Weekly Update - Friday, December 20, 2019

Happy Friday - and happy Winter Break!

I hope each of you takes some time to relax, unwind, and enjoy those around you.  We often run on such a low battery ourselves - this break is a great time to recharge that battery.  You can't serve others if you aren't serving yourself, too.

Take some time to be yourself... and relax. 

Thank you for all that you do for our students! 

Transition Day - Jan 2 & 3:
With only two days back after break, the transition day team determined that you may want to spread out some of the activities for both Thursday and Friday. 

Click here to access the details

A huge thank you to the team for planning this!

Building Weekly Newsletter:
Click here to access the Jan 2-3 Building Weekly Newsletter
Click here to access the Jan 6-10 Building Weekly Newsletter


See you in 2020!
-Justin

Weekly Update - December 13, 2019

Happy Friday, everyone!  

Winter Concert:
Wow, another great winter concert!  Nice job to our students, staff, and Mrs. Huse for our hard work making this a beautiful event!

Next Week:
As you know, students (and staff) need routine.  When we move away from this routine, we start to see behaviors and other engagement issues.  With it being five full days next week, I am cautioning you to keep those days as "normal" as possible. 

If you have students who are showing that break is going to be an issue, please connect them with Annette.  This can be for a variety of reasons - not having food, being alone for a lot of break, or for not having gifts.  Annette can help problem solve with you on how to support the student. 

There are some fun dress up days next week.  In the past, we have done a schoolwide movie on the Friday before break.  However, it sounds like that creates more issues in the afternoon.  Due to this feedback from staff, we will not be doing a schoolwide movie on Friday. 

Also, I will be serving a taco lunch on Friday as a "thank you" for all that you do. 

Math PLC January 6thWe have received feedback that clarity could be increased for the changes in math assessment and the work that is being done at the district-wide math sub outs.  On Jan. 6th PLCs will all meet together so that we can collaborate around and establish clarity with both the math assessments and how the PLC can look for math.  We will meet in 4B/4C from 2:40-3:40.  Please bring student work with you (it could be your work for the upcoming math meeting, but it doesn't need to be).  Decide as a grade level team which work you'd like to bring.   Ideally, student work would meet the following criteria: *Includes an explanation of student thinking in how they solved the problem.*Can be solved in more than one way.  *Is for a critical EU if possible.  
Please let Libby or Justin know if you have any questions.  

Fountas & Pinnell Benchmark Assessments Grades K-5

It's time to start planning for the Fountas and Pinnell Benchmark Assessments.  The window to complete these is February 1- March 21st.  The data must be entered into Infinite Campus before you leave for spring break.
Here are some options for completing these assessments that worked for people last year:
*Take one day per week beginning in February and do not meet with guided groups, but assess students.  (You could assign the writing from a guided reading book from the previous day's guided group for them to do when they are normally with you for guided reading.)  
*Each day, do not meet with one guided group (rotate which group this is) and assess students during that guided group time.
*Use the time you set aside for conferring or reading records to do an assessment.
*Take one week and do not meet with guided groups (but have additional meaningful independent time things for students to do) and get all of your assessments done in one week.  
*Assess a student or two during library time.  
Chat with your team and see if there are other ideas for completing these.  It will be important to have a plan for completing them as it will be here before we know it!  Please reach out to Libby if you'd like to brainstorm how this could work in your classroom.

GUEST BLOGGERS - "A Day in the Life of an Co-Taught 4th Grade Classroom"
By Dani Rypka, Danielle Nystrom, Laurie Wolhart 

So Co-Teaching is AMAZING! Totally amazing - but exhausting, right? We have been working with a new team dynamic in 4th grade, some of us have been co-teaching together for years (like, you know, we are married) but most of us are new to teaching together (dating phase) or co-teaching itself. We have tried SO many different models, planning times and structures, etc. While we still have a list of things we want to grow in, one thing we are really excited about with our newest couple of interventions is how we are communicating between the three of us. 

We have a couple students that are receiving services from EL and Special Education as well as receiving a guided reading group with their classroom teacher. To meet the needs of these students we have used many co-teaching models. One of these being a version of alternative teaching. This allows students to get the scaffolding and reteaching that they need to support their language needs and continued progress. 

The reading intervention requires more of a pull out model which is where our communication could easily break down. However, thanks to time spent making sure we all understand the interventions from both the special education teacher and the English language teacher, we are able to make connections between what the kids are working on throughout the day, in each of our groups and settings.  We use a shared Google document for lesson planning. This allows us to create continuity and use the same language. Within the document, we are able to see what is happening in each part of the reading block; within the general education setting, as well as the focus of each small group is. We are informed of each group time and understand the role that each of our small groups have in progressing these students forward. 

This shared document also allows for us to set students up for success within the general education setting. When we are on the same page, our students are supported both in small group and whole group teaching. Recently we have been working on using adjectives and describing words. This skill was also targeted in small group writing. With the knowledge of small group work, we felt comfortable calling on these students to share their thinking and set them up for success in the general education classroom during picture writing!

It has been a work in progress and we have definitely failed forward throughout it! However, in the short time since starting, we have seen a growth in both skills and confidence levels. These students have a drive to learn and grow and we are honored to be a part of their learning experience! Every student. Every Day… no matter what!  

International Fun Day at Work:
We will be participating in International Fun Day at Work 2020!  We will be celebrating a week early - on Thursday, January 16 (Friday is a Teacher Workday).   More information will come out after break.   Your team can start to do some brainstorming around your "dress" for the day.  Prizes will be awarded for "most unique" and "most wow factor".

Building Weekly Newsletter:
Click here to access the building weekly newsletter


Have a great weekend, everyone!  Take some time for YOU!
-Justin

Weekly Update - December 5, 2019

Happy Friday, wonderful educators!

If you are tired, you are making a difference!  Thank you for the love, compassion, and supports you give our students, every day!  You are important! 

November Twitter Challenge:
A huge thank you to everyone who participated in our gratitude challenge.  It was so uplifting to read the tweets and see what you appreciate.  It also helped remind me of the good in our lives - gratitude does that!  A huge congratulations to Michelle Simon for winning the lunch.  She and her team will enjoy an off-site lunch in December while I supervise all of 1st grade (YIKES!). 

Exit Ticket:
I found this on Twitter this week and thought it was a creative, engaging way to check for student understanding.  The student circles the emoji on how the student is thinking the learning went - then they justify it below.  As we know, students are well-connected to technology... just another way to make our check for understanding applicable to their lives! 

November Office Referral Data:
This week, I looked at our office referral data (ORD) from October and November.  Below is a link to the spreadsheet.  I wanted to provide you with some "big rocks" from this data:

• We have 47 less office referrals for October from last year to this year.  Woo hoo!  That's remarkable.  
• We have 7 less office referrals for November from last year to this year.  That is still a great decrease!  
• Physical aggression is still very high.  It seems as if many of these start off as play and turn into pushing/hitting/kicking.  
• Our lunch hour (11-1) is still the highest.  When I say this, I don't necessarily mean lunchroom either.  That time frame seems to be high for the building.  
• Friday's are very high for referrals. 

One thing to note: the data can look misleading if you don't dig deeper into it.  For example - 3rd Grade's numbers look higher in comparison to the other grade levels.  However, as we realized, 10 of the 15 referrals are for 3 students alone.  I will be pulling data in the next week on individual students and sharing with teacher(s). 

As we move into December, please know that emotions will be high for some of our students.  There is excitement, as well as uncertainty, for break and Christmas.  Many of our students may show behaviors due to this excitement and uncertainty.  

Click here to access the ORD Spreadsheet

Christmas:
With Christmas approaching, I want to caution us of bringing Christmas-related activities into the classroom.  With our building & District's focus around equity and serving all, this can be an area that we can marginalize people (unintentionally) when we do activities related to Christmas.  I am asking you to refrain from these activities - gift exchange, parties, but also things like worksheets, independent activities, and crafts.  I'm starting to see Santa and Christmas tree activities show up.  We serve a diverse population and are here to serve all.  In doing these type of activities, even if they are subtle, we can send a message that marginalizes people's views/thoughts/beliefs.  Again, I doubt this is intentional.  However, it happens.

If you are questioning an activity, project, etc, please come see me.  I would rather have a conversation about it and understand your thinking before you do it. 

Building Weekly Newsletter:
Click here to access the building weekly newsletter


Have a great weekend, everyone!  - Justin

Weekly Update - Friday, November 22, 2019

Happy Friday, McKinley!

American Education Week:
A huge thank you to each of you for what you do for our students!  As you know, each of you are "educators" - you play a role in educating our students.   Our staff is the best - passionate, dedicated, and truly cares about our students, families, and each other.  I am honored to work at McKinley and work beside each of you.   Thank you for the energy, heart, and hours you put into this career.  I appreciate you! 

If you haven't had your picture taken & would like it taken, see Steph today.  Thank you!

Problem Solving:  
Our Problem Solving Team is scheduling out into late December at this point.  If you have students to bring forward, please complete the referral form as soon as possible.

Also, just a reminder - you do not need to wait if you have concerns with students.  We don't expect you to have completed a period of interventions, or anything like that.  This team is here to support you - and the students.  If you need to, please take the two minutes and complete the referral today!

Communication Home:
Just a friendly reminder to be keeping in contact with families, regularly.   If you have a situation occur - or a concern - please, please, please make contact with the family.  I am dealing with more situations were families say, "this is the first time I've heard of this."  When I talk to staff, I'm hearing "well I told them next time I'd be calling home".  If you have concerns about a student - behavioral, academic, social-emotional, a call home is needed.  I often think of this analogy with calls home - During a physical, a doctor is concerned.  She finds a lump.  Would I prefer she connected with me regarding next steps or just waited until it happened again?  I know I'd appreciate the communication - ASAP.

On the other hand, we have done a lot of work around making positive commnication occur - High 5 letters, Call of the Day, Positive Office Referrals, McKinleyStrong slips.  These are all in the "Hub" and are great ways to connect with families in a positive way!

The Power of Formative Assessments!

As we know, the day-to-day checks for understanding have such power.  It creates responsive teaching - students are showing what they know and teachers are being responsive by providing next steps of instruction.  Sometimes formative assessments are often think of as "exit tickets".  However, there are so many other ways to do this check for understanding.  Below is a document, from Teaching and Learning, on some unique ways to do those formative checks.

Formative Assessment Ideas 

Building Weekly Newsletter:
Click here to access the building weekly newsletter (November 25 - 29

Click here to access the building weekly newsletter (Dec 2 - 6)


There will be no blog next week - so Happy Thanksgiving, also!
Enjoy your time with those you love!
-Justin

Weekly Update - Friday, November 15, 2019

Good morning! Happy Friday!
Thank you for the extra hours this week with Family-Teacher Conferences.  It's great to have families in the building!  

Labels:
I saw this on Facebook this week and loved it.  It also reminded me of the power of labels - "low kids", "Special Ed kids", "bad kids".  Your words become your beliefs and actions.  What words are you using?  Believing?  Acting on?  

American Education Week:

Next week is American Education Week -  a week for us to celebrate all the people who educate our students.  As I have said in the past, we are all educators - we have a role in the education and development of our McKinley students.  Below is a link to some special events for next week's American Education Week!  

Click here to access the events next week

Mindful Art - Guest Bloggers Amanda Gislason & Annette Warner:

Mindful Art group uses the creative process involved in making art to:

• Increase self-awareness
• Help students relieve stress and anxiety
• Help students explore choices
• Help students develop social skills
• Help students process traumatic experiences

Benefits of Mindful Art:

Mindful Art provides a visual and verbal approach to access and address student’s unique emotional needs.  Mindful art gives students a means of externalizing the complexities of their emotional pain. It allows students to express themselves in ways that are less threatening that verbal communication.  

Students who benefit from Mindful Art:

We have found great success using mindful art for students whose emotional instability impacts their education.  For example, students exhibiting symptoms of depression, anxiety, grief/loss and/or PTSD/traumatic experiences.  

Following are statements/comments from students who have participated in mindful art. What I like about Mindful Art:

• We can put on music and be calm
• Gives me time to meet others that are sort of like me
• I loved the dolls we made (worry dolls)
• That I can relax in so many different ways
• It is calming
• It gave me other things to do when I am mad at other people and things
• It helped me with my family deaths
• By talking with others I got a chance to try new strategies
• It helped me feel more confident
• “I am a very closed in person.  I don’t talk to people about my feelings but when I joined I wanted to talk and so it helped me”

MSU Placements:

As you may know, Owatonna is a partner district with MSU-Mankato... this gives us an opportunity to provide field experience hours and full-time student teaching placements. Your partnership and expertise is critical in helping develop our future colleagues! If you are interested in hosting a beginning teacher in your classroom in some way, please share your information using this form: Cooperating Teacher Interest.

*Completion of this form does not guarantee nor require acceptance of candidate placement, it simply is to gather an interest bank. Final placements are at the discretion of the University and District Administrators.

Contact Katie Coudron or Jane Sorensen (TOSAs with MSU-Mankato) with questions.

Why set goals using the Literacy Continuum?

Recently, the idea of finding the time to set goals for each reader and group using the Literacy Continuum was brought up, as some are questioning if it is worth the time now that we have the Guided Reading Classroom resource from Fountas and Pinnell.  Here are my own thoughts as to why setting goals using the Literacy Continuum is well worth the time:

1. If you don’t set goals, how do you know which introduction, discussion and teaching points to use from the lesson?  I so often hear when planning with teachers, “They all look good.” or “I want to do them all!”  To which we can take a look at the goals for the readers in the group and determine which questions or prompts the readers in that particular group need.  Without those goals, for me, it doubles (or triples) the amount of planning time it takes to plan each guided reading lesson, as I really don’t know what kids need to move them forward.
2. When you set goals for readers, you identify what is holding them at their current level, which gives specific information to focus on during prompting and teaching.  My ultimate goal is two-fold: kids LOVE to read and kids can read whatever they want to read.  Therefore, I want to continue to support their growth and advancement in what text they are able to process independently.  If I find those four or so goals for them, then I can prompt while they are reading at the group (when I bop in to hear them) or when I confer.  It can guide which students I call on during group for which questions. Therefore, they have more opportunities to grow in that goal. While the goal is not just to push them through the levels as fast as we can, the goal is to continue to grow in our reading so that they can access any text that they might encounter.
3. How will we know when to move a group on if we aren’t tracking specific goals?  The Literacy Continuum provides so many goals at each level, we can’t possibly track all of that information. If we focus our attention on tracking what has kept them at that level, and then they begin to become solid in those goals, we can confidently move students to the next level without fear that they don’t have every single goal mastered in that level.  

As our students grow in their goals and the level of text, we must continue to revisit the goals we set and add new ones and remove mastered goals based on our reading record data and anecdotal information from guided groups.  Even today, after doing a reading record with a student on an O level text, I had to go back to the continuum to see how the goals for summarizing are stated in that level. In level O, one of the summarizing goal shifts from “Summarize the important information in the next, selecting the information that is important.” to “Summarize the important information in the text in a clear and logical way without extraneous detail.”  The student I had read with had done a great retelling of the story with a lot of important information, but she really had not eliminated any detail. If I had not gone back to both the comprehension rubric, and the continuum, I would not have realized that this is about the level where students need to start really honing in on what is truly critical in the text.  

If we want to have our students receive the most targeted instruction possible, it is critical that we continue to set and revisit goals using the Literacy Continuum.  

Building Weekly Newsletter:
Click here to access the building weekly newsletter


I hope you have a great, relaxing weekend - enjoy the 40 degree heatwave!
-Justin

Weekly Update - Friday, November 8, 2019

Happy Friday, everyone!

Problem Solving Team:
Click here for an awesome video on our Problem Solving Team process (thank you, Libby!)

Just a friendly reminder of our Problem Solving Team!  This team is available to assist you (and ultimately students) throughout the year.  As we have learned from previous years, our team's requests fill up pretty quickly in January (after winter brenchmarking).  If you have a student you are concerned about - due to teacher observation, assessments, or progress monitoring data, please request a meeting with our team below! 

Problem Solving Team Request Form 
Problem Solving Team Process

Winter Gear:
Please remind students to bring in winter gear.   I have posted some requests on social media, too.  If you have students who did not bring gear, we have hats and gloves in the office.  However, we will not be a regular distributor this year.  If a student continually borrows gloves, we will ask you to make a call home to remind families that they need the gear.  If the family is in need of support, please connect them with Annette. 

October Office Referral Data:
Below is a link to our October ORD.  Our McKinleyStrong Team met last night to look through this data.  Overall, our referrals are down by 47 majors from last year.  That is a great thing!  As we know, less time in the office means more learning time!  Our physical aggression data is higher than normal.  We are going to pull the data deeper and share with teams, by grade level.  Look for this information in the next couple of weeks. 

Click here to access the data

Building Weekly Newsletter:
Click here to access the building weekly newsletter

Have a great weekend, everyone!
-Justin

Weekly Update- Friday, November 1, 2019

Happy November, everyone!  It's the month of Gratitude!  I hope you are all joining on the Twitter challenge - yes, all of you!  What a great way to build a community of gratitude, appreciation, and reflection! 

Just a reminder - our McKinleyStrong Celebration is today at OHS.  Please see the schedule and be on time for the bus.   Thank you! 

I Will Never Forget that Cup of Coffee... well worth the view!  
Take 5 minutes to watch a powerful video about happiness and your mindset.   This is a great lesson about how we show up in spaces, how we choose our happiness, and our mindset on the work we do.  Pretty powerful - take some time to listen to Ryan! 

Are you a Warm Demander?
Do you build deep, meaningful relationships while holding students to high expectations?   The more I reflect on this, the more I realize how hard this is!  Often, teachers are really great at relationships, but may lower their expectations a bit due to a students' background, ability, disability, etc.  Or, they have high expectations but struggle with showing kids how much they love them.  A "Warm Demander" does this - balances relationships with holding all kids to high expectations.  The below article is a great reminder of what you can do as a warm demander. 

https://www.edutopia.org/blog/warm-demander-equity-approach-matt-alexander

Building Weekly Newsletter:
Click here to access the building weekly newsletter


Have a great weekend, everyone!  - Justin

Weekly Update - Friday, October 25, 2019

Good Morning - and happy Friday! 

Gratitude Challenge Starts Friday!
Next Friday, our annual "gratitude challenge" starts on Twitter.  This is something I would like ALL staff to engage in.  If you aren't on Twitter yet, it's time.  Join today, it's free. 

Below is a calendar with the daily prompts.  If you tweet about 12 of these, you will be entered into a drawing to have an off-site lunch with five of your colleagues.

I'm looking forward to spreading the "gratitude word"! 

Gratitude Challenge Calendar

Words We Choose:

As you know, this is one of my favorite quotes - "the words you speak become the house you live in".   We've done extensive work around the words we use to describe students - and how powerful these words can be to your beliefs, actions, and expectations.  But, what about yourself?  your workload?  Are you choosing the words you are using there, too?   I know - we have a lot on our "plate" this year with new initiatives and new curriculum.  However, start to monitor the way you talk about this.  Your brain is wired to listen to your thoughts and put those into action.  Instead of thinking "I'm so overwhelmed and this sucks", think "I have a lot to do - and the things that are important will get done".  It will change your mindset and the "house you live in!". 

Think Time:
It's been so great to see our new reading resources in action.  The language, stories, and activities with these resources is engaging and higher level.  It's exciting!   I know these resources have left people feeling like, "Where do I fit all this in?"  I know time has become an issue in most classrooms.  As we continue into the year, don't forget about the power of "think time".  Our scholars need time to think, reflect, and process... and, at times, have productive struggles. 

Bus Driver Appreciation Week:
This week was Bus Driver Appreciation Week.  A huge thank you to Karen & Grace Thurnau for creating cards for our drivers - and thank you to everyone who signed the cards.  We delivered cinnamon rolls yesterday morning to each driver.  Thanks to Steph and Selena for all of your work organizing this.  Below is a message I received from the Bus Company: 

Justin and McKinley Staff,

What an awesome and unexpected surprise we all had when dropping at McKinley this morning!  I personally drove a McKinley based bus and saw Selena holding the big box containing the treats as I drove up to unload…I was then pleasantly presented with my pastry and card that certainly will be the highlight of my day!  You folks have always taken the extra step to make us feel extremely appreciated and valuable.  Lots of smiles and boasting going on from the McKinley drivers, for sure!!

Have a wonderful rest of your week!

Mindfulness:
Mindfulness has become something that is just a regular thing in our day.  It's been great to see how much our staff are engaging in this work - to help regulate students and get them ready for learning.  Just a reminder to be using the term "mindfulness" instead of "yoga".  There are religious connections to engaging in yoga.  I've had a few questions this year from parents on this. 

Building Leadership Team Meeting Notes:
Our Building Leadership Team met this week - below are the notes.  We read a great article from Peggy MacIntosh on white privilege - your BLT rep will be discussing it with you! 
Click here to access the notes 

Building Weekly Newsletter:
Click here to access the building weekly newsletter

Have a great weekend, everyone!  Go do something you enjoy!
-Justin

Weekly Update - Wednesday, October 16, 2019

Happy Friday - or Wednesday!

Courageous Conversations:
Thank you for your conversation around the Courageous Conversation protocol & compass on Monday.  This will guide our work, moving forward.  As you enter into conversations about race, always ask yourself where you are at within the compass & stay focused on the agreements and conditions.  This will help us focus on the work (race) and keep the conversation productive. 

If you did not read the article, please take some time.  This is critical work.

Accountable Talk
Below is a link to a card to help students stay accountable during discussions.  This was on Twitter recently and was on each student's desks.  The goal is for them to use the sentence starters & questions to stay focused and engaged in a discussion. A huge thank you to Eric Oppegard for creating & sharing this!

Accountable Talk Card 

LCSI Foundation #3 -  Guest Blogger Danielle Nystrom:

Foundation #3: Developing the Art of Listening

The third foundation that LSCI is built on is “Developing the Art of Listening”. Within this foundation it is important to acknowledge that choosing to listen to a child is a purposeful action. The choice is made to engage in a conversation. This is the first phase; attending. The choice is made to listen and the adult needs to have a neutral and approachable demeanor. In order to do so successfully, the adult must pay attention to their body language, their breathing, and their facial expressions. Presence has an impact. Children are able to pick up on the slightest shift in body language and facial expressions. The second phase is decoding. While the child is speaking, the adult should be looking for what is not being said. They are searching for meaning and attempting to make connections between the feelings experienced and the behavior that occurred, in a nonjudgmental way. During this phase is also important to allow processing and reflection time for the child so that these connections can sink in. 

Challenge: Check out this video from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off ! Watch it twice! The first time you watch it, turn the volume off. Watch the body language of both characters. The second time you watch it, pay attention to the tone and the questions being asked.

Building Weekly Newsletter:
Click here to access the building weekly newsletter

Make Time for YOU! 
As you know, this job demands a lot.  Without self-care, you can become exhausted - physically and emotionally.  Take some time this break to do something YOU enjoy.  Do some relaxing, unwinding, and be with those you love.  Take care of YOU!

Enjoy your MEA break!
-Justin

Weekly Update - Friday, October 11, 2019

Happy Friday, everyone!

Camp McKinley:
We had a great turnout (around 250 people!) for our "Camp McKinley" last night.  A huge thank you to Chelsea Van Roekel, Dani Rypka, Danielle Nystrom, Julie Bauer, Kathy Feltes, Sami Nelson, Laurie Wolhart, and Madie Conley for your work around this night.  Another thank you to Sylvia & Nura for being available for language support.  What a great night! 

Dear Complainer...
A great blog entry from the Energy Bus on complaining & blaming.  Take a minute to read - great reminders!  Click here to access the blog entry

How Does Communication Fit into the Literacy Puzzle - Guest Blogger Amanda Wood
Check out a great blog entry from Amanda Wood on how communication and literacy fit together. 

September ORD Data:
Below is a link to our September Office Referral Data (ORD).  This data is collected to examine trends in behaviors, but also provide supports for individual students.  Our McKinleyStrong Team analyzed the data last night and found the following observations:

• The 11-1pm is our highest time for referrals.  We thought this could be possibly be due to a large amount of kids in one space (lunchroom), volume in lunchroom, students being away from a teacher for the first time during the day, or just that it's their first unstructured time during the day.
• The team found that physical aggression is extremely high.  This matches previous years, too.  We talked about possible reasons and determined we would track who is being physical and figure out how to support them best.  

September ORD Data

Reserve November 1 - SHHH, it's a SECRET:
Keep this secret.. as we will be announcing next week.  We did fill the jar!  Woo hoo!  Our team met last night and determined that November 1st will be our McKinleyStrong Celebration.  More information will come on this; however, plan on an activity on this day.  More information to come! 

Life Space Crisis - Guest Blogger Danielle Nystrom:

Foundation #2: Understanding the Dynamics of the Conflict Cycle:

The second foundation that LSCI is built on is “Understanding the Dynamics of the Conflict Cycle”. This is especially important when trying to understand the timeline of an event. The conflict cycle is made up of four parts and occurs in a cyclical rotation. First, the child brings their values and world views into a given stressful event. This event or stress causes an emotion to be felt or experienced. An internal dialogue occurs based on the thoughts and feelings. This internal dialogue leads to some type of observable behavior. This could be anything from an eye roll to flipping a table. Once the observable behavior occurs, there is some kind of response from the adult that is around. This response will either keep the stress level the same or will increase the amount of stress the child is experiencing. It is imperative that the adult involved in the situation be responsive to the child’s needs; not reactive (yelling, punishment, etc). If the adult reacts to the behavior, the students’ stress level will increase, a new emotion will be experienced, followed by a more intense behavior. This cycle will continue if the adult continues to match the student; and the stress level will continue to rise. As stated earlier, the adult has multi-dimensional thinking and the ability to manage and control their emotions. The adult needs to be the thermostat in the event and work to keep the stress at a level place to assist the student in draining off their intense emotions.

Understanding the conflict cycle is important as it helps the adult involved understand how the child is feeling. It is also very helpful in assisting with determining the timeline of an event or crisis situation. The conflict cycle lends itself to this process. The adult can ask simple questions to gather information. Questions include: What happened? How did you feel? What were you thinking or feeling? What did you do? How did they respond? These questions allow the adult to hear the perception of the student and understand the feelings that the child was experiencing. 

Check out this great example of going around the conflict cycle… a few times! Breakfast Club

Building Weekly Newsletter:
Click here to access the building weekly newsletter


Have a great weekend, everyone! Keep your fingers crossed for NO SNOW!
-Justin

Weekly Update - Friday, October 4, 2019

Good morning - and happy Homecoming!

Mindset & Language Matter!  Think about those words you are choosing - they have greater impact than you realize!  

Guided Groups:

Guided groups are up and running this week!  A huge thank you to all the teachers who spent hours getting student goals established and schedules made.  I know this required a lot of time and effort.

Just a reminder - guided groups are a priority.  These time, along with intervention blocks, are sacred.  If we want to get students to becoming readers, guided groups are the structure to making this happen.  Please remember a few things:

• Guided groups are ineffective if we are not monitoring student goals and adjusting throughout the year.  These are our resources - the responsive teaching is what is critical to making our students high quality readers.
• Guided groups are at a minimum - 20 minutes.  
• LLI is designed to support guided groups.  Teachers between both programs should be communicating on the goals, level, progress, and the observational data they are seeing in group.  

If you need support, please let Libby know.  She is a great resource!  

Library Re-Design:
As you could see yesterday, Denise and Kayla were busy re-assembling our new learning space - the library.  The goal of this space is to move away from it being a "books only" spot to more of a learning space.  Eventually, Denise will have things out - puzzles, MakerSpace items, etc... the list is limitless!  The goal of yesterday's work was to create spaces throughout the library for small groups to work.  It looks awesome!  A huge thank you to Denise and Kayla for their hard work!  Also, thank you to the Maintenance Team for their help and our fellow Media Center EA's! 

EL Graduation:
Congratulations to our 2019 EL Graduates!  We are so proud of these students!  A huge thank you to Laurie Wolhart, Liz Stitzmeyer, Caryn Boetel, Sylvia Zavala, & Nura Elmi for all their work coordinating this special evant! 

Life Space Crisis Intervention - Guest Columnist Danielle Nystrom: 

Over the summer I had the opportunity to become certified in Life Space Crisis Intervention (LSCI). LSCI is a framework for working with students who are in crisis. This framework meets the students where they are at and works to increase their capacity to navigate settings that are managed by adults (school); this is something that is a struggle for students who have/are experienced trauma and haven’t developed a sense of safety. This framework is built on three critical foundations. It is important to understand the foundations of the LSCI framework as it plays into the mindset of the adult who is working with a child in crisis. With these insights, it allows the adult to meet the child where they are at. 

Foundation #1: The Understanding of Brain Differences between children and adults

The first foundation is “The Understanding of Brain Differences Between Children and Adults”. This foundation contains three important understandings. The first is the idea that a child’s brain is different than an adult brain. These differences are evident in four different ways: thinking, perception, feelings, and behaviors. When looking at the brain of a child, their thinking is irrational, events are perceived in one way, emotions take over, impulsive behaviors occur and defense mechanisms are used when the pain is too much. This differs from the brain of an adult. Adults are able to think rationally, use multidimensional thinking, manage and control emotions, and can take responsibility for their actions. Adults also have the understanding that their presence has impact; positive or negative. This understanding is important because it shows that children are self-centered in their way of thinking and struggle to see all sides of a situation or event. Adults are able to use multi-dimensional thinking and use all aspects of the situation or event when deciding how to act or respond.

	Child	Adult
Thinking	Irrational	Rational
Perception	Centered on self- Sees things one way	Multidimensional thinking- See all sides of a situation
Feelings	Emotions take over	Ability to manage emotions
Behaviors	May act impulsively and use defense mechanisms to protect themselves.	Can take responsibility for actions and understand that their presence has an impact in some way; positive or negative.

NEW Educational Assistant Schedule & Role:
Our new EA Schedule starts this Monday.   Just a reminder, EA's are supporting intervention blocks throughout the day.  With their "open" times listed on the schedule, they will eventually have individual students or small groups assigned to work with.  This will be assigned based on data and need.   A huge thank you to the EA team for their flexibility with scheduling this past month! 

Discussion Strategies:
Below is a link to some great discussion strategies - ways to get students collaborating! 
https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/speaking-listening-techniques/

Infinitec Trainings - Due in 27 Days!
August is right around the corner and as we wait for the 19/20 school year to begin, I am sending out the step-by-step instructions for the required on-line training modules (using Infinitec) for all employees.  The required trainings include the following:  

1. Anti-Harassment Training
1. Bullying Basics
1. Mandated Reporting
1. Student Confidentiality

Once you have viewed each video, you must take the quiz and receive a score of 80% or higher, otherwise you will need to re-watch the video until you achieve 80%.  DO NOT print out the certificate.  We will pull reports from the system and provide to the appropriate administrators and committees.  The training needs to be completed by October 31, 2019.

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