Friday Flash: February 10, 2012

February 10, 2012

Reflections on Design Principles

It continues to amaze me how I can pick up a journal, book. or piece of literature and have owned it for quite some time, and not looked at it in ages. I can remember when I first read it and how powerful it was to me. I reflect and remember how it spoke to me at the time. And yet, as I thumb through it again today, it is though I'm reading it for the first time.

I note what I underlined, marked or tagged and wonder why that was a big deal to me? Or...I say, "oh yes...how could I have forgotten that?" Or..."why didn't I underline this!" Why, I had this most amazing and guiding book right under my nose and I've been ignoring it?

Then, right behind those thoughts, I feel a bit of frustration creeping up. I resent that I don't have nearly enough uninterrupted time to allocate to the reading I want to do. Thinking, "why, if I only could get this all read, I'd know exactly what to be doing and how I will fix the things that need fixing!"

I recently picked up the very tiny book by Emily Cousins, Reflections on Design Principles. Within this book are the ten design principles that are our best short statement of the philosophy of education and core values of Outward Bound and Expeditionary Learning. I fell in love all over again.

I decided I would read one design principle each week; ponder it, grow a deeper understanding and application.

I am reminded of the teachings of Marie Clay and how the efficiency of words is critical for learners to take on new knowledge and transfer new learning into real understanding.

The book is no bigger than my hand and fits in a pocket of my purse. I think Emily Cousins understood something about saying a lot with a few words.

Well, I didn't even get past the preamble this week...in fact I got stuck on it...

"Preamble to Design Principles:

Learning is an Expedition into the unknown.

Expeditions draw together personal experience and intellectual growth to promote self-discovery and construct knowledge.

We believe that adults should guide students along this journey with care, compassion, and respect for their diverse learning styles, backgrounds, and needs.

Addressing individual differences profoundly increases the potential for learning and creativity of each student.

Given fundamental levels of health, safety, and love, all people can and want to learn. We believe Expeditionary Learning harnesses the natural passion to learn and is a powerful method for developing the curiosity, skills, knowledge, and courage needed to imagine a better world and work toward realizing it."

What, in this preamble, speaks to you?

Calendar

February 13- 17th:

Monday:

* Josh's Crew leaves for Winter Voyage

* 3rd Grade Reading CSAP week

Tuesday:

* RTI meeting 7:15 a.m.

* Valentines Day :)

Thursday:

* 3rd grade Field Work to Garden of the Gods

* Fire Drill 10:00 a.m.

February 20 - 24th:

Monday: No School

Tuesday:

* RTI meeting 7:15 a.m.

* Michelle/Lonnie Crew leaves for Winter Voyage

* Bill/Rebecca leave on Winter Voyage

Peaceful week?

Student Led Conferences

Making the shift to semesters (hard to even say that word in an elementary school) has changed the way we schedule our Student Led Conferences. Looking over the remainder of the year, it would not make sense to hold these in May when we are up to our eye brows in end of the year rituals, such as Portfolio Showcases.

So, we will plan on having our Student Led Conference the week of April 16th. This is a four day week, as you are granted a teacher compensation day on Friday, April 20th for your extra time for conferences. Some of you may prefer the week of April 23rd through April 27th and that would be fine if you need the flexibility.

Now is the time to mark your calendar!

For next year, I propose we think about doing our first Student Led Conferences right after Fall Break rather than December, and spring conference right after Spring Break. This way, we are having those conferences mid-way through grading periods.

Professional Development Opportunity:

The Tointon Institute for Educational Change

This academy is designed for teams of teachers/leaders from schools. The academies are held in Beaver Creek, Colorado June 14 -17th and at no cost to you (except for supper each evening).

I would like to take a team to the academy this summer!!!! Unfortunately, I can't take all of us! The academy limits the size of the team and we can send 6 teachers. Some of you will want to attend, but your summer schedule will be a conflict. For others, this may sound like just the right thing for your professional goals/needs.

It is quite exciting that Jill and her husband, Karl, will be the presenters for one of the days!!! Yeah Jill!

If you are interested in attending, I need you to write a narrative explaining why you would like to go, how you think the content of the academy fits into your needs and how you will be accountable for putting what you learn into action. I will evaluate and select the participants based your reflection, need and commitment.

As you write your application consider the content of the academy.

Here are some things you might consider as you write your application:

*Is there a better way to help today's students learn? How do we get there?

*How can I teach to the future and what does that even mean?

*How do you choose the appropriate learning tools for students to use?

* What are the roles of assessment?

* What types of assessment are most useful for partnering with students?

* What are the essential skills our students need to learn in order to be successful?

* What should future schools and education look like?

* Where are you in your application of providing meaningful feedback to students?

* Where are you in planning and following through with including evaluations from a global audience and/or audience outside our school?

* How do you help students understand their own progress?

THIS IS NOT A LIST OF QUESTIONS TO ANSWER! Just food for thought to get you thinking before you write.

Please email your word document application to me by Wednesday, February 22nd.

Here is the description of the academy:

Meaningful, Changes Classroom Dynamics and Propels Student Learning
June 14-17
The academy will focus on what we do with students in our classrooms and how to do what we do more effectively.
In this academy, we will look at how we can think differently about the role technology
plays in our instruction. We know this is a powerful tool to aid student learning and to increase student engagement, but we will examine some principles we need to consider in implementation and discuss how can we integrate technology seamlessly into our daily work with kids.
Additionally, this academy will provide an opportunity for teams to learn about effective instructional learning targets and the power of developing clear criteria for success, aligning formative assessments to lessons and providing descriptive, evaluative and coaching feedback.

We will learn about the relationship between the feedback we provide and the mindsets of
our students. Finally, we will examine effective elements of team planning, including how we ensure that there is a high level of implementation of initiatives in classrooms, how we monitor implementation and how we address resistance and have difficult conversations in order to improve instruction in our classrooms in an effort to increase student learning.

Life Is Art; Update

Emily Key is spear heading the crew projects. Here is what she is sharing with us:

I just wanted to update you on the Class Project portion of Life Is Art in hopes that you can give the teachers a heads up.

-We have projects planned for k-6, some will be combined across the grade level and some will be classroom specific.

- We will need an hour at most of class time to complete these projects and we have set aside (Tuesdays) Feb 21st and Feb 28th to make these happen. (some projects will be 15 minutes or less)

-There will be a sign up genius coming in the next week for time slots for these dates.

- We will supply everything except maybe classroom items such as scissors etc.... and we will try to give each class a heads up as to what they will need to help things run quickly and smoothly.

- We realize there are voyages sprinkled through these two dates, but are confident we can find everyone a time- please let the teachers know we will work with them to find a good time for them!!!

-We will reveal the finished product to the class at a later date so they can swell with pride. We will probably be a little vague until then with some projects. We don't want them to know what's coming. :)

-if anyone has any questions or concerns they can email me directly ekey1025@yahoo.com

Love and Logic

Teacher-isms:

Questions create thinking...
warnings, lectures, and threats create resistance.

Crew Blogs

It's been so impressive to see how we have all grown in our ability to communicate with our community using digital tools! Just amazing! Talk about evidence of learning! We have long strived to make the learning visible, and this has certainly supported realizing that goal! Collectively we created tremendous momentum around growing and learning about how to use digital tools for learning. Thank you for keeping this focus and continuing to grow in your personal use with these tools.

I notice that we are providing links to one another's blogs on our home pages. That is great! Friday Flash is intended just for staff, so please do not include Friday Flash as a link for our community.

I have to acknowledge that I have dropped the ball on my 'Pondering's of a Principal' blog. I have struggled with that and hope to pick it back up soon.

Call for Featured Folks authors...

Thank you to those of you who have provided a feature piece for Featured Folks. I know that Featured Folks is everyone's favorite! A call to those of you we are still waiting to hear a story from! When you email me your piece, please send the pictures as an attachment. It's been so wonderful to connect together in this way.

Featured Folks

authored by Michelle Oslick

Hmmmm…What to share? Isn’t that always the question when trying to write about yourself? Where do I start?

I guess a good place would be to say that, in a million years, I never though I would be a teacher. My plans and dreams were very different for the first 18 years of my life. Since life very rarely turns out the way we imagine it, though, I can only be thankful that somehow, I ended up right here at Renaissance.

As I child, I had one passion in life, dance! To be more specific, ballet. I was born and grew up in the far northern suburbs of Chicago, and thanks to the proximity of the city, and having an older sister, that I had to emulate at every turn, I started dancing and developed a major interest in the arts when I was about three. You add into this mix a grandmother who also had a passion for dance, before having 10 children, and a grandfather whose soul focus was his family and making sure that all of his kids and grandkids (which now numbers somewhere in the upper 20s, though we stopped counting some years ago, once the great grandkids started to come along) had every bit of love and support possible. In other words, I had everything I needed to pursue my dream.

And so, I grew up in a very typical Midwestern family, going to school, dance rehearsals, fighting with my sister, etc. building on my dream until I was dancing with professional troupes downtown, and making plans to attend a performing arts school in New York. Life was pretty prosaic, UNTIL my junior year of high school, when a bizarre incident at a rehearsal left me with permanent nerve damage to my sciatic nerve and the pronouncement that I would need years of physical therapy before I could even contemplate dancing again, and that if I didn’t do this and kept dancing I would be lucky to walk by the time I was 21.

A new direction had to be found. Not being able to give up my link to dance completely, I found myself an assistant teacher to the 2-3 year olds at one of my old studios. It didn’t take long to realize that my love for kids, could be my new path.

I started this journey by attending the University of Iowa, to study elementary education. I spent three years on campus in Iowa City studying, and thanks to a cohort they participate with, was able to move to Ireland and teach in a three room school house right on the Atlantic seaboard. I taught preschool, kindergarten, and 1^st grade all in one room, and absolutely loved it. I spent my time there teaching and traveling.

This love of traveling and exploring that came home with me when I returned to the States, making me decide to give living outside of the Midwest a try. I took a leap of faith, and moved to Colorado without ever having visited.

I started teaching up in Cherry Creek. It was there that I found my passion for G/T, leading me to switch elementary schools in an effort to work in that field. However, that move had a more unexpected outcome. Instead of my dream job, I found another dream, my husband. He was a 5^th grade teacher at the new school I was working at. In fact, the first time we met, was the day he interviewed me for my teaching position there. This is still a source of constant amusement and teasing from our families and friends.

At the same time, I was no closer to being able to have my dream job of working full time with gifted students. That is, until I got an email from a former colleague about the Discovery positions open here at REMS.

I made the move down to Douglas County; and though I am not anywhere near where the dreams of my youth directed me; I am exactly where I know I am supposed to be.

Other fun facts the might/might not surprise you

-I love heavy metal and hard rock music

-Though very type A outside of home, I am the relaxed parent willing to say, “She’s fine…it was just a little bump”

-While I camped as a kid it is not an activity that I would chose to do on my own time (ironic with the 6^th grade voyage I know).

-Math is my least favorite subject to teach

-As a kid I played ice and floor hockey

-My instrument(s) of choice is the drums

-I love to climb and have since I was a kid

-I am dyslexic (I am NOT the “go to” person to ask how to spell)

-I love musicals and plays but hate concerts

-If you ever are able to sneak up on me in my classroom during work time, don’t be surprised to find me singing and dancing away while working around the room, or I might be on top of some piece of furniture to be able to reach and staple things to the ceiling. I have often had to chase people that walked in, look for me, and walk right out again.

-Family is everything to me

-I was lucky enough to grow up with 3 sets of great grandparents, as well as my 4^th great grandmother. In fact it wasn’t until I was 16 that any of them passed away. While all of my grandfathers have passed on, all 3 of my grandmothers (one is a step grandma but was never considered so) are still alive and in there 80s.

-My mom’s side of the family (is huge) keeps growing by leaps and bounds. Last year we actually did try to count how many of us there were from Grandma, down to the great grand kids. We gave up around 52, because we knew we were missing someone. Funny thing is, we are all really close. We still have Thanksgiving, Christmas and 4^th of July together at one of the aunt’s house. It’s absolute chaos and I wouldn’t change it for anything.

-I hate reality television

-I have three vices: Really good champagne, a hot bubble bath, and romance novels (especially with vampires and other supernatural characters in them).

Peek Into the Life of Our School