The Dodgeland Download (DES): January 24, 2020

Hear Ye, Hear Ye

An "escape room" math activity using Google forms provided a hands-on problem solving math task for groups of students to apply the math learning targets taught that day.
First graders working on their PLTW unit drawing a picture to describe the problem they are investigating.
4K students successfully making "The Serious Goose" smile in their story during library. (This is a new book in the IMC. Check it out! It's a great book!)
Jr Coaches describing for me the problem solving wheel and how it helps them and other students during recess. It is so awesome to listen to the language that they are using and their opinions of how it helps younger students at recess.

Would there be anyone interested and available to help out in the lunchroom on Monday and Tuesday (1/27 & 1/28)?

2nd Quarter Pride Assembly at 2:30 (Have students packed up before the assembly please.)
Last day of the Soup-er Bowl
Make sure to complete the Employee Engagement Survey before today. (Link is below)

Last call for interested summer school staff... I will be working on this over the weekend and don't want anyone to miss out on the opportunity to join us this summer! It is a wonderful way to try new activities and provide students with a safe learning environment.

This week the director of the After school program from the Y shared that they have 2 full-time openings for after school. Please let me know if you know of any families that need after school care.

Also, they have openings for employment to work right here at Dodgeland in the after school program through the Y. Click here and here for more information regarding this opportunity.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for all of the staff members that have submitted sheets for me to feature you this spring in our FaceBook feature. If you have pictures you'd like me to use, please email them to me. I plan to start sharing them on Friday, Feb 7.

There is one last week for students to earn tickets for the Attendance Raffle for the month of January. I will have a short video to give one final push for students to be present all week. The attendance committee will be making a video where we draw names there. Prizes will be handed out on Friday, Feb 7 at 2:30pm.
February's Attendance Challenge will be a classroom challenge using the words Valentine's. When your class fills in all 10 letters, please provide a class selected reward and post the class chart near the attendance chart in the hallway near the mailroom door.

The Foundation is collaborating with us bring the TalkReadPlay initiative into our playgroups here at Dodgeland. The initiative has a wealth of resources for parents of children from birth through age 5. The goal of the initiative is to bring awareness of brain and language development and provide ways to enhance everyday routines by stretching the routine by adding in language and learning activities. This includes asking questions like, "How many _____ do you see?" "What do you see that is red?" etc. This includes a free app for ideas to use with young children as well as other resources for parents. When young children have opportunities to build brain synapses early in their life, they enter school ready to successfully take on the academics and social situations at school. Please see any of the 4K teachers for more information or click here for the website.

Please take a few minutes to complete the Employee Engagement survey that Dr. Thompson sent out this week before Friday, Jan 31. We value feedback so that we can continue to grow and make our school and district even stronger. Dodgeland School District Employee Engagement Survey.
In addition to employees, we also would like to get feedback from our students. Please plan a time for students to take this survey before Friday, January 31. I will send out a QR code and link for students to take this survey. The survey is similar to the one that students took last year. Please let me know if you have any questions.

A couple of weeks ago we learned how the teaching points are written and ways to help make our mini-lessons, mini. Each teaching point has a goal and a strategy written into it. Each lesson has a connection, teaching point with demo, active engagement, and link. Sometimes the q/a section of a class gets away from us during the lesson. Everyone wants a chance to answer, and before we now it, our mini-lesson has gone twice as long as we planned. This article was shared with me from Mrs. Andrea Schulte. It made me think about how often this happened to me when I taught Read 180. Hopefully you will find this article thought provoking and helpful for your practice as well.

A joke that can be shared with our students. It just makes me laugh. :-)