https://blogs.4j.lane.edu/chinn/?p=5614
Happy Labor Day Weekend Everyone,
This is the big week! The start of any school year is always crazy, but throw in a new building and we’re guaranteed extra craziness. I’m just about positive there will be technology that fails, kids and families who get lost, and planned systems that won’t quite work out like we planned, but like I said at our meeting; as long as we get kids into their classrooms, it’ll be a good day. Moderate your expectations of all the new “stuff” working perfectly and instead focus on making students feel welcome and cared for. That’s the most important piece for our start of the school year.
Twenty Five items of note for this week:
• Enrollment Updates – If you’re curious what our enrollment looks like, we’re over our projection at all grade levels, except for 3rd, which is still our largest grade level; KG (65 projected, 76 actual), 1st (68 projected, 83 actual), 2nd (61 projected, 69 actual), 3rd (85 projected, 84 actual), 4th (63 projected, 70 actual), 5th (70 projected, 78 actual). Our total projection was originally 413 students, but we currently have 460 students fully registered. These projections and actual numbers include Life Skills students counted as a whole student, though for staffing purposes HR counts LS students at 0.25 a student since they are not primarily served in gen ed classrooms. I have notified downtown about our numbers and am advocating for an additional 1.0 FTE to make three classes at both 4th and 5th grade. Our actual numbers at the moment justify an additional 0.66 FTE, but if all our packets out come back and we don’t have too many no-shows, we will have enough students to justify another full-time teacher. I think we can minimally expect to receive some FTE, but I will keep you all posted once I hear anything.
• Meet Your Teacher – During Meet Your Teacher on Tuesday, I’d like to have all non-classroom staff available to direct families, passing out a zoomed in version of this school map with highliters to help guide families and also passing out a flyer about parking procedures & the first day of school. We’ll also arm people with a complete set of class lists to be used this day and also on the first day of school.
• What is your hope? – Here’s the video I wanted to show at the end of Wednesday’s meeting, but had technical difficulties with. I’ll be out front during Meet Your Teacher with a white board doing this.
• First and Second Day Plans – Linked here is a more detailed version of our plan First Day Plan, but the short version is most everyone who is not in Life Skills, CLC or a classroom teacher will have an assigned spot when the doors open at 7:25. Students will meet their teachers in the Gym (1-3), Cafeteria (KG), and Courtyard (4-5). All staff members with assigned location will have a set of class lists, and maps w/highlighters to guide families. At 7:55 I will do a brief welcome and classes will be dismissed to class. During my welcome to students, staff members with assigned locations should move to their new locations to help guide students and families who arrive late or get lost along the way to class. See the linked First Day Maps for where staff are assigned from 7:25-7:55 and a second map from 7:55-8:10ish (or whenever everyone is in class). If you are available to help and I left you off this list, please let me know. If you are unable to adjust or schedule to come in at this time or have another responsibility at this time, let me know ASAP so I can revise the map.
The second day of school we will begin our normal routine of students eating breakfast and then grades 1-5 going out to the playground. It would be good for 1st grade teachers to pick up students, but I think other grades should be able to find their way. And hopefully the door timers are programmed correctly so they are unlocked at the end of the before-school recess. The second day of school will be more informal, but it would be good if non-classroom staff can again make themselves available to help guide students from breakfast to the playground (7:25-7:50) and from the playground to class (7:50-8:00).
I’m sure we’ll still have some kids get lost these days, but we just need to do our best to make kids feel safe and career for. Le the know if you have any questions on this.
• Media Coverage Tuesday and Wednesday – On a related note, KMTR is going to be here for Meet Your Teacher. They are going to be in charge of getting parent permission to film kids, so staff don’t have to worry about No-Media kid lists yet. We’ll also have The Register Guard here on Wednesday, the first day of school, but I’ll take them around after we have everyone in their classrooms and after Coffee & Doughnuts with the Principal and PTO is over.
• Playground Lines – Linked here is a map of where classes should line up at the end of recesses. I’d asked for each of the numbers to be spaced 3-feet apart, but they appear to have gotten scrunched together starting around the double digits, so I did every other number for 4th and 5th grade (I also noticed in the picture they seem to have skipped eleven). But the reason I need teachers and recess supervisors to teach students assigned spots for lining up is for when we have grades 1-5 all outside at the same time during breakfast before school so they all need to know where they should line up. From there, in the mornings, I dismiss students by class to walk to class.
• Howard/Kelly Track Use Schedule – We have a new plan for sharing the track this year, where both schools can use the track every day, but we’ll plan to just cut the track and field in half, where Howard uses the east end (the half closer to our building) and Kelly will use the west end (the half closer to their building) each day. The one exception to this is the same as last year, which is if the the Kelly PE classes are using the track and field, Howard kids stay off the field. That didn’t happen too often, but this year we’ll have a small soccer/softball field with natural grass adjacent the playground that we can also use. That field should e done next week, but it’ll only be seeded, which means we’ll have to wait a few months for the grass to grow before we can use it.
• Investigations Workbooks Recall – The Investigations workbooks schools received are the 2008 edition and we should have received the 2012 edition. This was a mistake when downtown ordered them and they are extremely sorry to add this layer of confusion to an already chaotic time of year. They expect the correct workbooks to arrive no later than Friday, Sept 9th. In the meantime, box up the student workbooks we already have, which will be picked up sometime later this week. I’ll have Crystal see if we still have boxes around to put them in if you already got rid of all your boxes.
• PBIS First Week Plans – Watch for an email from Rae with details on this year’s PBIS teaching plan, which will be very similar to last year. We’ll do a playground rules review the first day of school at the start of each recess. We’ll also again have school rules for classroom teachers to review with students.
• Principal Visits to Classrooms – I’d like to again visit every classroom sometime during the first few 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 10-15 minutes block of time I can come and visit. Thank you!
• Classroom Newsletters – I’d love to have copies (email is best) of classroom newsletters when teachers send/email them home to families. This helps me get school events on the building calendar, keeps me up to date on what’s happening or going to happen in classes when families ask, and it 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 – Here’s a link to this year’s District Back-to-School Memo (and PDF), which covers a variety of district rules, policies and guidelines. Section 1 is the portion that all staff are required to review. I honestly haven’t had a chance to review this year’s update, so I’ll try to provide a summary of any changes next week. All staff must review the memo and sign & return the check list acknowledgment form to the office no later than Friday, September 29th. I’ll place hard copies of the acknowledgement form in staff mailboxes next week. This year principals are expected to give HR copies of all signed forms, so be sure make time to review these polices before the end of the month.
• Monthly PBIS Focus: Safety – The September PBIS monthly focus is Safety, so remember the PBIS/CFK Cheat Sheet, which matches our PBIS monthly themes with Caring for Kids class meeting lessons. This is a nice way to tie the PBIS and Caring for Kids together.
• Bus PBIS Slips – The transportation department sent principals and secretaries an email about how they are doing their behavior management systems this year, but the one part the effects classroom teachers is they are asking us to honor their positive slips (Star Slips) the same as we would our positive PBIS slips (Beep, Beeps).
• TAG Identified Students – Teachers, if you have any TAG identified students in your class this year, you’ll have already received an email naming the kiddos. If you didn’t see an email, you’re off the hook.
• Morning Announcements Start Monday, 9/12 – I won’t do morning announcements the first three days of school, but we will be starting regular morning announcements the first full week of school on Monday, September 12th with a couple 5th graders who were trained up at the end of last school year.
• Fresh Fruit & Vegetable Program – The Fresh Fruits and Vegetable program will be continuing this year and is set to start on Monday, September 12th. Joan is working with Rae to figure out if they’ll need another wagon for this year.
• New Building Updates – Here are quite a few items of note regarding the new building:
• Projector Updates – The Technology Department has come up with a solution for our projector issues, which is to use HDMI cables instead of VGA. They have ordered HDMI cables and Thunderbolt adapters, which should be here Tuesday, so everyone should have working video the first day of school. The audio cables may not get here by Tuesday, so have your old desktop speakers handy for the first day of school. Peggy will be coming around on Tuesday to help everyone set up their laptop, doc cam, and projectors. I’ve requested that the Tech Department send extra help on Tuesday to make sure everyone is ready to go. I’ve also asked for extra TSS staff for our first day of school. And if you’d like to tackle it yourself, linked here are a couple Quick Sheets for connecting your doc cam to the projector and connecting your laptop to the projection (though you’ll need an HDMI cable for that one).
A separate issue with the projectors, particularly for second floor classrooms who have skylights, is the projectors are not bright enough (despite the reassurances we received during design and construction phases of the new building). There is not a definite solution at this point, but Misty is getting a demo projector in that has 7000 Lumens and is are going to see how that works with all of the natural light in these rooms. Technology folks know teachers are very frustrated and are working through this as quickly as possible. In the meantime, teachers may want to use your remote to go into the projector settings in the Menu and increase the brightness. It does help a little.
• Evacuation Plans – Linked here in an updated version of the fire evacuation lines I shared at Wednesday’s meeting, which includes where classes are to line up. Also, the Fire Marshall just last Thursday gave final approval of our building evacuation plans, so I will be updating our building emergency procedure manuals to match the approved plans and will be sharing that soon. Linked here is the fire evacuation routes from different points in the building. One important item in regards to students in wheelchairs on the second floor during a drill do have permission from the Fire Marshall to use the elevator if the elevator is operational (it will shut off if the smoke detectors inside the shaft are tripped). If the elevator is not operational, an adult should stay with the student at the “Primary Area of Refuge,” which is marked on the map and located by the upstairs front windows so fire fighters could easily spot that someone is still in the building. If that location were unsafe, the student and adult would go to one of the “Secondary Areas of Refuge” which are located in front of each of the upstairs courtyard windows. Let me know if you have an questions on this.
• No Recess Bells (yet) – Sub contractors are working over the weekend to get exterior speakers installed, because right now we cannot page outside the building or hear any bells ring outside either, so anyone supervising students out on the playground should have a whistle handy just in case the bells are set in time.
• Elevator Badges – I’ll be giving out an elevator badge to all upstairs gen ed classrooms so you can safely send students downstairs with lunch boxes and/or library books. However, as of Friday, the elevator still works with the push of a button.
• Punch List Items – As with any new building, there are plenty of things that got missed, damaged or installed wrong. Please send me an email, with a picture if applicable, and I can get our project manager on it. We want to get all punch-list type of items taken care of now, while Todd Construction is still here. Another reason we want to know right away is because many items were installed back before spring break, so their warranty started back then, which means we’re already 6 months into their coverage.
• Clean Maps – If you’d like a fairly clean map of the school without a lot of architectural markings, attached is a first floor map and a second floor map. Linked here is a map of the entire Howard property that includes playground, parking, bus loop, etc. if that helps to explain to students the different areas of the building.
• ENZO Keyboards Coming this Week – Last week’s training was not what I was expecting and was kind of a debacle. I though the training would be to just show how to connect your doc can and laptop to the projector and how to use the interactive features. However, if you do want to play with the ENZO wireless, the keyboards are being delivered this week, possibly on Tuesday.
• ENZO Manuals and Video – This is probably more information than anyone wants at this point, but linked here is the manual on how to access the ENZO system to wirelessly to your projector and also how to utilize MirrorOp, which is good for laptops, but pretty limited in it’s use with iPads. Linked here are the classroom IP address of each classroom ENZO unit and a short 2-minute video on how to connect to the ENZO system.
• State Test Results Released Tuesday – ODE is releasing state test results this Tuesday. Principals and ESCs were given preliminary results and our scores took a pretty big dip last year. Let me know if you’d like a copy of the preliminary scores ahead of time and I’ll share the official scores after they’re released.
• Substitute Folders/information (EA and Guest Teachers) – HR asked principals to share the linked list of suggested information/items that teachers and EAs should consider when preparing lesson plans for substitutes. With the goal being seamless transition and a successful day when permanent staff is out, it is essential that our Guest Teachers and Educational Assistant Substitutes receive the best information possible. Our Guest Teachers continue to ask for this help and support.
• On the job injury: Incident Report and Process Flow – Starting this school year, for all on the job injuries, staff will need to complete the an Incident Report, which is now available in fillable form on the Risk Management Occupational Safety and Health webpage. Also available to district staff in the above link is an interactive process flow for on the job injuries, which has links that provide further information.
• Northwest Community Credit Union (NWCU) Grant – NWCU has a grant opportunity seeking requests for classroom supplies, technology, books, funding for projects, programs or field trips, to Northwest People Power volunteers to paint, landscape, move, or spruce up a space to make it a better learning environment for kids. Nominations will be accepted through October 15, 2016, while project fulfillment may extend into 2017. See their website for more information.
• Google Apps Permission Form – I don’t believe anyone was using Google Apps with students last year, but if you are, linked here are the permission forms in English and Spanish.
• Technological revolution to affect education, economy – A fourth wave of technology is approaching that will drive the economy and revolutionize education, said theoretical physicist Michio Kaku during the keynote address of the annual International Society for Technology in Education conference. “The future of education will gradually be changed,” he said. “This means that educators are going to have to stress concepts and principles, rather than the drudgery of memorization.”
• Schedule of Events for the Week – See the Google Calendar for future events, but here are the events of note for the next two weeks:
September 5 (M)
Labor Day – No SchoolSeptember 6 (T)
8:00-10:00, Staff Meeting– CANCELLED
10:00, Q&A Session for New Staff – Optional (Office)
1:00-2:00, Meet your TeacherSeptember 7 (W)
First Day for Students
easyCBM Fall Benchmarking Begins
PBIS Focus: Safety
7:25, All Hands on Deck to Greet Students and FamiliesSeptember 8 (H)
Regular DaySeptember 9 (F)
8:30-5:00, School Board Retreat (Howard Community Room)September 12 (M)
First Day of LibrarySeptember 13 (T)
Regular DaySeptember 14 (W)
4:15-5:15, Allan to North Region Principals’ Meeting (Awbrey Park)September 15 (H)
8:00-12:00, Data Team Meetings (Title 1 Room)
9:00-11:00, Allan to ILT Meeting (Ed Center)
7:30-9:00, Allan to 4JMAPS MeetingSeptember 16 (F)
7:30-9:00, Allan to 4JMAPS Meeting
I got a little perspective last week on how our new building is coming along when a custodial supervisor was out here and said that, believe it or not, that Howard is actually way better off than Roosevelt or Gilham. But like I said before, don’t expect everything to be perfect, just focus on making it a great first week for kids.
Allan
