Week of November 21 - November 22 and November 28th - December 2nd

Thank you for taking the time at the end of the staff meeting to go on the Gratitude Walk.  Here is the list you created.  I got a little choked up reading what you put down.  Each of is evidence of the incredible things you do day in and day out for the students and families at Jefferson. Many items showed up on multiple lists.   It is sometimes hard to see the fruit of what you are planting, but in years to come, we will be amazed by the things that are harvested in kids lives.  Enjoy every minute of your Thanksgiving Break!

Gratitude Walk List

Our students

Teachers trying new things

New blacktop

Clean classrooms

Our secretaries

The candy jar in the office

New entryway bulletin boards

The new welcoming look of the school

Our Lunch Ladies rock

The amazing art displays of kids work

The kids writing displayed on the walls

Our Specials - Luck to have 4 great ones

Dual Immersion option for kids

Our students who are compassionate and care for other kids

Walking Track

Extra Para Time for Math Interventions
Lori Johnston, our RtI/MTSS Support
Lauren, Rachel, Kristina and the folks who support us with SPED

Art Mom

Our SPED Staff

4 Square and other game options on the playground

Extension for our high level kids

Buddy Benches

30 minute lunches

Lunch choices for adults in the lunchroom

Our gym

Our amazing PTO

Parent helpers and volunteers

Jefferson Grandmas

Art Mom

Access to Laptop Carts

Additional Wing

Room Number Chalkboards

Boxtops Program

Miss Debbie's Support

School Jobs

7 Habits

Mrs. Silva, Maria and Maria for the language gifts they share with kids

A cool new music room

Our custodial staff

Working copiers

Stop Walk Talk Program

Kelso's Choice

New playground equipment

Posters from the high school

New paint in the halls

Our Principal and Vice Principal

New materials for reading

Student PSR who is doing a great job

Smiling and supportive staff

Special notes and words of encouragement left at just the right time

Tons of new resources for reading curriculum

Teacher wish lists

 The United States and a free education for everyone

Organized storage room

Low class sizes

Interventionists who are organized, supportive and flexible

Voice fire alarm in the new wing

Teamwork

Beautiful fall weather and outdoor recess

Hot Wheels for a writing project

Prep time

School start time

Imagine Learning

Flexible paras covering recesses, duties, subbing...all on top of interventions

New phones

Just 2 duties a week for teachers

2 waves of dismissal

Windows

Hardworking janitors

Cute library

Veterans' Poppies

Bright bulletin boards

Thankful to be at Jefferson

Our Staff and Students

Please check out this link.

Terri came across this link and shared it with me.  I'd like to pass it along to you in light of your 7 Habits collaboration last week.  Thank you for thinking through your "First Things."  Together, you make an impact on kids.

Congratulations Denise!
Last Thursday night, Denise received the Excellence in Teaching Award for Elementary at the JSD Board Meeting.  Noted in the nomination were here efforts to reach tough kiddos and her constant willingness to help all of us (me included!) with technology problems, issues and projects.  Denise has also brought these skills and her creativity to support our PTO.  Way to go Miss Baugh!  Congratulations!

Holiday Days Off Clarification
There has been a little confusion, but there is no school for staff on Wednesday, November 23rd and Thursday, December 22nd.  Teachers, December is a 1/2 contract day for you, but it is a flex day for you to complete your end of the semester grades on your own time frame.  You are not required to be in attendance that morning.

Exciting Reading Opportunity for 2nd and 3rd Graders

We have had a group of JHS seniors working on a senior project to support our students in reading.  They have been working hard to secure donations and have been able to finalize a budget that will allow 2nd and 3rd graders to participate!  Students will work with their teachers to set a goal for how much they can read between the beginning of December and the end of January, including the Christmas Break.  If they can reach this goal, they will receive a t-shirt.  This t-shirt will allow them free entry to a varsity basketball game where they will be honored for their reading.  There will also be prizes for top readers.  We will have the seniors finalize the details of rolling this out to your kids this short week.  Please stay tuned for more details.

No Interventions this Short Week

If you need some para support, please see Liz and Nicole who will be helping coordinate.

Lunchroom Expectations Review

Teri will be doing lunchroom expectation reviews with classes this week.  If you did not get on the schedule, please see Teri to see if she has a spot to fit you in.

Progress Monitors Due December 2nd

Thank you for doing a great job at having your PM in by 8AM Monday morning of December 5th.  You guys have been great about this and it helps us get data ready for Data Team meetings!

Staff Meeting on Monday, November 28th

Professional Goals

Please make sure to set a time to meet with me to go over your professional goals before the Christmas Break.  I will reschedule a couple from last week.  Thank our for flexing with the student/classroom need we had.

BoxTops

Thanks for turning these in each week.  I know that you sometimes get a big bunch from a family, but it does help the Cooleys to get them weekly.  Much appreciation!

Week of November 14th - November 18th

Thank you for a great week of Jefferson!  It was a busy one.  We did so many great things for kids!  But, that can also take a toll if we aren't careful.  I hope you'll have some time to relax and regroup this weekend.  A long holiday is fast approaching!  Here are a few details that you will need for the week ahead.

Family Literacy Night Thank You

Thanks to all of you who helped serve hot dogs, prepared jokes for doors and helped organize cookie dough.  We had a great turn out!  It was fun to see how excited the kids got to have Gary Hogg read their work to the crowd.  Priceless!  Thanks to Liz and Nicole for all of the organizing!  This was synergizing at its best!  Here's my new favorite photo taken earlier in the day at the assembly:

Staff Meeting

We will have a staff meeting Monday.  Prizes will be given.  :-)

Journeys Training

Tyler, the Journeys Trainer will be here Wednesday and Thursday.  BLT planned with Tyler a week ago, and we shared your questions we had at that time.  He will primarily spend time with you and your team talking about planning and resources for a 90 min. block Monday through Friday.  He is aware of some of the constraints you deal will and will try to answer as many of your questions as possible.  Please bring your materials to the library during your team's time.  We also got word that the software you need to access the interactive tools is being loaded this weekend!  Our hope is that Tyler can help with these pieces as well.  We may need to borrow an empty classroom for this piece.  Here's the basics:

Nov. 16th

AM - 3rd Grade 8:30-11:30 (Please aim for 8:15 if possible)

PM - 2nd Grade 12:30-3:30 (Possibly 3:45)

Nov. 17th

AM - Kinder (Please aim for 8:15 if possible)

PM - 1st Grade (Possibly 3:45)

Library Changes

Due to Journey's Training and RtI Upload Day on Friday, we will be using the library Wed. through Friday.   If you have a library special Wed-Fri, please contact Jen about a push in library special on those days.  Thanks for flexing Jen! I wish we had more available spaces!

Picture Retakes

These are Friday.  They will only be for individual kiddos in the library.  We'll try our best to work around your schedule.

Collaboration - Habit #3

Put First Things First is habit #3.  Looking forward to what the trainers have put together for collaboration this Friday!

Kid Successes

Recently I have had a number of you send me emails about kid successes, both behaviorally and academically.  I can't tell you how much I LOVE this!  It fills all of our buckets to see kids that have struggled, having great days!  Thank you to all of you who have also let parents know about these celebrations!  We would also LOVE to get to celebrate with the kids in person.  Please don't hesitate to send them to the office for extra recognition or to hang their work on our brag wall.  There is a lot of power in positive reinforcement!

Behavior Practise

Thank you Deb for reminding me that we are here to teach kids, not just apply consequences.  Deb had a lot of success with a little guy last week because they took a recess to practise.  On this note....

Lunchroom Practise

Teri reminded me recently that we never took the time to really explain to the kids our expectations in the lunchroom.  The duty staff think it would really help improve the flow and atmosphere.  During the 21st and 22nd, there will be no interventions.  If you would be interested in signing up to have your class attend a lunchroom procedures presentation for about 15 min. one of those days, please let me know by Wednesday of this week.

Data Teams

Data Teams were AWESOME!  It was so good to be with all of you, hear your noticings and wondering about kids, and hear what you need to support them in our reading interventions.  Liz and Nicole notice something new at each meeting about how we can make them even more productive.  Thank you also for having all of your data in by Monday morning!  This made getting ready that much easier.  Much appreciation!

I'm still working to secure this blog so that you can add comments as you are reading.  Sorry for the extra step, but I would be happy to entertain any questions through email!

Have a good weekend.

Angie

Week of November 7th - November 11th

You guys are awesome!  Thank you for joining in on the fun!  Your costumes were so creative, but that's really no surprise.  You do amazing things with your kids everyday!  Thanks for making Halloween so much fun for our kids.

 Here are a few of the highlights you'll need to know for the week...

All School Progress Monitors are Due

Please make sure these are in no later than Monday at 8AM.  We will be looking at this data to get ready for the Data Team Meetings.

Data Team Meetings

We will be running Data Team Meetings on Wednesday so there won't be intervention.  Paras will be covering your rooms.  Please let me know if you need a refresher on your time or who will be covering your room.  We will be meeting in the Intervention Room.  Our big questions (paraphrased) will be:

• Which kids are growing and having success with the interventions that have been put into place?
• Which kids have flat data lines and may need a different resource or intervention and "change line?"
• Which kids may need to change groups to better match their need?

Gary Hogg and Literacy Night

This coming Thursday, Nov. 10th is our Literacy Night.  

Gary Hogg will be here all day Thursday doing assemblies and writing workshops again!  He did such a great job last year and we hope this will inspire the kids again.  Below is the schedule for that day.  We intend to still have interventions for K, 1st and 3rd,  but 2nd will be in writing workshops during  their block.  Please make sure that kids have the following items for the workshops:

• whiteboard or something to write on
• pencil
• paper

Also, Gary will be staying to do an evening performance for the families at Literacy Night.  From 5:00-6:00, we will have dinner and guest readers and we would like families to be able to go to your door to find a joke.  They will read the joke and record their answer.  They will get to enter this work for a fun drawing!  Please let Liz, Nicole or I know if you are struggling with this project.  Gary will start his performance at 6:00PM.

Thanks for your help with this!  We think it'll be another great day for kids and families.

Thursday's Schedule

8:30-9:30 - Assembly (2nd, 3rd, Kinder AM)

9:45-10:30 - 3rd Grade Workshop

10:45-11:30 - 2nd Grade Workshop

Lunch

12:45-1:45 - Assembly (1st, Kinder PM)

2:00-2:30 - 1/2 of 1st Grade

2:30-3:00 - 1/2 of 1st Grade

Veteran's Day Activities

In the Jerome School District, Horizon has traditionally done the Veteran's Day Program and Jefferson does the Memorial Day Program.  We do have some paras (Thank you Teri) who will be helping with a bulletin board to honor veterans this week, but we have also bought a book for each of your classrooms to use as a read-aloud.  Please use this text as you see fit.  The K-1 book is already here and will be delivered tomorrow.  We are hoping the 2-3 grade text will be here tomorrow as well.  If you are interested, here are the links:

What is Veteran's Day - K-1

The Poppy Lady - 2-3

We hope you find the books helpful as we seek to help our kids understand what it means to honor veterans and others who help keep us safe and free to learn.

Habit 3 - Put First Things First

Collaboration for the week will be around Habit 3: Put First Things First.  This is the habit that can be hardest to help little ones learn.  They know what to do, but it's so much easier to put it off and do the thing you want to do.   I've been reflecting on this one a lot myself, and I think it will helpful to have the refresher with colleagues before going into this busy season.

Lesson Plan Schedule

Please notice the lesson plan schedule to the right has been updated.  Please upload or send your lesson plans to the office.

PTO Hat Day and BLUE JEAN FRIDAY!!

Nov. 11th is our PTO fundraiser "Hat Day."  I think we are also due for a Blue Jeans Friday.  So live it up!  New staff, we will ask students to make a donation to wear their hat, but we will NOT strictly enforce this.  If they come with a hat, but without money, they may participate.  This money will be donated, but I need to have Daphne remind me where it will be going.  This is a way for Jefferson kids to practise generosity and giving back.

A Great Question and a Quick Read from the Daily 5 Sisters