Is it too late to wish you all a happy Halloween? :)
Good afternoon, Arts Fam!
Welcome to the first Friday of the crazy month of November.
Here are some things to know while planning your lessons for students:
- There are 14 educational days in November- know that there will only be ONE full week of school.
- Plan knowing there will be a feeling of "short week" with the kids-
- K-5- this may mean you are missing a cohort of kids two times this month (Friday classes?).
- 6-8- this may mean that you see your Tue and Friday kids less than the rest- be ready to either "abridge" a task or add an extension task to the kids you see on Mon/Wed/Thu.
- 9-12- seeing your kids daily, you may not have as much of a clunky feel to the month, but it's still bound to be a little weird, not gonna lie :)
- So, how do we get in front of this? Consistency, engagement, being human.
- Be consistent- the honeymoon is over, people! LOL, really though. Kids have settled into your routines, don't let go of those- it's November-December that test the most skilled of teachers in terms of behavior.
- Frontload expectations. Reminders for students help eliminate redirections later on.
- Engagement- we have been working on Identity as a 6-12 team, and will branch out and share this work Tuesday afternoon with the K-5 team. OUR KIDS WANT TO FIND ASPECTS OF THEMSELVES IN YOUR CURRICULUM. Think about how you can do that as they acquire content specific skills.
- Being human- remember, your kids learn from you 24/7- not just how to hold a brush, cut paper, paint, draw, act, sculpt, perform, but also how to respond, how to have patience, how to be welcoming, accepting, how to persevere, how to learn new things. I bumped into an old student I had in the early 2000's last night, and she reminded me of a couple of things she learned from me, and none of them dealt with the actual content. Reflecting, it reminded me of the hat we wear as adults in the lives of our impressionable kids. That's a BIG HAT. And you wear the heck out of it.
- Don't take things personally. Many of our students at times make poor choices. Know that this is not something that is targeting you (if a student has a less than stellar interaction with you) personally. Be consistent, be a model of what you want them to see, even when it's hard.
- ELL Stuff:
- This week, an interesting movement in Boston regarding ELL education was captured in THIS article. Check it out.
- For teachers with newcomer ELL students.. Have you ever said to yourself, I wish I knew how to get to my ELL kids who hardly speak English? Here are a list of Teacher Moves (common teacher sayings) that you can PRINT, POST enlarged, SELECT and USE.. Up to you. Saying these phrases in a language other than English does two things:
- Engages ELL students in direct guidance in a language that is familiar to them
- Allows English speakers to acquire basic Spanish or Portuguese phrases
- PD Day:
- Tuesday is a full day PD Day! So, how does this work?
- 8-9 AM is prep time, so please come to Durfee building, and find a place to use your prep. Be ready for a 9 AM start in session 1 (your choice from doc). The Culturally Relevant Task Planning group will start together and then break out into two groups.
- 11:30-12:30 is lunch- bring a lunch or buy a lunch- there is a NY Bagel, McDonalds, Papa Gino's or Dao Market all in the plaza across the street.
- 12:30-3- Session 2: for this session, we will be working on Culturally Responsive Task Planning or TAB Teaching. The first group will start together and then break off into art and music groups.
- Make sure you register in TeachPoint!
Have a wonderful weekend,
Jackie
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