Weekly News and Notes

Greetings,

Hope that many of you are seeing the desired results on mid-year exams! There are many different exams ongoing, from the multiple choice, to the performance-based, to the written. The students have seemed ably prepared, and the feedback from staff on the half-days has been largely positive. Hopefully the results support what your expectations were.

Second Semester Duties:

Please look at the duty schedule and determine with whom you share the periods where the seniors may not be around. I would love for folks to collaborate on those periods on freeing each other up - I will, for the time being, defer to professional courtesy, until such time as that becomes problematic. I have the utmost confidence that we do not need to hand schedule these at this point with a schedule as to who is covering for whom. Please, please, please work together!

Student Assemblies Next Week:

Dot forwarded the message below to the High School conference last week - be aware of assembly times!

As you are aware,  underage substance use continues to be a concern for this community, for Metro West and for Massachusetts.  Though there is much data available, in the 2010 MWABS,
*—50% of Medway students said they hung out or attended a party where alcohol was available.
—*42% hung out or attended a party where marijuana was available.
I anticipate that  data trends for this past administration will yeild similar data at the very least.  Raising awareness of parents and students is only one part of prevention. 

Please mark your calendars:
On January 28th at 7 pm we will host a program for parents presented by the Norfolk County District Attorney's Office and by RIchard L. Campbell of a nationally known law firm, Campbell, Campbell, Edwards and Conroy. The DA's Office will focus on legal consequences of underage substance use, and the law office will present "Be a Parent, Not a Pal, " focused on social host liability.

On Wednesday, January 30th, we will host similar presentations by the DA and an attorney with a student focus to raise awareness of consequences.  The social host piece, "It's All About You, " is a powerful presentation.  To allow adequate time for the presentations for the entire student body, the schedule is as follows:

Students in Grades 9 and 10-  8:50- 10:00
Students in Grades 11 and 12  10:10-11:15

Students will be called by grade  to the auditorium 5 minutes prior to the start time above.  If you have a class of students from mixed grades at the time, please send only those students in the grade assigned at the time and remain with the students in the other grades in your classroom.  Otherwise, your presence in the auditorium is appreciated. We understand the difficulties that overlap of periods may cause, but hope you can embrace this effort and its impact on saving lives and fostering positive decision making.

For your information, if students plan to attend the ring dance or prom. parents must attend the parent presentation.  We are finalizing options to satisfy this requirement for those who are unable to attend.

Assembly for Seniors






We will be hosting an assembly for Seniors ONLY on Friday, February 1. This assembly will be taking place in auditorium, during F block, at 9:15. That way, the assembly will not impact a period that would have been dropped earlier in the week or been altered due to the assmblies.


The purpose of the assembly will be to review procedures for Senior Privileges, as well as to get students normed per our expectations of that privilege. We do not expect the assembly to last the entire period; please wait to be called, and if teachers of seniors could report with their classes, that would be appreciated.


GRADES CLOSING!

Reminder: second quarter grades close on Tuesday, January 29. Report cards will be issued on February 5.

Scheduling Update

Most of you have no doubt had department heads review with you the "course change form," which will allow for course revisions, "deactivations," or additions. We hope to use this to track changes to the Program of Studies, as well as to put forth the courses for which students may register. The goal this year in terms of scheduling will be to have course selections drive the master schedule, not to put a schedule in place and fit the students in. While we do anticipate some hiccups, the goal is obviously to build a master schedule that satisfies not only what the students are taking and need, but also to allow some continuity in teaching, which has sometimes been difficult in certain departments.

By the same token, there are some revisions being examined that could potentially support fewer students in study during certain periods, as well as some discussions on the number of total credits a student would need to graduate. More on that will be forthcoming as these discussions evolve!

Video of the Week: Educator Rick Wormeli shares his thoughts on the purpose of homework.

Article of the Week: How a Good Teacher Becomes Great. I'm sure many of you will see some of the traits you practice every day!


Please enjoy the time assess mid-years, de-compress at the end of the term, and prepare for the onset of the second semester, and, as always, if you need anything, don't hesitate to ask!

Weekly News and Notes

Greetings!

Thanks again to everyone for such rich and positive conversations today. Our PD was focused, productive on many fronts, and suitable to a number of needs; we will be looking through all the feedback forms and working to provide opportunities to support our needs, and to provide the opportunities people need to continue these collaborations!

SENIOR PRIVILEGES

Senior privileges were approved at the School Committee meeting on Thursday, January 17. We will hold a senior assembly on the first Friday of second semester (February 1), at which point we will outline the procedures to the students. Please let us know if you have any other concerns or ideas in terms of implementation, which will be in place, hopefully, by the first day 1 of second semester, the following Wednesday.

Thanks to Christine Ryan and Spencer Christie for their patience and advising of the students, as well as Diana Rodgers, who provided support throughout the process to the seniors as they honed and refined their presentations and ideas.

ELA Interviews

We are in the process of finalizing the ELA position, and hope to have someone recommended to Dr. Evans at the end of next week. That person will hopefully be in place by the following week in order to hit the ground running on Friday, February 1, after Linda Matondi's retirement!

SECOND SEMESTER DUTIES

My apologies for sending out duties in a couple of different formats; I was under the impression that you could see the same schedules that I could on MMS. Hopefully the files on the high school conference make sense; if you need any clarification on when and where your duties are for second semester, please see me. I have made every possible attempt to ensure that everyone gets at least one long block free, and to ensure that everyone has a first or last period duty when the seniors could come and go.

With the additional "time," which is really only 1-2 periods every week or so, we are hoping to provide some pointed ideas for filling that time: working toward SMART goals, time for Atlas and curriculum collaboration, coverage for others who need time to collaborate during school time, etc. I am open to ideas - I would love to make that time as productive as possible for folks and support your goals as best we can!

SCHEDULING CONVERSATIONS!

Doug and I will be attending an MMS seminar in early March regarding the scheduling of the building. As we start to look at the schedule, we have shared with the department heads our desire to schedule the building around the courses that students elect to take, not simply rolling the schedule forward from year to year with a couple of tweaks.

Already, we are having some conversations with the arts and PE about revising the schedule to allow for greater curricular opportunities, as well as to reduce the number of students forced into study as a result of the scheduling of PE classes without anything opposite them. Furthermore, there will be some additional opportunities to write electives and offer new courses, hopefully, to students, particularly opposite the PE courses that meet every other day.

Please consult with department heads about elective offerings that you would consider pursuing. We are entirely committed to getting students OUT of study halls, into more classes, and giving people opportunities during non-teaching time to collaborate and work on what is important to them, rather than baby-sit in a directed study!

MIDYEARS

Please check the high school conference or last week's blog for information about mid-year exams; in the interest of retyping everything, I will just refer you there. Sorry for posting in multiple places.

Enjoy your long weekends!

Weekly News and Notes

Greetings!

Our only five-day week of January comes to a close, and with it, we have some updates on the coming weeks and the schedule ahead.

Jan. 18 PD

Please consult the schedule for the January 18 PD, which was sent by Shari today and was posted to the District News conference. We have a full day planned, and you can expect to work on both Common Core and Atlas, so that the day will apply to as many of the needs as people have requested. We will look to continue some continuity and to find ways to give people opportunities to work together!

Senior Privilege and Second Semester Duties

For next semester, we have tried to make some adjustments to ensure that all teachers have at least one period where they would benefit from periods where seniors arrive late or leave early, pending School Committee approval. For example, if Ms. Pereira, Ms. Cecchi, and Ms. Oleksy all proctor the duties during period A of day 1, and the seniors are coming in late, Ms. Pereira will have a free period the first week, can cover for Ms. Cecchi the second week, and Ms. Oleksy the third week, thus giving an extra free period to each of them. In some cases, people may have this happen more than once. A more detailed explanation will be forthcoming, but it will definitely provide some flexibility for people who are freed up by seniors coming or going. Hopefully that makes sense - stop by with any questions!

An FAQ document, which will be shared with parents and School Committee, will be published. It should answer many of the questions that are out there.

As for all the duties, a complete listing and a pdf of all teacher schedules will be posted to the P drive by the middle of next week.

Other things to be on the lookout for: I spoke with Mary about the library and modifying the procedure. Students who sign up ahead of time will be guaranteed spots, and others could check in at the beginning of the period, after which Mary could log attendance. That will help get more students into the library!

MCAS!

MCAS is coming. I will attempt to get you as many instructions as possible in advance of the test so folks can plan accordingly. The ELA dates, which are rapidly approaching, are March 19 (long comp), and March 21-22 for reading comprehension. Not sure why there is a day off in between, but there is!

Midyear Exams

For the last day of classes before mid-year exams, we will have a schedule that allows all classes to meet. Though it is a Day 2 on the schedule, we will adjust the first couple of periods to allow all classes to meet; there will be no long block, and lunches and the final two periods of the day will all remain the same.

The schedule for the day before mid-years begin, January 23, will be:

8:11-8:55                    Period A

8:59-9:42                  Period B

9:46-10:29              Period C

10:33-11:17            Period D

11:17-12:35           Period E with lunch

12:39-1:33              period F

1:37-2:31               Period G


For period A, we will follow a day 1 schedule. For periods B-G, we will follow a day 2 schedule.

For the exams, here is the coverage schedule for the cafeteria for studies, but we do expect that many students will be dismissed. In the interest of equity, everyone has been assigned some time in the library; you can work out that time period with your peers however you would like:

Midyear Exam – Study Proctors

Jan. 24:

EXAM PERIOD	8:15-8:45	8:45-9:15	9:15-9:45
A	C. Ryan, M. Cecchi, Murphy	Oleksy, Pereira, Trottier	Nassiff, Webster, Infanger
	10:00-10:30	10:30-11:00	11:00-11:30
B	Aigler, Hallett, Coutu	Buscio, Kirby	A. Rojee, Pacelli

Jan. 25:

EXAM PERIOD	8:15-8:45	8:45-9:15	9:15-9:45
C	Coyle, Lamond, Murphy	Guilfoil, Avellino-Chan, Trottier	Jasinski, Aylward, Bliss, Infanger
	10:00-10:30	10:30-11:00	11:00-11:30
D	Beltran, Lynch, Mackenzie	Rodgers, Collins	Burch, Nelson

Jan. 28:

EXAM PERIOD	8:15-8:45	8:45-9:15	9:15-9:45
E	Foucre, Brodeur	Petrarca, J. Rojee, Infanger	Shire-Swift, Murphy, Trottier
	10:00-10:30	10:30-11:00	11:00-11:30
F	Champagne, Amaral	Christie, Brandon	Bryan, Morin

                       

                                                           

Medway Weekly

The Medway Weekly is posted here. There is a decent video on how to deploy educational technology, for those of you who are looking to implement or try something new. I realize this usually gets sent on Wednesday, and I hope to get back to the regular publication schedule next week!

Have a great weekend!

Weekly News and Notes

Welcome back!

These three day weeks sometimes feel more difficult than the full five, but we trust that everyone came back rested and rejuvenated for the stretch run for second quarter.

Second semester schedules/duties

With a couple of changes that may still come to pass, the second semester duties and study halls are active on MMS. There are changes from first semester, so not everyone who had lunch, computer, or hall duties are the same. Also, if you notice, all study halls have been assigned to individual teacher classrooms. The directive to students will be to REPORT TO THE ROOM NUMBER THAT IS ON THE SCHEDULE. Hopefully, that clears up some of the lingering issues from the start of the year, as many of the students were cooperative with going to study, and the correct study at that.

Ms. Dolan and I will be working on again revising the library use procedures for students. Hopefully, that will also increase traffic there, as students come to follow our expectations.

Finally, we will make adjustments based on the senior privilege policy. We hope to meet with the seniors briefly the week of the 20th, understanding that compromising class time is not something we really want to do too much of heading into mid-years. That said, it is important for us to deliver the message to them after the next school committee meeting, when we hope the privilege policy will be approved.

With some periods, there is a noticeable drop in the numbers with the seniors not there, which should allow teachers to work out coverages amongst themselves. More specifics on those numbers will be forthcoming.

MIDYEAR EXAMS

This year, mid-year exams are set to begin on the 24th and 25th, continuing until the 29th. Second semester, and new schedules, will start with a DAY 3 on January 30.

There will be a schedule for covering the cafeteria. As with last year, students who do not have an exam, because they are taking a class for which there is no exam or they have study, will not need to be in the building. Thus, they will go to the cafeteria or get picked up. Attendance will be taken in individual classes; there is no homeroom. (This is the same procedure as last year).

To ensure a measure of equity, we have assigned everyone a 30-minute window to assist in the cafeteria, typically paired with at least one and maybe two people. If numbers are small, it could reasonably be a 15-minute duty if shared. That listing will be sent next week.

On the last day, there will be a period for G block and a makeup period. Please let me know if there are any procedural questions.

MCAS

Hard to believe - but soon we will begin the process of scheduling for the sophomore MCAS exam, which will be administered mid-March for ELA. Those of you who teach all or mostly sophomores can expect to be on our list of proctors! While I'm not entirely certain of how this has been done in the past, I will be sending out very specific instructions as March grows closer to ensure the proper, and least disruptive, administration of the test.

Student Teachers!

Medway High School will have two students teachers in the building this spring: Mr. John Mitchell will be working in social studies, and Ms. Reena Bammi will be teaching English. Both are very excited to be here, and I am sure they will learn a great deal from working with this faculty and staff!

Jan. 18 PD

You will be hearing more about our January 18 PD day in the coming weeks. The first part of the day will begin at the Middle School. Most of our staff will be working in small groups, watching lessons being presented by high school content teachers and middle school ELA teachers that intend to unpack and help with the comprehension of the Common Core literacy standards. Groups will be assigned after the large group meeting.

The arts, music, and PE teachers will be working on performance assessments, and there are specific activities/trainings being planned for special education and counseling staffs. More details are on the way!