Harwood Hacks Gratitude Log: Ask students to list three things they are grateful for today and share one thing with the group. You may also include more specific prompts such as: “a song you feel grateful for”, “an activity that brings you joy, “a piece of media that you love” to get students thinking about all of the different ways to feel and express gratitude. |
HUGE thank you to Molly and Chris for your tireless efforts to produce an amazing Harwood musical once again! And doing this while also balancing your normal classes and the Winooski Valley Music Festival.
Check out the latest edition of the Common Ground and a specific highlight of the who.
Calendar:
04/11 - College Process Overview, @ HUHS Library - 6pm
04/12 - Middle School Career Fair @ Crossett Brook Middle School
04/13 & 4/19 - Family/TA Conferences *New process this year. See note in blog.
04/14 - Vermont Tech Try a Major Day field trip
04/16 - 4-6 p.m. - Rwandan Media showcase @ Zen Barn
04/18 - 2:00 - 3:20 - CirqueUs Performance - Whole School - no ELO 2!
04/19 - 04/27 - France Trip
04/20 - 5:30 - 6:30 - Rising 7th grade transition Evening
04/24 - 04/28 - April Vacation - No school
Appreciations:
Staff Member | Appreciations |
Randy | For her thoughtful and caring response and support of the students she supports as she manages MANY very challenging situations at the same time! |
Angela | For her tireless work to submit the Samsung video. |
Brian W. and Tara K. | For their connection activities to continue to drive the work of Aspirations and our learning as a school staff. |
Eve | For your inspiring connection activities at the start of each lesson - it is a powerful example of time off task can increase time on task. |
Safe - seen, heard, respected & understood:
Topics | Information/Links |
Health Office UpdatesPlease | Hello Staff! MUGS? Have one in your room that doesn’t belong to you? Have one at home that you want to donate? We are down quite a few. Gentle reminder…Springtime is field trip time! PLEASE, remember to get a list of students to the health office any time you are bringing students out of the building at least 5 days before you go! We are not notified of field trips unless you tell us the when and who. Please, and thank you. Be tick smart! Perform a tick check after spending time outside. If you find an embedded tick, remove it properly and contact your PCP to see about a prophylactic dose of an antibiotic (doxycycline) as a preventative measure. |
TA update | The full focus of advisory for the next two weeks is the Spring Student-Led conferences. All teachers should have reached out to the parent/caregivers of their advisory group with a method for sign up to occur. The process document for preparing students for the conference is on your TA grade-based slideshow. One strategy I have tried this week is to meet with individual students using the conference preparation document as a guide. Students respond to the questions, while I scribe the answers. I found this to be a guide for a comprehensive conversation with each student about what have been bright spots and challenges from their perspective. The look forward has been a particularly interesting part of the conversation. This is a great opportunity to consider what we are learning with our Aspirations work! Conference Dates: Thursday, 4/13 and Wednesday 4/19 from 3:30-7:00 PM Please follow up with families who have not signed up by Wednesday, 4/12! TA SLIDESHOWS |
Rigorous & Robust Academic Program:
Topics | Information/Links | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Staff Meeting  | Objectives: Department time to continue the scope and sequence work and to ensure proctors for VT CAP are trained for the upcoming testing. Where: Dep’t heads will reach out with locations When: 3:30 - 4:30 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
ELO Series | Thank you to everyone who brainstormed and proposed different ELO series for Quarter 4! We have a number of different offerings, outlined in this document and below. Over the next week, these offerings will be created in Adaptive Scheduler, and a student-facing document will be posted and shared. Students who want to participate in an ELO series can reach out to the individual teacher to be booked, or can book themselves through Adaptive Scheduler the week the series starts. Here’s what we’ve got:
Most series start the week of 4/17, but see the document above for more specifics! | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
VTCAP (Cognia) State Testing starts after April break! | Information was shared through email earlier this week, but is now immortalized for all posterity here in the blog: This year, the state of Vermont is shifting from SBAC assessments to VTCAP (Vermont Common Assessment Program, with Cognia as a vendor). The same tests will be given in the same grade levels as in the past, but the platform is new and different, and will require new proctor training. This document contains a lot of details for VTCAP testing at Harwood, but I'm including the basics below. Scheduling - Cognia testing will take place in some classes, as well as during some ELOs (these will be pre-booked this week): Middle School School Testing Calendar (window 4/12-5/26, inclusive of makeup testing)
High School Testing Calendar
Practice Testing - Anytime between now and the test dates, it might be helpful to have students take a look at some of the practice test resources (practice site HERE). This site was also sent home to families in the family newsletter. Proctoring - There are a lot of proctors needed, across departments, to pull this off. The proctor training consists of three things:
Proctors will go through the highly engaging Mandatory Training slideshow next Tuesday 4/11 during faculty meeting time, and will have time to read the Test Administrator Manual (spoiler alert - it's a page-turner!) during an upcoming ELO. More details on the proctor training will be sent to proctors in a separate email. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
With the close of quarter 3, we have our eye on graduation and closely monitoring seniors as they complete their graduation requirements. If you have a senior student at risk of failing your class, please get in touch with their school counselor. We will review quarter 3 course scores and follow up with students regarding their progress towards graduation. Hopefully, giving them the support and encouragement needed to end the year well. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Positive school climate and culture:
Topics | Information/Links |
Hiring Update | This week:
Posted positions still:
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Introducing our new Reading Interventionist: Jodi Martin lives in South Burlington and has been teaching for over twenty years. She began her career at Pine Ridge School in Williston, a former independent school for students with language-based learning challenges. She worked with students one-on-one as a remedial language specialist and in the classroom as an English teacher, and she eventually became the Education Director and Academic Dean. Next, she taught English at Bellows Free Academy in St. Albans. She worked with a broad range of students and made cultivating a love of reading one of her primary objectives. For the past three years, she has worked at the Stern Center for Language and Learning in Williston, providing literacy instruction for students of all ages. Jodi holds a Master of Education degree and two Bachelor of Arts degrees, one in English and one in Secondary Education. She is trained at the Certified level in the Orton-Gillingham approach to teaching literacy. She is passionate about empowering students with strong reading and writing skills. It is no surprise that in her free time, she enjoys reading and writing. She also enjoys drawing and painting, and she is an avid Zumba enthusiast. | |
Spread the word and share with your students and their guardians/families. It’s never too early to learn about ways to pay for future education and training! Join VSAC Aspirations School Specialist, Ellen Bagnato, at Harwood on Thursday, May 4 at 6:00 pm to learn about how to save, plan and pay for education and training after high school. There are many pathways to success after high school and they don’t have to involve too much debt. Middle school- 11th grade students and families are encouraged to attend! | |
Congresswoman Becca Balint will visit us on Friday, April 14th, from 1-2:30 pm. Congresswoman Balint has been visiting schools around Vermont, having round table discussions with students and faculty/staff focused on mental health. The representative will arrive in the afternoon (around 1 pm) and will be staying through ELO 1 to have two discussions, one with a group of students and one with a group of faculty. Please get in touch with Erin for more information if you’re interested in participating in the faculty/staff round table discussion. | |
Here is a schedule for the Middle School Career Fair next Wednesday, April 12th. |
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