Friday, February 28, 2014

Staff News
3/3-3/7

I hope you are all ready and excited for the upcoming SEP Week.  Thank you for the extra time and effort required in setting up appointments.  As you conduct your SEPs next week, I wanted to provide a few possible suggestions that many of you already have in place that seem to help them go smoothly:

Ø  Greet parents in a positive friendly way.   The way you would like to be greeted if you were the parent.
Ø  Never start in on a problem as the first item of business of the SEP. 
Ø  Express appreciation for their child and that you love having him/her child in your class.  Parents always want to know that you like their child.
Ø  When dealing with a problem, approach it as an area where you would like to help the child improve.  Rather than comments that their child is behind all the other students or never completes their work, try rephrasing it into areas where they can improve.  (I want to keep working with… to help bring him from a first to third grade reading level.  A few things you can do at home are…) It is important to let parents know we expect their student to improve.
Ø  Work to create a positive climate.

If you would please be sure that Sherri has a copy of your SEP schedule.  If you were to share a live Google Doc with Sherri it would be even better.  She fields a lot of calls regarding SEP Schedules…

Thanks for all you do.  Have a fantastic weekend!
Thought: “The highest reward for man’s toil is not what he gets for it, but what he becomes by it.”  John Ruskin

Friday, February 21, 2014

Staff News
2/24-2/28


I hope you all had a wonderful week this week.  It is hard to imagine that we are approaching the month of March.  March will be different than it has in been in the past because we will begin our testing.  If you are in grades 3-5, please be sure you are taking your students into the lab regularly to practice the tools for the SAGE assessment.  The more comfortable the are on the system, the more accurate their score will be.   For grades K-2, please note that the lab schedules will be changing over the next few months as we move into CRTs and practice sessions.  There will be times when testing will interfere with Waterford.

Please note that we will NOT be doing Grand Parents Lunch during SEP week this year.  We may look at doing it later in the year.  Along with SEPs, we will need everyone to set up their **SEP schedules this next week.  You should have a list of siblings from fall SEPs.  If you would please correlate with each other when making up your schedules.  Parent surveys will need to be given out in grades 3-5 as well. We will do the student surveys in the computer labs like we have in the past.

Thought:  Video Thought
Keep making a difference.
"Parents send the best kids they have and we should have the same aspirations for them that we would for our own children."  Mike Smoker
Thanks for all you do and all of your hard work.  Enjoy each moment.


Have a wonderful weekend.

Friday, February 14, 2014

Staff News
2/18-2/28

I want to express appreciation for all of the extra time and effort everyone has put in over the past several weeks.  I know that we have had several late nights, and many of us have had many early mornings.  At times I wonder what makes our jobs different from others.  I think that, for many of us, it is that it goes way beyond a job.  When it comes to the long-term impact we can have on the lives of others, it helps drive a lot of what we do and why we do it.

Please include on your next newsletter that we are currently accepting applications for next year's first grade students for Spanish dual immersion.  

Please notice that on the calendar that we will have a test-scheduling meeting for grades 3-5 and SPED on Wednesday at 3:00 in the Title I room.

Thought: “A man can succeed at almost anything for which he has unlimited enthusiasm.”  Charles M. Schwab
Have a wonderful LONG weekend.

Friday, February 7, 2014

Staff New 
2/10-2/14

I wanted to thank all those that have completed their MLK hours as a grade level.  As I have visited with many of you, it sounds like the time has been well used.  We just have 2 more hours to finish up this Monday.  We will go from 4-6:00.  We have Fred coming to help with Go Math curriculum for a portion of the time.  After Fred, we will develop math lessons.  I hope it will be valuable time for you.

** Please mention in your next newsletter that we will have a parent meeting for dual immersion this upcoming Thursday at 5:30 in the gym.  Anyone interested can attend, be we especially want to encourage Kindergarten parents. 

Thanks for behaving while I was gone to the Title I Conference.  As I reviewed the cameras, I only saw a few dress code infractions.  The short shorts worn by Mr. Greenhalgh and Mr. Coates were pretty inappropriate an emotionally disconcerting.   I picked up a few things I look forward to sharing next week.  The nice thing is that we are already doing so much of what I heard. 

Have a fantastic weekend.


Thought: “Weakness of attitude becomes weakness of character.”  Albert Einstein