November 9th, 2015

High Point News

Week of: November 9th, 2015

********NEWS*********************

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Newest High Point Hound

Congratulations to Braley Hester, our ESOL parapro, who had her baby last Monday!!!
Eleanor Mae Hester weighed 6 lbs 8 oz and was 19 inches long. 
We wish Braley and her husband well as they welcome Eleanor home! 

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Retirement

It is with great sadness that we announce that Kim Lunsford will be retiring at the end of this month. Kim has been at High Point for over 30 years and is loved by many staff and many more children!!! We are so thankful for her dedication, humor, love, and support for our school! We are extremely sad to see her go but happy for her upcoming retirement days!! 

We are working diligently to find a replacement for her in order to have consistency in the classroom. 

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Instructional Rounds

Thank you to everyone who welcomed members from the CLC into their classrooms last Friday! They saw some amazing things and were very complimentary of our school. 
The teams shared the "positives" from each of their walkthroughs on the chart above. The purple comments were seen during reading block and the green comments were seen during math block. As you can tell, there are a lot of great things happening!!!!

We will be diving into their feedback and observations more in-depth over the next week. If you would like any feedback from the Instructional Round, you are more than welcome to seek out the person from High Point who was a part of that team. 

Thanks again for doing such a wonderful job and showing the CLC team what an amazing job you are doing for our students!!!

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Building Open This Saturday

Hess will be opening the building this Saturday from 9-1 p.m if you would like to work in your classrooms. 

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Instructional Technology Coach from KSU

High Point Elementary will be receiving an Instructional Technology Coach from Kennesaw State to help us navigate through our Personalized Learning journey. Our IT coach is Andrea Jayaraman. She will be using the Technology Instructional Matrix and observing in classrooms over the next two weeks. She wants to get a baseline of where we are with technology. This is NOT EVALUATIVE and she knows the laptop carts will be checked out to complete student surveys for the next two weeks. We are using the technology that we have available. :) 

Her ultimate goal is to invest her time with a group of 4-6 teachers (not Vanguard) in order to build capacity and support the personalized learning roll-out. Her picture is below in case she comes into your classroom. She will have a Fulton County badge but sometimes they are hard to see. Thanks for welcoming her. 

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GEORGIA CLIMATE SURVEY 

Below is information and A LINK AT THE END about the Georgia School Climate Survey. This one is required as part of our CCRPI rating – the state’s school rating system. 

We must have 75% participation…Right now we only have 50% participation. 

EVERY staff member should complete this. There are only 30 questions so it's fairly quick!!!

Thanks for completing this survey!!! 

http://apps.gadoe.org/schoolclimate/personnel.nsf/Survey.xsp

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REMINDER!!!!

ESOL Monitored notes should be entered by November 10^th. Any questions, please see an ESOL teacher or Megan Eigel. 

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Formative Observations

While we are still wrapping up walkthroughs, the Formative Observations will also be beginning this week and will go through January. They will not be announced. 

Jacinta or I will be in your classrooms for approximately 30 minutes. While we will be rating all 10 standards, we will only be commenting on standards #2, #4, #5, and #8 unless we are giving a rating other than a Level III.  

We will send an email after each observation so that a mid-year conference can be set up. You will be asked to send three different dates and times that work best for you. The conference should last approximately 20 minutes. 

You will sign off on your formative observation AFTER the conference so that if changes need to be made, we can make them during the conference. Please do not sign off before the conference. 

As always, if you have any questions or concerns, please see Jacinta or myself. 

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Attendance

Thank you for continuing to support good attendance from our kids!!! The summary report which compares last month to this month is below. Way to go 4th grade!!!!

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PBIS 

We are beginning to approach the holiday season. Our past years of PBIS data show that we see a spike in behavior issues during this time. We all know that as these exciting times get closer and closer, we start to see compliance to classroom procedures decline. Below are two articles that give some strategies for helping your whole class to stay on track!

http://thecornerstoneforteachers.com/2009/05/whos-in-control-of-your-classroom.html

http://www.educationworld.com/a_curr/columnists/jones/jones002.shtml

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What I've been thinking about...

We just received our GA Milestones scores from last April. Below are the summary results from last year's third, fourth, and fifth grade students. 

As I have said before, these results are all of ours. We all impact these children and help them meet their own learning target each hour, each day, each month, and each year. While we should take time to celebrate our results, we also know there is a lot of work to still be done! Thank you for your continued work and tireless efforts to grow our students!!

As of right now, these results are confidential. Please do not share them with parents. An email blast was sent out Friday letting parents know the results are beginning to come in and we will be sharing school summary reports in the next few weeks. We need to get approval to share them with the community. 
Students' individual reports will be going home once we receive them at the beginning of December. If parents have questions, direct them to a member of the administrative team. 

***********MATH CORNER************

Redbird Advanced Learning Updates from Robyn Kohen

Teacher Resources and Parent Letters

Teacher resources are in the PLP toolbox, redbird.massivepd.com, under browse more.

Please see video below on how to access what you need. If you do not have your PLP links, Robyn can provide them.

http://www.screencast.com/t/CLRMzNUx1mg0

Moving Students Who Seem to Be Placed Too High

To manually move a student to any beginning or mid-point of any grade level, click the button next to the students name (there are two to click…the right button that turns blue when you hover over it) and it will say “change starting point.” Here, you can re-set their CPA or just manually place them.

In Person Help

Robyn will be here at High Point November 12 in the conference room from 10:00 am-noon.  Bring your lunch and ask your burning questions in person!

If you need classroom coverage because of your lunch schedule, please let Kerstin know as soon as you can.  Last minute requests may not be possible to cover.

*****WRITERS' GALLERY**********

The pledge and writers' gallery is hosted by Ms. Gersten/Noel's  class this week.

The pledge and writers' gallery will be hosted by Ms. Owen's class next week. 

******CALENDAR OF EVENTS*******

Monday, November 9th  

9:00 - Prospective Parent Coffee (off campus)
9:30 - Prospective Parent Tour

Tuesday, November 10th  

1:45 - Leadership Meeting

Wednesday, November 11th

Veteran's Day
Math PLC During Specials
4th Grade Field Trip

Thursday, November 12th

Picture Day Retakes
1:30 - ETT for 3rd Grade
2:50 - PLCs
Alexander to Assistant Principals' Meeting

Friday, November 13th    
7:45 - PTA Board Meeting
Legacy of Excellence Luncheon for TOTY and PEOTY
Student of the Week Certificate

******BIRTHDAYS! ****************

Happy birthday to Judy Berger on the 15th!!! We hope you have a wonderful birthday!!!