January 24, 2025

 Hear Ye, Hear Ye

• What a weird week, huh? But, you all picked right up and didn't miss a beat this week.  Thank you for teaching with urgency and making good use of every minute we get to have with our students!

• Shout out to the 5th and 3rd grade teams that collaborated this week in the mid year data meetings. I enjoy listening to the celebrations of student growth and making plans for our students as well.

What's Happening at Dodgeland?

• Sunday, January 26
• Happy Birthday Stephanie Schuett!
• Happy Birthday Tina Ellefson!

• Monday, January 27
• Bus Duty: Schweitzer, Mosher, O'Toole, Ellefson (3K/4K playground)
• Lunch Supervisors:
• 12:00 - Stampfl
• 12:30 - Huso
• 1:00 - Fortmann
• Jenny in a meeting from 8:30-10
• 4K AimsWeb testing continues (8:30-11:30am)
• Mentor/Mentee Meeting @ 3:15pm in the IMC (bring a device with you)
• School Board Meeting 6:30pm

• Tuesday, January 28
• Social Media Posts Due to Jessica: Klink, Fortmann, Jenkins, O'Toole
• Lunch Detention Supervisors:
• 12:00 - Braunschweig
• 12:30- Open
• 1:00 - Open
• Jenny in meeting from 8:15-9:15am
• 2nd/3rd grade AimsWeb Oral Reading Fluency begins at 8am
• 4th Grade Data meeting 12:35-1:25pm

• Wednesday, January 29
• Workout Wednesday
• Semester 1 grades due by 8am
• 2nd Grade Data meeting 12:05-12:55pm

• Thursday, January 30
• Lunch Detention:  All lunches are open

• Friday, January 31
• SAEBRS assessment due for mid-year (including mySAEBRS)
• Report cards are sent out electronically
• Summer School Course proposals due (Here is the link)
• 4K Grade Level data meeting 11:35-12:25pm

Nitty-Gritty

• Assembly Date Change
• Our assembly for next month needs to change the date.  Please update your calendars:  The assembly will now be on THURSDAY, FEB 13 at 2pm.  The family night will be the same day at 6pm.  Sorry for the confusion but the performer had a family commitment necessitating a date change.

• Grading for Students who Access Sp. Education
• Jen sent this guidance out in email this week.  As you work on your grades, please keep this in mind.

• If a student receives accommodations, they should be graded on the same scale as their peers. Accommodations may include tools such as a multiplication chart, manipulatives, shortened assignments, speech-to-text technology, etc. Please be sure to include celebrations and note the growth that has occurred in the classroom, as well as progress on IEP goals and through progress reports.

• For students receiving modifications to standards (typically involving a replacement curriculum), their grades will include an asterisk (*) and will be assessed on the proficiency scale using the modified work. However, it cannot be noted anywhere on the report card that the child is accessing special education. It should be noted in the child’s IEP that they are accessing modified standards 

  If you have any questions, please reach out to Jen! 

• Google Classroom How To
• Amanda Beaudo shared a document with directions on how to reuse an assignment and materials in a post within Google Classroom.  As we continue to learn to use Google Classroom for organization and distributing materials/lessons for students, learning from our colleagues will help us to be efficient, etc.  Click HERE to read the document/directions.

• Gallup Survey Brainstorm List
• At the staff meeting this week, I asked you to write down ideas for things to keep doing and things to consider changing.  Click HERE to read the list that was generated.  When we meet next month, we will dive into them in more depth and work together to determine action steps for the second half of the year.  Please read through them before then. If you want to talk about anything on the list, please don't hesitate to reach out to me.  I'm always open to a dialogue on how to make things even better!

• Summer School Anyone??
• It is a total of 19 days (half days that is) and is a really great way to enjoy our students, help them limit the effect of summer slide, and teach some new projects/activities.  If you are still on the fence, let me know and we can talk about options.  I'll be working on the list of courses for this summer soon.  Either email me or fill out this Google Survey. You will not regret it!  :-)

TechKnow Tip

Have you looked at Sora lately?! Not only are there amazing digital and audiobooks, there are also magazines to fit every reader in your room! There are magazines for our early learners like DOT, Bluey, Pokemon, and Lego, middle grade readers such as Fortnite, National Geographic Kids, and Time for Kids, and high school readers such as Car & Driver, Food Network, and Paint & Draw. Each magazine can be checked out by your WHOLE class or a small group of students to be read together. Once you find a magazine you like, you can even go to back issues from other years and keep reading! Magazines are a great way to expose students to different types of reading, give them agency, and give them a chance to get excited about what they’re reading! An added bonus: as adult readers, you have access to over 280 magazines including Popular Science, National Geographic, Better Homes and Gardens, Magnolia, and Outdoor Life. There is literally a magazine for everything!

PD Spotlight

Friday Funny

I find this so odd!  I can still remember my grandmother's landline number from 40 years ago.  And, I haven't used that number in more than 20 years besides.  Yet, I just had to ask for a password to get in to our streaming service just yesterday and have had it for a year in our home.  Sigh.