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| Students love seeing their teachers! |
"Compassion before curriculum, grace before accountability."
-Rick Wormelli
Important Dates
May 4 - Dept. Head Meeting After School - TBD
May 4 - Senior Awards Ceremony - TBD
May 8 - Prom - TBD
May 11 - Senior Internship Begins - TBD
May 12 - Staff Meeting After School - TBD
May 20 - Academic Awards Breakfast TBD
May 25 - No School - Memorial Day
Important Information
Google Classroom Parent Notifications - Sarah Thrasher's work in assisting our staff with many of the technical needs of going online has been a great help. Thank you, Sarah! Last week she created a tutorial on how to add Guardian Summaries to your parents' mailboxes. To do this, you need to have guardians set up for all your students. I know most of you already have this, but if not, here is a link to learn how. Keep in mind, parents still have to accept the invitations and can even adjust setting how often they receive messages.
Posting Zoom Sessions- Many of you are assisting your students by posting Zoom sessions in your Google Classroom. Thank you for doing this. Sarah Thrasher sent out another great piece of information regarding the demonstrated need to edit the beginning or end of your sessions. Use Screencastify to do it for you. You can easily edit the beginning and end of your sessions with tools that are embedded in Screencastify. See Sarah's email on April 17 for details.
ACT Scores - Many of you asked about our students' ACT scores last week. Student scores were delivered by ACT to homes last week, and we now have an electronic copy of the assessment scores. Shawn is preparing a results document for each eleventh grade ELA and math teacher.
AP Exams - Please be aware of the new AP exam schedule. You can find it here. Please be considerate of the students taking these tests by not planning other assessments near or on these test dates. All AP students are expected to take the exams.
Praise and Concern - Since we have been online, I have shared with you notes of appreciation as well as items of concerns raised by our students and families. Sometimes these times are general observations, and occasionally it is specific information regarding a child's experience. Either way, I filter these calls and emails, and share with you notes that we can all use to get better at teaching and learning using this online environment. Here are few I received this week:
- Scheduling Student Work - Communicate what the students will be asked to do well in advance. Students are making plans to complete their assignments, and many students are having a difficult time budgeting time with assignments being given and are due within the next day or two. Plan ahead and publish what is expected to be turned in with a notice of several days.
- Students are struggling with the many different platforms we use to turn in assignments. Please do not introduce new online tools to have students submit work. Several weeks ago, I asked you to not add new online tools without letting me know. Please keep to this understanding.
- On a positive note, I woke up Sunday morning to a very kind email from a parent who just wanted to thank all of us for what we are doing during this challenging time. Keep up the great work, everyone. Our students and families are lucky to have you!
Good morning, Jay!
I hope you and your family are staying safe and sane during all of this! Hard to believe we already have 5 weeks of isolation and no school on the books!
I just wanted to say thank you to you and all of the staff for all that you’ve done and continue to do for the students – all of Jerry’s teachers have been incredible so far. The Zoom platform can be awkward to follow sometimes, but seeing and hearing the teachers and random students is wonderful therapy for the kids, and much needed.
Nothing about this is smooth or easy – we are so grateful for all the work your teachers are doing. The every day reality of it is just heartbreaking, but we support everything you do 100% and are thankful for the support given to our kids in return. Just praying that we will back to school in the fall, however that may look.
Thank you and stay safe!!!!
Kindly,
Heather K-R
Good Professional Reading
8 Tips for Conducting Virtual IEP Meetings
Smart Classroom-Tech Integration
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