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.

Blended Learning

Staff,

This Tuesday at our staff meeting, I'll briefly review the student survey requirement for Year 2 probationary and continuing teachers. However, most of the meeting will be set aside for teachers to share and reflect on the blended learning opportunities implemented during Readers Workshop this year, and the impact they've had to engage and personalize learning for students.  I"m hoping this is a time we can learn from each other about what has worked well and what hasn't. I've meant to give you opportunities like this earlier in the year at staff meetings, but there just hadn't been time.

Some reminders about district staff development this week. There is all day ELA and Integrated Units of Inquiry for grades 5th (Tuesday), 3rd (Wednesday) and 4th (Thursday) at River Crest in room 201. On Friday North Hudson Elementary has an All School Meeting at 3:50pm. There still is time to turn in Celebration Reports for students to be honored on Friday. We're 15 away from our next benchmark:  120 students recognized.

As we move into December, I am again sharing an article from the Anti Defamation League with tips on navigating teaching in December: "The December Dilemma". You'll see under the school assemblies paragraph, steps we've taken with our All School Sing Along over the years to implement some of their recommendations.

Thankful

This morning I was reading the St. Paul Pioneer Press, and it had the "Big Thanks from Little People" edition in the Sunday Life section. There were a couple pieces of writing submitted by Hudson Prairie students. The image below especially got me thinking about the many things I'm thankful for like having healthy grandparents, parents, a wife and children.

I've also been fortunate enough to work with colleagues who each day put the needs of their students first while supporting one another. Wishing you all a Thanksgiving break with the ones you love, and time to reflect on the blessings in your life!

Planning Next Steps with Running Records or the Continuums

Classroom Teachers,

On Monday you'll have flexibility to use your Day 6 time to plan core instruction with your team, differentiate for students who need extension/reteaching or learn together as a grade level. When using the protocol, you can choose one of the three areas to work on. Feel free to use the math protocol instead, if you are ready to pre-plan for an upcoming math unit.

Our staff meeting on Tuesday will be for classroom teachers. K-2 teachers will meet in the media center with a focus on running records. Please bring your materials from the most recent ELA district staff development. We'll review how to infuse running records into your guided reading lessons, and give you time to decide which running record format you feel the most comfortable with. The remainder of the staff meeting time will be spent getting running records copied so you'll be ready to move forward with them. Kelli Hedlund will also be able to help those of you who want to use the running record app to assess your students.

Intermediate teachers will meet in the art classroom. Please be ready to plan using the F+P Continuum, MAP Continuum or the Decartes Reading Vocabulary by RIT. Think about what resource you included in your SLO action plan. You will also be able to use this time for making copies of materials needed either for future whole group or guided reading lessons. Amanda McCarthy or I'll will be available to assist your teams.

Under the PBIS tab, I have included a powerful article published in the Washington Post in regards to students with lagging social/emotional skills. It is a nice companion piece to the information I shared in an earlier blog.

SLO Reviews Begin on Friday

On Friday I will begin reviewing SLOs with individual classroom teachers during Day 6 collaboration time. These meetings will be around 15 minutes long, and Sue will send out a schedule later this week. If you haven't already, remember to submit your SLO to me through mylearningplan at least a day prior to our meeting. Specialists and special educators please set up a 15 minute meeting with me through Sue to review your SLO from November 10-21.

This week we have some items to remember. The Hudson High School Swing Choir will be performing for us at 2:15pm in the gym tomorrow. There will be no second recesses Monday because of this event. Three of our grade levels have professional development this week. On Wednesday Kindergarten has ELA PD in the am and First Grade has ELA PD in the pm at River Crest Elementary:  Room 201. On Thursday second grade has a full day PD regrading ELA and integrated units of study also at River Crest:  Room 201. Here is the link to our 2014-2015 PD Calendar. The building Tier I PBIS team is also meeting on Thursday at 8:05am in the conference room.

At our staff meeting this Tuesday we will have a little time to reflect on conference scheduling and conferences. For the benefit of year two teachers (probationary and continuing) I'll go over the student survey component of our evaluation system that is due mid December. At the end of the meeting, there will be time for a couple business items I need to cover.

Focus For Classroom Visits

Teachers,

After Steve Dunn returned to provide staff development around Writers' Workshop and the nonfiction reading strategies of summarizing and paraphrasing. There were a few high impact strategies I wanted to focus on when giving feedback in quick visits during the upcoming months.

1) The continued use of clear learning targets for mini-lessons that students interact with.

2) Frequent use of pair shares to allow teachers to assess students' thinking and increase engagement. There are three levels of pair share experiences.

• Level One:  one word answer or thumbs up/thumbs down
• Level Two:  a complete sentence answer
• Level Three:  an explain your thinking/defend your answer (think why or how cues)

3) The use of the gradual release process without skipping the guided practice phase. The following link has a nice visual to remember all four steps. Gradual Release of Responsibility This visual uses the language demonstration instead of think aloud and shared practice in place of think together. 

These are all high impact strategies as a staff we've implemented, but we can continue to get better at our utilization of these strategies. Feel free to let me know which of these strategies you'd like the most feedback on. 

This Thursday our Day 6 collaboration will be focused on progress monitoring and making decisions on what students need Tier II reading or math interventions. 

The MAP Continuum

FYI:  On Wednesday, the lock down drill will occur at 10:45am. 

During Day 6 collaboration on Tuesday, we will take a look at your classroom's MAP reading data. I will have the class breakdown reports by goal for each classroom teacher. This report will allow us to look at students' current instructional level through the MAP assessment lens. 

The MAP assessment provides its own learning continuum. Through going through this process on Tuesday, it is my hope you'll see how this information aligns with the F + P continuum, allowing you to also use this resource to plan for your next steps in reading instruction. Here's a link to the MAP Website.

Please view my short webcast below for a little front-loading before our Day 6 Collaboration.

Day 6 Collaboration and Conferences

Classroom Teachers:

Tomorrow at your Day 6 Collaboration, you'll have the flexibility to focus on Tier I instruction, Tier II or your own learning. I have placed in the your Google Doc Day 6 folder the following template to guide your work:  Day 6 Protocol. Each Day 6 please make a copy of this protocol and rename it with that day's date within your Day 6 folder. Then focus on the area of need your team feels is the most important on that day.


Also leading into Parent/Teacher Conferences, I wanted you to have some helpful assessment information/resources shared by Ann Mitchell. Please know it is not my expectation you discuss PALS and MAP data at conferences. Especially for those of you just learning about these assessments for the first time this fall. These reports will go home in first trimester report cards.

PALS Parent Letter sample

NWEA MAP Talking Points for conferences

NWEA MAP Parent Letter (results)

How do I share assessment information with parents/guardians?

Hudson student-parent-teacher conferences should be meaningful conversations focused on student strengths, struggles, and next steps in learning. We want students to know themselves as learners, to understand steps they can take to practice areas of struggle, and to share goals with parents to help them focus their efforts.

Be thoughtful about using fall assessment data to communicate student learning with parents. Whether referencing NWEA MAP, F&P, PALS, or other assessments, please consider sharing the following:

§  Specific areas of strength and struggle (rather than a score or level). Highlight with students and for parents steps each can take to support the student making progress in their learning.

§  Explain the value of the assessment as an instructional tool designed to help you (the teacher) plan the best (literacy) instruction for their child.

§  If helpful to parents, provide an overview of the tasks that are assessed, the benchmark scores associated with each task, and the scores obtained by their child.

§  Identify the literacy instruction you have in place, and how you are planning to address their child's strengths and needs as indicated by the assessment.

§  With a focus on literacy and reading, encourage parents or siblings of emergent readers to read with each other, sing songs and rhymes, look through pictures in a book, and so on. Encourage parents of all students to explore books with their children, expand into a variety of genres, and talk about what they read.

If you are looking for additional guidance on how to conduct productive, literacy-rich meetings with parents, view the following webinar that is available on DPI’s Read Wisconsin (www.readwisconsin.net) website here.

The The Continuum of Literacy Learning and Planning for Guided Reading

Staff,

During this week's staff meeting, you'll have time to look at the current guided reading groups you've developed through the lens of the F+P Continuum of Literacy Learning. Please bring your groupings to this meeting.

On Tuesday turn to the guided reading tab/area of your continuum and focus on behaviors and understandings to notice, teach and support (within, beyond and about the text) within the specific instructional levels you'll be using with your reading groups. I'll have a graphic organizer available to assist you with your planning.

I also wanted to remind you of the Planning for Word Work after Guided Reading section found inside the guided reading area. These demonstration ideas can assist you in putting word work in context while allowing students to apply these skills.

Finally each instructional level within the guided reading section lists suggestions for selecting guided reading texts, as well as the characteristics of these texts at each instructional level. I'm looking forward to our time together to dig more deeply into this resource while planning for guided reading.