Highline Alt Ed Weekly: December 2012

Sunday, December 9, 2012

Monday Points: December 10, 2012

Happy Monday to you! This will be our last Monday points for the calendar year. Here we go…

Celebration Points:

Thursday was a big celebration for New Start. First, at Brag day we had student awards for performance and exhibiting positive behaviors (as New Start Sharks do!). Then we had some celebrations for teacher grant awardees…I mentioned Mrs. Kelsie Maney’s grant last week, but joining our list of awardees is now Ms. Andrea Love, and Mr. George Wheeler. Andrea received a grant from the Highline Schools Foundation to prepare our students who will be the first generation in their family to go to college. George, at CHOICE, received a grant from the foundation to start up his first robotics class. This year through grant awards, teachers have brought in over $2500 dollars to directly use in their classrooms, and that’s cause for celebration. Congratulations Andrea, George and Kelsie!

Also let’s cheer for Key Club which celebrated its second annual fundraiser Hot Potato Dinner on Thursday night at New Start. Thank you to Mrs. Trina Palosaari, our Key Club Advisor, and her students. Also thank you to Bill and Nancy Tracy of White Center Kiwanis who helped organize the event. I heard they made a lot of money. I ate some great chili, and enjoyed a fun live musical set by the visiting Delridge Boys in our very own Salmon Creek Gym. Thank you all who made this event possible.

Data Points:

PCT on November 30 focused on Charlotte Danielson, initially exposing staff to our district’s Instructional Frame, and Teachscape, the online professional development tool teachers will engage with this year. I sent out an evaluative survey to see how the first of our four PCTs on this subject was received, and ask for suggestions on improvement. In my ongoing efforts to improve, I have looked at the data and want to share with you a quick initial analysis…as is our practice in alternative programs.

Here is the survey data table:

	Great	Good	Fair	Poor	Terrible
Use of Time	20%	53%	20%	7%	0
Pro Growth	21%	43%	29%	7%	0
Presentation	33%	40%	20%	7%	0
Organization	26%	47%	20%	7%	0
Technology	60%	40%	0	0	0
Usefulness	40%	40%	13%	7%	0

The presentation team received Good to Great ratings in all areas. No one thought it was Terrible. One respondent had a Poor experience. Overall the PCT was well received and appreciated, especially in use of technology and overall usefulness to individual practice. So I think our professional growth team is on the right track and did well with this PCT.

50% of respondents provided comments to the question: “How could the PCT have been improved?” 50% of comments did not provide specific suggestions to improve, instead offering personal opinion of the framework, school and state efforts around school improvement. Specific suggestions for improvement listed: better chairs, more time to go deeper, less time on a Friday, clearer expectations around coming to the PCTs prepared, more information about impact on evaluation, and more videos showing actual classroom teaching at the different proficiency levels. All suggestions for improvement will be discussed by the team to see how we can better deliver our next Charlotte Danielson PCT…on February 1. Again, thank you to those who responded to our survey.

Professional Growth Points:

Pedagogy of Confidence: No evaluation survey on this one, but general feedback suggests our time this last Friday (Dec 7) was well spent. The book sparked good conversations and we had the opportunity to go deeper in specific areas of interest. The book talk felt very collegial to me and everyone engaged well. There were too many discussions to recap in this venue, so I just want to say thank you for your reading, note taking and joining us in discussion on Pedagogy. March 8^th is our next meeting on this. Please read the next three chapters, “The Practice”, 4, 5 and 6.

PCT Point: December 14, 2012: The last of 2012, will be a self-directed “Team Time” collaboration afternoon. You choose who you collaborate with. I look forward to circulating and dropping in on the several data team meetings I have already been invited too. Have a good PCT with your teams!

Mike’s Schedule:

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Dec 10	Dec 11	Dec 12	Dec 13	Dec 14
District Strategic Planning Team. All Day at ERAC	District Strategic Planning Team. All Day at ERAC	EOC Training Monitor Gateway to College at Highline CC Alt Ed Leadership Team School Board Meeting	LA Data Team Observation In Classrooms Advisory Planning Team M/Counselor Present CHOICE at HS Options Night. Cascade MS.	504 Meeting Weekly Office Meeting PCT: Visit Data Teams Contract Meeting

As you know, next week is a short week leading to Winter Break. Classes for 2012 conclude next Tuesday December18. You are invited to our 5^th Annual Holiday celebration at my house then. (email me if you didn’t get an invite).

School resumes in 2013, on Wednesday, January 2. Next Monday Points will follow on January 7.

Until then – If I don’t see you at the party, let me take this opportunity to wish you the happiest of Winter Breaks. Celebrate and keep warm with family. Rest! Enjoy the new year…it is fast approaching. From my family to yours, here is wishing you a healthy happy holiday.

Cheers

Mike

Sunday, December 2, 2012

Monday Points: December 3, 2012

Welcome to December. I want to begin by welcoming aboard a new colleague to our district programming. Welcome Siri Quigley, our new Truancy Officer for this year. You may have met Siri last year. She was a social work intern in our district while completing her MSW at UW. Siri also has a JD from Willamette University in Salem, OR. Her commitment is to help keep our students in schools and out of court altogether. Please send her an email or call to welcome her to our team.

Celebration Points:

This week we will celebrate grants. I want to congratulate Mrs. Kelsie Maney, at New Start, for applying for and receiving her first $1000.00 installment of a three year $3K grant from the Armed Forces Continuing Education Association (AFCEA). I gave Kelsie her check at Friday PCT and we will give her a BIG check in front of students at Brag Day this week. Clap, clap, clap!

More information about this grant is at: http://www.afcea.org/education/scholarships/undergraduate/TeachersScholarship.asp Next deadline for application is April 1, 2013.

In addition, I have been told we have grant recipients from the Highline Schools Foundation at both New Start and CHOICE. Announcements will be made this week at CHOICE Staff meeting and the Brag Day Assembly.

Instructional Point:

Last week we shared in collaborative learning about the Charlotte Danielson Framework for Effective Teaching. The Classroom Environment, Domain 2, had focus as we learned about Components and Elements which make up the structure of the framework. We looked at components in Domain 2: The Classroom Environment. It should be no surprise that I, again, want to give emphasis to Component 2A, “Creating an Environment of Respect and Rapport”. In November’s Monday Point s I asked you to think about 2A as it applies to you. The elements in this component are “Teacher Interaction with students” and “Student interaction with students.” And, yes have seen evidence of respect and positive rapport in our programs and classrooms. But I can’t seem to let this one rest because it seems so foundational to me.

Students supporting other students, in small group work while completing an assignment, shows that our kids can work and communicate well with each other. This contributes to the respect for peers, the teacher and learning in general. “Respect” tops the list of our PBIS universal traits at New Start, HIPP and CHOICE. A positive rapport between students and teacher come out of a mutual respect for all involved in the teaching and learning relationship. It is disheartening in those few times that respect is lost, and a good rapport is in breakdown. Though these lapses when teacher and students are not fully working with each other, toward a greater learning goal are few and far between, we must still work to avoid complacency at all costs.

Clear expectations, accountability and follow through are pillars of respect between individuals, and indeed foster strong relationships. Even what seem to be the most minor strategies, like greeting students by name, or checking individually for understanding conveys care and concern for a child. You do this every day, a hundred times a day. My point this week is to make sure you are aware building respect and rapport is a best practice recognized in the framework. In my observations I am looking for clear evidence of your efforts, and words, toward making better connections with our students. Keep building that respect and rapport in your classroom. It’s in the framework, and yes, I am always looking for it.

Data Points:

After first quarter report to you leadership team, I am pleased to report that our data collection tools are growing. We still have a ways to go but we are well on our way to being able to regularly collect school, department and classroom level data about student academic performance. In Literacy we have a reading screener that has been administered to most New Start students. Math has created their own as well. At CHOICE we are using the Math Benchmark Assessments accessing Data Director to get data at school and grade levels. We are further exploring the use of MBA’s into other subject discipline such as using RBA (for reading) or developing other benchmark assessments around science and social studies standards. MAPs testing will be returning to New Start for the mid-year window, and has been at CHOICE for many years now. Also, the difficult work to develop a common rubric for the evaluation of student work in writing and presentation has begun at New Start and CHOICE, respectively. Math at New Start has received PD and access to ST Math which is an online math assessment an intervention. CHOICE will be getting ST Math soon.

Data Teams are making good progress and I am proud of you. I predict by third quarter we will be awash, from multiple sources, with informative and multi-leveled data. From school, to classroom, to individual student, we will soon mostly have what we need to begin action planning our practice for student and school improvement. THough, I suspect some of you have enough now to inform practice immediately!

Professional Growth Points:

Pedagogy of Confidence: You should be wrapping up Chapter Three this week. Our first PCT to collaborate around the ideas of this book will be Friday. This first section of Pedagogy of Confidence is titled “The Belief”, and sets context for the practice described in the remaining sections. Please come prepared to PCT with an understanding of the big ideas in our first three chapters. Our hope is a brief group discussion will help us all make some meaning, and perhaps some application to our students, their lives and what it is we are trying to engage.

PCT Point: December 7, 2012: The Pedagogy of Confidence

This will be our last full group PCT of the calendar year. As described above our Instructional Growth Planning Team will conduct some professional learning on chapters 1-3 of The Pedagogy of Confidence by Dr. Yvette Jackson. Please have read through Chapter Three by Friday. Meet at Salmon Creek at 1:00.

By the way, If you attended last week’s PCT on the Charlotte Danielson Framework please take a minute to complete an evaluation. It is online and really short. http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/5MXNBYF Thank you.