Quote to consider:
‘I have been continually impressed by and grateful for the HDMS teachers and staff (even though I’ve yet to meet many face to face). An example of this was the professionalism teachers exhibited by attending, engaging, and collaborating in a lengthy IEP meeting recently.’ ~ Megan Logan, HDMS SRC teacher
To Dos:
ADJUST GRADES:
- Grades must be adjusted adhering the the district policy beginning Dec 1 2020. This was communicated to our families in my weekly message home last Friday.
- I support and will always defer to professionals on how they set up their grade book. When staff have valid reasons for having ‘excused’ in their grade books for specific students and situations, I support them keeping those as ‘excused’ and not adjusting to 50%. (ex: student or family was ill for an extended period of time, student didn’t receive a HotSpot until mid Oct., student didn’t have access to adequate space to complete the lab assignment, etc)
- Using ‘excused’ is still allowed for staff moving forward.
Click here for a letter from MS director Jim Boen regarding the district grading policy for middle and high schools. Here are helpful hints and instructions on how make these adjustments.
In order to support staff having extra time during work hours to make these gradebook adjustments, department meetings have been canceled for this week and next week.
Bits and Bobs:
GRADE GUARDIAN: Canvas Coaches, ICCL, SpEd, ELL, counselors and admin have been or will be trained with this tool. What I know of Grade Guardian is that this tool pulls from Canvas and allows folks who aren’t content teachers to access student grades and also allows us to pull data identifying students who are struggling without having to go into each individual student’s Canvas. There is a self-paced GG module, which all content teachers can access here to gain an overview of this tool.
SUPPORTING SECONDARY INSTRUCTION: Here is a one pager from Michele C. that outlines WebEx best practices. Here is a link to their blog that they update regularly.
Reminders:
SICK LEAVE: Please continue to proactively communicate with Wendy if you have appointments that are scheduled during the work day. Here is the message regarding “sick leave” for staff. It has been jointly crafted by BEA (Sarah) and HR (Jon) and hopefully provides some clarity around expectations/process regarding sick leave during remote teaching. Bottom line – communication is key.
DATE CHANGED: We are having an all staff meeting in Wendy’s WebEx Room on THURSDAY 12.17.20 at 3:00pm. We’re looking forward to coming together virtually as a community to share, laugh, and connect before the break. Wear your ugliest sweater!!!
SPANISH INTERPRETER: We continue to hear from our Spanish speaking families how grateful they are for these connections. Please continue to utilize our system of having a Spanish interpreter on Wednesdays from 1:30-4:00pm. Use the link on the sidebar of the blog to sign up by Tuesdays at 9:00am.
CONTACTING THE ADMIN TEAM: Please continue to email Wendy, Nole, and Heather P when contacting the admin team with student concerns, school-wide/systems questions, etc. This helps the admin team all be in the loop and respond in a timely manner. An example of the why behind this system is that Nole has grand jury duty the next four week and will therefore be less responsive to urgent items than typical.
STAFF GIFT OF GRATITUDE: Wendy and Nole have a small gift of gratitude for each of our staff members. Please use this link (by 12/14 at 4:00pm) to share with us how you’d like us to get your gift to you.
WEDNESDAY ATTENDANCE: The Wednesday attendance link will continue to be available to students via a global announcement in Canvas at 12:01pm on Wednesdays. The announcement link in Canvas and the Google attendance form will be open for students to complete from then until Thursday at 8:00am.
Some students have reported not being able to access the link. Here are some potential solutions you could consider sharing with these students.
- Show your students where this announcement appears in Canvas
- Reminding them of the 12:01pm on Wednesdays through 8:00am on Thursdays timeframe
- If students were working in Canvas before 12:01pm on Wednesday, they may need to refresh their Canvas page