I hope you are all enjoying the beautiful MN weather! Summer gives us that time to enjoy those around us and reflect, both professionally and personally. I hope you are savoring in those moments.
Theme for 2017-2018:
With our upcoming big building "change" and our continued focus on relationships, our school theme for the upcoming year will be "Make Every Second Count". You will start to hear and see more of this as we enter the school year. This saying hit me pretty hard - to remember what matters and to make every second count, no matter the situation. I often lose sight of things when I'm "stuck in the forest". I'm excited for us to use this saying to stay grounded and focused on what really matters.
Construction Progress:
Construction is completely underway at our new school. The whole building is a construction site - the office addition, adding flooring to the new K-1 addition, and remodeling the existing building. Below are some new pictures from yesterday:
The new front door to McKinley
The new McKinley Office (just missing Lorri, Selena, and Katie!)
The new serving line for the kitchen. There will be two garage doors that open to create an entrance and exit to the serving line.
Jen Koziolek's windows to her K2 classroom. These windows are between her classroom and the resource room.
Jen Koziolek's K2 Classroom (it's a dark picture - the walls are painted!)
The Kindergarten Resource Room
The main hallway looking south (toward the new front door)
The school name will officially change on August 1, 2017. On this date, Willow Creek will be renamed McKinley Elementary with our school sign being installed around that time.
Our school playground was ordered yesterday. Below is an artist rendering of the playground, which will sit between the gym and Hemlock Avenue. As you remember, our students voted on what equipment they liked the best. Most of that equipment was ordered in this design. Also, you will notice that the playground is in our school colors - purple and gold! The playground will be installed on September 8-9. If you are free to help volunteer, we would GLADLY appreciate the help!
Our PBIS team will be meeting to discuss the expectations of our new site - from arrival, hallway expectations, to dismissal. This will be a big change for us all. I'm excited to see how we utilize the new space!
Twitter:
Don't forget to keep up with Twitter over the summer! Just a reminder of our school professional learning hashtag- #mckinleyPD. If you find something that is of interest to our staff, please tweet it with that hashtag. There's a lot of learning and networking on Twitter!
Direct Instruction Time Guidelines:
Speaking of Twitter, I found a great reminder of the appropriate amount of time for direct instruction (in any content area). Ironically, this comes from Eric Jensen's other book, Teaching with the Brain in Mind. As you can see, students learn best in shorter segments - with a max of 12 minutes. This doesn't mean we need to only schedule in 12 minute intervals; however, it does make you think about how to segment your instruction into appropriate intervals. After a lot of direct instruction, you may consider adding reflection, collaboration, or movement before moving on to more direct instruction.
Just a reminder- our McKinley temporary Office is located at Wilson.
Have a great July, everyone! I hope to see you around!
-Justin
