Friday, January 25, 2019

Friday Focus - January 25th, 2019




This Thursday night will be our Student-Led conference night.  Each grade level should be prepared to have students discuss their learning goals/leadership notebook with their parents.  This will be the main focus of the evening.  The book fair and Panther Emporium will also be in the library.  Michelle Bell will be having an activity room for preschoolers as well.  Parents and students will sign-in at the front by houses - there is no need for them to sign in at your classroom.  We will also have pizza and drinks in the cafeteria.  Please make sure parents are aware of this event - we want to have good attendance.

Posters

 We are ordering poster ink and paper for the third time this year.  We want you to use our poster machine.  Just please be conscientious about what you choose to make into a poster - due to the high cost of the ink and paper.  If it is going to be used long-term - then that is great.  If it is only going to be used for a short-while and can't be saved for future years - this probably doesn't need to be made into a poster.  Our poster costs have been over $600 in the past couple of months.  

*Map testing continues next week
**Book Fair 
***School-wide job applications are being taken this week as well as applications for Show Your Voice

Next Week at a Glance...
Monday - Super Reader practice at 1:45
Tuesday - Super Reader ballgame - be there at 6:10 for super readers
Wednesday - 100th Day of School
Thursday - Family Learning Night at 4-6 pm

Have a great week!

Wednesday, January 16, 2019

Wow It's Wednesday - January 16, 2019

Louisville Bound - Good luck to our CCES Beta students and sponsors as they go compete this week!  


Bathroom Spruce Up project this weekend!  Judging will take place on Tuesday.  


Just a reminder about SLED day requirements - just in case we were to get one soon :)

1.  Teachers/instructional assistants must complete the book study from Teach Like a Pirate.  Here is a link to the slideshow that contains the discussion questions:  Teach Like a Pirate SlideshowThe answers to those questions need to be typed on a Google Doc and put in the folder on the team drive CCES - SLED Days 2018-19.
2.  Communicate with your parents on the SLED day.  Send out remind messages, put on facebook - we can't communicate too much.  Also - please make at least 5 personal positive contacts with parents.
3.  Remember these days count as work days for us - even though we don't have to report to school.  Some districts require their teachers to go in to school to get to count it as one of their days.  I want us to protect our opportunity to be able to count the SLED day as a work day for us.  Therefore, it is important that we not be out in the community, shopping, or posting things on social media (that are not school related) during regular school hours.
4.  Upon return collect all student work.  Students who have not completed the work will need to do so at school within a couple of days. Our goal is 100% participation!
5.  Print out and turn in hard copies of the SLED Day Collection sheets.  

Homecoming Week 2019
Spirit Days
Tuesday - Make Yourself at Home (pjs/comfy clothes)
Wednesday - Home Run (sports clothing)
Thursday - Homies Day (match with your friends)
Friday - There's No Place Like Home (House shirts) 

*CCHS basketball homecoming will be on Saturday at 3 pm.  Encourage students to come support CCHS.  

*CPA testing continues - MAP testing begins for select grades*
Next Week at a Glance...
Wednesday - Action Team meeting at 3 pm
Friday - House meeting on Friday morning - link is on Living Calendar
Book Fair begins on Friday!




Friday, January 11, 2019

Friday Focus - January 11th, 2019

I wanted to share with you some findings from our lock-down on Thursday.  First of all, I am so impressed with how quickly everyone springs into action and things become quiet.  Within seconds, someone would think that there are no children in the building.  I know you have practiced this with your students a great deal and it shows.  All doors were locked and students were not visible.  Again - good job.  

Areas that we are going to keep working to improve:
1.  Barricading our doors - some teachers did barricade their doors and we were impressed with that!  We will be coming around in the next few days to have discussions with each teacher about what would be best to use to barricade the door with and where it should be located in the room.  
2.  Ready to fight - again - some teachers had some type of object or a plan in mind of how they would fight the intruder once they entered the room.  Do you have a plan?
3.  Download Google Chat if you have not already done so on your phone.  
4.  If you do not have students in your room when a lock-down is called and it is safe to do so - please come down to office to assist.  


The staff leadership  team met on Wednesday and I wanted to give you a brief run-down of what we discussed.

1.  Family Learning Night will be on January 31st from 4-6.  The main focus of this night will be our student-led conferences in their homeroom.
     Michelle Bell will have a room for pre-k students.  
     Kindergarten classes are going to focus on AR for their           conferences. Parents will read a book with their child and       take an AR test here at school so they will be familiar with       the process.  
     First grade students are going to share with their parents       about Lexia, DreamBox and Reflex math progress. 
     Second thru fifth grade classes will be sharing their                 leadership  notebooks.  
The book fair will be in the library and Angela is going to have Panther Emporium set up as well.  
We may do a photo opp with a friendly dinosaur for students and families.
Pizza, drinks and cookies in the cafeteria.  

2.  January House meeting on the morning of 1/25.  It will be a regular breakfast house meeting and will be over by 8:30.  The focus this month is on ambition.  Google slides with the plan for the meeting will be posted to the Living Calendar.

3.  We decided not to do another One School One Book project this spring but make big plans for next fall.

4.  Action team meetings will be held on January 23rd at 3:00 pm in the library.

~It's CPA Time Again~

Many grades will be beginning the 2nd round of CPA testing next week.  Here are just a few reminders about CPA testing and the purpose of it.
1.  CPA's should only cover content and skills that the students have been taught.  No new material.
2.  Round 2 CPA's should spiral and go back to review some content from the first round.
3.  CPA's should be done under a testing situation.  Exceptional education students and 504 students should receive accommodations like they would on the KPREP.
4.  USE THE DATA from the CPA's - that is the only way to make it a good use of our time.

Remember to do your #observeme observation this month.  If there is a class you want to observe that is outside your planning time - let me know and we will cover for you.  It's all about your learning!


21st Century for the Spring Semester begins next week!

Next Week at a Glance...
Monday - 1:30 Jr Beta Showcase in the gym 
                 4:00 SBDM meeting
Tuesday - KONA Ice Day
Wednesday - Jr. Beta leaves for state meeting

Good luck to our Jr. Beta students!  Bring home the hardware!

Last reminder - Bathroom Spruce-Up project on the long five-day weekend.  Judging will be held on Tuesday morning!!!!




Friday, January 4, 2019

Friday Focus - January 4th, 2019th


Bathroom Spruce-Up Project

We are planning to update the look of our student bathrooms again the weekend of January 17th - 21st.  
1. You can find our teams here.  
2. You will have the five day weekend to complete your bathroom - all bathrooms must be finished by Tuesday morning, January 22nd.  3. Each team will have a $100 budget to spend.  You can spend this money at Browns, Dollar Store, Walmart or Amazon.  If you think of somewhere else that you would like to purchase from - let me know.  
4.  Purchase orders must be completed BEFORE you make the purchase.  
5.  If you are ordering from Amazon - those orders need to be submitted to Sonya by Tuesday (1/8) afternoon at 3:00.  Please check the shipping date so you know it will get here on time.
6.  You can stay with the same theme for the bathroom or completely redesign - it is up to your team.
7.  Bathrooms will be judged on Tuesday the 22nd.
8.  Winning team will receive lunch downtown and an afternoon off work!  
9.  This is a surprise for our kids - we want to reveal on the morning of the 22nd!

*No 21st Century this week.
**9 weeks Awards at assembly next week - make sure to check Living Calendar.
***Please bring a laptop, chromebook or ipad to PLC's next week to access MAP data.  

Next Week at a Glance...
Monday - 
Tuesday  - Sam's Club rep will be here to meet with teacher's on their planning
Wednesday  - CALEB FARLEE DAY  - parade on 1st floor immediately following morning assembly
-3:00 Leadership Team meeting
Thursday
Friday - MACEY POINDEXTER DAY - parade on 1st floor immediately following morning assembly 
-4th grade Math Live Scoring

Have a great week!

Sunday, December 30, 2018

Sunday Shoutout - December 30th, 2018

Panther Mystery
I hope everyone has enjoyed their Christmas break and is looking forward to the New Year!  We will start the New Year back at school with the Panther Mystery.  Here is just a little recap of what is going to happen - on Monday - we will share a video on Facebook of our Panther mascot being kidnapped and encouraging kids to hurry and get back to school on Wednesday to help us solve the Panther Mystery.  When you see the video on Facebook - please share it.  Then fast forward to Wednesday morning at assembly.  We will probably show the video again to those who may not have seen it but then reveal that the Panther has been returned but locked up in a cage.  The keys are hidden around the school and the students will have to work during the day to find them.  As the classroom teacher - you need to have a way for students to find their key(you hide it where you want) - you decide how that will be. (Your keys that you will need to hide will be placed in your mailbox on Monday.)   Then about 1:45 on Wednesday afternoon - we will have everyone come back to the gym with their keys and unleash the Panther!  Hopefully this will get kids excited about coming back to school!

Next Week at a Glance...
Wednesday - post 2nd nine weeks grades today
Thursday - Report cards go home
                    1:45 - Spring Panther Time planning meeting (for staff                      who teach Panther Time)
Friday - Lunch trip for students who met their attendance goal

Looking forward to the spring semester!


Friday, December 7, 2018

Friday Focus - December 7, 2018


STAR Scores - Round 3

Oct ScoresDec 2018 ScoresDec 2017 scores
Kindergarten79%81%88%
1st grade66%61%63%
2nd grade91%81%88%
3rd grade88%82%75%
4th grade61%56%64%
5th grade83%82%73%
Avg78%74%75%



Questions to Consider:
1.  What attributes to the success that your grade level is having regarding these STAR scores?
2.  What areas of weakness or concern do you have regarding the reading level of students?
3.  In 5/6 grade levels, the percentages went down slightly from the October testing.  We know that part of this can be because it is a moving target.  Our goal for our students keeps increasing.  What can we do to ensure that our students stay up with that moving target?
4.  Is the data we are collecting for STAR scores consistent with other sources of data like MAP, CPA, Core, etc?
5.  We are at the half-way point of our school year.  What needs to change to improve instruction and learning for the remainder of the year?

We will discuss the scores and questions next week at PLC's.  Please bring a device or hard copy of your STAR scores next week.  Also - please put your STAR scores into your data tracker as soon as  you can.  

Hours for next week:

Monday 8-2Classes will come during special class
Tuesday 7-12Open hours
Wednesday12-3Open hours
Thursday8-2Classes will come during special class

All items are $2.  Please send remind to parents about the store!


We will have a Christmas Potluck on Thursday during lunch time.  The school will be providing baked ham.  Staff can sign-up to bring side dishes and desserts.  I will put a sign-up in Ms. Sonya's office.  

*Please make sure you have your Teach Like a Pirate book for SLED days.  Also remind students of their SLED packets and how that works.  

*Core and SNAP needs to be done before we leave for Christmas break and data entered into data tracker.  

Micah will be pulling students next week to test for the Sonday system and will try to work around homeroom schedules.  

Next Week at a Glance...
Monday - Vocabulary Party
Tuesday - Hat Day $1
                 -WIG celebration - cookies will be ready to pick up in                        the cafeteria.  Give those who met their goal a cookie                        and some extra free time.  
                - Kona Ice  - Schedule Change****
                             12:00 - 2nd grade
                             12:20 - kindergarten
                             12:40 - 1st grade
                               1:00 - 3rd grade
                               1:30 - 4th grade 
                               2:00 - 5th grade
                               2:30 - Little Panthers
       *Kona Ice will be in cafeteria
Wednesday - AR Movie reward at LWM - please have students                            clean up before they leave
Thursday - House Meeting
                              BAFA performance at 5 pm in the gym
Friday - 3rd grade Grinch performance at 10 - all invited
             -1:00 5th grade International Buffet
             -1:00 Kindergarten program for parents
             -3:00 Deck the Halls in the gym

Five more days - make them great!




Sunday, December 2, 2018

Sunday Shout Out - December 2, 2018

Sunday Shout Out it is when the Friday Focus doesn't get done on Friday!   

Ten days to go and our year will be half over!  It will be a busy couple of weeks but a lot of fun for our kids.  Hang in there!

I just want to say how proud I am of our students and all of you all.  I am amazed at all the accomplishments they are making.  We have students becoming Super Readers, blowing vocabulary out of the water, zooming through Lexia and Math Whizz and the list goes on.  Our students only do this because you all have high expectations for them and continue to push them daily to set goals for themselves.  Keep up the good work.  

STAR testing this week.  Remember to have conversations with the students about their goal to be on grade level or make .6 year's growth since their August score.  We will have celebrations next week for those meeting their goal - free time and chocolate chip cookies!

Lower grades are also completing the second round of Core and SNAP testing.  This testing is time consuming but gives us valuable information about how students are progressing.  

Also - if you do not do your peer observation for November - remember to do it sometime during the next couple of weeks.  Only one required for both November and December.

Next Week at a Glance
Monday
Tuesday - 5th grade Nursing Home trip at 1
Kitty Carter - insurance rep will be here in the afternoon
Ketones Mixer in Lisa's office at 3
Wednesday
Thursday - Fire Drill 
Ron Clark Academy visit for Mandy, Paige, Kayla and Sarah
Friday - Deadline for 100 Vocabulary points
4th grade Nursing Home trip at 1
RCA trip
Jr. Beta Christmas Dance

Have a great week!




  MONDAY Tomorrow the Panther Store will be open in the library from 8-2:30. We are not going to make a schedule - just come as you have tim...