Student Leaders pt.4 - 2nd Quarter SAT

I've talked at length, this year, about our Student Advisory Teams at Riverside Elementary School. How we've created two teams (one made-up of kindergarten, first grade, and second grade students, and another made-up of third, fourth, and fifth grade students) of student leaders who are given the opportunity to advocate for changes that they'd like to see at Riverside Elementary. As we approach the conclusion of the second quarter, I wanted to share some of the major contributions that this team has been responsible for implementing.

K-2 SAT

• Expressed a desire to have a pajama day. They drafted the note that was sent home communicating this.
  
• As a result of the positive feedback that we received from our pajama day, we are having a red and green color day on the last day of school before winter break. They, also, drafted the note that will be sent home communicating this.
  
• Planned and announced a chunk of 15-20 minutes where everyone in our school was to stop, drop, and read.
  
• Requested opportunities to work with the older students in our building. This led to the younger students being paired with older students to assist them in drafting their letters that they were writing to Santa Claus for our local newspaper(s)
  
• Our goal is to pair all of our classrooms within our school to consistently and regularly allow opportunities for our younger and older students to read and write with each other (much like our kindergarten and fifth grade classes have already been doing)

3-5 SAT

• Creating and planning a YouTube channel. This is definitely a work in progress. (The members of this team will have the option to continue to regularly meet to plan how and what we share to YouTube.) So far, we have added videos of our students competing in an ice cube challenge that took place during our mindset assemblies for students grades two through five and birthday announcements. Going forward we've talked about how we can use this as a platform to enhance how we make our announcements. We've also had initial discussion about how we could use YouTube to provide students the space to share about the books that they are reading.
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• Riverside Elementary - Highland CSD

I think that the most satisfying thing about the work that these Student Advisory Teams have accomplished during our second quarter has been their originality. Going into working with these teams, I was a little worried that they might simply want to duplicate the work of our first teams - plan and run an assembly and/or make some sort of a video. That did not happen. These teams had their own ideas. They had their own very good ideas.

A Minion Reasons To Be Thankful

The other day, there was student work in the hallway that caught my eye. I asked to participate in their creation. And then I asked about allowing the students the opportunity to publish their work via my blog in-order to enhance student voice and increase the reach of their audience. What follows is the work of our students in Mrs. Sulhoff's second grade classroom.

I am thankful for the teachers that keep us safe. Taylor

I am thankful for good food.
Lucas

I am thankful for teachers.
James

I am  thankful for lots of reading. Bri


I am thankful for the support at school.
Kael

I am thankful for the people that provide us lunch.
Logan

I am thankful for art. Cayden

I am thankful for learning. Aliscea

I am thankful for people who help me. Olivia

I am thankful the teachers.  Carsen

I am thankful for teachers. Pearl

I am thankful for the kids. Payton

I am thankful for a clean school. Brixton

I am thankful for...
  1. Teachers
  2. Learning
  3. Safety
  4. Art
  5. Math
Love,
 Ainsley

I'm thankful for the healthy food. Ayden

I am thankful for learning. Quincy


I am thankful for teachers because they help us learn! Hailey Netser

I am thankful for being safe. Graci

I'm thankful for P.E. because we get exercise. Wade

Thanks, Mrs. Sulhoff's class, for your awesome thinking and writing!

Mindset

"I can't do that."

"I give up."

"I'm not a good writer."

How many of you have children and/or students that have said these things? How many of you have said these things yourself? 

These are statements that come from a fixed mindset. People with a fixed mindset believe that intelligence is something that is determined at birth.  A fixed mindset causes us to give up easily and become frustrated with challenges. Having a fixed mindset can be an obstacle for learning. 

Contrary to a fixed mindset is a growth mindset. A growth mindset causes us to embrace mistakes and challenges as learning opportunities. A growth mindset is ideal for learning because of the belief that intelligence is something that is developed through hard work and effort. As a result, we are attempting to establish a growth mindset throughout Riverside Elementary School.



Several years ago, I read Dr. Carol Dweck's book, Mindset. As an educator, as a parent, and as a person I loved what this book had to say. My biggest takeaway after reading the book (for the first time) was to make every effort to no longer tell any child/student how smart he/she is.

I have started to re-read Mindset for a book study that I'm involved in with my Highland CSD administrative team, this fall.

Also this year, during guidance lessons, our students have been learning about mindset with our guidance counselor, Ms. DeLacy. She has been incorporating picture books such as The Dot and The Most Magnificent Thing into her teaching about mindset. It is neat to see the impact that these lessons are having on our students! Just earlier today, while playing some online math games with our third grade students, I made the mistake of stating how a task that was presented to me was impossible. I regretted my words after I was called out by one of the students who told me, "Mr. Ewald, that's a fixed mindset." 

And this week, Ms. DeLacy and myself planned and delivered some mindset professional development for the teachers at Riverside Elementary School. Due to the overwhelmingly positive response to our professional development, we are excited to be going forward with a mindset book study at our school. 

The following links are some of the resources that were shared to support the understanding of mindset and the implications that it can have on learning and teaching for our teachers: 

• The Power of Belief - Mindset and Success - Eduardo Briceno (TED talk)
• A Study on Praise and Mindsets - Dr. Carol Dweck (video)
• Developing a Growth Mindset - Dr. Carol Dweck (video)
• The Perils and Promises of Praise by Dr. Carol Dweck (ASCD article)
• Even Geniuses Work Hard by Dr. Carold Dweck (ASCD article)

There are almost an infinite amount of hits that return from a simple Google search re. Mindset. My (current) favorite is a blog posted to the Huffington Post written by the founder of the Khan Academy, Salman Khan - Why I'll Never Tell My Son He's Smart. 

There is great news shared, in Salman Khan's Huffington Post blog (linked, above), about how, "The research shows that just being exposed to the research itself for example knowing that brain grows most by getting questions wrong, not right can begin to change a person's mindset."

I'd like to conclude with something for you to reflect upon. Think about something that you used to be poor at, and are now good at. Think about what happened in-order to shift from being poor at something to being good at that same something. Chances are it was hard work and/or practice. That is an example of the growth mindset.

Student Leaders pt.3 - SAT Accomplishments

Our inaugural Student Advisory Teams have concluded their assignments. Prior to the formation of these teams, my only hopes were that we would 1) begin to develop students to take-on leadership roles within our school, and 2) begin to give students a voice in regards to the decisions that we make that impact our school. Unfortunately, I did not have a clear, detailed plan as to how we would accomplish either of those two things. Nonetheless, throughout the past two months, it has been an absolute pleasure to watch these teams of students brainstorm ideas and plan actions that could improve our school.

The Student Advisory Team comprised of kindergarten, first, and second grade students decided early-on that they wanted to find a way to minimize the distractions that occur in the classroom while students are on the playground at recess. What follows is the skit/video - A Recess Rules Reminder - that the K-2 Student Advisory Team created to share with each of the classrooms in our school.

Our third through fifth grade Student Advisory Team had a larger laundry list of upgrades that they wanted to see take place. Amongst the things that we were able to accomplish:

• Announcing student birthdays, weekly, over the intercom
• Allowing fifth grade students to get the first opportunity for seconds at lunch
• No longer prohibiting students from talking with their peers at lunch (we even incorporated music playing in the background for our students during lunch)
• Having more assemblies, which they planned and then led an assembly regarding caring for all of our K-5 students
• (They wanted to raise money for new recess equipment, but I informed them that our Elementary Support Organization was writing a grant as well as planning to use some of the money raised from our walk-a-thon for that purpose)

My hope is that these students will continue to take-on leadership roles within our school despite no longer being a part of our Student Advisory Teams.

I am excited about the two new Student Advisory Teams that will form within the next week.

Like last time, the plan will be to start by asking the new members of our student advisory teams to begin thinking about what they would change about our school if they had a magic wand with such powers. From there we will see what kinds of ideas they formulate that we can explore implementing.

Because after all, this school belongs to our students. It should be our obligation to make every effort to make our school the place that our students envision.

The Caring is Contagious poster that was designed to have every student in the school sign as their pledge to be caring.

Student Involved Conferences - Feedback

As most of you know, this fall, we upgraded the format of our conferences to a student-involved parent-teacher conference. Allowing our students a seat at the table - giving them a voice and then allowing them to hear the expectations, feedback, etc. of his/her teacher and parent(s) is a big shift. This change came with some negative feedback, but overall the response that I received was very positive. Personally, I feel as though our conferences were a huge success.

What follows is the data that was compiled from the feedback that we received after our conferences.

At the time of conferences, our K-5 student population was 198 students
The teachers at Riverside Elementary School conducted 194 conferences this fall

• 98% of our students had a conference

Of the 194 conferences, our students were involved in 183 conferences

• 94% of our conferences involved the student

12 teachers provided me with feedback after our fall student-involved parent-teacher conferences.
Of those teachers that provided feedback...

• 92% felt that having students at the conference was better
• 100% felt that the process for the new conference format was both clear and effective
• 50% felt that 15-minutes was an adequate amount of time for each conference
• 50% felt that more than 15-minutes was needed for each conference

62 parents provided me with feedback after our fall student-involved parent-teacher conferences.
Of those parents that provided feedback...

• 98% had their child attend his/her student-involved parent-teacher conference

• 60% felt that having students at the conference was better
• 25% felt that having students at the conference was no different
• 15% felt that having students at the conference was no worse
• 100% felt that the process for the new conference format was clear
• 89% felt that the process for the new conference format was effective
• 56% felt that 15-minutes was an adequate amount of time for each conference
• 44% felt that more than 15-minutes was needed for each conference

This process was new, and like anything that is new it was not perfect. Some of the things that we plan to take into consideration as we plan conferences for the future (based off of feedback received as well as personal reflection) include:

• Extending the length of the conference
• Holding conferences at an earlier time of night, especially for our younger students
• Increasing vigilance regarding the conference schedule
• Increasing vigilance regarding the length of the conference
• Including a transition time before and after each conference
• Clarifying the strengths, areas to improve upon, goals document that was sent home prior to conferences
• Giving parents more of a voice in regards to scheduling their conferences
• Providing some form of childcare during conference times

Each conference was an opportunity for everyone to practice this new format. Over time, practice leads to improvement. We are confident that this process will continue to improve as teachers, students, and parents continue to gain experience being involved in these conferences. Your patience through the growing pains is appreciated. This is something that we truly believe will benefit our students.

Student Leaders pt.2 - A Place at the Table

Our newly established Student Advisory Teams have met twice. (A reminder that we have one team comprised of kindergarten through second grade students, and another team that is third-fifth grade students - see 'Student Leaders,' which I originally blogged about on September 1st.) While we haven't accomplished much, yet, we have had some really good discussion and the students have generated some great ideas. These teams are literally giving our students a place at the table.

When I first informed the students that they had been selected for these teams, I gave them the assignment of beginning to think about what they would change about our school if they had a magic wand with such powers. At our first official meeting, we brainstormed ideas of the things that they wanted to see changed. We didn't rule anything out. All of their ideas were left on the table.

After two meetings, the first one spent brainstorming and the second one dedicated to narrowing down their list, the 3rd-5th grade team's list includes:

• Reducing  the restrictions that students have re. conversing with their peers during lunch
• Improving their lunch procedures/schedule
• Raising money for new playground equipment and more technology 
• Announcing birthdays, as well as other important events/reminders at the end of the day
• Desire for more assemblies that their Student Advisory Team will help plan/lead

It was so neat to listen to their ideas, as almost all of them were things that were already in the works!

Now I would be lying if I said that the Kindergarten-2nd grade team was being as productive as our 3rd-5th grade team. Nonetheless, I believe that the process is valuable for these students that are involved. It is beneficial for them to know that they have a voice when it comes to improving our school. It is beneficial for them to think about the things that they can do to improve our school. And it is beneficial for them to see how change is a process that takes time and work.

With all of that being said, this group of kindergarteners, first, and second graders has decided to focus on limiting the amount of distractions that occur inside our classrooms from outside (the major distraction being other kids playing at recess near classroom windows). I'm fairly impressed.

I realize that this is, unfortunately, a small percentage of our students that we are enabling with student voice. However, it is a starting point; a starting point that I hope to build upon. After all, Rome was not built in one day. Nonetheless, the excitement that I see from the involved students leads to my growing belief that this may, in fact, be an optimal method for beginning to increase our students' sense of ownership for what happens within the walls of their school.

Student Involved Conferences

We are very excited to announce that we are upgrading our conferences!

As we are continually working for our students to have more ownership of their learning, we think it is essential that they have a place at the table when conferences take place next week (Tuesday, September 23rd and Thursday, September 25th). What we are introducing is not a student led conference, but instead a student involved conference. The teacher will be the facilitator of the conversation, which will actively involve both the parent(s) and the student.

"Students - when given the chance - can prove remarkably insightful about the quality of their work and what they need to do to improve it."

- ‘Student Involved Conferences’ ASCD Education Update

"The conferences are about the children and their learning. They are about where the children have come from and where they are going. They are about how their parents and I can support their learning journey. It only makes sense for them to be there, too." 

- Kathy Cassidy, ‘Student-Led Parent Conferences: How They Work in My Primary Classroom”

We are encouraging parents to bring their child with them to his/her conference so that we can have a student involved conference.

The process for each conference will be as follows:

1. The teacher will ask parents if they have any questions/comments.
2. The teacher will review the process of the conference.
3. The student, then the parent, then the teacher share three strengths the student has demonstrated as a learner.
4. The student, then the parent, then the teacher share two areas the student needs to work on as a learner.
5. The student articulates goals (no more than two or three) for future work (with assistance, as needed, from the parents and the teacher). Each party pledges specific kinds of support for the goals.
6. The teacher answers questions, recaps, and concludes the conference.

Also, we ask that parents begin to give thought to the strengths and areas for growth that they feel their child has as a learner, as well as how to contribute to their academic improvement. As we finish-up benchmark testing in the areas of math, reading, and writing, expect those results to go home next Friday, September 19th. This will be information that may help parents when thinking about their child's strengths and areas for growth.

These conferences should take 15 minutes, and in an effort to respect everyone's time we will be vigilant of our time restrictions. If there are other "issues" that need addressed, we definitely want to offer the opportunity for a traditional meeting with the teacher. If, as a parent, this is the case, please let your child's teacher know.

This process will be new, and like anything new it will not be perfect from the onset. We appreciate patience as we implement this change, as we truly believe that it will benefit our students. Furthermore, we will invite parents the opportunity to give us feedback regarding their conference experience after conferences have taken place.

Thanks, and we look forward to this first round of conferences!

Student Leaders

Last February, my Superintendent gave all of the principals in our district a copy of Yong Zhao's World Class Learners. First of all, I would recommend this book in its entirety to anyone who has an interest in public education. However, my biggest take-away came from the following text as it became crystal clear to me that there was a need to establish some sort of leadership opportunity for our students at Riverside Elementary School.

"Student voice has a positive effect on the school culture, increased student engagement, and overall improvement in children's well-being." (Zhao, 2012, pp.183) 

"Students bring unique perspectives and knowledge that can help improve the school environment and academic quality. Students can point out structural and cultural obstacles in the school that may be overlooked by adult administrators and teachers. Thus students should be considered "capable and valuable members of a school community who can help initiate and implement educational change." (Zhao, 2012, pp.183)

"Students should be considered an integral part of the school leadership in the new education paradigm." (Zhao, 2012, pp.184)

Adding to my excitement, over the summer, I read a book, Engaging Students with Poverty in Mind, that a former principal that I'd worked with had given me. This is another book that I'd give high praise towards, as a resource with great strategies for engaging all students. The following two-passages, shared below, only heightened my sense of urgency to provide our students with a leadership role.

"How can I expect to keep kids invested in the process if I don't give them a piece of the action?" (Jensen, 2013, pp.76)

"Taking leadership roles and collaborating in teams increase student responsibility and help students become more confident. The more self-reliant students become, the more control they feel over their learning, and the more likely they are to actively engage as a matter of routine.

"Developing students' leadership skills begins with granting incremental increases in responsibility to students while providing relevant instruction in the skills they need to succeed, offering encouragement, and holding them accountable for the obligations they take on." (Jensen, 2013, pp.140)

After much reflecting over the summer months, and thinking aloud with colleagues, I started to draft a plan for this idea. I am excited to announce that we are going to create two Student Advisory Teams at Riverside Elementary School. We will have one team with a student representing each classroom from kindergarten through second grade, and we will have an additional team with a student representative from each classroom in grades three through five. Each team will meet weekly over their lunch time. Depending on how much interest students show, team members may rotate quarterly to maximize participation.

Last week, I visited each classroom to explain the leadership opportunity that students will have by being a part of our Student Advisory Team. The conversation covered logistics, and the following slides were shown as talking points re. leadership.

Student Advisory Team - Leadership images/slides.

Older students, grades 3-5, who expressed interest in the idea of having a leadership role were asked to answer the attached questions. Younger students, kindergarten-2nd graders, who showed interest in the leadership opportunity had the option of drawing a picture or writing about what leadership looks like at Riverside Elementary School. 

My goal is for these teams to be formed and begin to meet by mid-September. Hopefully, these meetings will give students the opportunity to identify things that have the potential to be improved at Riverside Elementary School and then brainstorm solutions for how to make these improvements a reality. I think this will be really exciting for two main reasons: 1) I am excited to witness our students flourish when given a leadership role, and 2) I am excited to explore implementing the ideas that our students have to improve their school. 

What Did I Do All Summer?

It's August! My "new year" has kicked-off; many teachers, school staff, students, and parents will start their "new year" within the next few days and weeks. Where did summer go? What did I do all summer?

Now before I answer that question, I want to give appropriate credit to Nick Proud who is a principal in the Iowa City Community School District for inspiring this blog. Earlier this summer, he posted a blog where he answered the question, "What do you do all summer?" I, like him and every other educator, am also frequently asked that question throughout June and July.

Olivia, almost two months old

Olivia, as a newborn

Now this summer has been a little...a lot different from past summers because on June 7th my wife, Amy, and I welcomed our new daughter, Olivia, into the world. Despite the shortage of sleep that we are experiencing as new parents, Olivia's addition into our lives has been pure joy. And the timing of her birth was ideal as it allowed me to spend extra time at home with my newborn daughter, as well as help Amy with various things.

Olivia and Ryne looking out the top of The Arch

Ryne and I at Wrigley Field

With the birth of a new baby, we weren't allowed to do nearly the amount of traveling that we like to do as a family (my wife is a teacher, too) over the summer months. However, I did find time to sneak-in to Chicago (twice) to catch a couple of Cubs games with my son, Ryne. We also, as a family, managed to drive to St. Louis in late July to spend a day/night with my brother who lives down there.

Professionally, I was fortunate to have the opportunity to present at a conference for the first time in my professional career. Our Grant Wood Area Educational Agency technology consultant had asked me to be a part of Grant Wood's #iPadU, a three day course in July covering all things iPads in education. The breakout session that I led explained how our Elementary Support Organization (ESO) purchased iPads for all of our teachers, and then how we rolled those iPads out to our teachers and provided them with professional development regarding their new iPads. It was very flattering to see a room full of other educators that wanted to hear our story.

I also took a team of teachers to a two-day training to learn about FAST. FAST is the new universal screener that we will use for our students, kindergarteners through fifth graders, which will replace DIBELS. This is the literacy screener that the State of Iowa is sponsoring. My favorite thing about moving to FAST is that very little changes for our students with this new assessment. An additional thing to like about this new assessment include the fact that because the teachers are using a computer to assess the students, all of the data is uploaded and available immediately upon testing. We will be sure to share more information regarding FAST as we move forward throughout the school year.

With what little remaining time that I had, I spent some time enjoying two of my preferred hobbies - reading and running. Over the summer, I read (for both pleasure and professional growth): Engaging Students with Poverty in Mind, The Advantage, The Perfect Mile, Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power, and World Class Learners. In regards to running, I've been preparing myself to run another half-marathon in Madison later this month.

Back to Nick Proud's blog...as he said, "Summer is key to setting the stage for the upcoming school year." Fact. I, like all principals, have spent ample time planning, preparing, reflecting and reenergizing for the upcoming school year. That work is now done (or at least very close to being done). The school has been much too quiet for too long. It is now time for staff and students to come back to work and resume growing and learning from and with one another. This is one of my favorite times of year. Happy New Year.

Focus

This past school year, our Building Leadership Team, as a book study, read Finding Your Leadership Focus by Doug Reeves (@DouglasReeves of @LeadAndLearn). A real short and simple synopsis of this book is that schools try to do too many things. And when schools try do a lot of things, they usually end up doing them no better than adequately. Schools need to "weed their gardens." They need to eliminate some of the things that they are trying to do, but not doing with fidelity due to a lack of time and resources. Schools should focus on no more than six areas to really implement well.

After on-going discussions throughout the year, last month, I created a Google Form to see what common areas needed to have our focus at Riverside Elementary School. Of all the responses, there were four that rose to the top:

1. Flex teams/Flex time, which is what we call our Response to Intervention (RtI) block of time. This is something that I've talked about in two previous blog posts ('Things that I am proud of and are worth celebrating' and 'Flex'). After hearing RtI guru, Mike Mattos (@mikemattos65) of Solution Tree (@SolutionTree), in Cedar Rapids at an event put-on by the Grant Wood Area Education Agency (@GrantWoodAEA) this past September for two days, we created this Flex system that we implemented while hitting the ground running. Overall, it seems to be beneficial. However, there is a desire to focus on how to improve the initial system that we have put in place.
2. Student data binders - To some degree we have used student data binders for at least a couple of years now. However, they are still more of a teacher resource and they have yet to really become a tool that students are using to monitor their own learning. This is our task - to increase our students' ownership of their own learning. We think that we can help ourselves in this area based off of some ideas that we have for how to use our student data binders more effectively.
3. Data meetings - Again, this is something that we already do. School staff is having regularly scheduled meetings where we are spending time talking about what is working well with our instruction for students and what needs improving. The system is in place, but how can we enhance our system so that we are maximizing the impact that this can have on student learning?
4. Data walls - These have started to pop-up in various classrooms, the data room that we've created as a place for teachers to meet and center our discussions around data, and in the front entryway of our school. We want to be transparent with our data (the good, and even the not so good). There are two mains reasons that we see this as beneficial - 1) when it is visible for students, it helps increase their ownership of their learning, and 2) for school staff it is about our accountability and our sense of urgency in regards to student learning.

We'll keep you posted as we focus our improvements on these areas, next year, in an effort to enhance student learning at Riverside Elementary School. 

Things that I am proud of and are worth celebrating

The March/April 2014 issue of Principal magazine highlights three practices for schools to implement in-order to overcome difficulties - 

1. Compile electronic data binders for each classroom that are updated on an ongoing basis with new scores. These can help principals keep track of their students’ and teachers’ progress.
2. Give students their own data binders to track their own achievement data. This gives students greater autonomy and a sense of accomplishment.
3. Create a "data room" for teachers to help them visualize and better track key measures of student success.

This was especially exciting to me because all three of these things were implemented this year, at Riverside Elementary School. Now I'm not naive enough to think that we have mastered any of these three, but we have created the framework and we are committed to improvement. Nonetheless, these are three accomplishments that I'm proud of and that I think are worth celebrating from this school year.

Recently, I asked that question, "What are three things that you are proud of/worth celebrating from this school year?" at the end of a staff meeting, via a Google Form. As you can tell from the following responses (below), a lot of our teachers are very proud of our flex. (Flex is our systematic Response to Intervention (RtI) block of time. I posted about our Flex implementation on this blog on October 28, 2013.) This is relevant because our "data room" and our electronic data are both tools that we use to help us monitor our implementation of flex.

• Starting flex teams and experiencing success with the flex teams.
• I think my students made tremendous growth in reading - whether it was fluency, accuracy, retell, or just an increased interest in reading. I feel like that was a result of our flex team work, our classroom work, and also in making good connections with my students and showing an interest in not only how they were reading, but what they were reading as well.
• Flex groups and data teams affected student growth tremendously with open and honest conversations about what the data showed and what students needed.
• The implementation of our flex teams. This has been very beneficial for the students. It has also helped bring our culture to an "our student" focus.
• I am excited about our flex groups. It was a learning process, and I think next year will be even better!
• I feel like we really came together as a staff this year. The whole staff seemed willing to do whatever they could for every single student in the building. I also think people were more willing to try new things and keep an open mind. It really felt like I was working on a team.
• Flex Groups - Not only did my students enjoy working with multiple teachers, I enjoyed having the chance to collaborate with others to improve student learning.
• I feel like flex teams have really helped us focus on what our students need and provide that to them.
• All staff working together and being willing to try new things. We implemented many new things this year such as flex teams, safety procedures, a new lunch schedule, etc.
• The kids are taking more responsibility in their learning. 

That last bullet is an area that we really want to commit to as being an area of focus for next year. One of the ways that we are planning to do this is through some enhancements that we are planning to make to our student data binders. We've used student data binders in the past, but it is a definite area for us to upgrade in-order to support students' learning at Riverside Elementary School.

We're Going to Have a 5K/1-mile Color Run/Walk!

This past Monday, shortly after 11am (central time), Meb Keflezighi won the 118th annual Boston Marathon. Several hours later, almost 1200 miles to the west of the Boylston Street finish line in Boston, a group of individuals met in Riverside, Iowa to work on organizing and planning a run associated with our elementary school.

Along with the Washington County YMCA (a special thanks to Marcus Hall and Becky Harkema for helping us plan and host this event) we will be putting-on a 5K and a one-mile color walk/run in Riverside on Sunday, June 22nd. A note with more specific sign-up information should be coming home via Friday folders this Friday, April 25th. If you are from outside the Highland CSD and are interested in learning more about this race, please don't hesitate to contact me.

Hosting a run through the school is very exciting for me because running is a personal passion of mine. That wasn't always the case, however. I ran in high school (track and field) for two reasons - 1) to stay in shape for the other sports that I was more invested in, and 2) to spend time with my friends who at the time were more serious about running than me. After high school I would run occasionally, but it was not my preferred method of exercise. Once I became fully employed and time started to stretch thin, I started to choose running as a form of exercise that could be accomplished relatively quickly. One thing led to another and several years later I now thoroughly enjoying the training for and the running of half-marathons. It's funny how things change.

Anyways, this run that we are producing will be a great opportunity for our school to promote fitness and good health through an activity that can be done throughout one's life. Furthermore, it is a nice extension of the walk-a-thon that or Elementary Support Organization (ESO) has put-on for our students each of the past two falls. It also connects very nicely to the laps that Mr. Jaspering has his PE students run as a warm-up at the beginning of each class period. The students keep track of their laps, turn the laps into miles, and monitor their progress as the year progresses. As of April 23rd, the leading student at Riverside Elementary is just shy of having tallied 25 miles this school year!

All 3rd - 5th grade students received a shoe to decorate after they ran/walked one-mile. They also sign a poster documenting that they've ran/walked one, five, ten, fifteen, and twenty miles. This is posted in the gym. All 3rd - 5th grade students have recorded at least 10 miles this school year during PE.

Proceeds raised from this event will be split between the Washington Co. YMCA and our ESO. Our ESO uses their funds on things that will benefit our school. This year, we were fortunate to receive iPads and accessories for all of our teachers from our ESO. We are extremely thankful for the influx in technology that you have provided us with, as well as all of the things that you provide for our teachers, our students, and our school. Nonetheless, this event is not about raising funds; we are planning this event because it will be a fun, nice thing to do this summer with your family and the school community. We hope to see you there!

This Email Made Me Smile

This seems like a fitting time to post this as we just sent home our students' Iowa Assessment scores, last week.

The italicized text below was sent to me via email a few weeks ago. In following-up on the email that I received, I was pointed to the blog of the the principal at Amana Elementary of the Clear Creek Amana Community School District's blog (http://benmacumber.blogspot.com). Amana Elementary's principal, Mr. Ben Macumber, does not appear to have authored these thoughts, but he does share the same note in his entry titled, 'I didn't think of this, but I sure wish I had...'

My daughter's new elementary school principal sent this to all the students as they received their state standardized testing scores this week:

"We are concerned that these tests do not always assess all of what it is that make each of you special and unique. The people who create these tests and score them do not know each of you-- the way your teachers do, the way I hope to, and certainly not the way your families do...They do not know that you can play a musical instrument or that you can dance or paint a picture. They do not know that your friends count on you to be there for them or that your laughter can brighten the dreariest day. They do not know that you write poetry or songs, play or participate in sports, wonder about the future, or that sometimes you take care of your little brother or sister after school. They do not know that you have traveled to a really neat place or that you know how to tell a great story or that you really love spending time with special family members and friends. They do not know that you can be trustworthy, kind or thoughtful, and that you try, every day, to be your very best... the scores you get will tell you something, but they will not tell you everything. There are many ways of being smart."

Shifting Lunch and Recess Schedules

We are excited to make some changes (starting Monday, 3/31) to our lunch/recess schedule!

The kindergarten and first grade lunch/recess times were able to remain, for the most part, unaltered. Second through fifth grades had to rearrange some of the things that they teach so that everything still fit into their day. We believe that these changes will have a positive impact on our students. As a result, some of the highlights are:

• Providing increased adult supervision during transitions (to and from lunch and recess)
• Providing increased consistency and supervision at recess
• Four adults instead of three adults on the playground
• No longer taking away staff to bring-in classes while other students remain at recess
• Benefit of recess before lunch for the upper grades
• A longer gap between lunch recess and afternoon recess for the upper grades
• No longer a need for lunch helpers from the upper grades to be pulled away from the classroom during instructional time
• It will reduce the amount of student traffic flow in and out of our locked front entry way over the lunch hour

We are going to try this for the last two months of the school year. We are open to making adjustments as we go.

Our School is Worth a Pot of Gold

One of the things that I love about Riverside Elementary School is how so many different people possess different leadership traits that allow us to thrive. On any given day, any given person will take the initiative to get something accomplished. Each staff member is a leader.

Maybe you have noticed the visually appealing rainbow, the four leaf clover border, or the pot of gold that contains staff and students reasoning as to why our school is worth a pot of gold written on the posted gold coins. That is the product that a group of teachers took charge to organize and create. They have displayed a platform that shares the positive things and success stories of our school for everyone entering our building to see. What resulted is described and pictured below.

Our school is worth a pot of gold because...
...of our pride in what we do and the respect, responsibility, and caring of our people
...we all work hard
...our teachers are understanding
...we all show the Huskie way
...we are Huskies that like to learn
...we are respectful, responsible, and caring
...we have really good teachers and students
...everybody is caring to each other
...the teachers are making school fun for the students
...we are all kind and proud to be a Huskie
...data is showing growth
...we have teachers and students who are always learning
...there is a lot of good people
...we have teachers who help everyone
...everybody is so nice to each other
...everyday the teachers are teaching us a lot and we learn everyday
...it is safe for children
...everyone is friendly
...we do fun things
...we have good friends and good teachers

Take a look at the bulletin board the next time that you are in our school. It should make you smile.
In fact, I encourage you to take a gold coin (look for blank coins to be clipped (and labeled) on the bulletin board later this week) or comment at the end of this blog to share your thoughts as to why you think our school is worth a pot of gold.

Grateful for Gifts and Grants

The new technologies that we have acquired this year at Riverside Elementary School is like waking up to a room full of presents on Christmas morning!

This year we have been fortunate to add 20 iPads and 25 MacBooks to our technology arsenal. Our ESO was kind enough to buy all of our teachers an iPad this past fall. The Riverside Casino and Golf Resort's Washington County Riverboat Foundation, through a grant this winter, allowed us to purchase the MacBooks and the resulting mobile lab for our students. I (we) want to thank everyone who played a part in allowing us to receive these gifts and this grant.  

I am a firm believer that putting new technology in the hands of students leads to increased student engagement, and increased student engagement leads to increased student achievement. It is evident that the students really look forward to using the devices and they enjoy having them in their hands as a learning tool. As a result, seeing our students use these devices is fun. Watching the students exhibit a high level of respect for these devices while using them is neat to see, too. 

However, using the iPads and MacBooks are a new experience so there is a learning curve that goes along with that. After we received the iPads, we were able to send two teachers to a three-day course at the Grant Wood Area Education Agency (AEA). Throughout this course, our two teachers learned about iPad basics, as well as incorporating QR codes, screen casting and story telling applications, and student blogging. These two teachers, along with our Grant Wood AEA technology consultant and myself, have been responsible for passing along this learning to the rest of our teaching staff throughout three professional development sessions. Additionally, we have created a forum for sharing educational apps amongst staff on a regular basis. The MacBooks are still pretty brand new, and the learning for these devices has been fairly informal up to this point.

It is common knowledge that a picture is worth a thousand words. Because of this shared understanding, I have included, below, some of my favorite pictures that I have been able to capture, this year, that shows our students and teachers with some of our new technology.

Part Two...Great Growth

The following four slides are visual representations of our students' growth from the Math and Writing benchmark assessments that students have taken in the fall (end-of-August) and winter (mid-January). They compare how many of our students have met their year-end benchmark goals for proficiency in the fall, versus how many of our students have met those same year-end benchmark goals in the winter. This is worth sharing and celebrating, and it is a testament to everyone's hard work. We are very excited with these results, and very proud of the efforts that contributed to this growth.

The math computation probe consists of 25 problems representing year-long, grade-level math computation curriculum. Depending on the grade-level, students get between three and four minutes to answer as many of the problems as they are able.

The math application probe consists of 18-25 problems representing the year-long, grade-level math concepts and applications curriculum. Each test is three-pages long. Depending on the grade-level, students get between six and eight minutes to answer as many of the problems as they are able.

Students are given a writing probe; they have one-minute to think of a response, and then three-minutes to write a response. Total words written is a count of how many words students were able to write within the three-minutes

The same writing probe that was used to score total words written is used to score correct word sequence. To receive credit for correct word sequence, writing must be correctly spelled and grammatically correct.

This information helps us in determining how students are responding to instruction so that we can make necessary changes. The following pictures represent some of the ways that we are monitoring progress in-between benchmark assessments. Students are setting goals, and students are keeping track of their own progress compared to those goals. These are things that are having a positive impact with our students.

All of our up-to-date benchmark assessment data (Reading, Math, and Writing) is on display inside the glass case across the hall from the office at Riverside Elementary School. I encourage you to check it out the next time that you come into our school. Also, for individual child/student fall and winter data, as well as grade-level expectations for throughout the year, please be on the lookout for a note coming home on Friday, February 14th that will provide those specific results.