Monday Mustang Memo: March 2019

Sunday, March 24, 2019

Keith Lenz's Halo Effect

Ideas in Education: Keith Lenz’s Halo Effect

Keith Lenz suggests that we can better understand our students and better plan lessons if we use the HALO method, meaning we consider how High, Average, Low, and Other achieving students will experience the learning that we are planning. Lenz recommends imagining the faces of your students as you plan your lessons.

Some things to consider:

What are the learning intentions and acceptable levels of mastery for all student groups?
What are some possible areas of confusion?
What prior knowledge, skills, and vocabulary will students need?
What levels of scaffolding and supports are going to be needed?
How can I accelerate student learning?
What’s an appropriate level of struggle for this lesson?
How can I make this relevant, relatable and rigorous?
What will I use--and students use--to assess and monitor their progress?

What are some questions that you ask yourself in lesson planning?

Ideas in Education: A Follow Up to 3 Things We Must Do in Every Lesson...And They Can Be Done in Five Minutes

Last week I wrote about the necessity of sharing the learning target within the first five minutes of class. I’m going to correct myself. There are lessons where sharing the learning target ruins the suspense or the novelty of learning and/or detracts from the learning experience. This might be a discovery lesson or a lab for example.

Important Dates and Information

Interested in Offering a New Course for 2020-2021?

Please submit your request by Spring Break using this https://www2.k12albemarle.org/dept/dart/enterpriseapps/powerschool/course-requests/Pages/default.aspx . Requests will be reviewed by Mr. Vrhovac and, if approved, it will be assigned to a lead coach for further development. From there it will be collaboratively developed and will need approval by the Dept. of Instruction and finally the School Board.

March 28: ½ day students, PD in afternoon

1pm meeting in forum
1:30-3:30pm CRT teams
Read chapter 7 before meeting.
Key concepts: Academic mindset, mindset shift, growth mindset, fixed mindset
Be prepared to discuss: What have you done to either teach or embrace a growth mindset? AND In the past, what have been your “go to” strategies for helping students regain confidence in their learning?
Please bring your book as we will explore chapter 8 together in our CRT teams.

March 29: Flex Day

Prom April 13: Ms. Stott is looking for chaperones and supervision help. There are 2 shifts: 8-9:30 and 9:30-11. Areas needed: ticket check, bathroom supervision, outside areas, parking lot. This year’s prom is at the Holiday Inn on Emmet St.

April 8 from 11:30-1: ACPS technology department is seeking feedback and ideas from students and educators about technology and learning. Members of LEAD’s leadership team will be here to have these conversations. If you’re not able to stop by during this time or you have a concern or question you would like addressed, please email John Mitchem or me.

April 11 (9am): Grades and Special Education Progress Reports Due

April 12 (9am): Potential Senior Failure Form Due This form will enable school counselors and administrators to support your efforts to get our seniors across the stage. We ask that all teachers complete this form even if you don’t have any seniors in jeopardy of failing.

Field Trips and SOLs

March 26: Rising Freshman Tour

March 27-29: AVID College Tour

March 30: NOVA Teen Book Festival

April 9: Tom Tom Festival

April 15-19: VPT (Virginia Placement Test/PVCC)

April 25: PVCC Onsite Admissions

Shout Outs

Cinderella’s Closet raised over $2000! For comparison sakes, last year the total was under $1000 and the year before under $1200. Huge shout out to Shamika Terrell, Nikki Eubanks and our PTSO!

Our varsity volleyball coach Meg Carpenter Laughlin organized the first annual volleyball jamboree with proceeds going to The Haven. It was a great event and fun was had by all. Thanks to participating staff: Corey Hunt, Lisa Bendall, Sam Wright, Chris Stanek, Veronica Price-Thomas, John Mitchem, Deandra McDonald, Lauren Thomas, Derek Frazier, and Paige Pippin.

Also on Friday night was our Jazz and Casino Night. Great job of organizing by Katherine Williams and our Music Boosters and a hat tip to bassist Paul Jones.

Birthdays

March 27: Leta Johnson

March 28: Hank Atkins

March 29: Jeannette Stott

March 30: Lydie Omesiete

April 5: Gwen Reynolds

April 9: Shannon Mound

Useful Information

Bell Schedules : http://bit.ly/MOHSbells

FAC Form

To add to Monticello-Outlook, School Calendar, PowerSchool Daily Bulletin

Morning Announcement Stream: http://streaming.k12albemarle.org/ACPS/links.htm

Announcement Request

Athletic team schedules, rosters, etc.

Teacher Handbook

We’ve got something new! Want something included on the Monticello Outlook Calendar, the Monticello website, in the PowerSchool Daily Bulletin, or the student newsletter (viewed by parents, students and staff)? Please use this link https://goo.gl/forms/bIjfJLKokWPcEHx33

Student, Staff, Student of the Month Form

Worth Your Time

How college admissions really work: if the college admissions scandal shocked you, read this

There are better ways to assess students than standardized tests; these schools are using them with success

No one likes the SAT. It’s still the fairest thing about admissions.

The warm demander: how to raise student expectations (and have students rise to meet them) Angela Watson’s blog, books and podcasts are definitely worth following!

½ Day Bell Schedule

8:55-9:45

9:50-10:35

10:40-11:25

11:30-12:50

Lunch	Class Time	Teachers/Who
Lunch 1 11:25-11:55	12:00-12:50	Pippin, Reynolds, Rocco, Schafer, Bendall, Di Battista, Eddy, Eisenhauer, Fisher, Haney, Lipscomb, McClung, Parsons, Redd, Ritchie
Lunch 2 11:55-12:25	11:30-11:55 and 12:25-12:50	Ayres, Frazier, Hatchett, Huneycutt, Inman, Jennings, Kai, Keith, Stanek, Thomas, Trent, Wade, Waters, Wilkerson, Williams,
Lunch 3 12:25-12:50	11:30-12:25	Bradley, D. Brown, R. Brown, Clark, Colgan, Dudley, Easton, Garland, Lindemann, McDaniel, Michel, Parks, Price-Thomas, Rowanhill, Stott, Timms

On January 18, all CATEC students will be at CATEC ALL day. Return by 12:25 for lunch.

On March 28, all CATEC students will remain at Monticello ALL day

Sunday, March 17, 2019

3 Things We Must Do in Every Lesson...And They Can Be Done in 5 Minutes

mohsmustangmemo.blogspot.com

Ideas in Education: 3 Things We Must Do in Every Lesson...And They Can Be Done in Five Minutes

After greeting students as they walk into the class, I firmly believe that the first couple of minutes are the most important. We should aim to provide a structure and a purpose to the rest of the lesson. The following three teaching strategies can all be accomplished in 5 minutes and check out the effect sizes on student learning.

Strategy	Examples	Marzano or Hattie Effect Size
Recall prior learning using questions Primes the brain and links new learning with previously learned information. Enables the teacher to pre-assess what the students already know and accordingly modify instruction on the fly. Provides structure for the lesson. Student answers, whether correct or incorrect, can be referred to throughout the lesson.	History: Today we’re looking at the role alliances played in the start of World War I. What’s an alliance? Can you think of examples from your life or from history where alliances caused problems? English: We’re going to look to at using commas to offset appositives. Can you tell me some other examples of when you use commas? Math: Standard deviation is to measure how spread out numbers are. To figure out standard deviation, we need to be able to use mean, squared differences and square roots. What can you tell me about those? World Languages: Today we’re going to learn how to conjugate -ir verbs. What were the rules for conjugating -ar and -er verbs? What are some -ir verbs?	.93
Give structure for the new learning in graphic form Graphic organizers can help students learn complex topics. They are particularly helpful when the lesson involves difficult learning whether this is because there are multiple steps or the topic is potentially confusing. Graphic organizers can provide an overview at the beginning of the lesson and help in regards to both whole-to-parts and parts-to-whole learning. Graphic organizers help all students, but they are especially helpful for students with disabilities, ELLs, and they make learning visible.	For any subject: Before teaching, determine what graphic organizer would best serve this lesson. Create a completed graphic organizer. Minimize the graphic organizer to just the basic structures. Have students complete the graphic organizer throughout their learning. How this is best done depends on the lesson and the learning.	.48-1.3
Set a learning goal Set a goal with high expectations that students are able to work towards and see their progress. Referring back to the goal throughout the lesson is always helpful. This may be as simple as including the goal on various slides in your presentation. It could also mean showing how students are progressing towards the learning goal.	Examples of learning goals stems: I am going to ask you to… By the end of class today, you are going to be able to… (Present a scenario/problem) Let’s find out what happened and why? Let’s see how we can figure this out? Your task today is to… (Share an exemplar and/or non-exemplar). You are going to be able to produce a ____ that will have all the characteristics we just identified.	.97+

Often the best hooks and introductions will take more than five minutes. lesson’s hook will take more than five minutes. Often the transition to a new lesson will take place in the middle of a class.

Important Dates and Information

March 19 @ 9:45 Tornado Drill

**March 19: 20th anniversary planning meeting @8:15 in Katina’s room, any and all who are interested

March 20 come learn about Hypderdocs. HyperDocs are a strong, transformative lesson design. Think of it as a package… a way to curate instructional content and learning experiences in a way that engages learners. Come learn how this might be used in your classroom to give students the opportunity to engage, explore, explain, apply, share, and reflect. RSVP

**March 21: Faculty meeting at 8:15

Interested in Offering a New Course for 2020-2021?

**March 28: ½ day students, PD in afternoon

March 29: Flex Day

**Prom April 13: Ms. Stott is looking for chaperones and supervision help. There are 2 shifts: 8-9:30 and 9:30-11. Areas needed: ticket check, bathroom supervision, outside areas, parking lot. This year’s prom is at the Holiday Inn on Emmet St.

Before spring break ACPS will be sending out an email to families reminding them of the homework policy, which includes no homework should be assigned over breaks. When we return from spring break, students will be asked to complete a survey about homework. This is part of the county’s continued efforts to address mental wellness for our students. The entire policy and belief statement is included below and is included in the teacher manual.

We’re looking for two teachers to attend the Teacher Advisory Committee meeting on April 16 4:30-6 at Cale. If you’re interested, please email Mr. Vrhovac. In the new model, they are rotating teachers for the various sessions (winter, spring, fall).

Field Trips and SOLs

March 19: Global Health Case Competition

March 26: Rising Freshman Tour

March 27-29: AVID College Tour

March 30: NOVA Teen Book Festival

April 9: Tom Tom Festival

Birthdays

March 18: Adam Levine

March 19: William Jennings Bryan

March 20: Fred Rogers

March 21: Gary Oldman

March 22: Anthony van Dyck