Klein “This I Believe” celebration — Courtyard 3:30-4:30 p.m.
Board Meeting 7:00 p.m.
Tuesday, May 16 — Yoga Club 8:15 a.m.
Tech Team Meeting
Vision Screening Makeups
MSTEP Grade 3 ELA CAT
NWEA Yesh in Lab 12:20 p.m.
5th Grade Rovers in gym 1:00 p.m.
Staff Meeting 3:45-4:15 p.m.
Wednesday, May 17 — SIP Chair Work Session: Metzger, Klein, Simonds to Riley
NWEA Maynard Reading in Lab 8:30 a.m.
NWEA McCall Reading in Lab 10:00 a.m.
Kindergarten Field Trip to Zoo
Sports & Fitness Club 3:30-4:15 p.m.
5th Grade Band Rehearsal 3:45 – 5:00 p.m.
Mindfulness Group 3:45 p.m.
Thursday, May 18 — Mindfulness Group 7:30 a.m.
MTSS Meetings
MSTEP Grade 3 MATH CAT
APHS Band Performance for 4th & 5th grades 9:00 a.m. Cafeteria
NWEA Lauth Reading in Lab 10:30 a.m.
Garden Club 3:30-4:30 p.m.
Family Garden Event 6:00 p.m.
Potbelly Restaurant Night
Friday, May 19 — NWEA Liedel in Lab 12:00 p.m.
American Sign Language (ASL) Club 3:45-4:30 p.m.
LOOKING AHEAD
5/22-5/24 — 5th Grade Reproductive Health Unit
5/22 — NWEA Housley in Lab 12:20 p.m.
Strategic Planning Metzger to Riley PM
Run Club 3:30-4:30 p.m.
5/23 — Yoga Club 8:15 a.m.
DRA 2nd Grade
MSTEP Grade 3 MATH PT
NWEA Yesh in Lab 12:20 p.m.
IP Reviews PM
5/24 — DRA 3rd Grade
NWEA 5th Grade Math
NWEA Maynard in Lab 9:00 a.m.
NWEA McCall in Lab 10:00 a.m.
Sports & Fitness Club 3:30-4:15 p.m.
5th Grade Band Rehearsal 3:45-5:00 p.m.
Mindfulness Group 3:45-4:30 p.m.
5/25 — Mindfulness Group 7:45 a.m.
DRA Kindergarten
NWEA 4th Grade Reading
Metzger to Riley in AM
NWEA Lauth Math in Lab 12:00 p.m..
Garden Club 3:30-4:30 p.m.
5/26 — 5th Grade Field Trip to Greenfield Village
Speech Team Meeting
NWEA Liedel in Lab 12:20 p.m.
ASL Club 3:45-4:30 p.m.
5/29 — NO SCHOOL MEMORIAL DAY
COLOR RUN
A HUGE thank you to all Bobcat staff members and families who helped in making Friday’s Color Run a huge success! Over 300 runners, volunteers, and spectators enjoyed a beautiful night at Champaign Park! This annual event is a favorite for our Bennie community!
MINDFULNESS
Our latest staff endeavor is a journey into Mindfulness. 33 of our staff members are participating in an online learning community through Mindful Schools.
Please use the shared doc to log notes from your group’s meeting during the week. This way, we are all able to see what others are discussing since we will not be meeting ALL together probably until the last week. If you met in a group this week but didn’t add notes to this document, can someone add your group’s thoughts?
Remember to sign the Sign In sheet each week when your group meets. In order for the meetings to “count” for SCECHs, they need to be around 45 mins or so — remember that when you sign in!!
Each week, there are standing meeting times on Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning, but like this past week, feel free to find a time that works for you and a few partners and make your own time! Please record your notes on the shared doc!
More great news! Class Dojo has released their latest video series on, guess what? Mindfulness! Check it out! There are some great lessons and activities on the Class Dojo website, too!
MTSS/DATA TEAM MEETING
Our final MTSS/Data Team meeting of the year has been rescheduled for Tuesday, June 6. At this time, we will have the results of all of our year-end assessments and can take a final look at our data! Please feel free to join us even if you are not on the team!
POTBELLY RESTAURANT NIGHT
AMERICAN SIGN LANGUAGE CLUB
Please pass this info to parents of 1st-5th graders!
Beginning this Friday, May 19, an opportunity to learn sign language is being extended to our Bobcats! Two Allen Park Middle School students created an American Sign Language (ASL) Club and would like to teach any interested Bobcats about sign language! The club will be held in the Bennie Media Center from 3:45 to 4:30 p.m. and will go on for 4 weeks. At the club meetings we will teach your child American sign language (Adult will be present)we plan on teaching them the alphabet, family signs, and basic words in our vocabulary, over all we plan this to be a club for kids to learn more and be able to communicate with other people.
Mike Dawson has indicated that the Safe Schools training window will open on July 1 with a due date of October 31. Please let me know if you need any assistance accessing your Safe Schools account when the window opens.
PD LOGS
Now that PD has concluded for the year, please print and submit your PD log from the MOECS system and turn it in to my mailbox no later than May 31. A list of this year’s PD was included in a previous blog post if you need to reference it. If you have a certificate that does not need continuing ed credits to renew, you will enter your PD log on the RESA website.
TECH TIP
10 Tips for Organizing Google Drive
Google Drive has become one of my essential tools. With unlimited storage and easy access from any device, I put everything in Drive. At first, this was no big deal. But after about five years of heavy drive usage, it became more difficult to find and manage my files. I had to improve how I used Google Drive.
It’s time for some Google Drive spring cleaning!
There are some simple things you can do to remove clutter and confusion from your Google Drive account. Put these principles into practice and you will be a drive master! I was going to include all 10 tips right in this email, but after I got done the post was over 1300 words- yikes! Short emails are best, so:
There are two ways you can get my list of 10 ways to organize your Drive account:
Put my 10 tips into practice and send me a screen shot of your organized drive account. Include your mailing address and I will send you some AWESOME stickers for your laptop!
When I first started teaching I never liked hearing that infamous nine word phrase that teachers all too often hear from jealous folks who are not in the profession.
“It must be nice to have your summers off.”
Of course it’s nice to have the summers off…in theory. Who wouldn’t want to spend their days sleeping in, lying on a beach, sitting poolside or watching Netflix ’til the cows come home?
But the reality was that I wasn’t actually doing those things. It seemed I was always busy spending the months of July and August preparing for the upcoming school year.
As I gained more experience as a teacher I put a lot of effort into finding ways to work smarter and not harder. Teaching is challenging because there will always be a list of things to do, but over the years I came to realize the importance of recharging and the value it had in making me a more effective educator. I found lots of strategies that helped me to reclaim my personal time and find a much better work and home life balance.
Below are five things I started to do during my contracted teaching hours each spring (instead of during my summer vacations) that had me super prepared for the new school year in the fall.
#1 Plan and Prep for the First Few Weeks
It’s important to collaborate with your teammates so that you are providing your students with similar experiences. This is not easy to coordinate when you are all on different schedules and spread out in different locations throughout the summer. As the school year winds down and you have all of your activities for the end of the school year ready to go, work together to set your sights on planning and prepping for the new year.
The best part of planning as a team is that each teacher can take responsibility for copying and prepping a specific activity for the entire grade level. I placed everything into a copy paper box and placed it on a shelf in my closet and was ready to go in the fall…bonus…no waiting in huge copier lines with the back-to-school rush!
Try Something New
Is there a teaching method or educational practice that you’ve had on your radar, but never tried? Teachers often think, “Maybe I’ll do that next near.” Why wait? Your current class has established norms and is up and running. They are the perfect group to try things out with because they know your expectations.
When I first started using a Math Workshop with Guided Math Lessons in my classroom I was going to wait until the new year for a ‘fresh start,’ but instead introduced it in the spring. This was perfect because it let me iron out the details, figure out the best ways for traffic to flow in my classroom and get feedback from my students. It was fantastic! Not only was I ready to hit the ground running in September, but it enabled me to identify and fine tune the specific math skills each individual student needed before progressing to the next grade.
What have you wanted to try? Think about things like book clubs, reader’s theater, paragraph of the week, socratic seminar, STEM projects or perhaps even alternative seating and jump in with your current cohort. You’ll be glad you did.
Prepare Your Walls and Bulletin Boards
If you are fortunate enough to be staying in the same classroom next year then you may also be fortunate enough to take advantage of the opportunity to set up your wall space. I always recommend starting with a blank slate at the start of a new year, but you also want it to be inviting. Hanging fabric and bulletin board trim on your boards will provide a colorful backdrop for the first day of schooland make it easy to start displaying anchor charts and student work right from the start. You can also set up your schedule area, birthday board, calendar and any other yearlong displays. Some teachers enjoy having their current class create a “welcome board” for the incoming students. If you plan to decorate with a classroom theme you can use the time to print and laminate materials and gather supplies. If you are looking for ideas on how to set up and decorate a classroom please feel free to download my free Guide to Classroom Decor.
Fine Tune Your Procedures and Routines
Strong classroom management is essential to student learning and the key to good management is to plan, practice and implement procedures and routines for everything. Think about how things are running in your classroom now and identify areas that could be improved. Experiment with new routines and traffic flows until you find the ones that are most effective. Prepare a classroom routines journal by writing all the steps for everything you do. Include photos or better yet, video your current class modeling those routines. Show those video clips to the new class as you teach the procedures so they visualize the expectations and make them a habit.
Declutter Your Classroom
Having an organized learning space will help keep children on task and focused and save you time and money by enabling you to quickly find what you need. Students LOVE to help and are perfect for tasks like sorting, testing markers, sharpening pencils, etc. Just be sure not to use class time for these jobs. I suggest setting up a day to have your kids stay after school and help out. They will be thrilled with the privilege and you’ll appreciate the things they get done for you. I have tons of ideas available here on The Clutter-Free Classroom to help you get your classroom looking great and functioning effectively. I would love for you to stay for awhile and look around.
Click on the tabs at the top to explore the ideas I’ve shared for decluttering, organizing, decorating and managing your classroom.
I’ve written a companion post to this one titled, 3 Boxes Teachers Should Pack Before Summer Vacation for the Upper Elementary Snapshots Collaborative Blog. My hope is that the combined tips shared will allow you to enjoy your vacation, recharge your teacher batteries, spend time with family and friends and then hit the ground running for the new year. Be sure to visit my there and read that post as well.
Love that quote at the end!