Flex

We are labeled a SINA school at Riverside Elementary. We are a School In Need of Assistance. That statement can be quite deflating, but it shouldn't be. I challenge you to find a school that isn't in need of assistance and/or couldn't make improvements. We're all works in progress.

In fact, I could argue that there are several hidden benefits of being a SINA school. 1) It draws our attention to the group of students that we need to give extra supports. 2) It forces us to develop a plan for improvement. 3) It gives our school a little bit of extra money that allows us to enhance some of the things that we do.

This year our SINA plan now includes a component that addresses Response to Intervention (RTI). I am not going to go into detail explaining RTI, a simple Google search for RTI will return many hits to give you that information. Just know that RTI is a systematic method of delivering interventions to students, and that RTI is trending (for good reason) in education.

Last year, the Highland CSD's administration team studied Simplifying Response to Intervention, written by Mike Mattos. After the administration's learning from the book, Mr. Armstrong was generous to purchase the book for all of our teachers throughout the District.

This September, Riverside Elementary was fortunate enough to use a portion of our SINA money and send our Building Leadership Team to Cedar Rapids to hear the RTI expert himself, Mike Mattos.

A portion of the time spent with Mattos in Cedar Rapids was devoted to formulating a plan to create systematic interventions at our school. Coordinating a systematic block of time throughout the building for interventions isn't easy work to do, due to the logistics of scheduling, but it is the right work to do. Nonetheless, over the course of two days, we had brainstormed an idea as to how this might look at Riverside Elementary. Through multiple meetings spent developing this idea, by the end of September, we had a plan that we felt comfortable with.

 

What we came up with were Flex teams/Flex time. Our rationale for the Flex title is three-fold 1) students are going to get stronger, 2) groups will be flexible, and 3) our plan/process will be flexible, too. A note outlining the details of this should have come home with students on Friday, October 25th (below is a link to that note).
Introducing Flex - Google Doc

We're aware that this will be a work in progress. It is a starting point. As we begin, and as we go we will make adjustments to improve our plan/process. Nonetheless, the implications that this has in regards to student learning is exciting and that has us excited!

Pucker Up!

Last year, after our students reached our fundraising goal from our walk-a-thon, I spent a day working from the roof of the school. This was unappealing to me as I suffer from Acrophobia, more commonly known as a fear of heights, which encompasses a climbing ladders. Getting from the ladder to the roof, and then later from the roof to the ladder took some courage on my behalf. Otherwise, spending the day on the roof wasn't too bad (despite the cool mid-autumn temperatures).


This year, I agreed to kiss a pig if our students reached our fundraising goal from our walk-a-thon. In hindsight, I think I'd rather spend multiple days on the roof as opposed to kissing a pig. Tomorrow is the day that I am scheduled to kiss a pig. I am not excited about this, and I become less excited about this with each passing moment as my famous 'kiss-heard-'round-the-school' approaches.

However, saying that our students are excited about this is an understatement.

Everywhere I go, I am a distraction. I walked into a second grade classroom, and one of the students who was listening to a story on the computer blurted out, "You're gonna kiss a pig." The student was listening to an audio story with headphones on so she did not realize just how loud she was shouting. This announcement brought more, similar announcements so I decided it was best for the students' learning if I just left the classroom.

Last Friday, I was paged to Mrs. Swain's classroom; I walked down the hall anticipating the situation that I would be entering. I walked into the dark classroom, and the students were seated in a circle around the teacher. It was Ukelele Friday. I had been invited to listen to 18 giggling, smiling, first graders singing the songs that they had created, 'If you're happy and you know it kiss a pig' and 'Mr. Ewald kissed a pig, E-I-E-I-O.'

Our third graders are learning about different types of communities - urban, suburban, and rural. Students are in groups creating visual representations of these communities. Yesterday, a group of students approached me at lunch to ask for a small photo of myself so that they could place the picture in the pigpen that they had designed in their rural community.

I did however, have a small fraction of students who were empathetic towards my cause. I even heard one story from Mr. J how when it was announced how close the students were to meeting their goal, a student spoke-up to her classmates and said that $8K-some was more than enough money and that their fundraising efforts should cease in-order to protect my best interest. Kids are the best! This was the minority, though; it was not the popular consensus.

$9K is a lot of money. Kudos to our students, parents, families, and community members who contributed to this. Your support is appreciated by us at the school. Your support allows our ESO to do things like purchase iPads for all of our teachers. Your support allows the students to experience excitement leading up to, and the euphoria of seeing their principal kiss a pig. Thank you, sincerely.

We'll be sure to post pictures of this 'event' so that everyone can share the students' delight.