Resolutions for the New Year

Staff,

I hope this blog finds you refreshed and rejuvenated for the rest of the 2014-2015 school year. Before winter break, the first graders worked on their new year's resolutions. Here's a couple of them.

The following link is a list of the most popular new year's resolutions for 2015: New Year's Resolutions. Each one of the resolution ideas also has a link to a support page with resources. As you can see, some of these resolutions match the first graders: getting fit and helping others. Personally I'm focusing on the former with the help of a fitbit giving me frequent feedback on my progress toward 10,000 steps a day.

With a new year also comes a time of reflection. During the month of January, it is our opportunity to reflect on the SLO goals we've set using new student learning data collected from MAP and individual reading assessments.

On Monday, January 5th classroom teachers will have time at their Day 6 Collaboration to focus planning for whole group/small group instruction in Reader's Workshop or new learning utilizing resources like the Jan Richardson's guided reading videos now inventoried in the media center. Please choose the focus that is the most pending for your team. The January 5th protocol is ready for each grade level team, in their Day 6 google doc folder.

At our Tuesday staff meeting, you'll have time to dig into and reflect on your recent Writer's Workshop professional development, and plan next steps in writing instruction.

 

Writing Staff Development and Blended Learning

Staff,

A reminder of the Writers Workshop trainings this week with Steve Dunn. Kindergarten is on Monday, first grade Tuesday and second grade Wednesday. On Thursday third grade is in the morning and fourth grade in the afternoon. Fifth grade will be meeting with Steve Dunn on Friday in the am. All professional development will take place at River Crest in room 201.

On Tuesday at our staff meeting, please choose from the list of digital resources available for use during Readers Workshop. You  may also spend time at more than one station if you choose.

Scootpad spelling:  Heather Mathews and Brian Burbach
Digital literacy stations during Readers Workshop:  Nicki Lagerstrom and Amanda Susmer
Scootpad for reading:  Jennifer Schwalbach
Scootpad for reading, math and spelling:  Greta Lewis
Electronic books available for check out through the media center:  Kelli Hedlund
Digital resources for reading:  Dolf

Kelli will be sharing how students can check out electronic books to be read on devices. A couple of the resources I will be sharing can be accessed before hand at the following links. Rewordify is a website that allows you to simplify difficult text. The "reworded" text is highlighted with different options to choose an easier to understand version. NEWSELA: Kids Tab this gives daily news/informational text for children at five different lexile levels for each article. Each article has a short quiz option.

Thanks to all of the staff willing to sharing their new learnings around digital resources.

Late Start Professional Development

North Hudson Teaching Staff:

This Thursday our late start staff development will be building based. We will begin at 8:05am in the media center. K-2 bring the running records on a few of your students and 3-5 the formative comprehension interviews you've completed. Also bring any other recent formative assessments and resources you've been using for planning guided reading instruction:  F+P Continuum, MAP Continuum, Jan Richardson resource, etc.

To frame our work on this day, we will begin by viewing Jan Richardson videos modeling guided reading. K-2 teachers will view a primary guided reading lesson and 3-5 will view a different guided reading lesson than the one they watched last week at the district staff development. While watching think about all the things that reinforce what we're already doing in guided reading and also some new take aways.

After processing these videos, grade level teams will have time to dig into formative assessments, identify the focus of guided reading groups and plan for instruction. Here is the link to the protocol that will be used during this collaboration late start protocol

Learning Support Services will be sending out an email to specialists and special educators regarding their work on this day. Some special educators like speech therapists and SLD teachers will be asked to join a grade level team of a student who is on their caseload to assist with digging into recent formative assessments and planning for the next steps in instruction.