Morning Meeting

Morning Meeting

The morning meeting was one component that was rated by our staff as very important to the success of the academic and social goals we have for Holiday Park. So, without much PD we are jumping in feet first.

Hopefully this document will help. At the bottom there are links to some articles and videos that should be helpful as well. Please remember that the morning meeting will be part of our day for the entire year. This practice does not stop after the first 9 days. This will be one of the most important parts of our day as we develop relationships with our students and learn to “see” potential triggers or concerns first thing in the morning, which will allow us to be more proactive than reactive.

The Four Components of the Morning Meeting:

1.Greeting:

Children greet each other by name, often including handshaking, clapping, singing, and other activities.

2.Sharing:

Students share some news of interest to the class and respond to each other, practicing communication skills and learning about one another.

3.Group Activity:

The whole class does a short activity together, building class cohesion through active participation.

4. News and Announcements:

Students develop language skills and learn about the events in the day ahead by reading and discussing a daily message posted on a chart by their teacher.

Morning Meeting - Article

https://www.responsiveclassroom.org/what-is-morning-meeting/

Kinder morning meeting - Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bA7Rz1OkHbM

1^st grade morning meeting - Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFeCZX0EF-c

2^nd grade morning meeting - Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZQVVhueego

3^rd grade morning meeting - Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMctALPpLF4

4^th grade morning message - Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qjqh_HKiDXk

5^th grade morning meeting - Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibpx7YqDDbc

Meetings vary from teacher to teacher and class to class, each meeting reflecting the style and flavor of the students & teachers.

Week One Goals

Holiday Park Week One Goals:

Goals;

1      Students and Teachers will know each others names

2     Students and Teachers will be able to name some interests and out-of-school activities or experiences of their classroom students

3     Students will know basic expectations for, and will successfully perform, the following routines of the school day with close teacher supervision and reinforcement:

Arrival procedures

Transitions in class

Lining up and moving through the hallway and walkways

Bathroom procedures

Recess procedures

Activity/quiet/work times

Lunch procedures

Teacher signals

Work-sharing

Whole group meetings

Class Cleanup

Personal organization skills for desk and backpack

Dismissal

4     Students and teacher will name and share their hopes and       dreams for the school year.

5     Students will generate ideas and procedures for using basic tools and materials for reading, math, art, recess, writing, and other open-ended activities.

6     Each child will have presented her/his work to the group and least two or three times

7     Children’s art, writing, and personal artifacts will be displayed around the room

Welcome Back

Welcome 2016 - 2017 School Year

Hello new school year! We are so glad you are here. Holiday Park has spent the summer preparing for the return of our children and staff.  We have spent time learning, preparing, cleaning, making, doing, resting, laughing, and dreaming of our new year together.

We welcome our new teachers to the Cartwright District on July 25, 2016. It is with great excitement that we welcome a group of amazing educators to Holiday Park. We have been extremely blessed this year with a group of caring and passionate new educators that are anxious to get to know our school, students, and community. Each bring a renewed passion for teaching and the most up-to-date learning strategies to our school and we are very grateful that they chose Holiday Park to teach at.

We are also very blessed to have a core group of returning teachers that are committed to our community and our students. They have been working hard all summer to prepare for the return of our students. Our returning teachers are perhaps the best group of teachers any school could hope for. The passion, commitment, knowledge, and heart they have for our students, families, and their learning is contagious! Thank you to each of you for all of your hard work and your steadfast commitment to children.

On Friday, August 5th, from 5:00 - 6:30 we will have a parent meeting in the library. The focus of the meeting will be centered around the environment in which our students learn. We are committed to provide a safe a nurturing learning space for each student and would like to share research and strategies that will allow every child at Holiday Park to thrive and learn. We will introduce our new school counselor, our social curriculum from the MindUp foundation, our partnership with Southwest Behavioral Services, and a short presentation from Phoenix Children's Hospital. This meeting is crafted for our parents and adult caregivers, the content is aimed at informing adults and engaging adult conversation. There will be limited childcare available. Please call the office at 623-691-4500 for more information.

On Monday, August 8th, we will hold a "meet the teacher" event from 3:00 - 4:30 p.m. You are welcome to come meet the teachers and staff of Holiday Park. We look forward to your visit and helping you find the teachers and classrooms assigned to your child/children.

Tuesday, August 9th, is the first day of school. The campus opens at 7:30 and breakfast is served in each classroom from 7:45 to 8:00. School officially starts at 8:00. Students are considered tardy at 8:10. We are a closed campus, therefore, we lock our campus gates at 8:15 and all adults must enter and leave through the office after the gates are locked.

If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to stop by the school and speak with the administration. At times, it may be necessary to schedule a meeting, other times administration may be available immediately. Each day and situation are different and we appreciate your flexibility and support. 

Great things are happening at Holiday Park and we are honored to serve our students and community.

 

Build, Facilitate, and Researach - The Holiday Park Way

Who are we? What to we stand for? Who do we serve? It seems that these questions should be easy to answer. We are an elementary school. We are teachers and educators. We stand for excellence in learning. We serve our community. Simple. Yet so complicated. Who are we? Most of us would say teachers or educators, which is what we have defined as our job title. While teaching is part of what we do, I am not sure it defines our role in today’s educational system. With the current focus on accountability and budget, it is easy to loose track of why we wanted to work with children. Most of us, deep down inside, understand that children have remarkable curiosity, wonder, and thirst for learning.

We, collectively,  are much more than teachers. We are builders, facilitators, and researchers. As builders, we are responsible to build opportunities everyday for our students to learn, to feel safe, and to learn how to communicate successfully with those around us. As facilitators, we must know, at all times, the pulse of those we are working with. This makes it necessary to “present” at all times and in all situations with our students. As researchers, we must observe, hypothesize, and document what we are observing. We focus our observations on our students and their learning.

Master Builders and Designers, what makes them great? They have a vision for what they want to see happen. They think the design through very carefully. They consider all aspects of the design. They plan very carefully. They go over their plans very carefully, and then they have their colleagues’ go over their plans to get further feedback. They leave nothing to chance. Every aspect of the plan is thought of. As the design is being built, masters in this field observe what is happening. Checking over plans along the way. Trusting other experts in the field. Celebrating along the way.

Great Facilitators, what makes them great? They understand that they are responsible to connect with their participants. They gather information about the group. They practice, over and over, what they want the desired outcome to be. They respect their participants and know that the participants are the actual drivers of the learning. Great facilitators move flexibly throughout their delivery based on the feedback they receive from the participants. They understand that the participants need and want to construct their own understandings and truths. They enjoy leading them through this process.

Great Researchers, what makes them great? They understand the focus of their job. What are they trying to find out? For us, we know that our students and how they are interacting with their learning is our job. Researchers need to document what they observe. Every observation has the ability to drive the hypothesis of the researcher if they are present in the moment and aware of what they are observing. This documentation is then studied. Documentation is posted and made public amongst other researchers. It is questioned, hypothesized about, and discussed in groups of experts passionate about the focus. Plans are made for action and then the process starts again.

Give the above information, it is clear that we must plan our design for learning, facilitate the learning with excellence, and document what we observe with an understanding that this in necessary to reflect and improve. We must be willing to share our documentation and create a plan of action together. This is the only way to learn and grow together.

As we begin our week, let’s be very mindful of our job. Each day requires a plan, a design, to build every opportunity for learning. As facilitators, we must respect our participants (students), which require us to be aware of our interactions with them. Are we guiding them in a safe and motivating way? Are we regulating our responses to ensure a better outcome for our participants? Observing and documenting what we observe is a necessary part of our job. How often do we take notes during the learning? Are we purposeful about documenting our observations?

Our path is clear at Holiday Park. We are builders, facilitators, and researchers. Go Roadrunners!

  

Welcome November

Holiday Park is excited to welcome in the month of November. Why? Because we know that the long hot days of summer are behind us. We have had several months to get into the swing of the new school year and we know we still have time to positively impact the students of Holiday Park.

This quarter brings us the ability to collect our weekly reading data and align it with our RCBM data on reading. This is exciting as we plan our intervention and enrichment groups with our students. We are also close to 100% on board with Engage New York as our primary math resource. Very exciting as this resource has proven successful in school after school across the United States.

November also brings the exciting addition of Micro-Society to our Project Child classrooms. These students are so impressive. Starting with their work ethic, their continuous progress, and the level of commitment from their teachers, we know great things are ahead. As they start the micro-society program, we are excited to see how “real life” application starts to excite and engage our students. Thank you Project Child for starting this initiative. We will do everything possible to support you.

Just one more thought… It is important to mention the amazing qualities of the Holiday Park staff. Each day is challenging, yet each day I see staff members arrive with smiles on their faces anxious to see the students and start the day. Holiday Park has a committed and passionate staff that does everything they can for the students each day. Thank you does not seem sufficient, but is owed to each and every staff member. Thank you.

Belong, Connect, Engage

We all know how important belonging is to each of us. From the time we are born, we are hard wired to seek out a sense of belonging and connection. We also know this is specifically true for the students at our schools. The sense of belonging is so strong that research tells us it is very difficult for students to learn when they do not feel they belong. So… what can we do? As a school we know we only have control over our school community and environment. But, that is huge. We have the opportunity to make sure each student feels a strong sense of belonging and is connected to at least one adult at school.

As a school we understand how important it is to start each day new again. We have committed to greet each student at the door every morning. Not just a greeting, a genuine and personal greeting. It is the first step in each child’s sense of belonging. As we work together to set the tone for the day, we are also building a strong relationship with our students that will manifest itself for each student by increasing their willingness and ability to learn,

As a school, we have also agreed that screaming, yelling, sarcasm, cruel and unkind words, and humiliation are not in the best interest of students and will not happen in our classrooms. We are working very hard to continue to have conversations with each other to monitor our tone and affect because we believe our kids deserve it.

Each of us, from classroom teacher to cafeteria worker, comes to work each day for one reason. That reason is we love kids. Our staff is committed to our kids and we all work hard, everyday, to ensure their sense of belonging. We are working on putting together a video that shows our morning greetings. This will be the first of many video opportunities that will showcase what we do and who we are at Holiday Park.

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Welcome Back

Welcome back staff, students, and parents of Holiday Park. With fall break now behind us, our focus is on student achievement and learning. With our much-needed break over, we are retuning rested and recharged to make every day one that is filled with thinking and learning for our students.

We are very excited to meet with our parents and community members next week for parent-teacher conferences. It is at this time that we get to know our families and they get to know us a little better. Thinking about our families and what they expect from us is the best way for us to start off our 2^nd quarter of learning.

Recent research identifies the major areas that parents find most important in their child’s school. Listed first and foremost is the desire for the school to have a solid core curriculum in reading and math. After reading and math, opportunities for science and technology learning are a close second. Parents also indicate the desire for their children to have good study habits, strong critical thinking skills, and excellent verbal and written communication skills.  Thinking about our school and the direction we are going, we can speak to each of these expectations as we work to meet the expectations of our parents.

Solid Core Curriculum in Reading and Math –

We are very pleased to say that the district GVC is helping us to guarantee a solid curriculum across content areas. We have focused as a school on our framework for reading and are seeing very good results across the grade levels. This framework has given us common language to guide our conversations and PD opportunities. We are working together as a site to commit to the math framework Engage New York. This will be exciting and I have heard from so many of you how excited you are to take this on. 

Science and Technology –

We have implemented our science curriculum with the help of the district GVC. Each team, in an effort to ensure that science instruction is happening in each class, has allocated instructional time in their schedules.

We are working to open up the computer lab for students to start using Successmaker for math and reading for both intervention and grade level learning opportunities. We will continue to have conversations about integrating more opportunities for technology into our students learning day whenever possible.

Good Study Habits –

It is very important for us to focus on our fluency homework for quarter two. Not only is the homework beneficial for each student and their reading fluency, it helps prepare the students for study habits that will positively impact them the rest of their lives. Please make sure that you have a system in your classroom to check homework, seek out support from parents who’s children are not completing the work, and telling all students that the homework club is in the morning in the library at 7:15.

Strong Critical Thinking –

We are working as a school to implement Depth of Knowledge across all grade levels and content areas. We are focusing on 1^st grade right now and then will take what we learn with this grade level and move it to other grade levels to implement. Ensuring that we are offering level 2 and level 3 thinking opportunities daily to our students will give them multiple opportunities to engage in critical thinking throughout the day.

Excellent Verbal and Written Communication Skills –

This is one area that we need to address as a school. It is very important to our parents and necessary for our student’s success that we design and implement verbal communication lessons for our students. While we do focus on language in our school, the purposeful teaching of verbal communication and presentation is not something that we have implemented as of yet. This is an exciting opportunity for us to reflect on this and come together as a staff to provide these opportunities for our students.  I look forward to seeing how this develops over time for us.

You might want to talk with your parents and students about the above during your parent-teacher conferences next week. As the above areas have been identified as important by most parents, it is a perfect opportunity for us to share the great things happening at Holiday Park and our desire to continue to improve.