Last Two Days of Instruction

Team,

We have two instructional days and your last day to complete the 2019-20 school year.  This year has been filled with challenges and success that has proven that we are a school on the rise.  From audits to building a school in a virtual environment, we have persevered and together we will continue to build our collective efficacy to support students, families, and one another to be great.  Thank you for your consistent outreach to students and families and your collaboration with one another.  As we close the year, there is some information and reminders I need to share.

Closeout Schedule:  Please be sure to stick to your scheduled time (3 hours max) to close out your room/office.  If you have a conflict with the schedule, please talk with me.

Closing Checklists:  Teacher closeout and Instructional Support/Classified closeout

Health at Work Guidance:  Please read this document before returning to work to close out your classroom.  All staff must complete the HEALTH SCREENER linked to this document.  You must wear a mask and practice social distancing.  Please do not bring children or other people with you.

Grades for the 4th grading cycle are due in Infinite Campus by 4PM today per our contract deviation.

Please review attendance/participation from last week and update any changes in Infinite Campus by 4PM today.

We will have a short faculty meeting Thursday at 3PM to close the year.

Have a great day!

Seven days of NTI

Team.

As we embark on the next seven days of instruction, continue to keep engagement in the forefront.  Please encourage students to complete work that has been assigned over the past few weeks to finish NTI strong.

As you move through the last eight work days, take time to reflect on your growth and performance throughout our time of Non-Traditional Instruction.  It is very likely we will begin our school year in the same manner, so this is a time to reflect and think of how we will refine our practices and build our individual and collective tool boxes for the 2020-21 school year.

Take a second to think of how far we've come.  We went from a stressful February and March to creating a whole school online for students.  Not everyone can do that and we have been successful in creating this foundation for students.  Our jobs are not easy and rarely perfect, but look at the amazing work we have put in over the past six weeks.  To say that I am proud of Team King is quite the understatement.  Thank you, thank you, thank you for your dedication to our students.

Our attendance/participation last week was 86.68% with 49 students showing no participation.  Please review work from the weekend and ensure all participation is accounted for in Infinite Campus.  I will forward the list of non-participating students for comparison.

See you at Faculty Meeting -- 10:30 AM -- link is on the blog email.

Have a great week!

12 Days of NTI to Go

Good morning and Happy Mother's Day to all our mothers at King.  As of today, we have 12 days of NTI left for students and we want to close the year strong.  Our attendance and participation last week stands at 91.85% with 30 students showing no participation.  As you start the day, please take a few moments and double check your non-participation students and make any updates to attendance in Infinite Campus by 3PM today.

Thank you for your work with NTI Weekly Progress Monitoring Sheets, this not only shares the work students are doing and the feedback staff is giving, but it prepares us to continue the feedback loop with students so that every students/family is aware of student progress and what they need to be successful on assignments and over the course of the school year.

At this time, we must complete plans to close out the school year and make plans to celebrate our fifth grade students. I have received some ideas from the fifth grade teachers and have been talking with other principals to see what others are planning. If you have any ideas to contribute, please let Ms. Jones or Mrs. Mozier know so we can finalize plans this week.  Thus far we have ideas of a parade, picture slide show, yard signs, and certificates.

I am still waiting on guidance for how staff will close the year, I will keep you informed as I learn more information.

Staff Assignments 2020-21

Kindergarten:    Schmidt/Andrews and Wilkerson/Drane
First:                  Edeburn-Ward/Helm; Mellett/Fortwengler; Mary Miller/Frazier
Second:             Hayley Miller/Lee; Wendy Smith/ (assistant vacancy)
Third:                Butler; Embry
Fourth:              Stivers; Morgan Andrews
Fifth:                 T. Johnson; Holloway
Fourth/Fifth:     N. Williams
EBD SC:           Teacher Vacancy/Forrest
ECE Resource:  McBride; Lamb; Pam Sheehan
ESL Resource:   Mina; Tomanic; Hassan; Velazquez
Resource Staff:  Camp, A. Williams, Ross, Allen, Buckley, Vialpando, K. Johnson
Special Area:      Gamble, Martin, Newton
Security:             Perissi

Faculty Meeting Link

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/852157074?pwd=TzVXVDgrQndjMFVCQ0FhbzIyZUxjZz09

Meeting ID: 852 157 074

Password: 3fFkQR

Have a great week!

Happy Teacher Appreciation Week!

Team,

Thank you for your work, your presence, and your professionalism over the course of this school year and as you continue to provide engaging instruction for our students at King.  We appreciate the time you invest in students as well as your professional growth.  While we are not physically in the same place, the collective work of our team has accomplished the task of creating a school in a virtual space for students to thrive and continue their learning.  This is not an easy task and I thank you all for making it so.

We do plan to have a celebration for teacher appreciate once we are all in the same space.  In the meantime, please accept my gratitude and an IOU.

Our attendance for last week is currently at 95.65%,  with 16 students having no participation.  We have until this afternoon at 4:00 to make any changes or adjustments to attendance for last week.

Below is the link for today's faculty meeting.  Have a great week!

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/852157074?pwd=TzVXVDgrQndjMFVCQ0FhbzIyZUxjZz09

Meeting ID: 852 157 074

Password: 3fFkQR

Half Way Through NTI

Team,

This week marks the half-way point of NTI, with the last student day being May 27th and the last day for teachers as May 28th.  We have 22 days of instruction with each day being an instructional day other than May25th -- Memorial Day.  The Kentucky Department of Education requires 1,062 hours of instruction per school year and Commissioner Brown is allowing every school district to count NTI days  as 7 hours of instruction as opposed to the 6 hour and 15 minutes we were previously allowed to count.  As a result, we will reach the 1,062 hours at the end of the day on May 27th.

Thanks to our Instructional Leadership Team and Ms. Jones, we now have a teacher choice board for all things NTI available in our school Google Classroom.  The link to the classroom is here
and the class code is dpysfia.

Updates:

• Evaluations will be moved to next year for all non-administrative staff.  If you were due for a yearly or summative evaluation, it will be moved to next year -- pushing all summative evaluations a year.  For example if you were due to have a summative this year 2019-20, it will be moved to the 2020-21 school year and so on.

• Materials from the building -- at this time, there are no plans to have staff re-enter the building to retrieve materials or break down classrooms for the summer.  We will continue to follow the guidance of Governor Beshear and I will advise when we are able to re-enter the building.

•  Principals have been advised that summer professional development may be virtual as we are unsure of when large groups can return to the school building.  More to come on this.

• Within the next few weeks, I will schedule short meetings with all staff to have opportunity to communicate with all individually regarding progress, growth, and feedback.  Just a heads up so everyone is aware.  

Have a great week, I appreciate you all!

NTI Week 3

Team,

Thank you for your work with Non-Traditional Instruction.  As we move into week three, please continue to engage students with meaningful learning activities and provide feedback.  With the progress monitoring sheet you turn in, there are three types of feedback we want to be sure students are receiving.  When you hover over the columns for feedback they give you a brief description of the type of targeted feedback so you can enter information accordingly.

1. Wellness Check (This column is for just checking on students and their families).
2.  Learning Progress Point (What has the student told you about their learning-- is it on track, what is their biggest Ah-ha moment?)
3. One - Three Specific Feedback Points (What are 1-3 points you have gone over with students to support their learning or clear up misconceptions?)

Please keep this in mind as you provide and record feedback for students.  With the activities tab, that is for you to write non-student specific activities you have completed such as field trip planning, transportation verification, working on school plans, etc.

I'm very proud to report our student participation rate improved from 89.4% in the first week of NTI to 91.3% in the second week.  We still have 32 students that did not participate last week, so we still have room to grow.  Please continue to make effort to reach these families and refer any that you have had no success reaching to me by the end of the day Tuesday.

I appreciate all you do to support our students and families.  Have a great week!

Non-Traditional Instruction Week #2

Team,

I am so proud of our team and the way in which everyone has tackled the task of creating online and remote learning environments for our students.  I've had the opportunity to view the choice boards and Google Classrooms and thank you for preparing engaging activities for our students. 

We are moving into week two of Non-Traditional Instruction and our continued focus must be on student engagement, feedback, and communication.

Student Engagement:

• Review the assigned work from this week and pattern the next week in a similar fashion.  Students need consistency and repetition and this is achieved with developing routines and procedures for students to become familiar.  Types of activities, number of assignments, and the frequency of feedback.

Feedback

• What will be your routines and procedures for providing meaningful feedback to students?
• What is the frequency -- how often will you provide feedback?  This should be standardized with room for additional student questions.
• What format will it take - phone calls, written feedback (Google Classroom), Class Dojo, short video explanation, online meeting?  Make this a routine.
• Make sure students know they have the opportunity to redo assignments following feedback to improve their performance.

Communication

• How are you establishing weekly routines and procedures for communicating with  students and families?
• If you share students with ESL and ECE, how are you collaborating to ensure all students have contact each week from the teacher of record and the collaborating teacher?
• K-2, how are you sharing the communication/feedback duties with instructional assistants?
• How can families/students reach you with questions/concerns?
• Be sure families know this is a growth model, students are not penalized for making mistakes, but will be encouraged to improve performance.
• NTI will not impact placement decisions for next year (students will not fail the grade as a result of NTI work completion)
• Students who work with Ms. Allen (advanced/gifted) will still have enrichment opportunities, Ms. Allen will provide information this week.

Continuous Improvement

• There are learning opportunities this week from the digital learning department.  Click here for this week's schedule.

Reminder:  Report grades are due in Infinite Campus by Friday @ 4:00PM.

Have a great week.