-2014-2015

Early Release at 1:40

1:40-2:40 Collaborative Planning Time with your Grade Level Team or Specialists

Thursday, September 4th

School Wide BBQ 6:00-8:00 PM

Friday, September 5th

Green Team Meeting at 2:45 with GPS

Happy Friday

Hi all,

I had a great three day weekend and I hope you did too. I have not had a chance to get all of our PD materials listed in the tabs above yet, but will work on this during the day tomorrow. You can expect all the materials from PD sessions to be up with the exception of some of the Caring for Kid’s Planning materials. I have those in paper in case you missed it. Erin Gaston will probably get those to me in electronic form by the end of the week. I hope you all get settled in nicely to your routines. Enjoy getting to know your students. I am especially excited to get to know them this fall. In fact, I haven’t been this excited for the start of school since well, maybe 1984 when I started 5th grade.

I changed my blog address this week to remove the Awbrey Park reference. We are now Camino staff!  Please bookmark this new address.

Here are some items of note for the week:

• Open House Procedures: Staff  should  greet families in your classrooms from 2:45 to 3:45. I will come on the PA to thank families for their visit at 2:40 and encourage them to go home. Please collect fees in your classroom of $ 25.  This will help reduce the lines in the cafeteria for paying fees. Provide a receipt for them and keep track on a roll sheet. Edna will get these to you tomorrow before the open house.  If families choose to, they can pay in the cafeteria. Families can pay for more than one child at once in your room IF you keep track of all payments.  Edna, Yasmin, and any licensed specialists (Sarah, Karen, Bryan, Aline) available are encouraged to support fee payment and bus information distribution in the cafeteria.

• Supervision First Week of School – All available staff should help supervise in the morning out front and in the hallway areas. Students and buses generally start arriving at 7:50. Staff should also help out at dismissal in the bus area and by the front of the building near the sign. Even if you are not on the supervision list, please make yourself very visible on the first few days. It makes a big difference to relieve all those new school jitters and it’s just helpful.

• Staffing Updates – PE Position to be interviewed this week.  We have not hired a Temporary PE position yet due to a lack of applicants.  Still, just this weekend, a couple new applicants were referred in NEOGOV. Allan Chinn and my self will be reviewing these applicants and most likely doing interviews within a week. In the meantime, there will a a guest PE teacher to begin the PE schedule. The first day for PE is Thursday and a PE teacher should be here. Music also begins this week with David Adee.

Due to a large kinder class (85 at last count), I am lobbying the district to increase staffing for our kinder EA’s. I will keep you all up to date on how we are doing with that and if we get more hours to support kinder soon.

• PBIS Focus: Virtudes de Ganas PRIDE Focus is Respect– The September PBIS monthly focus is a great connection to your CFK Morning Meetings. Once you get beyond names and greetings, consider using respect as a theme for the month of September/October for conversation.

• Classroom Newsletters – Please forward me electronic copies of classroom newsletters (electronic version preferred) when teachers send/email them home to families. This helps me keep up to date on what’s happening (or going to happen) in classes, and also lets me know details of any class activities that I might be able to get the local media to come out and cover. I love promoting our school!

• District Mandatory Policy Review for all Staff – Attached and linked here is the District Back-to-School Memo, which ALL staff must review and sign & return the acknowledgement form to Edna no later than Friday, September 26th.

• Camino del Río Staff Handbook Review – Attached is the updated Staff Handbook for 2014-2015. All staff must review the handbook and sign & return the  acknowledgement form  to Edna by Friday, September 26th.

• Principal Visits to Classrooms to Read and Greet – I’d like to again visit every classroom sometime during the first couple weeks of school to greet students. I’ll read a favorite story to your class and chat with the kids a bit. Teachers, please let me know a good 15-20 minute block of time to come and visit in Spanish or English. Thank you!

• TAG Identified Students – Jennifer and I will be reviewing any TAG identified students in the next week.  We will send you an email to ensure you are aware of the student needs. We may be meeting to revise TAG Plans as needed.

• Information Supplied for Guest Teachers – In this email from HR is a list of suggested information/items that teachers should consider when preparing lesson plans for Guest Teachers. With the goal being seamless transition and a successful day when our permanent staff are out, it is essential that our Guest Teachers receive the best information possible.

• 4J Admin Updates – Maddie Ahearn is the new Math Curriculum Administrator for the 2014/15 school year. Maddie was previously a math teacher leader in 4J, working at North Eugene and Roosevelt. I was on the interview team that helped hire Maddie into 4j  in 2010 and am happy to see her take on such an important role in our district. Before coming to Eugene 4J in 2010, she worked in Baltimore Maryland as a math instructional coach and teacher. Randi Bowers-Payne was just hired for the Risk Manager Administrator position. In Lansing, Michigan, Randi acted as the entire Human Resource department for a Regional Education Service Agency.

• Dept. of Ed. projects public schools will be ‘majority-minority’ this fall – If we needed an additional reason to focus on issues of race and equity, a milestone is expected to be reached this fall when minorities outnumber whites among the nation’s public school students for the first time, U.S. Department of Education projections show. This is due largely to fast growth in the number of Hispanic and Asian school-age children born in the U.S., according to a Pew Research Center analysis of Census Bureau data.

That’s all for now. Have a great week.

Joel