Weekly Memo Week 19, December 12-16, 2016

What great unpredictability our weather provides us. I hope you enjoyed your two snow/ice days and have figured out how to rearrange the week to fit 7 days into 5. Please note we have reschedule Giving Chapel to Tuesday.  See details below. Chanukah Chapel has been postponed until after Winter Break. It is a busy week with field trips, learning celebrations, parties and special events.  And then...Enjoy your Winter Break.

COMMUNITY

OES Employee Holiday Party, Saturday, 12/10, 6:00 - 9:30, Dining Hall

Good food, great company and door prizes await.  Please join us in celebration of the season.

LS Holiday Party, Monday, 12/12, 3:30 - ???, LS Library

• Holiday Potluck has become our popular annual tradition.  Home cooked or store bought food dishes are both welcome. Find your food or activity assignment here: POTLUCK 2016.  If you wish to trade your food assignment with another, please let Lyn know.
• Yankee Swap!
• each participant is asked to bring along a gift worth no more than $20
• gift should be wrapped in whatever mysterious fashion you desire
• everyone who has given a gift will receive a gift, swapping/trading is OK
• Bring in a holiday or new year’s card, or a family photo for the LS Office bulletin board. We thought this would be a fun way to share and honor a personal side of our faculty and staff and brighten the kitchen area.

David is involved in search activities Monday and Tuesday mornings and Wednesday afternoon. He will be off campus all day Thursday at a Division Heads retreat.

Kiah Job Share

2 more finalists visit Tuesday and Wednesday this week for demonstration lessons and interviews. One finalist may visit after the break.

Prekindergarten

Colesie will be ending her teaching day at 12:30 Monday through Wednesday for the foreseeable future so she can spend more time with her family. Sandy Parks, familiar to you as an Extension Teacher, will be joining the Prek teaching team Mondays to Wednesdays at 12:00 to assist Lauren and Jeanna. Please join me in welcoming Sandy to PreK.

Screenagers

Interesting documentary on the challenges and opportunities of teenagers using technology.  

2nd Grade Learning Celebration

Congratulations to the 2nd grade team for their wonderful work preparing their students to present their research findings.

Giving Chapel preparations!

Thank you to the 5th grade team and Kristen Haferbecker for guiding the 5th graders through these presentations and projects.

Giving Chapel, Tuesday, December 13,  8:10 am NOTE CHANGE OF DATE

Giving Chapel morning is always quite bustling. Here are some details to know, so that we can make the morning as smooth as possible:

• No students should go straight to the chapel. Girls' Choir participants will check in with their classroom teacher, drop off their backpacks, and then report with their Giving Chapel bags to the chapel by 7:45am call. If you are a 3rd-5th grade teacher and have morning duty, please consider making an alternative plan with your choir students about checking in with you at your duty.
• 5th Graders will likewise check in with their classroom teachers before heading to their assignments.
• Please take attendance before chapel. There will be adults in the LS building to "sweep" for latecomers and send them to chapel.
• All parents have been asked to drop their children off with their Giving Chapel bag and then proceed straight to chapel, not to linger in the classrooms.
• There will be a couple of 5th Grade helpers assigned per classroom to help students carry large offerings. Specialists--consider offering your help and hands in your buddy classroom.  
• Be aware, there will be a handful of faculty out at a professional conference—Kiah, Claire, Chris T. Talk with your team about the plan and make sure to check in that everyone knows the routine.
• There are extra bags in the LS office if anyone needs one this week.  
• Any questions, direct to Kristen!

Chapel This Week

• Giving Chapel - All Lower School in the OES Chapel, Tuesday, 8:10
• Season of Light Chapel - Beginning Years in the OES Chapel, Wednesday, 8:15
• St Nick’s Chapel - All School (PreK and K opt out) in the Gym, 1:30

Recess Alerts

Our first grade boys are facing challenges playing together safely, both physically and emotionally. We’d love your help keeping a particular eye on this group, who will need more support and intervention if you see them engaged in rough play. Please watch their faces to see who looks like they are having fun and who looks distressed, and intervene if you think someone may need help communicating or finding appropriate play. Sequoia Sanders has been particularly patient with friends but has also been injured several times because of his proximity to/participation in this play--we’re invested in ending that pattern.

For kindergarten recesses we appreciate your eyes and ears on the monkey bars if you’re on ACP duty, as it can look like things are going well from afar, but some hurtful words are being exchanged and a few children tend to dominate, making it hard for others to participate equitably.

If you are looking for resources for your students about widening their game options, take a look at these games from Playworks.

Library Open 7:30 - 7:50 Each Day

Playground Design Update

Thanks to Chris Thompson, the 4th and 5th grade Design Team and the many other adults and students who have helped in the process. The architects brought a rendering of potential playground elements to the student team this week, incorporating student ideas from their concept maps and feedback from the community gathered over the last few months.  We’ll bring this map to you during team meetings over the next few weeks and will next seek feedback about priorities as we see what will fit into our budget.  Click here for a link to some slides that outline the playground design team’s experience.

PROGRAM

Admissions Visitors

All field trips or events that would prevent us from having an applicant visitor in your class on a certain day must be on the LS Faculty calendar. Sarah sets up visits dates in September.  Relocation families makes plans accordingly. If you need help learning how to add dates to both the LS Faculty and LS Events calendar, please talk to Jeffrey, Debra, Chris T or Kirstin.

Tech Update:

AppleTV troubleshooting/testing: Ruben from IT would like to be the first person on the scene to help you when you have a dropped connection from the AppleTV. This will help make the troubleshooting consistent and he can record where/when/conditions that the incidents occur. This should help clear up confusion as to the cause of the connection loss and speed up resolution. We've already made a number of changes that should improve the reliability of the connection to AppleTV so we are recommending at this time the following path...

• Use the LS Tech Checklist over the weekend and Monday morning before start of school.
• Have experienced significant disconnect problems before or during conferences? please send an email to oeshelp@oes.edu with ATV in the subject and include the "Device" or Devices used, and roughly when they occurred. Continue to use wired connections to the projector. After Ruben works with you we'll then ask you to start using it again as you feel comfortable, with wired connection as a backup.
• Haven't used AppleTV to connect? please start using it again. Report as soon as possible your drop to oeshelp@oes.edu with the information above. Have your wired connection ready as a backup.
• Have been connecting with no problems with multiple devices (ipads, macbook etc.) continue to do so and report to oeshelp@oes.edu as necessary, again with ATV as the subject line.

*** Jeffrey will be scheduling room observations over the next few weeks.. for more on "why the heck would he do such a thing" check out the OES LS Technology Google+ Community.

Primary SSTs
The SST meeting for Deborah Bridgnell's class has been rescheduled for 7:35-8:35 am on Thursday 12/15. The meeting for Beth Breiten's class remains 3:15-4:15 on Thursday 12/15. Both meetings take place in the Flex Classroom.

SST on Thursdays

SST meetings are available on Thursdays from 3:15-4:00 for anyone who would like a whole team approach to supporting a student or students. Please contact your Assistant Head to request a Thursday afternoon SST. Also let us know who you’d like to request to attend.

PGD Site - John Holloran has launched the OES PGD website, which will come to include recommended PGD opportunities and writeups of PGD experiences.

Monday, 12/12 - LS Holiday Party - bring Yankee Swap gift and Potluck item

Thursday, 12/15 - No Meeting

OPERATIONS

How to reserve a room on the LS Faculty calendar

Did you know you can reserve rooms like the Performance Commons and Flex Classroom through Google calendar?  You add a new event, and where you would normally invite guests you click the word 'rooms.' If the the name of the room is visible on the list, it's available and you can click on it to reserve it.  It will then appear in your 'location' box.  If you don't see the room on the list, it's because it's already reserved.  If you really need it (for a performance, for example) and are wondering if you can work out a deal with the person who has reserved it, Jeffrey and Debra have access to the room calendars.

Raincoats and Warm Clothing

Remind students that they need a raincoat or coat to play out in the rain.  If they come to recess without a coat they need to play under the covered areas. You may need to send reminders to parents this week about warm clothing if you notice children unprepared for the drop in temperatures.

Inclement Weather

• If you did not receive closure notifications be sure to check your Honeywell Instant Alert account. In your ‘Alert Setup’ section for your Honeywell account, make sure you have the blue cell phone icon if you want to receive text messages, the brown phone for phone calls and the envelope icon for emails (you can select more than one, or add new devices if needed).
• review our policies for weather emergencies
• Contact Rebecca Williams if you had issues with alerts

 

ADP Tutorial

For help on any ADP related matters: login or registration, password retrieval, or time card approval process, please view this beautiful presentation that Ed Cecere put together.  This is a helpful guide and should answer your ADP related questions.   If you still have problems after using Ed’s helpful guide, please let Veena: iyengarve@oes.edu know.  There is a plan to put the ADP resource link in the LS Employee Resource page for future reference. Stay tune.

Your Announcements

Send any announcements you have for faculty to Kirstin, Chris or David by Thursday each week and we will include them in the Weekly Memo.  This should help reduce the number of emails we are receiving, and maximize our time to collaborate during meetings.

Archive

Utilize the archive for previous Weekly Memo.

• Substitute Procedures 2016-2017
• Library Usage for Classroom Events
• Food from Home
• Maintenance Requests - maintrequest@oes.edu
• File Cabinets - in the storage room.
• Duties Procedures

Weekly Memo Week 18, December 5-9, 2016

This week is full of special events; Screenagers, 2nd grade Portland Research Celebration, Giving Chapel and the OES Employee Holiday Party. Be sure your Instant Alert subscription is up to date as the weather this week looks wintery and unpredictable.

COMMUNITY

David is involved in three hiring searches, US Head, Associate Head and 3rd Grade Job Share between now and the break.  Each one requires significant time.

Kirstin is out on jury duty on Monday 12/5, and as needed depending on jury selection. BY teachers, please call the LS Office for any emergency student support in her absence so they can find someone to assist you.

Chris is off to POCC Wednesday through Friday. IY teachers, please call the LS Office for any emergency student support in her absence so they can find someone to assist you.

OES Employee Holiday Party, Saturday, 12/10, 6:00 - 9:30

Good food, great company and door prizes await.  Please join us in celebration of the season.

Screenagers

Employee showing at 3:30 in the MS Commons

Community showing at 7:00 in the Chapel

Documentary on teens use of tech screens.

2nd Grade Learning Celebration

You are warmly invited to a celebration of wondering, research, and writing as second graders share their "All About Portland" books.

When: Wednesday, 12/7

Time: 9:00- 9:30

Where: Second Grade Classrooms

Kiah's Job Share Search

• Interviews are underway
• Visits for finalist are being scheduled
• Please let David know if you have any candidates to recommend

Giving Chapel preparations!

5th graders led some great giving chape presentation and work sessions this last Friday. Next Tuesday is another chance to get in on the fun or try a new station. Don't forget to sign up and watch our 5th graders spread their empathy and passion for these great organizations and the good work they do!

Giving Chapel, Friday, December 9 8:10am--logistics:

Giving Chapel morning is always quite bustling. Here are some details to know, so that we can make the morning as smooth as possible:

• No students should go straight to the chapel. Girls' Choir participants will check in with their classroom teacher, drop off their backpacks, and then report with their Giving Chapel bags to the chapel by 7:45am call. If you are a 3rd-5th grade teacher and have morning duty, please consider making an alternative plan with your choir students about checking in with you at your duty.
• 5th Graders will likewise check in with their classroom teachers before heading to their assignments.
• Please take attendance before chapel. There will be adults in the LS building to "sweep" for latecomers and send them to chapel.
• All parents have been asked to drop their children off with their Giving Chapel bag and then proceed straight to chapel, not to linger in the classrooms.
• There will be a couple of 5th Grade helpers assigned per classroom to help students carry large offerings. Specialists--consider offering your help and hands in your buddy classroom.  
• Be aware, there will be a handful of faculty out at a professional conference—Kiah, Claire, Chris T. Talk with your team about the plan and make sure to check in that everyone knows the routine.
• There are extra bags in the LS office if anyone needs one this week.  
• Any questions, direct to Kristen!

LS Holiday Party

The LS Employees Holiday Gathering is on December 12th. Holiday Potluck has become our popular annual tradition.  Home cooked or store bought food dishes are both welcome. Find your food or activity assignment here: POTLUCK 2016.  If you wish to trade your food assignment with another, please let Lyn know.

This year we have decided to try a Yankee Swap! In a Yankee Swap each participant is asked to bring along a gift worth no more than $20, it could be funny or helpful or sweet or yummy, etc. The gift should be wrapped in whatever mysterious fashion you desire. When we arrive at the potluck, each player will pick from a number from a hat to determine the order of gift picking and opening. Everyone who has given a gift will receive a gift, swapping/trading is perfectly acceptable so that, as much as possible, everyone goes home with a gift they are happy with.

We would also like to invite you to bring in a holiday or new year’s card, or a family photo into the LS office. We can gather cards and family photos on the bulletin board in the LS office kitchen. As we enter into the season of light and prepare for winter break, we thought this would be a fun way to share and honor a personal side of our faculty and staff and brighten the kitchen area.

Playground Design Update

Thanks to Chris Thompson, the 4th and 5th grade Design Team and the many other adults and students who have helped in the process. The architects brought a rendering of potential playground elements to the student team this week, incorporating their ideas from their concept maps and feedback from the community gathered over the last few months.  We’ll bring this map to you during team meetings over the next few weeks and will next seek feedback about priorities as we see what will fit into our budget.  Click here for a link to some slides that outline the playground design team’s experience.

Recess Alerts

Our first grade boys are facing challenges playing together safely, both physically and emotionally. We’d love your help keeping a particular eye on this group, who will need more support and intervention if you see them engaged in rough play. Please watch their faces to see who looks like they are having fun and who looks distressed, and intervene if you think someone may need help communicating or finding appropriate play. Sequoia Sanders has been particularly patient with friends but has also been injured several times because of his proximity to/participation in this play--we’re invested in ending that pattern.

For kindergarten recesses we appreciate your eyes and ears on the monkey bars if you’re on ACP duty, as it can look like things are going well from afar, but some hurtful words are being exchanged and a few children tend to dominate, making it hard for others to participate equitably.

If you are looking for resources for your students about widening their game options, take a look at these games from Playworks.

Library Open 7:30 - 7:50 Each Day

According to the duty schedule Lara and Heidi are in the library each morning ready to supervise students. Please remind your students of this option.  I think many students do not know it is a choice.

Widening our Worldview

As author and researcher Ellen Galinksy says, "Perspective taking affects how we deal with conflict." Others  have suggested in recent weeks that if we can find a space to know the stories of those whose worldview is radically different from our own that we may also find places of connection. Here is a brief NPR piece about the idea. We own both the books featured plus others that may be of interest in our professional collection.

Post-Election: Resources to Move Forward

Ann Sulzer offered a particularly powerful letter to parents in a recent Middle School Messenger, connecting to a post-election statement by the Episcopal Diocese of Oregon.

Several faculty have found these free resources from the online story streaming service Sparkle Stories useful as they guide children and families of all opinions in how to care for one another post-election:

• Healing the National Rift is a blog post that provides a free story attempting to address the question, “How do we reach out to the ‘other side’ and make an authentic attempt to heal?”
• This link gives suggestions for how to stabilize children’s worlds when the adults around them may feel emotional or experience change. The gentle and helpful tips are followed by four stories families can listen to with their children, or classrooms together during reflective times.

PNCA Playground Exhibit

An opportunity you all might be interested in; a visit to the Pacific Northwest College of Art exhibition, Extraordinary Playscapes, running Oct. 6-Dec. 17th at the Arlene and Harold Schnitzer Center for Art and Design at PNCA.  Kirstin attended recently, so see her for more details and photos if you need some inspiration to attend!

PROGRAM

Admissions Visitors

All field trips or events that would prevent us from having a visitor in your class on a certain day must be on the LS Faculty calendar. Sarah sets up visits dates in September.  Relocation families makes plans accordingly. If you need help learning how to add dates to both the LS Faculty and LS Events calendar, please talk to Jeffrey, Debra, Chris T or Kirstin.

Tech Update:

AppleTV troubleshooting/testing: Ruben from IT would like to be the first person on the scene to help you when you have a dropped connection from the AppleTV. This will help make the troubleshooting consistent and he can record where/when/conditions that the incidents occur. This should help clear up confusion as to the cause of the connection loss and speed up resolution. We've already made a number of changes that should improve the reliability of the connection to AppleTV so we are recommending at this time the following path...

• Use the LS Tech Checklist over the weekend and Monday morning before start of school.
• Have experienced significant disconnect problems before or during conferences? please send an email to oeshelp@oes.edu with ATV in the subject and include the "Device" or Devices used, and roughly when they occurred. Continue to use wired connections to the projector. After Ruben works with you we'll then ask you to start using it again as you feel comfortable, with wired connection as a backup.
• Haven't used AppleTV to connect? please start using it again. Report as soon as possible your drop to oeshelp@oes.edu with the information above. Have your wired connection ready as a backup.
• Have been connecting with no problems with multiple devices (ipads, macbook etc.) continue to do so and report to oeshelp@oes.edu as necessary, again with ATV as the subject line.

*** Jeffrey will be scheduling room observations over the next few weeks.. for more on "why the heck would he do such a thing" check out the OES LS Technology Google+ Community.

SST on Thursdays

SST meetings are available on Thursdays from 3:15-4:00 for anyone who would like a whole team approach to supporting a student or students. Please contact your Assistant Head to request a Thursday afternoon SST. Also let us know who you’d like to request to attend.

PGD Site - John Holloran has launched the OES PGD website, which will come to include recommended PGD opportunities and writeups of PGD experiences.

Faculty Meetings  - Faculty Meeting Schedule, Faculty Meeting Agenda

Monday, 12/5 - “Screenagers” viewing - optional, recommended

Thursday, 12/8 - 7:35 - 8:35: Appreciations, Summer, Patricia P and MLK
Thursday, 12/8 - 3:15-4:15 Primary Recommendation SST in the Flex Classroom (Bridgnell). Thanks to BY specialists and support staff for attending this meeting.

Monday, 12/12 - LS Holiday Party

Thursday, 12/15 - No Meeting

OPERATIONS

How to reserve a room on the LS Faculty calendar

Did you know you can reserve rooms like the Performance Commons and Flex Classroom through Google calendar?  You add a new event, and where you would normally invite guests you click the word 'rooms.' If the the name of the room is visible on the list, it's available and you can click on it to reserve it.  It will then appear in your 'location' box.  If you don't see the room on the list, it's because it's already reserved.  If you really need it (for a performance, for example) and are wondering if you can work out a deal with the person who has reserved it, Jeffrey and Debra have access to the room calendars.

Raincoats and Warm Clothing

Remind students that they need a raincoat or coat to play out in the rain.  If they come to recess without a coat they need to play under the covered areas. You may need to send reminders to parents this week about warm clothing if you notice children unprepared for the drop in temperatures.

Inclement Weather

This is a great time of year to review our policies for weather emergencies and to check to make sure your subscription to Honeywell Instant Alert is updated with the settings you prefer. In your ‘Alert Setup’ section for your Honeywell account, make sure you have the blue cell phone icon if you want to receive text messages, the brown phone for phone calls and the envelope icon for emails (you can select more than one, or add new devices if needed).

Recess Duty Responsibility

• Put ball bins away at end of each recess
• Walk around and supervise
• Behind shed and around bike racks is not a play space

Loop Road Duty

We are still having trouble with the Primary-First Grade pick up duty.  Here’s how you can help:

• Please arrive for this duty no later than 2:55. This will probably mean ending your class by 2:45 and walking your kids to their destinations by 2:50 so you can be on time.
• If you can’t make your duty, you must find a replacement. We absolutely need three people to cover this duty--it is unsafe without this minimal coverage.   Make sure you leave explicit directions in your sub plans for your sub if you are on duty.
• Please check your duty calendar every morning if you have this duty so you remember to come on your designated days.  We’ve had several incidents of people forgetting they had duty or going to the wrong location. We really need you here.
• Please have parent conversations at another time if you’re on duty. If you are on duty, we need you supervising children and assisting with loading. Just let parents know you’re supervising and you’ll be available after 3:10, or suggest another time to talk.
• Primary and First Grade classes, thanks for your efforts to be out of the building on time.
• Students should be supervised by their teachers until at least two people are on duty at each gate.
• Walkie talkie guidelines are simple--the person waiting with kids by the windows listens for names on their walkie talkie and sends those kids to the gate. It’s best if this person knows the kids stays alert for latecomers or siblings of kids who have already been called.  One of the two people loading announces the names of the cars in the pick up line on their walkie talkie.  The person without the walkie talkie loads kids into cars.

Thank you for your help with this important part of our students’ day!

 

ADP Tutorial

For help on any ADP related matters: login or registration, password retrieval, or time card approval process, please view this beautiful presentation that Ed Cecere put together.  This is a helpful guide and should answer your ADP related questions.   If you still have problems after using Ed’s helpful guide, please let Veena: iyengarve@oes.edu know.  There is a plan to put the ADP resource link in the LS Employee Resource page for future reference. Stay tune.

Your Announcements

Send any announcements you have for faculty to Kirstin, Chris or David by Thursday each week and we will include them in the Weekly Memo.  This should help reduce the number of emails we are receiving, and maximize our time to collaborate during meetings.

Archive

Utilize the archive for previous Weekly Memo.

• Substitute Procedures 2016-2017
• Library Usage for Classroom Events
• Food from Home
• Maintenance Requests - maintrequest@oes.edu
• File Cabinets - in the storage room.