February 28, 2020

Hear Ye, Hear Ye

• The Read Across America's planning and kick-off assembly this week was so great!  A shout-out to all the members of the committee! --Sue, RaChelle, Brenda, Elizabeth, Mitch & Mandy--
• 5th graders are adding text features to enhance their informational pieces on the Iditarod.  Not only do they include them, they are explaining how the feature teaches more information and improves their writing piece.
• Vocabulary Parade - Need I say more!  So many adorable vocabulary outfits.  This was my first experience with this and I loved it!
• Many of us have stepped in again this week to help with students that need us, fellow staff members that need help covering in different places, and even just providing a calm and friendly ear to someone that needs to talk.  Thank you for taking care of each other and even me!

What's Happening at Dodgeland?

• Monday, March 2
• Hat Day/ Dr. Seuss' Birthday
• EP training - Documentation Log (optional) @ 3:15 in the IMC
• Band-o-rama for 5th-12th grade @ 7pm
• Tuesday, March 3
• LUNCH TIME CHANGE for grades 5K-5th - 11:30-12:30
• ACT test day at the High School - HS TA's will probably not be present in your rooms
• Dodgeland Referendum Open House @ Clyman Town Hall from 6-7pm
• Wednesday, March 4
• Step Up to Your Bright Future Day (wear neon/bright colors)
• Jenny has a GWCF meeting in Watertown from 9-11
• Grade Level Data meeting for Grade 1 @ 12:05
• Thursday, March 5
• Students of the Month announced @ 8:10am
• Submit the Bridges survey
• Friday, March 6
• Talkread Playgroup @ 9am in room 115
• Consumable packets due to Marie

Nitty-Gritty

• New Face:
• Please welcome Ms. Amara Hartmann.  She will be working with Shanalyn V. for the next month or so as a substitute.  She may look familiar to some of you.  She is also the after school Y-Care teacher as well.

• Students of the Month
• It's time to announce student of the month!  Please click here to fill in your nominee for this month.

• Bridges Math Input
• I am looking for your input on thoughts from your exploration of the Bridges preview and the scope/sequence.  Please complete the quick survey before March 5.

• March 3 Lunch time
• Due to the statewide ACT testing on Tuesday (that lasts until 12:30), our lunch times will change to 11:30 for K-2 and 12:00 for 3-5.  If you have a special at 11:30, please see Sue, Elizabeth or Justin to make sure that it still works for 12:30 that day instead.

• Target Based Grading Update
• The last two Thursdays have been so helpful and informative.  I can't wait to share all of my new learning.  However, I do have to say that the biggest thing I have learned is that we are on the right track!  There were many times in those two days where Mrs. Johnson and I looked at each other and said, "We are doing that."  That felt good.  I also have some answers for some of the questions you left for me last week.  Our next PD day is on March 16.

• FaceBook Faculty Feature
• I have lots of faculty features to use for the upcoming weeks.  If you have not sent me 3 pictures to use for the post, please do so.  Or I can come to take pictures of you in your classroom, just let me know!

PD Spotlight

On Wednesday, I referenced this article during the staff meeting.  Click here to read (or listen to) the entire article.  After spending a couple of weeks focusing on kindness in our school through the random acts of kindness week or the Read Across America week, I find this article to make me think.  I like to think that I am kind, but when I read this I thought, "What are my 'rules' and does this affect my actions/words and my quest to treat others kindly and with respect?"  She says that when you understand others' perspectives, the behaviors become far less frustrating.  At the end of the article, she talks about how to deal with these types of "secret rules."  I don't know if I can do all of these things, but I do know that I want to follow the path of "Judge Good" that Greg Wolcott and Ted Neitzke described.  I feel that these two ideas complement one another immensely.  Telling myself a new story about others' behavior allows me to be more at peace and calm.  However, with that being said, in the workplace, I do want feedback from our team.  It is important to me that I keep growing as a person as well as a professional.  Thank you in advance for your feedback!

Friday Funny

This week's Friday Funny feels like me this week.  I still remember my own name as of the posting of this week's blog!

February 21, 2020

Hear Ye, Hear Ye

• The collaboration on Monday was energizing and productive. I heard many in-depth conversations that ended with consensus as well as clear success criteria rubrics.  Great Work!
• Students were so excited to receive tickets for showing kindness at recess this week. They seemed so proud of themselves when they were recognized for their kind actions.
• Students were engaged and followed assembly expectations at this week's assembly.  It was music to my ears to hear their laughs and giggles!

What's Happening at Dodgeland?

• Monday, Feb. 24
• Read Across America Week Starts with Assembly at 11:30 in the elem. gym
• School Board meeting at 6:30pm
• Tuesday, Feb 25
• Wear Red Day - Clifford the Big Red Dog Day
• Wednesday, Feb 26
• Vocabulary Parade at 8:15am
• Grade Level Data meeting for Grade 2 @ 12:05
• Elem. Staff meeting @ 3:10 in the IMC
• Thursday, Feb 27
• Author Visit, Stef Wade
• 8:30-9:15 for 4K-2nd grade, and 10:15-11:00 for grades 3-5
• Kindness Day - Do a Kind Act - Piggie & Elephant Day
• Jenny is gone for the day
• Read Across America Family night 6-7pm
• Friday, Feb 28
• Pajama Day - Good Night Moon Day

Nitty-Gritty

• PD Day Follow-Up
• Our last full PD day is on March 16th.  Before the day, please complete success criteria for 3 of the domains for ELA.  Art, Music and PE - Complete success criteria for 1 of your grades.
• Next steps for our Target-based grading planning is:
• Finalize our report card format (I'll take your information from Monday's grade level discussions to bring a second draft to analyze.)
• Brainstorm and create success criteria for the Citizenship grading rubric
• Finish the rest of the domains for ELA.

• Reminder:
• Please look over the scope and sequence documents and sign up to preview the Bridges Math from the email that was sent on Monday.  On March 2, I will be sending a survey to get your input and opinions. If you have any trouble getting on the site, please let me know.

• Assembly Follow-up
• In case you are interested, there are some follow-up activities to our energy conservation assembly from Tuesday.  Click here to see activities that you can use in your classrooms.

PD Spotlight

This week was Random Acts of Kindness and next week we start Read Across America with a theme of Kindness and Empathy.  There is a lot of research that has been reported regarding the benefits of kindness.  What I find interesting is that the kindness does not have to be given or received in order to benefit a person.  In fact, observing others being kind to others has noticeable benefits to the observers as well.  I watched this Ted Talk called "Kindness is the Cure."  The whole video is about 16-17 min. long and I realize you may not have time to watch the whole thing in one sitting.  However, I would encourage you to check it out.  So as we emphasize kindness and encourage our students to create habits of acting kind, it is also important that they are observing kindness as well. The past week (and this upcoming week), we have been (or will be) focusing our attention on kind acts.  Just as Cindy Grimes states, "Energy flows where our attention goes and it grows in your conscious awareness, whether it is objectively true or not."  I challenge us as a team of educators that are working hard to help our students develop strong SEL skills and habits of kindness, to pay attention to the kindness we see around us every day and allow our students and colleagues to benefit from observing kind acts that we participate in too. 

Friday Funny

February 14, 2020

Hear Ye, Hear Ye

• I'd really like to hope that all of us (staff and students) are going to be healthy and feeling better by Monday.  However, thank you to everyone for being flexible and picking up extra tasks to fill in for sick staff members.  I love being part of your team!
• Teachers are posting the teaching point for students before beginning the mini-lesson.  Some have even underlined or highlighted the parts of the teaching points to help students see the goal and the strategy.
• Teachers sharing difficult news with parents in a compassionate and caring manner.  Parents and teachers that work together to problem solve and have open communication will benefit our students and their progress.  

What's Happening at Dodgeland?

• Monday, February 17
• PD day - Click here for the agenda
• Tuesday, February 18
• All school assembly at 2:15pm in the Elementary Gym
• Read Across America Committee meeting at 3:05pm
• Wednesday, February 19
• Work Out Wednesday
• 3rd Grade Data Meeting 12:00 in D.O.
• Newsletter articles due to Marie
• Thursday, February 20
• Jenny will be out for the day.
• Friday, February 21
• New EC/4K Playgroup using TalkReadPlay with expanded age limits (ages 1-5)
• If you have any families with younger children, please encourage them to attend the playgroup from 9-10am.
• Kids Heart Challenge Packets due today.
• Donate $1 to wear a hat for the Kids Heart Challenge.

Nitty-Gritty

• Read Across America
• Read Across America begins the week of February 24.  The theme of the week is Kindness and Empathy.  Watch for more information from the committee this week.

• Summer School Update
• Summer School courses are being finalized within the week.  Registration will be online again this year starting on March 23 at 4pm.  Students that attend summer school, not only have the opportunity to continue their learning in reading, writing and math, but they also have access to a safe, caring environment to see peers that provides a healthy breakfast for all, and lunches can be ordered for students to take home as well.  Please encourage families to have their children participate. There will be lots of options for students, including some brand new options this year too.

PD Spotlight

For the past couple of weeks, I have been reading this book.   I wanted to learn and to understand and be part of the solution.  I haven't gotten through every chapter yet, but I felt like others may be interested in his work as well.  One of the strongest pieces that he states is, "Kids do well if they can" and "Doing well is preferable to not doing well."  This made me think.  How can I be part of a solution that helps kids do well.  And I also wanted to read and reflect on whether any of my habits or responses are contributing to behavior issues at school.  Click here to read a one page FAQ page about Dr. Greene's approach, called the CPS model. (Collaborative & Proactive Solutions)

Friday Funny

This week's Friday Funny comes from the file of "Things that only happen to Jenny."  Some of you may have heard I got myself into a predicament yesterday morning before school.  I started to back out of my garage and all of a sudden, I notice the lawn mower coming with me.  Ella and I tried a few different ways to get the car unstuck from the mower, but with no luck.  Finally, we had to get Mason up.  I am certain he has not seen 7:15 am in more than a year!  Notice the look on his face below! He was very frustrated with his mom!

Eventually, we had to jack the car up to free the mower from the front of the car.  So while the normal thing would be to be stuck in the SNOW we just had, not me.  I am stuck on a LAWN MOWER!

February 7, 2020

Hear Ye, Hear Ye

• 1st graders responding to the statement, "I didn't fail, I found 1000 ways that don't work."  The insight these students had in was incredible.  They were thinking very deeply and discussing SEL skills at the same time!
• MANY staff members filling in to allow the math committee to go to a school to observe a math program at their elementary school.  This was only possible because we are a team!
• Staff members communicating with parents frequently to help students to be successful at school.  When we have open communication between home and school, our students really benefit.
• Staff members vigilant at recess, before/after school, and in the hallways to address unkind and inappropriate words and actions.  It is not okay when students feel picked on and uncomfortable at school.  Thank you for everyone's help with this.
• Students are so proud of their work in PLTW!  In so many grades, students are building, creating, engaged and learning.  It is so exciting to witness.  Great job everyone!

What's Happening at Dodgeland?

• Friday, February 7
• Students of the Month announced (I missed it earlier this week.)
• At 2:30, please send the attendance raffle winners to the office to get their prizes. The videos are here.
• Monday, February10
• Wear Milwaukee Bucks Attire
• Tuesday, February 11
• Wednesday, February 12
• Donate $1 to bring a tech device to use at lunch recess.
• 4th grade Data meeting at lunch in the D.O. conference room
• Thursday, February 13
• Parent/Teacher Conferences - 4:00-7:30pm
• EC/4K Art Show - 4:30-6:00pm
• Jenny will provide some appetizers that night for everyone.  
• Friday, February 14
• Valentine's Day
• Donate $1 to wear PJ's to school

Nitty-Gritty

• Reminder:  
• If you or your class has not completed the National School Counseling Week Trivia, please do so before the end of the day.  The link is here. 

• Safety Updates:
• The Safety planning team met last week and there are a few updates/reminders to share.
• Please make sure that your Go Kits, class lists, binder, sub plans are all update with the most up-to-date information.
• Specials teachers, please make sure to go over safety procedures for your class.  Some students get confused when a drill occurs outside of their homeroom classroom.
• Please remember to wear your District ID badge every day.  If you do not have one, please see Kimi in the district office.
• Likewise, if you see visitors in the hallway during school hours, they should have a pass/sticker on.  If they don't, please ask if they need help or if you can assist them getting to a location.
• *NEW*  Finally, during emergency drill events, students need to be quiet.  If they are in the habit of staying quiet with no talking during drills, they will be ready to hear directions in the case of a real emergency.  At our next drill, please help to enforce this as it is new to us all.

• PD day is Monday, Feb 17
• Just a friendly reminder that we will be moving to the next step for the Target Based Grading system.  Below is the list from last month that needs to be completed before then.
• A completed learning framework with domains, priority standards, and learning targets for each domain.
• Reread chapter 2 (pgs. 13-29) to prepare for our work
• Review the report card draft and the citizenship examples that were handed out last month

• Parent Teacher Conferences
• If you would like me to attend a conference for one of your students, please let me know soon.  As a thank you, I will have some appetizers in the staff room after school for all staff members. 

• FaceBook Updates
• You may have noticed that all of the Dodgeland pages have been merged to one district page so that our families can find all of our information in one spot.  If you have a classroom page, please let me know so that I can follow it too.  I may share some posts to the district page so that even more people can see what awesome things our students/classrooms are doing.  The Staff Feature has started and will be out every Friday. (If you have pictures to share, please email them to me.)  
• Another weekly feature we are starting is a student spotlight feature.  If you have an idea for a student to highlight/nominate, please see me!  The first student was a former student from DES.

PD Spotlight

If your days are like mine, it seems like the to-do list gets longer and the finished tasks never seems to move.  However, sometimes I feel like I am in the middle of something and can't remember what I was about to do, or type or look up, etc.  I came across this 1-min video explaining something called a micro-break.  I am going to see if this will help me maintain focus and feel more accomplished.  Let me know if you try it too.  I would love to know how it works for you. 

Friday Funny

I think this is funny.  It might show my age a bit though.  This symbol was on a lot of stuff when I was growing up on our family farm.  I learned early to stay away from this "emoji."  :-)