About the Holidays

There are so many traditions at Chets Creek around the holidays so the excitement is already beginning to build, but it can be a mine field for a new teacher. While it would be impossible to describe all of our traditions in detail, I'd like to give new teachers a brief overview and then invite all of our teachers to make comments about the best advice they can give about planning for the holidays.

The wreaths! "Wreaths" are due in the front office on December 3. Each class is asked to prepare at least one "wreath" to be sold at a silent auction during December. PTA is in charge of this long tradition. All of the money that is raised with your wreath project will be returned to your classroom. Sometimes Homeroom moms will take this project entirely on their own but often it's a collaborative effort between the teacher and their Homeroom moms. "Wreaths" have morphed into almost anything holiday-ish so you are only limited by your own creativity. Check out this wreaths blog entry from last year to get a kindergarten sampling of the auction items from last year. All of the items will be displayed in the lobby between December 1-11.

The faculty party! Each year the faculty joins together for a festive evening. It's a BYOB and an appetizer to share. Your significant other is also invited but often teachers just pair up and come together. I would say about half of the attendees bring a girl/boyfriend or spouse and the others come with another teacher. Either way, it's lots of fun. Dress is holiday-ish, a sort of business casual. Our Principal used to REQUIRE that every new teacher come and said she was going to take attendance! Of course, that's because she wants new teachers to understand how important relationships are in feeling successful. It's just such a great opportunity to meet in a less formal atmosphere and to get to know staff members that you don't get an opportunity to talk to in your regular day. You can "drop in" or stay the entire time. This year we will be going to Lori Lincous' house on December 6. Directions will be given closer to the event. Come, enjoy! You'll be glad you did!

The GIVING TREE! Each year, in the Lobby, you will see a wooden holiday tree with shelves for gifts. Children are encouraged to bring in new and gently used toys and canned goods. You will get a flyer from PTA about this later. This year if we collect 1000 cans, BJ's will give the school $1000, so make sure to put it in your Newsletter and encourage this wonderful tradition. If every child contributed just 1 can... Most of the toys and canned goods that are collected are shared with families right here in our school. The leftovers are sent to shelters and food banks. The Giving Tree will be available from December 1-15.

Secret Santa and the Holiday breakfast! For a week each December Santa's little elves can be seen all over the building. Faculty secretly pull a name of another faculty member and then leave little treats for them all week. The Spirit Committee hosts a holiday breakfast in the Media Center on the Friday of that week and all the Secret Santas are unveiled. This year it will be on Friday morning, December 12. Each grade level will be asked to bring something specific for us all to share. ALL staff are encouraged to attend.

The holiday tree! Each year JB erects a HUGE holiday tree in the lobby. The idea is that there is a picture of every single child in the school on the tree. Your job is to think of a small "ornament" that you can use to add one of the school pictures for each child. Often teachers use one of the Ellison cut-outs and add a picture. This does not have to be an elaborate project. The teacher ties all of the class ornaments together in a string garland and will be assigned a time on December 3 to come with their class and add their ornaments to the tree - with JB's help.

The 12 Days of Sweets! On the 12 days before we leave for the holidays, the office will be filled with sweets - from December 4-19. Teachers are encouraged to sign up at the "Spotlight" to bring one of their favorite holiday recipes on one of the 12 days. Get here early each morning and stop by to sample some of the best treats of the holiday season! You'll have visions of sugarplums dancing in your head all day!

The 2nd Grade Play! Each year 2nd grade presents it's holiday play on three different nights - December 4, 8, and 11. Each classroom is invited during the day on one of those days to the dress rehearsal. It's a holiday tradition to see a children's play.

Classroom parties! Most classrooms have some kind of classroom celebration on the last or next to the last day before the holiday. Most of the primary grades have morphed the "party" into a morning of centers with parent help, but a variety of activities exist from pajama and hot chocolate parties around The Polar Express to a multi-cultural day that includes a Christmas Around the World feast. Make sure to check with your grade level and gather ideas on what has gone on in the past. The teachers on your grade level will be your greatest resource.

Story time with Auntie Claus! On the last day before the holidays each grade level is invited to the Media Center for a story time with our very own Principal dressed up as Auntie Claus. She reads some of her favorite holiday stories and then each child receives holiday cookies and chocolate milk. Can't wait!

No Teacher Meetings, Team Meetings in December!

Welcome Laura Stewart!

Laura Stewart is joining the Kindergarten team this year after the year started becuse of the growth at Chets Creek! She will be working with students on a safety net, Reading Mastery, in the morning and then joining Nina Thomas in the afternoons.

Laura has lived in Jacksonville for most of her life, and is a product of Duval County Public Schools. She was even a 3rd grade student of our Principal Susan Phillips!

Laura graduated from the University of Central Florida in 2007 with a degree in Interdisciplinary Studies. She concentrated in Physical Sciences and Social and Behavioral Sciences. She also has minors in Sociology and Religious Studies. After graduating, Laura quickly realized that her plans to enter the Non-Profit field needed to be reevaluated. After spending a few months weighing her options, Laura began substitute teaching in the spring of 2008. She held a long-term assignment at Oceanway Elementary School in 2nd Grade, and most recently covered for a Kindergarten teacher on maternity leave at Holiday Hill Elementary School.

Deciding to enter teaching was not a huge surprise to Laura or her family. All four members of Laura’s immediate family have now been teachers. Laura’s mom is in her 20th year of teaching at Oceanway Elementary School in 2nd grade, and Laura’s dad teaches in the Career Academy (Business & Entrepreneurship) at Ed White High School. Laura’s older brother, Allen, has also spent time teaching. After spending two years teaching English at Sandalwood High School, Allen is now in his second year at Columbia Theological Seminary in Atlanta where he is studying to become a minister.

Laura loves to spend time with her boyfriend, family, and friends. She also works as a youth group leader at her church, and has recently taken on the daunting task of helping to lead the youth choir.

Laura is thrilled to begin her teaching career at such an amazing school! She is looking forward to soaking up all of knowledge and experience of the wonderful faculty and students at Chets Creek!

Open House Advice from the Top!

Chets Creek Elementary Open House
September 2008
You never get a second chance to make a first impression – WOW them!

The following are items that should be covered at Open House. If you are addressing a looped class of parents feel free to address only those items you feel need to be touched on.

I. Purpose of Standards-based Open House
To help parents develop a clear understanding of what a day inside your standards-based classroom looks like.

II. Environmental Checklist
_____Attractive sign-in sheet and pens close to the door for parent sign-in.
_____Agenda of program to be covered written on board or hand-out
_____PTA envelopes available at sign-in
_____Classroom and offices clean and organized
_____Detailed Daily Schedule posted with Standards Based components included
_____Schoolwide Behavioral Standards/Classroom Covenants/Class Promise displayed
_____STARS wagon/basket outside door with books neatly arranged
_____Classroom libraries organized and labeled by genre, author, themes, levels, etc
_____Optional: “Packing List” for donations of classroom libraries with book title, author/illustrator, other things … (YES! DO IT AGAIN!!!)
_____Book-of-the-Month spotlighted in room
_____Word Wall displayed with some words added
_____Standards-based bulletin board complete outside of room with a minimum of standard, task, and student work, commentary

III. What to include in your Open House Presentation?

Standards Based Education (What and Why)
Assessments (Diagnostic/FCAT)
Behavior Standards (including STARS Procedures)
Readers to Leaders (Million word Campaign) – your grade level specific information
Book of the Month
Reader’s Workshop
Writer’s Workshop
Math Workshop
Science Workshop
Resources
Connection
Home-School Folders/Planners
Newsletter/Blog/Website

IV. Possibilities for Open House Presentation
A. Student led focus walks with flow chart of key items
B. Demonstration lesson and debrief (Every Day Counts, Skills Block etc…)
C. Let students lead agenda
D. Activity based agenda to cover topics
E. Standards-based PowerPoint (Add your own slides, pictures, clip art, if you choose)
F. Teacher directed presentation/conversation
G. Video of day, lesson, or tour

Open House

Open House makes many a new teacher shake in her shoes! All those eyes looking at you - so how can you make the experience less stressful? Below are suggestions from some veteran teachers.

Suggestions from 5th Grade teacher Tom Ruark: By far, the most productive Open House "routine" that has worked for me, as a math teacher, is to have the parents participate in a scaled down version of our Math Workshop. I have a Problem Of the Day (probably Every Day Counts Calendar Math) activity followed by a Math Investigations mini-lesson and accompanying student sheet. I advise the kids that they cannot do the work for their parents, but that they may help if their folks get stuck.

This allows the less "needy" parents to work with their kids in a real math environment, and allows the more "needy" parents to search me out and ask questions that allay most of their fears. At any rate, most seem to like this operation (they would stay for hours if we let them:-} ), and those who don't leave without saying a word, which always leaves me feeling great. I have officially entitled this "A Day in the Life".

From 3rd grade team teacher Jenny Nash: We usually send the children on a scavenger hunt or guided tour of sorts through our classrooms. However, there is one thing I wanted to share. I take this time to teach a little manners and social skills to my students. We have a lesson the day of Open House on introductions. (One of the items on their agendas/tours is to introduce their parents to me.) We role play in the classroom and I, of course, get silly and encourage them to introduce me as the best teacher in the whole world, etc. But on a serious note, I teach them the concept of waiting politely when I'm engaged in a conversation with another family, using eye contact and proper hand gestures, introductory language ("I'd like you to meet..."), what names to call adults by, what details to include in a personal introduction, etc. I LOVE DOING THIS. First of all, I think this is an area MAJORLY lacking in our children today (appropriate social manners). Secondly, I love to see the students pride in themselves when they have the opportunity to shine in front of their parents that night! Just a little touch from the mommy (and traditional, Southern girl) in me! :)

From 2nd grade co-teacher Vicky Sharpe: Brooke Brown and I usually do a video, "A Day in the Life of Your Second Grader". It has all the kids in it singing their transition songs and explaining what they do in all their workshops. We also have Eric Blair put the opening of the announcements at the beginning. The parents love that! Before the video, we have all the students come down to their carpet spot. They know the CHAMPs for the carpet and will be much better behaved. After the video each child has a check sheet at their desk which tells them all of the places to go and look in the classroom and also items and work to show their parents in their desk. Usually after this, open house is over! It is easy and fun for the kids! The parents love to hear what the kids are doing from the kids themselves. :) Brooke and I roam around the room helping out with anything that we may need to and talking to the parents.

From 3rd grade co-teachers Cheryl Chascin and Cynthia Rice: For the past several years we have created a PowerPoint slide show of a typical students' day. We begin taking pictures on the first day of school and try to keep a camera at the ready for photos of the students in action. We even include recess and lunch. Parents love seeing their children working and enjoying school. They are often amazed that we fit so much academic time into the school day and cover so many subjects. The best part about this is that we don't have to talk too much - just a brief introduction and a question and answer at the end. We get to stand back and watch the smiling faces of the parents. The kids get a kick out of seeing themselves, too. One thing we learned the first year we did this was to preview the slide show in school with the kids before Open House. That first year, the student reaction to the slide show was so vocal that it disturbed the Open House happening in the class next door!

I hope one of the things that you noticed in all these suggestions is that the teacher is NOT at the front of the room doing all the talking! Now, that's the way to relieve the stress!

Standard-based Bulletin Boards

Many years ago the decision was made that bulletin boards at Chets Creek would be teaching and learning boards instead of fluff. The idea is that a bulletin board is a window into the instruction in your classroom. The boards are used to show the teaching that is going on inside the classroom but are also used for learning as other teachers, classes, students, parents and visitors all stop to read the student work. Bulletin boards are one of the ways that we make our teaching visible, transparent.

The bulletin board shows the connection between a student's work, the standard the work is to meet, and the assessment that is used to decide when the work is good enough. Much of the work posted early in the year may not meet the standard or may be displayed as "a work in progress" but as the year progresses, more and more of the posted work will meet the standard and even exceed the standard.

Over the years, the school has adopted a specific criteria for bulletin boards. This is not to say that the teachers at Chets Creek don't often adapt the criteria as they take risks in showing work that has never been displayed before or use their creativity to rework the criteria. The proving ground is that a teacher can explain what is on her board and why she did or did not follow the specific criteria. Basically a Standards-based Bulletin Board contains the following features:

• Title - Each board has a title that describes the big picture. Teachers sometimes use catchy phrases or a play on words to entice someone walking by the board to stop and read.
• Standard - The standard is reproduced exactly like it is written in the Standards book or comes directly from the Sunshine State Standards.
• Task - The task is an explanation of what the class or student was asked to do. Teachers often include a list of the mini-lessons taught prior to the specific assignment so that the reader can easily see how the specific task fits into a string of lessons.
• 4 pieces of student work - 4 pieces of student work are posted that often show a range of work.
• Commentary - Each piece of student work includes a commentary written by the teacher or by the student that explains why the particular piece meets the standard or does not. Sometimes the commentary includes "next steps" to show where the student should go next. The commentary can take many forms: written in paragraph form, bulleted or in writing, can be in the same form found in the rubric book

In addition to the required parts above, the bulletin board might also include student work copied directly from the Standards Book as an example of the expectation for a particular standard, rubrics, artifacts such as photographs of the process, models or artistic representations of a product or experiment, charts, graphs and anything else a teacher may dream up! Risk-taking is encouraged and reinforced!

Thanks to Christina Walag for sharing her collection of bulletin board photos over the past few years below!

PRESENTATION IS EVERYTHING!

We all know that bulletin boards are about the depth of the student work but several years ago we decided that the depth didn't really matter if bulletin boards weren't attractive and interesting enough to make people stop and read, so we present the following tips and suggestions from the Bulletin Board Police:

• Does my bulletin board have a title that brings all the pieces together? (such as "Apple-tising" for functional pieces about making applesauce)



• Is my board appealing? (You slaved over it and now you want people to read it! Think about the boards in the building that catch YOUR eye and make YOU stop and say, "Wow- what is this?" You want that to be YOUR board)



• Is my most important point displayed at eye level? (That's where most people read)



• Is my bulletin board easy to read and follow from left to right? (most people read from left to right and top to bottom)



• Do my bulletin board borders look new? Do my borders coordinate well with the theme or color of my board? (anything bent or torn needs to come down - today!)



• Are all papers securely fastened to the board? (One staple or one clip makes the work look temporary)



• Does all my work in the hallways look fresh and new? (any work that is old or tattered needs to come down. Any seasonal work that is more than a month old should come down - no pumpkins in January!)



• Is my commentary easy to read? (font should be simple and .14 or larger so it is easily readable)



• Are there any spelling or grammar mistakes on my board? Check and double check spelling and then let a friend check it again. One minor error might be overlooked but many spelling and grammar mistakes will make the borad look unprofessional)

If you ever want a second opinion before putting up your bulletin board, stop by and talk over your board with your coach or a colleague. Or... e-mail your commentary for a coach to review before you put it up. We all learn more when we depend on each other for collaboration!

All about Targeteam

by Lauren Werch

What is TARGET?

TARGET stands for Teachers Accessing Resources through General Education Team

What is the Main Ideas of TARGET?

Target is a proactive approach to address all students’ educational needs. The student's teacher seeks assistance while problems are small and more easily manageable. Help is directed toward the student and the teacher in the general educational environment.

Who should be referred to Targeteam?

The Flagging criteria for a child to be referred to Targeteam can be any one of the following:

• Failing grade or significant decline in an academic area
• More than three disciplinary referrals within a month
• Parent request for Target services
• FCAT (Level 1 or 2)
• Diagnostic scores in the lowest quartile

What is the Target process and how long does it take?

The Target process is a four part process:

Phase 1 is coordinated by the student’s general education. The teacher identifies a student with a need and designs either a behavior or academic goal, initiates parent contact, utilizes classroom resources, and collects data for a minimum of 4-6 weeks on student progress toward the goal.

Phase 2 is conducted by the Targeteam, a school-based interdisciplinary team with parent involvement to advance intervention efforts toward the student's behavior or academic goal. This stage is held in multi meetings (a minimum of 3) over a period of at least 6 weeks.

Phase 3 is held only if the student's goal is not met in phase 1 or 2 and the team feels the student should be referred to the Multidisciplinary Referral Team (MRT). This team considers possible referral and eligibility for ESE (Special Education) services.

Phase 4 is entered only is a student qualifies and requires an Individual Education Plan or Section 504 Plan.


How do I sign up for the Target meeting?

A Data Input form must be completed for a student after Phase 1 is completed. Please submit this form to Lauren Werch (primary students) or Liz Duncan (intermediate students). One week before the scheduled day and time an invitation will be sent home to the student's parents and you will receive an email notification.

When are meetings scheduled and where do they meet?

Primary(K-2) meetings are held on Tuesdays at 8:00 and 8:30 in the small front conference room and Thursdays at 8:00 and 8:30 in the Guidance conference room.
Intermediate(3-5) meetings are held in the Media Center (room behind the front desk) at 8:30 on Wednesday and Thursday.

What do I bring to the Target meeting?

Bring the student's cumulative folder, data relating to the student need, interventions tried, and ideas for specific short and long term goals.

How do I find information on students already in the Target process?

Students in the process that attended Chets Creek last year should have copies of goals, objectives and intervention pages attached to their yellow promotion card. Please check the cumulative folder carefully for any information that looks like the Target process, especially for a student you feel is in need.

Who is part of the Targeteam?

The primary team has a facilitator (Lauren Werch), school psychologist (Laura Nilsen), two primary general education teachers (Debbie Harbour and Randi Timmons) and an ESE teacher (Lourdes Santiago). The intermediate team has a facilitator (Liz Duncan), guidance counselor (Betsy McCall), a general education teacher (Ann Tillis) and an ESE teacher (Tammi Sani). In addition, all of the student's academic teachers and parents are a part of the team.

Reviewing Cum Folders

This week, you should have checked all of your cum folders. Ever wonder exactly what it means to "check" your folders? As you have probably discovered, the cum folders can be found in The Guidance Office with the homeroom teacher's name on the front of the drawer. The first thing to check of course, is if every child on your roll has a cum folder! Tracy Carlin is the person to see if a folder is missing.

You often hear techers say that they don't want to check the cum folders because they don't want to form prejudices about children before they are able to form their own first impression, but this can be dangerous in the case of medical problems or custody arrangements. Often a child is entitled to particular services so a teacher needs to look for a few things from the very beginning. Below are some of the things that you should check to give you more information about the students in your class:

1. Target (our school intervention team work is filed in a manilla folder), ESE (Exceptional Student Education - Special Education folders, which include services for the gifted, are green), Speech and Language Services (in a pink folder), and Section 504 Packet Plans(which are also in a manilla folder) all have their own folders within the yellow cum folder. Each of these will tell you something particular about a student.

2. There will be an orange sheet of paper that will tell you if the child has had any interventions while at Chets. Attached to this are any PMPs (Progress Monitoring Plan) that will also tell you about intervention plans that have been designed for the student in previous years. The PMP will be signed by the parent indicating that the teacher and parent have had a conference discussing the needs and results of these interventions.

3.Custody issues will be a formal decree found after the Code of Conduct form towards the front of the yellow folder.

4. Students that have serious medical alerts will have a red dot on the front of the cum folder. You will also find additional facts about the medical condition with the health information inside the cum folder.

5. Make sure to also look for a red folder because this will tell you a child's ESOL (English Speakers of Other Languages) status. There will also be a Home Language Survery that will tell you if the family speaks another language at home and what that language is. This will be a big help in knowing if you need an interpreter for conferences. An active ESOL student requires that the teachers use ESOL strategies in the classroom documenting them in her lesson plans. An ESOL student in the 2 year monitoring phase requires a teacher to document progress on the left side of the folder on form c. An ESOL student who is finished with the 2 year monitoring phase does not require any additional paperword on the teacher's part but all of this information will be helpful as you get to know your students.

If there is anything in the cum folder that you do not understand, do not hesitate to ask about it. Tracy Carlin can answer any of your questions or can direct to the person that can!