Friday, March 24, 2017

Welcome back to the final leg of this amazing journey of 2016-17! We have a lot going on, so take care of each other, assume positive intentions and drink plenty of water. Remember gratitude cards are available in the ES Office; have you sent one this week?  

This week we also welcome back Kristina and farewell Beverly. Monicka will be stepping in to replace Beverly for the remainder of this year and Rachel David (a new substitute) will be working as a TA with Babs, Kelly & Megha.

Thank yous….

• Anna for leading us in writing on Monday, and Karen on Wednesday
• Lauren for innovating the gratitude cards concepts
• Babs, Lorna, Tiffany, Jana, Hilary and Rachael for heavy lifting with Dan on the C3 Standards
• Hilary and Rachael for the brainstorming concepts session
• Lauren for covering Kristina with excellent Grade 1 homeroom instruction whilst she was out
• John for covering Lauren with G4 EAL instruction while she was covering Kristina
• Monicka, Babs, Kelly, Megha and Jana for their flexibility and patience with TA cover
• Jet and the TAs from preschool through first grade for beginning the next phase of our barcoding project
• Grade 3, 4 and 5 teaches for hosting visiting teachers from Rajapalayam; they were blown away by the teaching they observed!

(**As per the Q12 Data Survey, a reminder that these recognitions can come from anyone - if you have a team member or colleague you feel deserves a shout out, please let Lori or I know by Friday morning!)

Elementary Staff Group Photo

We will have a group photo taken on 28th March, Tuesday morning at 7:50 a.m. Please gather in the soccer field (ES side) - come early, you don’t want to miss this!

Christy Curran is in the Building!
Great lab site sessions today with more next week.  

For Returning HR and EAL teachers: Christy will be running one overall specific workshop PD - Monday 27th, from 3:45 - 5:00.

Please make yourselves available for this time, as we would ideally love all returning ES teachers to attend and receive the same PD as we try to move further towards implementing workshop with fidelity.

Leaving teachers also welcome.

Faculty Meeting

Christy Curran leading ‘Building a Culture of Writing’ in the FAC Cafeteria; don’t forget your writing notebooks!

Thanks, in advance, to everyone for being flexible with the scheduling of these lab sites, and to TAs, Nicole, Ilona, Ron and John for covering classrooms while teachers attend Christy’s sessions.

Sherriden Masters

A reminder that Sherriden will also be with us this week.

Upcoming Testing Events

Please keep April’s testing events on your radar:

WrAP for grades 3-5 will happen the week of April 3-7. The tests will take two writing periods to complete, and can be scheduled at the teacher’s discretion. Specific information about test administration will come from Lori next week via email and/or team meetings.

MAP for grades 2-5 will occur from April 10-20 (with the majority of testing happening between April 10-13 and 17-18). The schedule will be linked to next Friday’s announcements; as with previous testing sessions, teachers will have some discretion to move testing blocks as long as we can arrange IT support to help troubleshoot any issues. Expect to hear from Priya soon, as she prepares devices for testing.

WIDA testing has a staggered administration throughout April. Click here to see the specifics of testing dates and locations.

Have a restful weekend!

Keryn & Lori