LS Weekly Memo
Week 4: September 1 - 5, 2014
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I enjoyed seeing you all back on campus last week and participating in the opening conversations about the new year. We have a wonderful opportunity over the next two years to get ourselves ready for the new building. I look forward to engaging in the preparations with you. Good luck with the final preparations for your students.
COMMUNITY
Recess Rodeo
Thanks to the PE team for guiding us through Recess Rodeo. Al;ong with the ruels and guidelines for the games we discussed several community agreements fro recess:
· We will use Walk, Talk or Rock as the quick conflict resolution strategy at recess
· When on duty - Be aware, walk around
· Students should not play gender vs. gender nor grade vs. grade.
· We will use the Incident Reports to track behavior issue with students at school.
· Recess Agreements that I would like us to use 1st – 5th grade - Safe, Kind, Fair, Fun
· SST referrals – Refer students who are having a particularly hard time to Student Support Team
Last year we began using the Incident Report tool as a way to log incidents that occurred at school so the Student Support Team can look at trends and interventions.
Use the form after you intervened in a situation that seemed more than a typical problem solving effort.
Student Support Team (SST)
Student Support Team will meet three times a week this year.
Mondays, 9-10am to discuss students who need our support
Thursdays 10:50-11:50 and 3:10-3:45 for teachers and specialists to meet with SST
Citizenship and Discipline
Please review the Citizenship and Discipline section of the Student Handbook before the opening of school so you are aware of our stated practices. There are seven sections to review.
Name Tags for Belltower Ceremony, Wed., Sept. 3rd
Don’t forget to collect nametags from the LS Faculty room. Each student should wear a nametag to the ceremony. Mo likes to greet each student by name.
New Student Files
New student files are kept in the LS Office and in Ari’s Office. I suggest you take the time to review the files this week to help you understand your new students.
Angela Hancock out Tuesday & Wednesday and maybe more
Her husband has surgery on Tuesday and Angela will be with him as he begins recovery.
Beginning School Early Dismissal, Sept. 3rd-Sept. 5th
For the second year all Beginning School students will be dismissed early at 12:30. Following dismissal teachers will meet with parents from 1:30-3:30 for a “Get-to-Know You Conference” (they will meet with parents on Tuesday, Sept. 2nd from 1:30-3:30 too).
Jenny will prepare a dismissal plan for each class and will deliver it some time around 12pm.
Here are the options:
•Student picked up by parent or caregiver at 12:30
•Student attends EC then goes home via the bus at 2:55
•Student attends EC and is picked up by parent or caregiver some time before 6pm
Custodial Crew
Bill and his crew finished removing discarded items Friday at noon.
They did their final cleaning of the building Saturday morning.
You will need do your own custodial work if you make messes after noon on Saturday.
PROGRAM
Open Classroom
Be ready to welcome new students at 8:50. We will try to send them out of Chapel and down to you a bit before returning students arrive to enter the classrooms.
8:30 – Specialists have display tables set up
8:50 - New students enter building
9:00 - 11:00 - Open Classroom
11:10- 11:30 - Faculty Meeting in LS Art Room
Specialist classes
- 2nd – 5th Specialists plan on starting classes on Wednesday afternoon
- All other specialists classes will meet beginning 9/8
- Specialists not teaching classes during the 1st week should check in with their classroom teachers during their regular teaching schedule to see if they can be of assistance
Classroom Website Updates
Be sure to update your classroom website by Wednesday, September 3, even if it as simple as posting your welcome letter.
LS Counselor Survey
Be sure to complete the Counselor survey. We will begin reviewing data Tuesday afternoon.
Volunteer Opportunities
I have heard from several teams about their efforts to reduce volunteer offerings to 200 per grade. See the email from me that contained the spreadsheets detailing last year’s volunteer offerings. Jane K-N is working on reducing Science volunteers to 100 per grade.
Building Conversations
· Thanks for participating in the conversation about the new building. We are working on scheduling time with THA to finalize some of the elements of the new design.
· Stefee introduced the sustainability conversation on Wednesday. We will be looking at ways our student can learn from, as well as in, the building.
· One of the significant sustainability questions we will be addressing in the next few weeks is the comfort range of the new building. The broader the comfort range we can work with the more sustainable the building can be. If you have a thermostat that measures the temperature of your room I would like to know what temperature range seems manageable.
Common Experiences Around Inquiry
· Our thanks to Carole, Tonya and Erin for sharing their expertise around classroom design that supports inquiry. We will revisit classroom design at our faculty meeting on Thursday, Sept. 25th.
· David and I will reconnect with Louise on Thursday, Sept. 4th. Our aim is to get our first round of Skype coaching (in November) on the calendar.
· Louise asked me to send her best wishes and love. Her youngest son is getting married this weekend. She sent the link to her blog entry about this big family event. Check it out. Cadwell Collaborative
· If you haven’t done so, please take time to read this recent New York Times article Louise recommended entitled Rethinking the Colorful Kindergarten Classroom and the link to the article mentioned entitled Consider the Walls . Another Classroom Design Resource from Edutopia: 8 Tips and Tricks to Redesign Your Classroom We’ll take time at an upcoming faculty meeting to discuss these articles and what it potentially could mean for classroom design that supports inquiry.
There were over 100 stipend days completed this summer by Lower School faculty. Follow the link to see what faculty worked on.
Back-to-School Picnic (BTSP)
As in the past, PAL will provide a dinner before the BTSP. We are doing something slightly different this year. This year we will enjoy the same barbeque-style meal served to families.
· Dinner will be available for you starting at 4:00 so you can eat before he picnic begins.
· The library will be open for you to enjoy your food before socializing at the picnic.
Faculty Meetings
Plan on being available each Monday from 3:15 - 4:30 and each Thursday from 7:40 - 8:40 for faculty meetings. See the LS Faculty Meeting Schedule for details.
Tuesday - 11:10 - 11:30
ICC Lower School Group
Has planned 4 experiences across the year to keep our exploration of Intercultural Competency current throughout the year.
OPERATIONS
Your Announcements
Send any announcements you have for faculty to Chris or me 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 to maximize our time to collaborate during meetings.
All School Earthquake Drill, Thursday, September 11th at 1:20
· By law, Rebecca Williams needs to schedule emergency drills the first week of school. We will have our first drill on Sept. 11th.
· We also need to have emergency bus safety drills before students go on field trips. We will discuss when to have our bus safety drill at our first Team Leader meeting Sept. 8th. Look for more details in an upcoming Weekly Memo.
Classroom teachers will eat lunch with their students the first eight days and will need a midday break. Specialists, we’d like your support covering lunch recess duties the first eight days of school. Please click the link below to sign up for a duty or two. Please take a look. There are a number of duties yet to be covered, particularly First-Third Grade lunch recess on the first day.
Uniforms
All upper wear worn inside must have OES logo and must be uniform wear.
Calendars Update
Be sure to update the OES Web Calendar and the LS Events Calendar with your grade level events by Tuesday, September 2.
Lyn would like you all to review the Budget Guidelines she posted in LS Important Docs. If you follow her guidelines, it will make her job managing the Lower School budget a lot more efficient.
Class schedules have been uploaded in the LS Important Docs. If changes need to be made to the class schedules you need to notify Lyn. She will be the one to make changes in the excel spreadsheet – this is with an understanding that you have already approved of the changes beforehand.
Chris continues to make minor changes to the Lower School duty schedule. (Click on the link above.) The most recent changes will come out on Tuesday. Let Chris know if you have questions or concerns. Please do not negotiate changes on your own.
