Two Weeks To Launch!

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Hey team,

Here we go! Last week a few of us did some drop in planning together and made a trip to the site. The rooms are looking more and more ready and there is a lot of potential for cool student and teacher creativity in the space!

We did stop by 10 Barrel afterwards for a beer though… so that gives you some background into our state of mind after the site visit: it was a mix of excitement and “oh crap, lets go have a beer”…. which I think is the perfect brain space for radical revolutions in education, right!!? 

Upcoming Planning and Move In Time – Feeling Kind of Urgent!

I believe that most of our team is back in town during this coming week of Monday Aug 20th and so it is likely a pretty critical time to get some planning and move in work done! I have calendared some place holders:

  • Tuesday and Wednesday mornings (at Realms Middle) for curriculum and/or expedition planning! I will be around and mostly available to support, answer questions etc. but I would encourage you all to gather and self organize as necessary!
  • Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons as possible facilities move in opportunities if you have time and interest

“Meet-Greet-DO-(Eat?)”  – 32 kids RSVP’d so far!!

WOW – we have 32 students who have already RSVP’d to come and hang out on Thursday afternoon this week to meet each other and help out around campus! SWEET! The student ownership culture is already building!

I have updated the agenda but still needs work:

  • meet/greet: help kids meet each other and get excited
  • do: start getting student voice and ownership involved in our planning and/or campus!
  • DRAFT agenda – recently updated with two new “doable” work project ideas!

What I need:

  • so far we have myself, Karla, Jennifer S, Zach, and Michelle (tentative) signed up to help. I would love to have one or two more (or all?!)  of us there to facilitate. I guarantee it will be fun!! Let me know if you can join in by accepting the calendar event or sending me a quick email!
  • I’d love to buy lunch on Wednesday for anyone who is helping so we can firm up our plan for the Thursday time. See calendar.

School Supplies You Want Students to Have – Email Jennifer

You all received an email from Jennifer on Friday of this last week about any specific supplies you want students to have for you class. Please get back to here ASAP as we hope to collate those requests into a supply list and get it out in next week’s 2nd Installment of Back to School Update for all families.

Curriculum Orders

I have copied all of you orders as of 8/17/18 into the official District Curriculum Order sheet and have sent it in to Skip O and Amy Tarnow. If you have have not yet had a chance to enter the curriculum you want to order (I know Heidi hasn’t yet… understandable!!) please LET ME KNOW so that I can be sure to get it ordered for you. Here is the copy of the District’s Curriculum Order spreadsheet – ANY QUESTIONS, email me!

After School Programs

FYI – Any teacher has the ability to offer an after school club or activity at Realms, for pay! Our students are looking for things to do, so if you have an idea for something you think students would like to do after school, PITCH IT! Some ideas include – leadership, ping pong club, jam band, art club etc. etc. etc.

The way it works is this:

  1. Pitch an idea for a club including 1 paragraph description
  2. You and I will estimate a reasonable tuition (scholarships available) which is often in the $75 for a trimester 1day/week club
  3. I post it and get it out to families for sign up through our Friends of Realms site
  4. If it fills with enough students to break even (typically around 7 or 8) then you run it, have fun with it and get paid on a time sheet at the curriculum rate $28/hr

We can also wait until the term gets going and we hear from students what they might be interested in. I also have two outside instructors I am in contact with from BEAT and PhotoU to try and offer a Photography/Yearbook club and a Drama Club.

This kind of stuff makes a big difference to students, so consider it!

Our Staff Planning Week

  • Monday August 27th – Friday August 31st. Specific agenda will be here – I will add to it early this week!
  • Sept 3rd & 4th are non work days for Realms HS staff
  • Wednesday Sept 5th is supposed to be 1st day with kids but not for us. We have our Back to School BBQ so will adjust our work hours to more like 11am – 7:30pm
  • Part time folks (Mark, Karen, Jen) can work a pro-rated version of this week and I suggest we craft a plan for which parts of the week make most sense!

Curriculum Questions and Updates

I have been getting a fair number of questions from students and parents about our curriculum – not surprising! And, while I am somewhat comfortable answering generically and talking about the power of Learning Expeditions, interdisciplinary connections and culminating products, I DO think we are going to need to communicate course and subject specific details sooner rather than later (it would be great to have these ready by Sept 5th)!

To that end, I am asking all subject area teachers to work towards the following:

  • brief 1st semester course description: which might include course name, short paragraph overview of semester, LTLT’s to be graded, major texts, and any other details you want to include. Here is a collection of syllabi we ultimately put together at the middle school that could serve as a model.
  • an expedition overview: a document that gets students interested and excited about the learning expedition component of our 1st semester curriculum. Simple example here: Expedition Description For Students
  • Here is a folder of blanks for all of these different planners.

 

 

Crew & Orientation Planning:

Michelle, Karen and I have been slowly working on both our Crew Overview & Plan and also our Orientation Plan. We strongly encourage you to look at our work so far and share feedback using the Comment feature of Google Docs!! AND… THANK YOU to Karen and Michelle for their great work so far.