Wrapping it up!

Third grade’s Social Studies Medieval unit concluded Monday with the annual procession and production of the Medieval Fair.  Many serfs, knights, and royals participated in the production; what a colorful parade through our halls!  In addition to the musical and story recitation in our cafeteria for parents, student projects were on display on tables of purple velvet.   Projects included in-depth study of stained glass traditions in art classrooms (and recreated in vividly decorated bottles), a further study and creation of personal shields, as well as a research paper (either straight research or creative journal entries chosen by some students) tied to the Big 6 research model components.  Loved the morning, loved the recessional around our halls following the performance for audience members, and loved the extra rigor shown in the written projects this year.  Let us then rejoice, While we are young.  After the pleasures of youth And the tiresomeness of old age Earth will hold us. – Student’s song (anonymous).

After school Math Pentathlon Club for current second graders is an extremely popular offering this year.  Sponsored by teacher (and  last year’s Teacher of Promise) Harrison Gay, this club gives students much practice in critical math skills.  Per the official website, “The Mathematics Pentathlon is a program of interactive problem-solving games, supportive curricular and instructional activities, and assessment tools for students in grades K-7. This motivational program strengthens basic math concepts and skills, aligns with National and State Mathematics Standards, and stimulates creative thinking while developing problem-solving skills through games and cooperative learning.”  When I checked in on Monday, students were intent on a Hexacross game, discovering patterns and developing problem solving strategies.  Mr. Gay shared that the  program also gives these students an opportunity to become more observant and detail oriented.  Currently he has 20-25 girls involved in the session I, next session will be all boys (though, as you can see from the picture below, Jamie got a jump start on Monday); Session III will be a co-educational offering for all interested second graders.  We’ve discussed the possibility of rolling this down to first grade next year, so spread the word!  Thanks Mr. Gay!

Second graders hard at work on Hexacross

Zach Scott is coming, Zach Scott is coming!  The brochures have arrived and they are ready to enroll students in the K-2 and 3-5 after school Acting Classes to be hosted at HP next semester.  Primary students will be involved in Creative Drama (Story Tellers), while our intermediate students will put on an actual play - none other than the classic Peter Pan!  Rog Wall,  the instructor for both classes, has more than 20 years of experience in teaching acting, creative drama and movement (13 being at Zach Scott).  We are more than excited to host this new endeavor at our school, so don’t forget to stop by the front office to pick up an informational flyer and registration packet.  Special thanks to Nat Miller for getting this on track for our school.  Truly, we can’t wait!

Finally, a special nod to our second grade students, teachers, and parents for having a winter party with a purpose.  While enjoying parent provided breakfast goodies today, students heard Cathyleen Requejo, AISD Community Ed Project Supervisor/Homeless Liaison, discuss the  many services of Project Help.  Students had gathered various toiletry/other items, stuffed socks with the items, then gave them to Ms. Requejo to distribute later today.  Thanks second graders for caring enough to give back to others. 

Ms. Requejo and Ms. Marques' 2nd grade students

The time is upon us and our holiday break is just around the corner.  If I don’t see you, know I carry continued gratitude for your grace, wisdom, and all you do for our school, our community, and most importantly, for our kids.  You, my friends, are the best gift I could receive.  Peace and Love to all. 

Something for everyone

Rewind to last weekend and you get a sense of high gear activity in the Highland Park community.  Saturday night HP staff travelled to the Golliher residence for our annual holiday get-together.  What a great evening for those who attended – who doesn't love a White Elephant game! Sunday saw the MAC performance of the holiday music and dance spectacle What-cracka?!  While I enjoyed this student created, unique performance, I only mention it here as several current Scotties hit the stage at intermission for a dance-off (seriously, there were tons of HP’ers there!).  If I’m not mistaken, the Dowd /Mendelsen trio took top honors!  What a way to get kids pumped around the arts!  Thanks MAC, thanks to fluency volunteers Alice Van Zant and Frances Cerbins for the company, and thanks to some top-notch high school performers to boot. 

Monday afternoon Austin Film Kids did indeed roll out the red carpet in our library for their first semester film festival.  We were treated to student created “shorts”, with Brian Cox giving us the ins and outs of what the kids had accomplished.  Camera angles, cut-aways, special effects, directing, and producing credits were noted, as were the actual storyboards used to create the films.   There were even out-takes shown with assistant Traviss Thomas being the good natured bearer of the inside joke.  I hear that students will move on to more in-depth editing processes in the spring and that many a kid has movie making gear high on their holiday wish lists now.  Thanks Brian for inspiring our kids in the love of story telling, for such a creative outlet for this high energy group, and for brainstorming with me the other day on where the program can grow from here. 

Mr. Cox rolling the credits

The year just wouldn’t be the same without Pajama Day.  One of a handful of “special days” sponsored by our Student Council officers, this fun day had most students and staff all cozy and warm in our PJ’s.  I saw LOTS of Scottie Dogs on LOTS of pajamas as I roamed the halls and classrooms, with teachers keeping the learning going (what better way to kick back and read than in your PJ’s?) while lounging in ultimate comfort.  Check out some of the pics below.  Fun!

                       

Kinder teachers travelled to San Antonio one day this week to attend the professional development workshop led by Dr. Jean.  Dr. Jean is known far and wide in early learning circles for creative, musical ways to make learning fun – takeaways for the day included teaching writing/spelling with karate chops – which we all practiced at Thursday’s staff meeting - and additional ways to teach language development through music. 

Scottie Singers came out in full force on Thursday evening.  Maria Satterwhite and Brion Briones led the group in their winter concert performance.  I think my favorite musical number was It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing) by Duke Ellington and Irving Mills.  Not only were all the right notes hit, but the choreography was very well done.  Special props to Marcus and Benjamin on having that swing down pat.  Our fourth and fifth graders looked quite nice in their Scottie Singers black and tan; what a wonderful addition to holiday happenings on such a wet, chilly evening.

Just have to say - George Lewellyn at Lamar Middle School, his support team of staff and parents, rock!  I was able to pop over to the Lamar Open House Thursday morning and caught the third group of interested parents and students in the library before the tour (heard the earlier ones were even more packed than the one I attended – some former HP parents tell me they had over 100 parents attend – woohoo!); yep, I continue to be impressed by George’s low key, “we’re going to get it done” approach to school change.   And you know what?  He’s doing it. George shared with me his most recent performance on the district benchmark assessments, with Lamar Middle School falling in the top 5 AISD middle schools in most tested areas (7^th grade writing was ranked 3rd overall!).  It takes a village and great leadership.  Thanks George and team for all you are doing for our kids and our community.

Many Ways to Care

Our PTA board kicked off the week with a festive dinner at Parkside Restaurant in downtown Austin Monday evening.  This incredibly hard-working, caring group of parents (plus one teacher and one principal!) came together for a bit of fellowship, a bit of work, and a bit of reflection on the year so far.  PTA activities and events slated for the year are on target or have exceeded expectations; this simply wouldn't happen without the organization, talents, time, and resources of our parent board, committee members, and parents at large.  Period.  It was a fun evening and special thanks to Parkside owner and HP parent Shawn Cirkiel for providing such a delightful, relaxing space for us to be together. Good food, good drinks, good company equals an incredibly good evening.

Thinking of "good eats", parent Julie Danehy continues her instruction to second grade classes on all things healthy eating.  I happened to catch one of her classes this week, sampled some yummy sugar free "noggin", as well as some honest to goodness sugar cane.  This week's lesson was geared toward the facts behind sugar in foods; Julie really stresses "go foods" with kids (and adults) and always prepares recipes that are far healthier than the original ones most of us are used to eating - this is a person who really cares what we all put into our bodies and is on a mission to change our habits.  These classes, part of an ABC grant Julie and Coach DeLine wrote last year, are informative, tasty, and per Julie, her hope for the start of more healthy eating initiatives on our campus and beyond.  With Julie leading the way, I have no doubt about it.

Good, solid planning (rather than eating) was the norm around here the last few days as well.  Four of our language arts teachers, Laine Leibick, Lia Nudelman, Kati Guimbarda, and Alyssa Smith, met in a day-long retreat, planning grade 2-5 aligned historical fiction units of study, with each grade level tackling a different time period in history, from pre-WWII years in the 1930's through the civil rights movement of the 1960's .  The take-aways from their retreat included historical novel selections (several selected for each unit of study), arts primary resource materials researched and ordered (think WPA posters, Louis Jordan's song "Ration Blues" tied to a 3rd grade unit around Victory Gardens for example), and some concrete inter-disciplinary projects and activities nailed down around essential skills and questions of the TEKS - the ultimate goal being an aligned thread tied to skills/arts/theme/other concept.  Teachers plan to pilot the unit this year in one class per grade level, with the units then being rolled out to all others in the future.  I even heard talk of a History Fair at some point, so we will definitely keep you posted on that.  Kudos ladies for caring enough to take the day to plan together!

Grade 3-5 teachers also had half-day retreat days in our conference room this week.  Teachers, using the district Schoolnet data system, pulled up middle of the year (MOY) benchmark data from recent assessments on reading, math, science, and writing, drilled down to standards mastery and item analysis reports, and made intervention plans for specific students in need and/or students who are now ready to go beyond.  Much work was accomplished, with refinements being made to current after school tutoring groups that have been happening since early November and instructional plans within individual classes.  Though all teachers have much on their plates these days, special "hugs" to those at our testing grades as they truly carry a lot on their shoulders and care enough to dig deep into the data on these important days each year.   Check out 3rd grade in action one day this week.

Finally, a word about the Henson-Wheat family.  I was incredibly privileged to spend a portion of my afternoon Thursday with Ryanna Henson.  As you know, the family was featured recently in the American Statesman's annual Season of Caring, with Ryanna's ongoing health issues a major concern.  A former Scottie and now a student at the Ann Richards School, this poised young lady bowls me over with her spirit, her intelligence, her attitude, and her kindness.  We reminisced about her first year on campus, and how, even though she was the new kid on the block coming in at fourth grade, she still managed to win students over with her student council speech and became an elected Stu Co officer that year!  Thanks to those in our Scottie community who are giving support in many, many ways to the family;  for further information on how you can help, please contact the Statesman at seasonforcaring@statesman.com or by calling Any Baby Can at 512-454-3743.   

A Sea of Science Fair Projects



Merrell Anne and Eileen setting up

 You can't walk into the cafeteria this week without coming into contact with a Science Fair project.  The trifold boards, 265 of them to be exact, are on table after table, as seen in the picture below.  Can I just say impressive? The annual event, traditionally held this time of year at HP, continues to grow from year to year, with many projects now spilling onto tables set up in our hallways.  All fourth and fifth grade students are required to participate, with many others at K-3 joining in due to their love of science or through the encouragement of their teacher or parent -couldn't do it without 'ya!  I love looking at all of them, but what's really cool to see are the Kinder students making their first attempts at idea development, presentation, and reporting on project outcomes - as seen in two examples below.  Today, I also had the privilege of announcing the fourth and fifth grade campus finalists; these students are now waiting in the wings, projects in hand, ready to give their oral defense/explanation of their project to a very knowledgable panel of advanced science students from Vista Ridge High School in Cedar Park - thanks Vista Ridge!  This panel's scoring, along with other scoring criteria, then determine the students who will advance to the city-wide science fair in the spring.   All to be announced by end of day.  Phew! As you can imagine, we absolutely could not pull this off without the help from some pretty terrific parent volunteers, Susan Hillman chief among them (seen below), as well as some dedicated teachers getting students ready to roll, scoring projects late into the evening, and more. Check out some pictures from this most marvelous event at our school.



Julie, Tina, and Susan





Kinder Project

 

Another Kinder Example



 

 

Vista Ridge HS students





5th Grade Project on Display


Finally, check out our hard-working staff and students in a couple of pics below.  After school tutoring in content areas is just getting geared up at grades 3-5.  Additionally, our second year of Scottie Homework Club, for 2-5 students who need extra support in organization, prioritizing, planning and more, is now taking place a couple of days per week as well.  With clubs and fitness and night events and academic supports happening, you can imagine what a busy place we are around here on a daily basis, including the weekends.  Thanks to our teachers who tutor and thanks to our HW Club staff Ms. Camarillo and Ms. Bucknall for working on those executive skill supports when and where needed. 



Ms. O'Donnell helping with math



Ms. Bucknall at HW Club