Friday, December 08, 2017

Dear Faculty,

Thank you for your honest and valuable input from Q12 Data meeting; those of you who provided helpful suggestions for areas that would benefit from extra clarity. The presentation can be found here.

We have collated all comments, and will be working through addressing some of these in either team meetings or with individuals, groups or departments as needed. A few relatively straightforward expectations, we have responded to here.

We also encourage you all to continue to help each other out as well as ask one of us if there is an expectation you would like to understand better or need greater clarity on. Remember, we are all in this together and it really does take a village.

There were also many positive comments from you - yay! Thank YOU!

• The team meetings we are having every day helps me to understand which roles I have and what is expected from me. Thank you.
• Working with the coaches is a great system to support our teaching. They do so much thinking for us.
• The weekly notes are very helpful.
• All positive here. Grade 4 Team rocks….now.
• We have a great team and we always help each other. So I really do not have much to contribute here. I am pretty much clear.
• We are teachers working with human beings in and out of class. We all need to be positive and happy in this space we share!
• The things I need clarity on are things I need to learn on my own. When I’m not clear, I ask my colleagues or Principal or lots of other people to help.
• I am very happy in my classroom with my teaching assistant. I know what is expected of me and what I need her to do. I think she is clear and comfortable with these expectations too.
• I hear the conversations that some teachers don’t want to plan with Coaches, but how can we move to inquiry without this? I love it! - and think you could make this clear for those who don’t understand.
• More time to work with the coaches please! It is so great having them available!
• Flexible Co-teachers have helped me focus on students who need help in specific areas. I think it is very important to be able to communicate freely with co-teachers.
• I love being in this school. There are so many support systems and I know exactly what is expected of me. Thank you.
• Thank you for finally getting serious about inquiry and planning for it.
• Thank you. Everything is very clear! I understand all that is expected of me!

ES Choir Performance tonight

Thank you to everyone who is coming to our first Community Carols singalong in the courtyard; huge thank you to Sarah, Finny, Vasanth and Fiona who worked tirelessly behind the scenes to work with our choir singers and prepare everything for this event. A lovely finish to our week.

Music classes - week of 18th - 21st Dec

No regular music classes; all teachers are involved in rehearsals, and so we will be suspending the regular music schedule. Your class will receive their music time through rehearsals and also the actual winter concert. If this affects your planning or meeting blocks, please work with your TA to keep the class going!

Thank yous… (don’t forget to let us know if there is someone you’d like to recognise…)

• From Megha - To Calley - for always being available and willing to have thoughtful data-based conversations, and support me with interventions for students with needs.
• From Scott - thank you to Ron for delivering an excellent lesson on personal emergencies
• Bindu, Linda, Nicole and Rachael for giving up part of your weekend for futures thinking as part of our futures summit last weekend
• Kay and Fer for providing Captain Thomas feedback after our emergency drill on Thursday
• To Hilary, Rachael and Alex who helped lead our Faculty meeting and gave greater clarity on our expectations.

Responsive Classroom Training - February 5 - 9 2018 - Alternate schedule

As you are aware we are hosting this PD here at AISC in February. Given that there will be 30 Elementary faculty participating in this training at the same time, we will be running an alternate schedule for these days, with teacher assistants covering as many classes as we are able. We will do our best!

Tutoring at AISC

As per the handbook, tutoring happening in our school grounds needs to be recommended by teachers, and should support a pedagogical/academic need. A reminder that teachers or TAs should not be tutoring the same children they teach.

Message from HRT

We will have a Head's Round Table meeting on Tuesday, December 12. If you have any topics that you would like us to discuss, please contact Carl, Fer or Morgen through email or talk to them directly. Thank you.

Warmly,

Keryn & Lori