November 11, 2019

By Allan  

 

Hi-Diddily-Ho Friends,

Thank you, all, for making conference week go so well. I had nothing but positive feedback from parents and I hope classified staff found Thursday’s PD helpful.

Fifteen items of note for this week:

• Staff Room Cleaning – Unrelated to our PTO provided feast during conferences, the staff room has had some flies and gnats buzzing around lately from food that’s been left out or from dirty dishes left lying about. Please remember to clean up after yourself!

• Second Step Reminders – Three Second Steps reminders:

• Home Links – For the first time as a parent, my 5th grader has been assigned the Second Step Home Links activities and they’re actually really good. I’d encourage teachers to give these a try and send them home as an optional activity for kids to do with their family as a follow up to Second Step lessons.

• Pacing Guide – Linked here is the Second Step Pacing Guide. I do realize Second Step is one more thing, but I’m a believer in explicitly teaching kids about social emotional topics in order to make them more kind and empathetic of individuals. You have my full permission to skip even core subject areas to make time for Second Step lessons (being a good human is way more important than fractions).

• Erin’s Law & Second Step Child Safety Unit– If you haven’t already, to meet the Erin’s Law state requirements, teachers must cover Lessons 1-4 of the Second Step Child Protection Unit this fall. Lesson 5 should be taught right before spring break and lesson 6 right before summer break. Teachers have to share the one grade level teacher guide, but let me know if your grade level would like me to digitize and scan the materials for you if that’s easier.

• Staffing Updates – The CLC EA Job Posting noted in last week’s announcements is now up and closes this Tuesday if you know of any good candidates.

• Thanks from Bruce the Gardener – Thank you to everyone who contributed to Bruce’s Thank-You Basket for all of his work taking on the enormous job of maintaining ALL of Howard’s landscaping. He wrote us a lovely Thank-You Note, which is also posted in the Staff Room. On a side note, the architects for the new North Eugene did a tour of Howard and asked how it is that Howard’s landscaping was so much nicer than when they had just toured River Road? Well, that would be Bruce.

• Friday Early Release PD – This Friday’s Early Release PD is designated as PLC Meeting time. Downtown hasn’t given principals details on this yet, but I’ll keep teachers posted if anything is shared at Tuesday’s Principals’ Meeting.

• Student Success Act Staff forums Tuesday & Wednesday @4:15Oregon’s Student Success Act is planned to provide about $1 billion in additional funds for early learning and K–12 education each year. Funds can be used in four areas: increasing instructional time, addressing health and safety needs, reducing class sizes, and providing a well-rounded education. If you’d like your opinion heard, one staff forum is this Tuesday at 4:15 at North Eugene High School and another Wednesday at 4:15 at Sheldon High School.

• SPED Procedures Manual – SSD created an online 2019 SpEd Procedural Manual for 4J. The manual contains processes and procedures for multiple aspects of special education service delivery. Let me know if you come across any errors or if there is additional information you feel would be useful in the manual.

• REPEAT: PTO Meeting, TUESDAY – This Tuesday at 6:00 will be the November PTO Meeting if any staff are able to volunteer their time to show support for the work of our PTO Board members.

• REPEAT: PTO MOD Pizza Fundraiser, THURSDAY – This Thursday is the November PTO Resturant Fundraiser and this month it’s at MOD Pizza on Coburg Road. Remind your students and hopefully we’ll see you there too!

• REPEAT: Fun Friday! – Sports Day, FRIDAY – This Friday is the November Fun Friday and this time it’s Sport Day. Come to school ready to celebrate your favorite team or sport. Get kids pumped and get your own attire ready for this Friday!

• REPEAT: NATIVES Program Assembly, FRIDAY – This Friday is the NATIVES Program Assembly. The KG/1/2 assembly will be 8:10-8:40 and the 3/4/5 assembly will be 8:50-9:20. Remember to pre-teach assembly behaviors before the assembly and remember there is a Caring School Community lesson on assembly behaviors if you’d like to use that lesson sometime before the assembly. See the linked NATIVES Assembly Map & Directions for details.

• Staff Website Photos – Anyone dislike your picture on the Howard Staff Director webpage and prefer your new picture form this year? If that’s the case, let me know and I’ll update your picture.

• UPDATE: MyOn (i.e. News-o-Matic) AccessMyOn was slow to roster our students and teachers, but it is not ready. Staff may have gotten an email from MyOn to set up an account, but you do not need to set anything up. Just log on with the info below!

STUDENTS:
USER: 4J email username
PW: 4J six digit password

TEACHERS:
USER: 4J email username
PW: roadrunner

• What Productive Talk Looks Like in the Elementary Grades – Using sentence stems to scaffold classroom discussions guides students to speak, actively listen, and build on each others’ ideas. See this Edutopia Article for some nice phrasing and talk moves (time to talk, Say more, , Who can repeat or rephrase that?, What is your evidence or reasoning?, Agree/Disagree, etc.) that can really get students talking and thinking.

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

November 11 (M)
No School — Veterans Day

November 12 (T)
Roadrunner Tail Feather Challenge Continues
Artist in Residence – Glass-Fusing Fun! w/Rachell Jarvis Continues
9:00-10:30, Allan to All Admin Meeting (Ed Center)
2:45-3:30, IPBS Meeting (Matt’s Room, RM21)
4:15, Student Success Act Staff Forum (NEHS)
6:00-7:00, PTO Meeting (Cafeteria)

November 13 (W)
Title 1 Progress Monitoring Day – No Groups
World Kindness Day
Picture Retakes (STEAM Room)
4:15, Student Success Act Staff Forum (SheldonHS)

November 14 (H)
10:25, Allan to Formal Observation
4:00-9:00, PTO MOD Pizza Fundraiser (Coburg Road)

November 15 (F)
Fun Friday! – Sports Day
Popcorn Friday!
8:10-8:40, K-2, Natives Program Storytelling Assembly (Gym)
8:50-9:20, 3-5, Natives Program Storytelling Assembly (Gym)
2:30, Early Release PD – PLC (Library)

November 18 (M)
Roadrunner Tail Feather Challenge Continues
Artist in Residence – Glass-Fusing Fun! w/Rachell Jarvis Continues
8:45-2:00, 3rd Grade Salmon Trip (Lawson/Peterson & Niccum)

November 19 (T)
8:10, Allan to Formal Observation
8:45-2:00, 3rd Grade Salmon Trip (Kreider & Charpie)
2:45-3:30, Staff Meeting (Volunteer’s Classroom)

November 20 (W)
8:10-8:40, 3rd Grade Classical Spark Assembly (Gym)
11:10-2:25, PLC Meetings (KG, 3rd, 5th)

KG, 11:10-12:10
3rd Grade, 12:20-1:20
5th Grade, 1:30-2:25

November 21 (H)
8:10-11:55, PLC Meetings (2nd, 1st, 4th)

2nd 8:10-9:10
1st 9:30-10:30
4th 10:55-11:55

2:45-3:30, TLT Meeting/PD (Angela’s Room, RM24)

November 22 (F)
7:30-9:00, Allan to 4JMAPS Meeting
10:30-12:40, November Birthday Lunches With the Principal (Community Room)
2:30-3:30, Early Release PD – Heggerty (1/2), PLC (KG/2/3/4/5)

Keep passing out those tailfeathers!

Allan