Thursday, March 12, 2020

Friday Focus - March 13, 2020



Great Things I Noticed this Week:
Time change + full moon + lack of sub coverage + coronavirus...and you've all stayed calm for our students. Wow! You all are amazing!
With 2 full days of training and many meetings, I know I missed out on seeing a lot of other great things happening in our building. I thank you all for continuing your focus on learning and keeping calm even when social media/news gives the message of chaos. Thank you for being the thermostat in your classrooms to set the tone, rather than the thermometer and for helping to support each other!

Upcoming Events:
Monday -PD Day
Wednesday - Workout Wednesday and MS Faculty Meeting (agenda-Employee engagement survey results/feedback session)

Nuts and Bolts Notes:
*Bathroom clipboards - please continue to have students sign out to go to the bathroom, but leave the clipboards in your room. This is to prevent the spread of more germs (some students have been seen not washing hands in the bathroom and walking back with the clipboard. EWWWWW!)

*I know we're already to March when student behaviors begin to increase or they've been pretty developed by now. In the past couple of weeks, Mrs. Modaff and I have had a number of conversations with parents about repeated/ongoing student behaviors and heard similar responses from parents: We had no idea that these behaviors were happening in class, why didn't the teacher tell me? We would have given consequences at home.
I know contacting parents isn't always easy and it isn't why you went into teaching, however, it's an essential piece. At the least, please send an email to parents when you have behaviors in your classroom to let parents know from your perspective what is happening.  If you're ever hesitant to reach out to parent, please don't feel bad in asking for Mrs. Modaff or my assistance to either join you for a phone conversation or help you to write the email.


Tech Tip of the Week:
Is that higher-order task really higher order? Blog post from Cult of Pedagogy. This week a resource on those tasks that we consider high order for students learning. Great examples in this article: https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/higher-order/ Reflective question, What do I want students to be able to do with this knowledge once the lesson is over?

Blogs, Tweets & Quotes:
*How Teachers are Talking to Students about the Coronavirus






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