Great Things I Noticed this Week: You all never cease to amaze me as you do the impossible in your classrooms with students both in person and virtually. Our students and our parents notice the incredible work that you are doing!
*Class Kahoot to check prior knowledge before digging into the first unit.
*A new student shared that the teachers here are so much nicer than his previous school.
*Small groups creating public service announcement videos for lab safety.
*Students helping each other with iPad skills (we have many new students unfamiliar with navigating Notability, Schoology and google docs on the iPad).
*Extra help in the hallways to reinforce face coverings (HS lunch time was SO much better on Thursday!)
*Emails to parents regarding individual students - starting with a positive and then sharing a concern (thank you for including me on those, then I'm aware and can follow-up on to support).
*Great faculty discussions in our virtual meetings...good questions, problem-solving and brainstorming.
When students were asked "Please share one thing you liked in school this week" here are some responses to affirm the work you're doing:
- I enjoyed a lot of the class activities I’ve done so far, and I really like a lot of the teachers I have this year. They are all very respectful and kind, I enjoy being able to see them.
- How the teachers are taking the change, keeping calm. And planning if the school has to go virtual again
- How the teachers learn about us
- All of my teachers were very very helpful with virtual learning!
- I liked that we got to go back to school
- How fun the teacher are and seeing my friends
- Actually being inside of school
- I like playing getting to know people games
- The games we played.
*Games and Jamboard came up many times in student comments. :)
Events Next Week:
Wednesday - Workout Wednesday (I think this should be every Wednesday during a COVID school year)
*MS faculty--we originally had a meeting scheduled for the 16th but I canceled it due to our grading discussion this week.
"Nuts & Bolts" Notes:
*I know that some of your concerns moving into content now are the gaps in skills from the COVID slide. I recently read the advice to teach "Just in Time" vs "Just in Case." Meaning...start teaching YOUR content for THIS year and if there's a prerequisite that students need, teach it when they need it.
*If you take your class outside for a mask break, students should still be socially distanced. If they are close to each other, then masks need to be back on.
*I'm still working on getting through all Schoology courses/Syllabi...if you haven't sent me your syllabi I'll look for it in your Schoology Course.
*Please get your seating charts to Linda/Laura.
*Attendance for blended: I know this has NOT been easy and I want it to be as few steps as possible for you. If you see a student in BlueJeans that doesn't already have a code in PowerSchool, please mark as present online. If they're already marked IL and in your BlueJeans please send Laura/Linda an email to let them know and they will change it. Do NOT stress about doing it right away when you are trying to be an octopus in your classroom....just write it down on a post-it and email them later when you have time. *Grading - You are all so amazingly patient and flexible. I still don't have answers, but will communicate them once I do!
Do your students need to improve on their email skills? Maybe this could help you in teaching them email etiquette:
Blogs, Quotes & Tweets:
Not a blog post this time, but a youtube clip from Chase Mielke on Self-Forgiveness in his new Thriving Educator series. I hope you take a few minutes for yourself to hear this message: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwLaDBacq-8. Be kind to yourself!
P.S. I have Mielke's book The Burnout Cure: Learning to Love Teaching Again and am happy to loan it out. Just let me know.
I LOVE this reminder of the small things that matter to our students:
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