NoRedInk Webinars
This month only, NoRedInk experts will be offering three separate 15-minute webinars to help teachers learn how to integrate our writing features into one or more of their lesson plans. For those of you who will be utilizing this platform (junior and senior instructors), it would be good to sign-up for one of these webinars. If you need coverage, let me know and I will arrange it. The webinars are on 3/26, 3/27 and 3/28.
sign up here
https://register.gotowebinar.com/rt/469837191247348428
Here is a pre-recorded webinar that encompasses our Writing offering as a whole: Strong Writers Make Strong Choices.
For a little more detail around specific Writing features, please see the following:
- Quick Writes
- Peer Review
- Guided Drafts
Department and PLC Meetings
- The Next Department Meeting is scheduled for March 26th
- Next PLC Meetings are scheduled for March 28th
Mandatory PARCC Training
Training will be provided at the April 9th faculty meeting.
If you miss that meeting there will still be 4 other opportunities.
- April 10th - period 9 or 3:15pm in the auditorium.
- April 11th - period 9 or 3:15pm in the auditorium.
Please review the following link from Mr. Laor for testing schedules, protocols, etc...
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1nLr95BOGSJWhBd-7v5RK-Tvcx-0Hjxt8UGtLnrCnCV8/edit?usp=sharing
Please review the 3rd slide in the following link that details the common infractions recorded during the last testing cycles...
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1QnNW3sk7Y6SxNKYVs_hZqBay7UD0D0zAzHAmPPyyAcc/edit?usp=sharing
3rd Trimester
As we move into trimester 3, please review your grades. If you have a student that could be in danger of failing for the year, please request a meeting with parents/guardians and guidance. If a student has ended up in this position, a parent/guardian should have been contacted in some way over the past 2 trimesters. If you have never contacted the parent, then we would need to discuss that before asking guidance to arrange a meeting.
If students are in danger of failing for the trimester, contact with a parent/guardian should be made by mid-trimester. It is not helpful to alert the parent/guardian that the student is in danger of failing in the last 2 weeks of the trimester.
If you have high-stakes grades (tests, projects) that will make or break a student's ability to pass the trimester, make those assignments due well before the end of the Trimester. This way, we can avoid the problem of the student failing "last minute."
Suggestion: It is best not to assign a project right before Spring Break. It is better to assign one a week or two before and make it due before the break.
Home Instruction Reminder...
As per another memo from Dr. Parent, we are still having some issues with the procedures for how to address students on home instruction:
When a student is placed on Home Instruction, Ms. Hannigan (our Home
Instruction Coordinator) sends out the following information to all affected teachers:
“While on Home Instruction, student's grade must be changed to INCOMPLETE. Teachers must manually enter incompletes in their grade book. When a student returns to school, the classroom teacher will update grades based on assignments completed.”
The Grade Level Advisory Teams have been monitoring the students who are currently on Home Instruction. It is evident that not all teachers are abiding by this and need to enter "INCOMPLETE" as a grade. The issuing of an INCOMPLETE is important – students who are on home instruction are not able to fulfill all proficiencies in their courses. Simply completing homework assignments or projects from home is no parallel to time in class, missed discussions, missed lecture, missed feedback, and is not an ample measurement for demonstrating understanding. Also, holding students to a grade of INCOMPLETE until after the student returns to school acts as a motivator for some students to return sooner rather than later. Upon a student’s return to school, each teacher can accurately assess the student’s academic or CTE performance in due time. The rush to issue an accurate grade is non-existent – a reasonable amount of time is approximately within two weeks of a student’s return to school.
Student Scheduling Timetable Reminder
Here is the schedule for when students will choose their classes for next year... Current Freshmen will be able to choose their Sophomore ELA class, however, their choice is not guaranteed because there will be another sweep to filter them into Concepts level and BSI based on criteria provided by our Freshmen instructors, APEX, and ELA 9 PARCC scores.
March 25-29
|
Seniors
|
April 1 – 5
|
Juniors
|
April 8 - 12
|
Sophomores
|
April 15 - 22
|
Spring Break – Course portal will remain open
|
April 22 - May 3
|
Final Student Revisions before portal closes
|
May 6 - 10
|
No more student requests. Admin revisions only.
|
Document Logs
Just a reminder to keep on top of your doc logs and SGO spreadsheets...
Only enter 3-4 Artifacts per strand. These should be things that ARE NOT observable in your observations (this way you cover a range of bases). They should also be "high quality" artifacts. The STRONGE evaluation rubric does not rate teachers as "highly effective" by the number of artifacts entered. In the same way, entering artifacts that cover every performance indicator in a strand also does not denote "highly effective" on the rubric. Choose fewer artifacts but ones that pack a "big punch." At the beginning of the year, Dr. Parent expressed to the newly appointed staff members that we are all striving for an effective rating. Highly effective is "unusual" and "not the norm."
In your doc logs, we will proceed with the same format as last year when entering artifacts into the strands. Write a basic/generic statement about the artifacts you are including in the strand... For example, "The artifacts in this standard reflect..." Then give a specific description of the actual artifact when you enter it. These can be written in brevity.
