Nuts/Bolts - Week of 6/12/17

- RISE Card STORE CLOSED! No more drawings - Replacement incentive? = High-5's & Candy
- Supervision Team B
- Admin Referral - 3rd Line? Send in the referral! 

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Goals / Objectives: Primary Evaluators will make sure they return your Goals/Objectives forms (and any other observations/evaluations) for final signature prior to teacher check-out on Friday. 

Monday, June 12 - PM Assembly Schedule "MS-Recognition Assembly"; 8th-grade yearbook distribution

Tuesday, June 13 - Final Team Leader Meeting; 

Wednesday, June 14 - Positive Behavior Reward / Minimum Day Schedule; 8th Grade Promotion Ceremony Rehearsal. After 1st period attendance, 8th graders sent to the gym. Supervision Coverage

Thursday, June 15 - Minimum Day Schedule. Students released at 1:20 p.m. 10 additional minutes on 7th period.  8th Grade Promotion Ceremony; After 1st-period attendance, 8th graders sent to the gym. Supervision Coverage. 6th/7th-grade teachers, @ 9:15 a.m. line up along the blacktop to "clap out" the 8th grade class of 2017. 

Friday, June 9 - @ 9am Social Committee Breakfast in the MPR; Teacher Check-out; Laptop Sign-Out Form; Year End Yippee @ Borgese's

Tech Tip: Feedly

If you are used to bookmarking your favorite websites and visiting them individually, this will BLOW YOUR MIND!

Feedly is a tool that allows to you to subscribe to and organize online information. It will pull new articles from your favorite websites into one location and you can "tag" or "label" and organize them into collections. You can save them for reading later and create boards that you can share / collaborate on. This would be a fantastic tool to teach students as they collect information online for research papers.

Even better, it's available via website, Chrome extension, and apps for iOS and Android. It all syncs on the cloud, giving you access to everything from everywhere.

Children Must Be Taught to Collaborate, Studies Say

"At its worst, group tasks can deteriorate into awkward silences, arguments—or frustration for the one child who ends up doing everyone else's work." Throughout the year, I've witnessed every teacher emphasizing collaborative work in their classrooms. I've also listened to students and parents as they continue to struggle with the imbalances of group projects. We all strive to make the process inclusive, fair, and purposeful for kids. We assign roles, have students grade each other, etc. 

This article includes some ideas about how to accomplish equity and reinforces the importance of teaching students the skills required for group work, including: communicating with others, resolving conflicts, and managing tasks.

I also noted that the article indirectly supported our co-taught and honors cluster models in saying, "Instead of trying to choose whether the high-performing students will benefit the most or low-performing students will benefit the most, if teachers focus on prioritizing interaction quality, … both benefit."

Nuts/Bolts - Week of 6/5/17

- RISE Cards - Give 6 Daily! 
- Supervision Team A  
- Admin Referral - 3rd Line? Send in the referral! 

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Monday, June 5 - ELA & Spanish Textbook Collection
Tuesday, June 6 - 8th Grade Textbook Collection, 1st period
Wednesday, June 7 - Homeroom Schedule; 6th Grade Textbook Return, 1st Period; Final Homeroom Lesson TBD - 6th & 7th graders receive registration packets during homeroom; Pop Show, Gym 7-8pm
Thursday, June 8 - 7th Grade Textbook Collection, 1st period; ELA Team @ Training for new ELA Adoption; Concerts in the Park, 6-8pm, Field
Friday, June 9 - TRTV Schedule; 8th Graders Promotion Dance 6-9pm

Shout Out! - ALL STAFF!

As the year is closing out quickly, we have ALL  found ourselves busier than usual. During these times, we truly rely on our teammates. We are asked to cover, pick up the slack, perform, compromise, balance, and carry each other across the finish line with the same energy we started the year with. 

To meet this goal, our staff at "The Ranch" truly puts students first.  We go WAY above and beyond our individual job descriptions and are willing to assist, support, and recognize each other every day. This trust, mutual respect, and teamwork are what makes our campus special. WE ARE TR! Thanks to all for your continued dedication and commitment to our school and community! 

Tech Tip: Stick Pick

Sometimes, during interviews, I stumble upon a tool that a teacher is using that is something I've never heard of. This one is called "Stick Pick". I know that many Travis teachers select students at random using a dice, equity sticks, playing cards, etc. This practice increases student engagement and accountability while extracting a comprehensive metric of ALL student learning. But THIS randomizer doesn't just randomly pick names...it has embedded Bloom's Question stems AND the ability to assess / store student scores. Pretty slick!  Also available for Android. 

A Powerful Way to End the School Year

"Year mapping allows students to see what they’ve learned in your class, and it’s a great resource for your incoming class." As a teacher, at the end of every year I surveyed students and talked to them about what they learned and what they would change to make my class better. In the same way, as an administrator, I'm always attempting to gather input to ensure our environment stays positive, energized, and synergized! This Edutopia post resonated with me as we close out 16-17. Essentially, students create posters and put them together into one big learning map and then present portions of the map to the class. Leave it up on the wall and it's a great introductory visual for the incoming class that you can use the 1st week back. I thought it was a cool idea. Read the article for more details.