Thankfulness

This has been one of those weeks where we all hug each other a little bit harder, try to connect with our kids a little bit more, and take the time to have a little bit more personal reflection on love, life, and questions none of us can really answer.  Though we can't ever know the reason why bad things happen to good people, especially those who are the most vulnerable among us, I do know that we can and should use these moments to not only reflect but also look ahead, and hopefully, come out on the other side as better people. 

Within the sadness we all felt this week over the Sandy Hook tragedy, we also kept things going for our own kids because, simply put, that's what schools do each day.  We do it because we love those we work with and we know they deserve to have goodness and joy still a part of their lives.  So that's what we did this week. 

Parents, such as Jay Plotkin and Moira Castanon, at school on Sunday, trying to get the staging set for Monday's student picture celebrating our 60th campus anniversary.

Third grade teachers engaging and facilitating the learning for their third graders with all things Medieval Faire, a great HP tradition that I hope lives on forever.

Kinder classes attending a special assembly by Creative Action, helping with the performance of The Shoemaker and the Elves.

And first graders in Ms. Ferguson's classroom, making a class list on all things they are thankful for this year.  I think it's an appropriate list to leave you with as we close out 2012 because we all do have much to be thankful for this holiday season, knowing there are others who are struggling - and rightly so - with finding reason to be thankful for anything.  Truly, lots of love and hugs your way.  Have a joyful season wherever you find yourself, see you in 2013, and know I continue to be thankful for each of you and the joy you bring to my life.

Ms. Ferguson – having a job at Highland Park and teaching this class of amazing 1^st graders

Zac – family, friends, shelter

Chander – Ms.  Ferguson

Jack S – food in our bellies

Ian – wonderful friends in this class

Solana – our school, nursing homes

Emmylou – friends, my family, teachers

Audriana – my family, friends, and that I am able to go to school

Megan – my mom and dad

Evan – my city and my teacher

Oliver – food and smartness

JP – family, food, my house and school

Jack F. – I’m thankful for us

Sarah – cars and a warm bed

McKinzie – my family

Matthew – friends, teachers, school and Ms. Workman

Leo –money

Cody – doctors and nurses

Victoria – the holidays

Lucky – my mom and brother Jazz

Emily – my family, friends, school and home

Tough Conversations

On Monday, Cari Land facilitated a very fruitful meeting with me and several representatives from The Center for Elimination of Disproportionality and Disparities, part of The Texas Health and Human Services Commission.  We met with Project Manager Sheila Sturgis, as well as the Center's Melonee Carter and Demaris Nicholson.  Some great dialogue surrounding Courageous Conversations and ways to examine our own personal biases about race.  Ms. Sturgis presented some eye opening statistics from the most current studies and we left the meeting with a planned joint training involving Kealing Middle School staff during our 13-14 preservice week.  These are sometimes difficult conversations to have - being color blind is not the answer - and I know we'll gain much personal insight from the work we will do together. 

Fifth grade teacher Kati Guimbarda Dean also recently tackled a tough subject in her language arts classes.  Connected to the class novel Maniac Magee, she had her students explore the Myths of Homelessness, with students conducting research around those myths and creating images and findings through the use of GlogsterEDU.  The pictures and words are powerful reminders that homelessness is most often not a choice and some common preconceived notions are not necessarily true.  This activity further served as a reminder that the use of multimedia arts tools can and do act as powerful change agents in our world.  Job well done and some sobering information for us all.



Science Fair Arrives!







Thanks McCallum HS students & UT's Marlo!



It was all things Science Fair this week, with the cafeteria and halls full of 290 tri-fold boards highlighting experiments and research on everything from vortex rings to product testing of window cleaners to an explanation on The Myth of Vampire Leaks.  Adults in attendance at our first ever Family Science Night, including co-chairs Juli Berwald and Tina Barrett, along with fifth grade science teacher Janet Matetich, agree with me that this year's crop of projects truly are the best yet.  I was thrilled to see that many project ideas came from some type of personal experience - this seemed to make those projects that much better as students had a personal reason to research. Such as Sarah's project on infant jaundice and bilirubin (baby brother Liam had it as a newborn!) and Trevor's research on retinal detachment - something he experienced this summer. In addition to today's oral interviews with a few McCallum HS advanced science students plus one UT student, our Thursday Family Science Night gave each fifth grader a chance to explain their project to adult attendees.  This extra component gave much meaning to the projects for our students and we are hoping to open the evening up to all K-5 entrants next year.  The students were very eager to share rationales, the hypotheses, the workings and findings of the experiments or research, as well as their conclusions.  They were also able to reflect and explain what they would do differently next time and (perhaps most importantly) any possible next steps in their research.  Cool.  Many budding scientists among us and I couldn't be prouder of the work done. 



 

Loved the DBI strategies I saw in use when I visited Mrs. Bachman's language arts class. Students were working on reading fluency, comprehension, and vocabulary and used Tableaux to help with their understanding of words such as weeping and miserable (from the novel they were reading, My Father's Dragon).  What was really cool though was seeing Moses in action, toward the end of the lesson, test out the DBI strategy Hot Seat.  He was a very convincing cat from the story and answered audience questions about his motivation, feelings, and more quite ably.  Building comprehension in meaningful, authentic, and motivating ways.  Can't wait to see more!



Kudos to Mrs. O'Donnell and her fifth grade math students for a truly engaging Van de Walle lesson on equivalent fractions.  The paired activity, with the use of counters, allowed students to create fractional parts in arrays, then further writing an equation showing the equivalent fraction.  They got it, they were discussing it together (socializing intelligence!), and they were able to explain their thinking to me. 

Finally, some other cool images from the week involve the third grade annual Medieval Unit.  Posted in our third grade hallways, and in anticipation of the upcoming Medieval Fair performances, we have student created shields and movie posters connected to the novel The Castle In the Attic.  Much more coming including a re-formatted performance in a couple of weeks.  I'm looking forward to it, but in the meantime, check out some of the student work below.