Week at a Glance

Happenings Next Week at Lava Ridge:

• Wednesday:  SIW @ 1:45 in the Media Center
• Thursday:  2:30 Meetings: 2^nd Grade MTSS; 1^st Prep for MTSS; Other grades: PLC
• Friday: Veteran’s Day: No School

We are planning to send the next newsletter home by Wednesday. Here it is.

Congratulations to Avery Burger who interviewed and was selected to join the Special Programs team. Avery’s 3 hour EA position has been posted and we plan to interview soon.

Ruby Bridges Walk to School Day is November 14th. Here is a link with more information. We are including information about this event in our next newsletter.

From the Tech Department: When to use the IT Help Ticket System: There are several ways to communicate with IT support staff, the most effective is our ticket system.  If you have a quick question, call the Help Desk (extension 1200) or shoot an email to your Client Service tech.  But if you have an expectation, or a request that will require action, you should ONLY use the Help Ticket system.
Why?

• A ticket directs your request to one of 30 IT staff that is best suited to answer your question
• It is the only communication method that will alert IT support if it remains unanswered

There’s an easy URL to get to our ticket system: bls.fyi/help. You can also find a shortcut right on your Mac: click the little circular “life preserver” icon in your top toolbar near your date & time and choose IT Help Ticket.

When Signing into Synergy mobile applications be sure you choose  “Sign In with BLS” whenever the option is provided. The regular Username and Password fields will no longer provide access and the change will take effect on the following applications: HealthVue, AdminVue, and TeacherVue (The change will not impact StudentVue or ParentVUE)

Next week is a B Week

Happenings Next Week at Lava Ridge:

• Monday: ICCL Meeting @ 2:30 in the Media Center
• Tuesday: Harvest Parties
• Wednesday: Dental Screening in A3; SIW School Design Goals + SLGG Goal Setting Meetings @ 1:45
• Thursday: Dental Screening in A3; Lion Pride Drawings @ Lunch; 3^rd MTSS @ 2:30; PTO Meeting @ 2:30 in the Media Center

This year, the PTO is planning to have meetings in the Media Center from 2:30-3:15 on November 1 and March 7. The team is not planning for grade level reports and are hopeful that a teacher from each grade will attend (except for those involved with MTSS). Thank you!

The week of November 6th we are planning to begin saying the Pledge of Allegiance as a school during the morning announcements each Monday. If your classroom does not have a flag, please let Haley know so we can order one for you.

Here is the latest version of the Lava Ridge Newsletter

BLS and BEA recently reached an agreement to modify the certified evaluation process for 2023/24.   This document has all of the details. At the ICCL Meeting on Monday, we discussed SLGGs and goal setting meetings and will have details to share at SIW on November 1st.

Next week is an A week

Happenings next week at Lava Ridge:

• Monday:  ICCL Meeting @ 2:30 in the Media Center
• Tuesday:  Picture Day (schedule)
• Wednesday: 7:15-3:15 Work In Classrooms;  3:15-7:15 Conferences; Dinner provided by PTO @ 3:00 in the Staff Room.
• Thursday: 7:15-7:15 Conferences; Pizza for dinner! @ 3:00 in the Staff Room
• Friday:  Enjoy!

At Conferences, families will have the opportunity to preview the Language Arts curriculum at the Main Entrance of Lava.

On Wednesday and Thursday, Laci or I will be stopping by classrooms after 7:15 pm with a friendly reminder that conferences are finished for the day. The goal of this visit is to get you home! To assist with this, please turn off your lights when you leave after your last conference. Thank you!

As we shared at the Staff Meeting on Tuesday, feel free to have more than one volunteer for Harvest Parties. In the event there are other times throughout the year that you need additional volunteers, just let Kim and Haley know in advance so we are ready to greet them and can double check they have been cleared to volunteer.

We are not planning to have visitors on Halloween.

With PTO, Discretionary, and Student Body funds allocated for this year, keep in mind that Haley can be a great resource in computing projected costs for field trips to assist with budgeting.

PTO has started to fundraise for the 2024-25 school year. Here is a letter families will be recieving with details on the new strategy PTO will be using to generate funds.

The holiday season is quickly approaching! As we work to grow a sense of belonging for each Lion, thank you for your thoughtful planning of the activities students might experience during this upcoming time of the year and beyond. Lava Ridge students celebrate a variety of holidays throughout the year, some do not, and some are not able to. Your consideration of every student is appreciated. Here is a reflection tool created the Bend-La Pine Equity Team you may find helpful in your planning.

Looking for a new show to stream?  Below are the recommendations from our staff:

• Bosch
• Heartstopper
• Shrinking
• Ted Lasso (mentioned by 3 staff members)
• The Bear (mentioned by 2 staff members)
• YouTube: Kara and Nate
• This is Us
• Modern Family
• Masked Singer
• Mom
• Yellowjackets
• Alchemy of the Souls

Happenings Next Week at Lava Ridge:

• Tuesday:  Staff Meeting @ 2:30 in the Media Center
• Wednesday:  Assembly @ 8:00 (loading @ 7:55);  SIW:  Teacher Prep
• Thursday:  Lion Pride Drawings at Lunch; Lava Teams @ 2:30
• Friday:  Dress Up Day:  Be you day!

Next week, families will receive the latest edition of the newsletter.

Congratulations to Jessica Baker! Jessica has been hired as a Special Programs educational assistant at Pine Ridge Elementary School. Jessica’s children attend Pine Ridge so this will be an extra fun and exciting change for their family. We have posted this position and plan to interview in the next couple of weeks.

On Nov. 1^st and 2^nd we will have Advantage Dental from DentaQuest’s Everybody Brush! program visit Lava Ridge for the annual oral health screening. Permission forms will be in teacher mailboxes on Monday for home. Thank you for collecting the returned forms.

As you begin to think through Harvest Party logistics, it is ok to have more than one volunteer for these events.

In the event you use a walkie-talkie, thank you for saying your name when you begin your call.

Next week is a B week

Happenings next week at Lava Ridge:

• Monday: Fire Busters begins*
• Wednesday:  Sibling Conference Scheduling @ 1:00 in the Media Center, SIW-Educator Network Day (K-5 classroom teachers will meet in the Media Center @ 1:45; focus ares: Foundational Skills, Wayfinder)
• Thursday:  Vision Screening in A3; 4^th MTSS @ 2:30 in A3

*We are planning that the Fire Department will deliver the Fire Buster worksheets on Monday. There will be a basket in the office for completed activity pages.

Thank you for arriving at Sibling Conference scheduling on Wednesday with only ELL conferences scheduled. Coordinating consecutive conferences (i.e. back-to-back time slots) for families with multiple Lions is a priority and this makes scheduling these most efficient. Jessica is planning to list ELL Conferences on teacher conference Google Docs prior to the meeting on Wednesday.

We continue to see dividends from the lost and found tub system. Thank you for bringing in your lost and found tub at the end of the day and being ready with your tub placement for the rainy and snowy days ahead.

Families received the latest newsletter earlier today.

Next week is an A week

Happenings Next Week at Lava Ridge:

• Monday: Bus Evacuation Drill @ 9:00-9:30
• Tuesday: ICCL Meeting at Jewell from 3:00-5:00
• Wednesday: Walk, Ride or Roll to School Day; SIW: MTSS Doc Preview and Seesaw PD @ 1:45 in the Media Center
• Thursday:  5^th MTSS @ 2:30 in A3 (Discovery Falls)

Next week is the first MTSS meeting of the year. MTSS will again be on Thursdays beginning at 2:30 and will take place in A3 (Discovery Falls). With Lava Team meetings also occurring on Thursdays, next week we will be sharing a schedule with you that also makes Thursdays our PLC meeting day. In a sense, Thursdays will be a day when we can all plan to be either be meeting in MTSS, Lava Teams, or in PLCs (similar to when Tuesday after school was when we met as PLCs or had a Staff Meeting). This common time will hopefully add some simplicity to all of our calendars. More details to come!

A note From Tech Services: IT made a change over the summer that now requires students to use MFA (multi-factor authentication) when signing in to BLS services from a personally owned device. An area of impact for our elementary schools is families that want to use Clever services such as Lexia and DreamBox on a home device. Families will not be able to do that unless their student has setup MFA. Complicating matters, MFA needs to be setup from a known secure network. For Bend-La Pine Schools, that means MFA needs to be setup either at a school (using BLS BYOD or BLS Visitor) or using the student’s iPad at home (which is always connected to the BLS network with VPN). Of these options, setting up MFA from the student’s iPad is going to be the easiest. If you have families that want to setup MFA so they can use services from a personal device, please send the student’s iPad home for 1 day along with either a 1 page printout of our student MFA instructions or share this link: https://bls.fyi/mfa-student Parents should be able to use the instructions along with the student iPad to get MFA setup. Once setup, the iPad can go back to school and stay there.

The Language Arts Curriculum Team met yesterday (Thank you Rachel for representing Lava Ridge!) and reached strong consensus to move forward with EL Education from Imagine Learning as our finalist for K-5 Language Arts Curriculum.  Here are more details

This year Kids Inc. is incorporating STEM activities into the daily routine for attendees from 2:50-4:00 each day in the Rainbow Valley and Friendship Mountain Commons and in the gym.

Coming soon to your inbox…an email from the UKG Performance Evaluation Module. This year, certified goal setting and evaluations will be connected to UKG and we can expect more information about this later in October.

Next week is an B week

Happenings next week at Lava Ridge:

• Monday: DIBELS Day; ICCL Meeting @ 2:30
• Wednesday:  Lockdown Drill; SIW-Walk to Skill Focus
• Thursday: *Tammy Doty/Lisa Burk Site Visit-AM; Lava Teams @ 2:30

*This year Laci and I have twice monthly meetings with Tammy Doty (Executive Director of Elementary Programs) and Lisa Birk (joins for one meeting a month; also an Executive Director of Elementary Programs). During these visits we will spend time in classrooms and also meeting.

Families received a newsletter yesterday and will get this one late next week (contains bias lesson communication)

Next week is an A week

From Mary Schlaefer: Across from the mailboxes is a 1-page form to complete if you would like a student’s speech screened. It can be a parent request or it can come from the teacher/staff member. If a staff member is requesting a screening, we must have permission from the parent to do a speech screening, which can be a phone call, e-mail, conference, etc.  

Next week, Kenya will begin a leave absence. Andrea Thompson will be teaching her class during this time.

From Julie (Curriculum, Instruction and Systems): Important Information regarding Dreambox: Dreambox has a new baseline assessment called Launchpad. Every elementary student will need to take this assessment as it will provide teachers and schools with valuable information regarding student’s strengths and areas for growth. We will be launching the assessment on September 18th. When student’s login they will need to complete the assessment which will take 15-45 minutes depending on grade level.  The assessment can be paused and started again-it does not need to be finished in one sitting.  Students will need to complete Launchpad by September 27th.  Here is a link to a quick video and one-pager explaining Launchpad.  Students will have normal access to Dreambox until September 18th.

At the Staff Meeting Tuesday we’re planning to discuss the bias lesson students will learn during October. Similar to last year, all Bend-La Pine students will have instruction about bias prior to the end of October. This year, grade level teams will have discretion to either teach a bias lesson in isolation or follow a sequence of lessons that includes Wayfinder content and the bias lesson. Here is the information from the District LEAD Team.

From Mid-Oregon Credit Union: Thursday, 9/21: Educators’ Night Out at the High Desert Museum. Doors open at 5:30 p.m., event from 6 to 8 p.m. A free, Back-to-school night for all of the adults working in Central Oregon schools. Join in demonstrations and get take-home resources. Food and beverages provided. Information and to register: https://highdesertmuseum.org/events/educators-night-out/.

Next week is a B week

Happenings next week at Lava Ridge:

• Tuesday:  Staff Meeting @ 2:30 in the Media Center
• Wednesday: 12:10 EA Monthly Meeting in the Media Center; 1:00-1:30 Student overview meeting for Specialists and Educational Assistants with Emily in the Media Center; SIW-Teacher Prep

The latest book recommendations from our staff include:  

• The Silent Patient
• All of the Brandon Sanderson books
• Libertas
• The Last Year of the War
• Just Wait Till You Have Children of Your Own, By Erma Bombeck.
• S#@& my Dad Says
• Lessons in Chemistry
• If You Tell
• The Lost Girls of Willowbrook
• Hello Beautiful
• Gods Hotel
• The Armande Ganache series by Louise Penn
• Fredrik Backman Novels
• The Old Place by Bobby Finger
• Blood and Oil: Mohammed bin Salman’s Ruthless Quest for Global Power

Wednesday is the first School Improvement Wednesday of the year. We will be meeting from 1:45-3:15 in the Media Center. Thank you for reminding the families of your students that dismissal on Wednesdays is at 12:45.

The Lava Ridge Spirit Store is now open. If you have any specific questions regarding the items listed, please email [email protected] 

On Tuesday, we are planning to send home another newsletter to families.

Teachers: If you are in need of additional curriculum please let Laci know.

Happenings Next Week at Lava:

• Wednesday:  School Improvement Wednesday 1:45-3:15:  Tier I Focus
• Thursday or Friday:  Fire Drill (we will announce this drill to students prior to the alarm sounding)

From Teaching and Learning: We need you! On Sept 26^th there is a half day Seesaw training for two teachers from each school (planning for one primary and one intermediate). A person doesn’t need to be a current super user of Seesaw but should be enthusiastic to learn more about the program and be willing to train others back at your site. The training will focus mainly on parent engagement and will take place in the board room at the Ed Center. The actual training will run from 8-11 to allow teachers time to return to their building. Interested in representing Lava? Please let Gary know. Thank you!

From the Teaching and Learning: Teaching and Learning and Instructional Technology are working hard to make sure each and every teacher and student has access to the digital tools they need for a successful start to the school year.   The team has hit a few barriers along the way and is working hard to resolve those issues as quickly as possible. 

Here is an update on timelines:

1. Wonders- a few rostering issues are happening currently. These should be resolved by next week . K-1 will only have access to the Teacher’s Edition. 2-5 will have access to both the Teacher’s Edition and the Student Edition

2. Really Great Reading-Classroom teachers should have access to their online teaching tool and reading playgrounds by the end of this week.  Blend classrooms are loaded and should be visible for teachers and students.  Interventionists, Learning Specialists and Educational Assistants should have access by the middle of next week

3. Lexia and Dreambox-a few rostering issues were happening earlier in the week and should now be resolved.  Both programs should be visible for teachers and students

4. Acadience– will be available early next week. If you don’t have what you need. Please let us know by following the link below:

Instructional Tech and Information Technology partnered to build an application where teachers can see what tools have been deployed to each of their classes. At the top of this page there is a feature where they can request a new tool. This can be requests to add, change, or remove tools

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At Lava, we love birthdays! We will be calling birthdays on the morning announcements again this year and and inviting those celebrating their special day to come to the office for crowns, pencils, and stickers. We will be messaging this information to families in an upcoming newsletter and will again be asking families to not bring in treats for their child’s birthday. Your help in messaging this to be families too, would be wonderful. Thank you!

If a student has a significant injury in class or on the playground (thinking something that leaves a mark or bleeds) please let the office know. In some instances we may need to submit an incident report for the event and we also always follow-up with a call from the office for support. Thank you!

At the end of the day, students can walk to buses or the front parking lot via the halls or outside (exiting through playground gates is ok) Please decide as a grade level which route you would like students to take and work as a team to have one teacher walk and supervise students as they go to the buses and one do the same with walkers/riders/rollers. Thank you!

Thank you for coaching your students to be ready to give their last name to Kathy or Teresa if/when they get lunch or breakfast from the Cafe.

We need you! If you do not have students at the beginning of the day Wednesday-Friday next week, we could use help at the Main Entrance navigating kids to class. Thank you!

Happenings next week at Lava Ridge:

• Wednesday:  First day!
• Friday: Wear your staff t-shirt day! All kindergarteners attend.