Still in high gear!

The Dragon from The Paperbag Princess

I had a fantastic start to my week.  Happy to say I spent Monday with a group of HP teachers, as we participated in Round II of full day DBI training.  Held at UT, Sarah Coleman and Lara Dossett led this second K-5/special ed teacher cadre through a similar activity that our first group went through earlier in the semester; our goal is for all teachers, including special areas, to have their own professional development day, seeing an entire 1-5 day lesson arc, centered around the TEKS in content areas that have the most meaning for them.  For example, the two days completed so far have been based on language arts objectives and our math and science folks on campus, though they have individual strategies they can pull from their proverbial toolbox, are at a place where they need (and are asking for!) this type of "big picture" look with their content areas as well.  This day was again a very meaningful experience for all of us - Mrs. Pappert shared that she was "so inspired, I changed my biography unit plans" - with teachers seeing how the experts in the work put it all together.  Again, showing us where to build in low and high emotional moments, how to wring learning moments from transitions, what to develop as possible final products and/or assessments that show kids got it and can extend the learning.   Powerful, with teachers spending time at the end revising lessons with materials they brought with them.  Ready to keep rolling in the fall.

Second and third graders, along with about 75 parents, were able to travel to The State Theatre as part of our work with Paramount's Story Wranglers.  As you know, our third grade language arts students have been working intensively all
year with several teaching artists, developing their skills in creative writing, critical thinking, and much more.  These kids are motivated to write!  Once they put their ideas on paper, the Story Wranglers put it all together and perform stories that student groups wrote. They were hilarious and those of us in the audience could see that kid humor on full display! Lots of creativity and lots of joy, with students able to introduce their stories before they were performed!  Thank you Story Wranglers for a great year at our school and we'll see 'ya next year!

Thursday morning was definitely out of the norm as well.  In an earlier blog post, I mentioned Kinder student Alistair Sharp's winning HEB Toasted Oats art entry.  And that prizes could be in store.  Happy to say, his

entry was the big elementary age winner chosen out of  1,000 entries. We were floored when contacted last week by HEB reps that not only had Alistair won a year's supply of cereal and his artwork would be featured across the state on a special Toasted Oats box (with HP mentioned on the back of the box), but that our school would receive a free cereal breakfast for all, a free t-shirt for all with Alistair's winning pic on the shirt, plus $5,000 donated to our school.  Wow!  So, bright and early yesterday morning we ate, we donned our t-shirts, and we were presented with our donation.  The monies will help support continued arts initiatives at our campus for next year, along with beautification efforts at another elementary campus.  Thanks Alistair for thinking of our school, and big 'ol thanks to Leti Mendoza and everyone at HEB for your support of keeping creativity alive in our schools.

And of course, we wouldn't get to late May without 5th grade's annual Greek Mythology Unit.  Students have been reading Greek plays, writing Greek plays (written much earlier in the year with

help from Pollyanna Theatre, creation tales, such as How the Peacock Came to Be, The Story of Io), and finally, developing their individual Greek projects for display in our halls (along with a fairly in-depth Greek Mythology assessment I'm told).  Today was performance day, it was a packed house, and again, we were all amazed at the quality of the writing and performances.  This is our second year of working with Pollyanna and it has made a tremendous, high quality difference in the level of sophistication and skill building surrounding the art of play writing, staging, costuming, acting, and much more.  Life long skills being honed on and off the stage.

Ocean Odyssey 2.0

Last Saturday, several of our 3rd-5th grade students participated in the AISD Music Memory contest at Austin High School.  The listening selections chosen would stump many of us I'm sure, but happy to say several of our students walked away with those coveted Malcolm Gregory pins, given to students who had a perfect score.  The kids were very excited about those pins, as well as other awards given during the morning event.  Way to go Scotties, Mrs. Satterwhite, and Mr. Briones for all you accomplished this year.  Keep the music flowin'!




In and around our annual team leader and intervention team retreat days - we accomplished so much! - our district celebrated teachers and all the other wonderful staff who help support students.  Back on campus after the big night, Alyssa Absher, our TOY nominee received an additional surprise from the district - a couple of pretty cool certificates detailing the recognition.  Very proud of Ms. Absher and thankful for all she does each and every day for kids.






And those Process and Product Displays are almost 100% complete for the year.  We have some folks waiting on end of unit wrap-ups, but Mrs. Matetich's 5th grade scientists dived into the topic of biomes, adaptations, and potential effects of global warming on our world. Student reflections show evidence of critical thinking around this hot button topic and the work they did was hands-on and engaging. There was also a bit of teacher DBI instructional strategy in use as well.  Love it!



 

Finally, I can't give enough gratitude to the folks at Creative Action, music teachers Mrs. Satterwhite and Mr. Briones (yep, busy people!), and first grade teachers and students for their pumped up Ocean Odyssey performance yesterday afternoon.  It was a full house, it was our first run at something different, and each class was able to show the audience what they had learned during their study of ocean animals.  Otis the Seagull figured prominently in every classroom skit, there was humor, there were songs, there was an avenue provided for students to practice presentation skills, make deeper meanings, and have fun while doing it.  Cool end to the day. 

 

 

 

 

 



Thank a teacher

This week we celebrated Teacher Appreciation Week.  As we say thanks to our teachers for all they do - and they do a lot! -  it's important to remember that they above all have a job in which the self-learning never ends.  For real.  Lessons they create are not stagnant documents - they are continuously reviewed, revised, and made better.   Or new ones are created.  Those good teachers we all know are always thinking ahead, as they want the learning maximized and the engagement high.  They care to make it better. It can be an exhausting and demanding profession, but always worth the effort.  Anyone who has ever attended a field trip with a class, subbed in a classroom, volunteered for an in-school activity which involves kids, understands that dynamic and always, always walks away with appreciation for the job at hand.  Me included.

There were many images from our week at Highland Park that show the sheer diversity of activities on campus this week.  Voting for the annual Scottie t-shirt design, the first grade field experience to Sea World, fifth grade play practice for their Greek performances, Fling win excursions, and more.  But the sheer work and energy teachers put into lesson planning and the delivery of those lessons are core to what we do at a school. 

This week, I saw Mrs. Goldsmith's first graders outside practicing for their re-vamped/pumped up! annual Ocean Odyssey performance.  The classes have been working with Creative Action to better

highlight "what was learned" at the upcoming parent event, her class is planning to show all they have learned about sharks (other classes have other animals), and I'm proud that the team jumped in to try something new.  Something which will highlight what their students have been doing the last few weeks.  Cool.









I also saw Mrs. Nudelman's additions to her second year delivery of In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson historical fiction unit.  She kept those amazing, meaningful learning pieces in place for her 2nd graders as last year - still love the This I Believe poetry - but refined the lesson to include additional DBI creative strategies, such as Role on the Wall.  Still very meaningful visual art based on artists of the time, student descriptions, and reflections, but Mrs. Nudelman shared with me that the research students conducted on the life and times of Jackie Robinson in connection with the Role on the Wall activity, made the historical fiction unit that much better and the learning that much deeper.  And yes, if you are wondering, she's thinking ahead to refinements for next year as well..

 

And, finally, I saw Ms. Snell's play today, the culmination to her new Immigration unit of study.  The students performed scenes from A Fair Day's Wages, portraying the early Russian Jewish immigrant experience, what it meant to come to America, their expectations for life in this new land, and their subsequent reality...with a sense of hope triumphant over adversity at the end of the performance.  Students followed up with a visit to the classroom to show their parents the group photo essays they had constructed, based on relevant themes such as housing and discrimination.  One father shared that now, when the topic of immigration is mentioned on the news, his child proudly states, "I know about immigration.  Let me tell you about it."  Pretty powerful learning I'd say.

Thank a teacher.  Hug a teacher.  They surely deserve our praise.

Spirit Lifted!

There are days even principals don't want to come to school.  It's true.  Though those days are thankfully far and few between, every now and then, one creeps up on me.  Call it spring fever or simply a busy life catchin' up...  If  we're honest, we admit it happens to all of us.

On one of those rare days when I needed my spirit lifted beyond usual measures, I paid a visit to the fifth grade wing.  I didn't go with the intent of looking for inspiration, but I found it.  Specifically, in Mrs. Dean's Process and Product display.  I won't show all the pieces here, and will let the photos speak for themselves, but needless to say this historical fiction unit centered around the novel The Watsons Go to Birmingham was well done, meaningful, and allowed students to make connections to other ideas, other times, and other places, all rooted in the early civil rights movement.  The student created art, the rationales and descriptions for their art, and, most importantly, the student reflections on all they had learned over the course of a few weeks moved me...and I hear has moved others as well. For me, it really hit home that right there, on those concrete walls, our ready to promote babies, those fifth graders, are showing us all the people they are becoming.  People we're glad to know.  People I'm glad to know.  And that's goose bump kind of inspiration.

Much gratitude fifth graders for who you are and the promise you hold for all of us.  Consider my spirit lifted!