Gator Run Friday Focus - October 16, 2015

I am so excited that the District has decided to add teachers to our principal learning experiences this year.  All of the academic departments have coordinated training that will focus on early literacy and numeracy.  So each principal has a Kindergarten and a 1st grade teacher joining them for a 1/2 day once a month.  Crystal Coyle and Tristan Hanley will be participating for our school.   We visited Westwood Heights Elementary this past Tuesday.  We discussed how we are implementing the shifts in reading and math in our schools and we also visited several classrooms. The group will be meeting at Gator Run next month on November 3rd.  I will let you know which classrooms we will be visiting beforehand.

A special thanks to our 4th grade team for their efforts with our Student Council and to Coach Cliff for his work with our Safety Patrol.  Major kudos to Mrs. Bryce, Ms. Fanella, Mrs. Mitchel, and Mrs. Sherwood for their work in putting together the Induction Ceremony for our Student Council and Safety Patrol.  Our students felt important and our parents were very impressed.  Amazing stuff ladies!

If you haven't updated your hallway bulletin boards recently, please so so.  We always need current student work displayed. 

Article of the Week - Formative, Summative, Interim: Putting Assessment in Context  My principal sub-cadre group is working on formative assessments as our learning focus for this year.  I think that this is a good article to ensure that we know which assessments should be used for each purpose. 

Next Week at a Glance:

• NESS Meeting on Monday at 2:15 in Mrs. Heyman's room.
• Next Wednesday is Wear Pink Day.  Let your students know!
• Kids of Character names are due to Ms. Felton by Wednesday.
• Thursday is an Early Release Day.  We have a Faculty Focus scheduled for that day from 1:15 until 3:00.  Del Vecchio's will be providing lunch that afternoon.
• Friday is a Planning Day.  Ms. Felton and I will be meeting with some of our grade level teams that morning.  Details to come at the beginning of next week.  

Quote of the Week:  "Failure is an event, not a person. Yesterday ended last night. Today is a brand new day...and it's yours." ~ Zig Ziglar.  Always remember this for yourself and please work to teach this to our students.