Allan's Announcements

By Allan 　https://blogs.4j.lane.edu/chinn/?p=7486

Greetings Howard Staff,

Want to hear my theory why kids are kind of nuts right now? It’s because we’re nearing a total lunar eclipse, colloquially know as a Blood Moon, this Tuesday night/Wednesday morning. If you want to be a science geek, it’ll be visible from 4:51am to 6:07am, and see the last item below for more lunar eclipse info!

Fifteen items of note for this week:

• Report Card Grading Day, Classified EAs – An email was sent to Title 1 and SPED EAs, but this also includes other EAs as well. 4J is putting on an Elementary EA Extravaganza on the report card grading day this Friday, February 2nd. There will be sessions happening from 8:00-4:30 at the Ed Center (you only need to attend the length of your regular work hours). The specific offerings are still being finalized and will be shared soon. Life Skills and CLC EAs, watch for an email from Seth or Leila regarding a MANDT training this day. Let me know if you have any questions.

• REPEAT: Report Card Grading Day, Licensed – For licensed staff, report card grading day is a regular work day. If you are working from home, remember to notify me in advance, but be sure to make plans ahead of time if you need to collaborate with any colleagues on grading.

• LZ Report Card Alignment & Parent Support Sheets – I had a couple teachers ask about Jamie Massee’s LZ Report Card Alignment email. This is not something teachers have to do in addition to the regular report card, but is a document to help teachers know which standards on the report card were taught to mastery, are in progress, or not yet taught if you’re keeping up with the pacing guide. Jamie shared them in a Google Drive Folder and I also put them on the Howard Google Team Drive under Curriculum/Instruction > Math > LZ Report Card Alignment. The link also includes grade level specific Report Card Family Support sheets that I’ll run off for classroom teachers and put class sets in your mailboxes on grading day.

• Want parent reports printed for you? – A few teachers mentioned it was nice to have the parent reports printed for them in the past, but that was done for teachers because only ESCs and principals had access to the Quickbase Parent Reports. However, let me know by Friday if you’d like me to run the new easyCBM Parent Reports for you. I’ll run them on grading day and will put them in your mailboxes. If you’d like to run them yourself, go to the easyCBM website > REPORTS > INDIVIDUALS > DOWNLOAD in the Parent Report column for each of your students. Never mind! Downtown just said they are printing them for schools and will be delivered on Wednesday. 

• Updated LZ Parent Math Resources – I’ve shared this link before, but the 4J Elementary Family and Community Math Resources webpage has new information posted, including some good short videos by grade level on “What does success in math look like at the end of the year for my child?” I’m planning to share one or two of these videos at the next PTO meeting.

• New Spanish Howard Pledge – Our new and improved Howard Roadrunner Pledge signs with a more accurate Spanish translation have arrived. I’ll deliver the new signs to classrooms on Monday if teachers can have students begin practicing the new Spanish version, which we’ll do over the intercom starting Wednesday. Thank you, Jill and Bianca, for the updated translation!

Soy un correcaminos de la escuela Howard.
Yo soy prudente, amable y responsable.

Soy un individuo único,
y soy parte de la familia de la escuela Howard.

Tomo buenas decisiones
y me emociona aprender.

Somos los correcaminos de la escuela Howard,
¡y el día de hoy será un éxito!

• No Hoods Up Inside the Building – Please do not allow students to wear hoods inside the building. We’ve seen more and more students doing this, so we need to be consistent in enforcing this rule across the building in all settings. If some staff allow hoods up while other do not, it sets students up for unnecessary negative interactions with staff and sets up your colleagues for unnecessary negative interactions with students.

• February PBIS Focus: Cooperation – The February PBIS monthly focus is “Cooperation.” The PBIS team created a PBIS/CSC Cheat Sheet that matches our monthly PBIS themes with corresponding Caring School Community class meeting lessons, which is a nice way to tie the two activities together.

• Setting School Culture With Social And Emotional Learning Routines – Speaking of Caring School Community, this Mind/Shift article highlights the importance of starting each day with a class morning meeting. Building students’ social and emotional skills with daily routines and regular class meetings is an important part of setting classroom and school culture.

• Student Care Team Resources – Thought I’d share a few resources shared at last Wednesday’s Student Care Team Meeting. Some have been shared before, but to highlight a few that you can feel free to share with families if situations arise:

• Therapist for Youth Offenders – Kelly Crane is the therapist who founded Sage House. She works with juvenile sex offenders and their family.

• Womenspace Survivors Support Groups – The Survivors Support Groups are a series of seven weekly sessions and is an open, on-going group, repeating every seven weeks. This process group offers survivors of Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) on-going support and education in a safe non-judgmental setting. An evolving curriculum provides clients with an understanding of the dynamics of IPV, safety planning, relationship red flags, healthy relationships, PTSD, self-care, and self-empowerment. Available in English and Spanish.

• First Place Family Center – First Place gives crucial assistance and support to families with children who are in transition due to homelessness, job loss, health issues, or other critical problems.

• Overnight Parking Program – The Overnight Parking Program (OPP) provides legal camping, free garbage disposal, and portable restrooms to homeless families and individuals living in their vehicles or campers. Parking for families is administered by First Place Family Center. Parking for adults is administered at the Eugene Service Station.

• Interfaith Night Shelter – Night Shelter is a consortium of approximately 32 faith communities offering night shelter, food, recreational activities, and comfort to 10 families per night, from the start to the end of each school year.

• Family Court Assistance Office – The purpose of the Family Court Assistance Office is to help the increasing number of self- represented litigants in domestic relations cases (divorce, custody, or parenting time proceedings). Office staff can inform self-represented litigants of court procedures and available court forms, review documents, and provide information about legal services and other resources available in the community.

• Wacky Wednesday: Favorite Character Day (next week) – Please remind your students that the February Wacky Wednesday is coming, not this week but next week, on Wednesday, February 7th and that the theme is Favorite Character Day! Kids and staff can dress up as a favorite character from books, TV shows, movies, or video games. The office staff plan is for me to dress as a male version of Cruella de Vil, with Lori and Bianca dresses as Dalmatians, so feel free join in and dress-up as one of the dalmations I’m trying to make into a fur coat.

• BEST Coordinator Update – Esther Flynn-Purvis has been offered and accepted the Howard BEST Coordinator position, which Bryan has been filling in as for most of the school year. Esther has been the #2 person at the Spring Creek BEST program and is familiar with the BEST/YMCA hybrid program we started this year. Esther is going to begin transitioning into the coordinator role here at Howard, but won’t officially start here until her replacement at Spring Creek is hired. In the meantime, Bryan will continue to coordinate the Howard BEST Program. Please welcome Esther to the Howard Team!

• Updated Incident/Accident Report – 4J has a new Incident Report Form that should be used to document employee or volunteer on-the-job-injuries and/or staff concerns related to extreme student behavior. The information provided will enable both the school and district to learn about what contributed to the incident and discover potential system failures so they can be corrected. If possible, the form should be completed and submitted to your supervisor (me) within 24 hours of injury or encounter. The first page must be completed by the injured/concerned employee or volunteer. The second page must be completed by supervisor.

• Total Lunar Eclipse Tues. Night/Wed. Morning – Wednesday morning is a Total Lunar Eclipse from 4:51am to 6:07am. A Total Lunar Eclipse is when the full moon travels through the Earth’s shadow and turns a deep red color for a couple hours. The next one isn’t visible in Oregon until 2019 and then not until 2021. The Eugene Astronomical Society is holding a local event. If you want to share about this with students, kid friendly information can be found at the NASA Kids website and the YouTube video below.

• Schedule of Upcoming Events – See the Google Calendar for future events, but here are the events of note for the next two weeks:

January 29 (M)
10:00-11:45, Christine Nesbit Visting Howard
12:00-1:30, Oregon State Senator Manning Visiting Jill’s Class
3:30-5:30, Allan to All Admin Meeting (Ed Center)

January 30 (T)
Regular Day

January 31 (W)
In District School Choice Applications Due
1:30, Allan to IEP Meeting (Conference Room)

February 1 (H)
PBIS Monthly Theme – Cooperation

February 2 (F)
Grading Day – No School
8:00-4:30, EA Extravaganza (Ed Center)

February 5 (M)
National School Counseling Week
Allan Out at ODE Tech Cadre Meeting (ESD)
Second Semester Begins
easyCBM Testing Closes

February 6 (T)
Regular Day

February 7 (W)
Title 1 Progress Monitoring Day – No Groups
Wacky Wednesday – Favorite Character Day
1:30-3:00, OPTIONAL: 4J Elementary EA Behavior Workshop (Ed Center)
1:15-2:15, Classified EA Meeting (Room 26)
2:30-5:00, Allan to Pay Grade Evaluation Meeting (Ed Center)
4:00-5:00, Allan to North Region Admin Meeting (NEHS)

February 8 (H)
7:50-10:40, Data Team Meetings 5/1/1
12:00-3:00, Allan to ILT Meeting (Ed Center)

February 9 (F)
Deadline for Report Card Translations
Allan, Angela, Ashley to LEL Meeting (Holt)
1:30-3:00, OPTIONAL: 4J Elementary EA Behavior Workshop (Ed Center)
6:00-7:30, PTO Valentine Family Craft Night (Cafeteria)

Have a good 4-day week, everyone!

Allan