PIE Meeting Notes – Monday, October 1, 2012
In attendance: Jim Goldsmith, Carla Wuthrich, Kitty
Frazier, Heidi Bouchard, Barbara Galgon, Sally Feussner, Betsy Knox, Kate
Dodge, Frank Twarog, Kim Gordon, Bob Goudreau, Joy O’Neil, Renee Durochia, Doug
Stewart, Sarah Murphy, Alicia Vert, Rachel Kring, Ali Douglas, Alyssa Lasher
1.
Welcome
and Introductions
2.
Assessment
Review Presentation
·
Assessments are the tool used to see how well instruction and
curriculum are impacting the learning and understanding of our students. Test
scores can help adjust teaching applications used to help better learn.
·
Betsy Knox (Literacy Coordinator) and Nancy
Pollack (Math Coordinator) represent HCS for Chittenden South Supervisory Union
when curriculum programs are being discussed and decided upon.
·
Betsy Knox shared handouts while she gave a
Power Point presentation: the information will be posted on the website along
the with tonight’s notes.
o We
understand how well students are learning based on classroom
performance/assessment, common local assessments, and state assessments.
o New
England Common Assessment Program (NECAP) is always given in October.
§
Oct 9-12
grades 6,7,8 testing in reading, math, and writing (grade 8 only tests for
writing)
§
October
12-19 grades 3,4,5 (reading. Math, and writing (grade 5 only tests for
writing).
§
(Science will be tested in April.)
§
You can
help your child by: helping with good nutrition, rest, and helping them
build stamina and perseverance with the testing process.
·
The reading test is roughly 45 minutes; students
need to self-pace themselves (and not to get “stuck” on one item).
·
Extra time can be given if needed; there is no
“hard” time in which pencils need to be put down.
·
Important
way that parents can reinforce is asking questions like: “How do you
know?”, “What is the evidence?”, “Can you justify that response?”
·
The question was come up about students being
“taught to the test”. Betsy and
Sally agreed that teaching “test taking strategies” is definitely occurring in
classroom. The complexity and thinking of the work needed to solve the problems
is prompting students to think more globally and to develop a logical line of
thinking to share knowledge.
·
The specific grade level expectations being
tested are unknown from year-to-year; however, things like writing a well-constructed
paragraph are strategies teachers can anticipate.
·
Teachers cannot help students during the tests
and they cannot see the tests after students are done with them. There are strict guidelines as to how
much and what kind of help teachers can offer.
·
Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC)
will be coming to our state.
o As
the Common Core has been adopted by the State of Vermont, the testing will
shift to fit these.
o CSSU
is focusing on the “informational
text” aspect of the Common Core teaching strategies.
o Spring of 2014 will be the first SBAC
testing completed at HCS/CSSU.
o The
format of these tests is yet unknown.
·
Local assessments include the Benchmark
Assessment System (BAS), Math Fact Fluency, CSSU on Demand Writing.
o Ways
you can help your child succeed includes the suggestions as above as well as
supporting a regular routine for practice of homework and increased tolerance
to doing reading/written work.
·
Data points and grade level expectations are
laid out for each grade level.
·
Some data points are used as screening tools and
not all students are given locally based assessment on a frequent basis.
·
Jupiter Grades starts at 5th grade,
but is slowly working its way down to the lower grade levels.
Celebrations, Save
the Dates, and “Did you knows?”
·
Spelling Bee for grades 5-8 in Williston; any
student who is interested can participate.
·
Staff Appreciation surveys are out; hope to get
folks together in the next week or two to review results and sketch out a
calendar
·
Maureen Locker is doing food sampling in each
classroom (thanks to grant money received by the Wellness Committee)
·
Walking mileage club started today (Oct 1st).
Kids can log their mileage and get cool “feet” necklaces.
·
Farm to School Program has started; first order
came this week!
·
Visiting teacher from Thailand at HCS and
spending time with each class.
·
October 8th 4th graders
going to Shelburne Farm to work on their geology unit.
·
Each 4th grader will have their own
Blog this year.
·
6th grade is working with their own
iPads.
·
6th grade is working on Crossing the
Wire (a book about a Mexican boy crossing the border) and “buying stocks” to
learn about the stock market.
·
Betsy is also using iPad technology for making
presentations to combine information from multiple sources.
·
Penguin Plunge will be a 6th grade
(optional) fund raising effort for Special Olympics… students 5th
grade to adult are welcomed to join in the fun!
Questions:
·
When do curriculum meetings happen and can
parents participate?
o There
are multiple layers of curriculum meetings, many might not be appropriate for
parents as time is spent analyzing data.
o If
there is a large interest, creating a curriculum night is a possibility. It
could be done by grade level or showing a more global progression of skills
learned in what sequence.
§
In the future (2013), Open House might be more
of a curriculum night. Stay tuned.
Help Wanted:
·
October 2nd
(8-11 am) help doing vegetable prep is needed in the cafeteria. Contact Deb
Bissonette… or just show up!
·
Looking for parents and older students to help serve dinner at the Open House Dinner;
contact Kelli Brown or Deb if you’re interested.
·
Looking for parents to volunteer in the cafeteria on Tuesdays (approximately 11-1pm).
Contact Kelli or Deb for more information and to sign up!
·
Music teacher
looking for folks to help laminate class materials. Contact DSertz@cssu.org if you can help!
§
PIE
Committee Updates:
·
K-5 Performance: (Joy O’Neil is heading this effort)
o For
next year, a K-2 performance will be connected along with the 6-8 drama. (For
example, if drama is doing Wizard of Oz, the younger kids can sing Oz songs
prior to the performance)
o Also
looking at opportunities for students in grades 3-5 to get on stage, share
their talents and build their confidence.
o Currently
there is no money to support this.
o This
year several grades have plans for larger shows to do in-house. Talked about
opening these shows to parents, so children can perform to a larger audience.
o Contact
Joy if you have ideas on ways to raise money, a project to produce, or any
other ideas.
·
Fundraising Committee:
o Meadow
Farms orders due today. This Thursday at 6 pm, folks will be tallying results
and sending out the final order. (No additional help needed at this time).
o Initial
organizing has happened for a bake sale on Election Day. Stay tuned for a link
to Sign Up Genius so you can help/participate!
o Box
Tops labels ongoing. First round is ending Oct 22nd.
o Book
Fair happening the first week in December. Sign up Genius will be going around
(and in the Viking) for information as it develops.
·
Staff Appreciation:
o Staff
bulletin board is up (outside the office). Great first project for our group!
o Also,
the library used our “volunteer search” to get help stuffing information into
packets. Looking forward to doing more of these kinds of “take home” volunteer
projects.
·
Wellness Initative Team:
o Maureen
Locker is visiting classrooms with food samplings…ask your child if she’s been
in and what they tried.
o Walking
Mileage club started today (Oct 1). Children are able to document their
distance traveled at designated times (motor breaks, recess, etc) and they can
earn tokens for each set amount traveled.
o Looking
for parents to organize a snowshoe club. The school has 24 pairs that are being
under-utilized.
o Farm
to School program has begun!
