January 2015 Teaching and Learning Staff Newsletter by Lake Orion Community Schools

January, 2015

Teaching and Learning Newsletter

2014 ~ 2015

Message from Heidi... Dear Staff,

NEWSLETTER

TEACHING AND LEARNING

Happy 2015! I hope you enjoyed the holidays and got a chance to relax a little during our break. We are quickly approaching the half way point of the school year. It is so hard to believe. We have already accomplished so much this year and we also continue to respond to the many changes this year from MDE. I compare it to a hamster running on his wheel, which we are used to, however, this year it feels we are getting things thrown at us while trying to stay on the wheel! While at times it is frustrating, overwhelming, and exhausting, I am so grateful to be in Lake Orion with colleagues that ban together to rise to every challenge. Please be sure to take a few minutes to read the Teaching and Learning newsletter to keep up to date on what is happening throughout LO. It has been mentioned to me that curious minds want to know where the money comes from for our newsletter prizes. A few years ago I was thinking of ways to get more people to read the newsletter and decided I wanted to award prizes. At the time, our building did not have a “jean” day. So…..I constituted Jean Friday for our office and the money that is collected is used for the newsletter prizes. Stay warm and have a great start to the new year!

ELL Testing

Great Start Parent Conference

Pearson Inform Update

School of Choice

World Language

Math News

State Testing Updates

MI Merit Curriculum Requirement Revisions

Tech Updates

attachments

1. Great Starts Conference 2. Historical Fiction 4/5 grades 3. 2 –12 Book club 4. SAT Exam 5. Graduation Requirements 2016, 2017, 2018 6. Graduation Requirements 2016—2019

Heidi Mercer Assistant Superintendent of Teaching and Learning

Teaching and Learning

Page 2

ELL (ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS) TESTING

The testing window for our English Learners

The test is paper/pencil this year, however,

is February 9, through March 27, 2015.

next year it will be computerized.

The

Administra-

test is the WIDA Access test, which is what

tion time of the Access is lengthy:

we used last year.

Listening: 25 minutes (group administered)

There are 3 tiers to the

test, along with different grade levels accord-

Speaking: up to 15 minutes (individually admin-

ing to English proficiency.

istered)

Each of the ESL

teachers have been trained on giving the test

Reading: 35 minutes (group administered)

and has had to pass a quiz to be certified.

Writing: 60 minutes (group administered) There are 5 grade clusters:

All students who are listed as LEP (Limited English Proficient) whether they are actively receiving services or not, are required to take the test. must test also.

  

Which means, parent refusals As with MME or M-Step, this

K, which is administered individually, Grades 1-2 which has 3 tiers, Grades 3-5 which has 3 tiers, Grades 6-8 which has 3 tiers and



Grades 9-12 which also has 3 tiers.

is a mandatory State test. Lake Orion Com-

When testing students, different tiers and clus-

munity Schools must have 100% participa-

ters cannot be done at the same time.

tion.

The test is also very important to us

in making AMAOs (Annual Measurable Achievement Objectives).

There are 3

There are over 250 students the ESL teachers must assess within the 7 week timeline.

AMAOs; showing progress, becoming English proficient and making AYP.

GREAT START PARENT CONFERENCE

On Saturday, April 25, the Lake Orion Community Schools’ Early Childhood Department will host the 9th Annual Great Start Parent Conference and Resource Fair at the CERC building. Lake Orion Community Schools, along with the Michigan Department of Education Great Parents - Great Start, the Great Start Collaborative and Oakland Schools offers the conference FREE to all parents with children birth through eight throughout the county. This all day conference theme, Discovering Your Parenting Village, begins with a kick off presentation and then invites parents to attend three “Breakout Sessions”. Along with

SEE ATTACHMENT 1

parent education sessions, numerous agencies and community resources will also be participat-

ing at exhibitor tables. All attendees will receive breakfast treats and lunch, which is provided by the Lake Orion Community Schools’ Food Service Department. Over 400 parents, children and educators will attend the event this year.

ELA Please see ATTACHMENTS 2 & 3 for exciting book club information.

JANUARY, 2015

Page 3

PEARSON INFORM UPDATE Did you know that as a teacher you not only have access to your data when logging onto Inform, you also have access to your building’s data and Lake Orion’s overall data?

Just a note: Elementary teachers your winter data must be entered into Pearson Inform no later than January 30, 2015. Reminder that the session name is “Winter”.

After logging into Pearson Inform there are 3 icons at the top left; the person icon is your (teacher) classroom data, the house icon is access to building level data,

and the building icon is to look at district data.

SCHOOLS OF CHOICE Lake Orion is excited to host The First Annual Effective Practice Conference for our county. The conference is scheduled for June 23—24, 2015, from 9 A.M—3 P.M. at LOHS. Michael Fullan and Jenni Donahou will be keynote speakers plus there will be many breakouts with our own talented Oakland County teachers and administrators! Stay tuned for more details.

The Board of Education has approved 106 seats for school of choice for the 2015—2016 school year. (60 elementary, 36 middle level and 10 Learning Options) The application window is April 13—May 12, 2015.

LAKE ORION WORLD LANGUAGE EXPANDS TO 6TH GRADE The Board approved a plan to slowly and carefully

again at our elementary level.

begin expanding our World Language program.

thoughtfully approved for us to continue to expand

While

The Board has

our budget remains a real concern, the Board also

the program one grade at a time, working our way

recognizes the need to continue to enhance our

down the grade levels.

programming.

takes into the concern that

Beginning next year, World Language

will offered in 6th grade.

In previous years an ex-

This implementation plan budget remains an issue

and if a grade level cannot be added at the next

ploration to World Language was part of the middle

level there will be no gap in the program because we

school program, where students received 5 weeks of

are working our way down the grade levels with im-

Spanish and French. It is thought that something

plementation.

similar to what was previously offered will be imple-

community continues to have interest in expanding.

mented for fall, 2015. World Language teachers are beginning to meet to plan the details.

It is hoped

that eventually World Language will be offered once

This is part of our program that our

Teaching and Learning Page 4 Page 4

MATH DEPARTMENT NEWS News

Puzzle of the Month

Grade 3-8, 11 – M-STEP – Get the latest updates from the state about the Spring 2015 M-STEP assessment by signing up for the Spotlight newsletter. https://public.govdelivery.com/accounts/MIMDE/subscriber/ new. Under Student Assessment, select Spotlight. A preview of M-STEP can be viewed in Google Chrome with the following link. Copy and paste this link into Chrome https:// wbte.drcedirect.com/MI/portals/mi/ott1 Click on the 2015 Preview Link, you will then need to click to sign on. Once on the sign in page, use the username and password displayed on the screen to log in. Students and teachers may log into the Spring 2015 Preview as often as they like. This preview does not represent all standards for ELA and mathematics, nor all grade levels. The preview is intended to provide students and teachers with a brief look at the technology-enhanced item types they are likely to see for English language arts (ELA) and mathematics. Students will also have an opportunity to use the navigation tools and features of the online delivery engine. High School – Released from MDE on January 7, 2015 - All Michigan high school juniors will begin taking the SAT as the state-administered college assessment exam beginning in 2016. There will be more information including free test prep materials and on-line practice available in Spring 2015 at http://michigan.gov/mde/0,4615,7-140--344785--,00.html Middle Level – Are you part of the Connected Math Facebook page? You can get many news updates and ideas while you are updating your status or finding out what your friends are up to! If you go the CMP website (https://connectedmath.msu.edu/ )scroll down to the bottom

Austin likes to watch squirrels find and store acorns for the winter. Brown Squirrels can carry two acorns at a time. Gray Squirrels can carry three acorns at a time and Black. Squirrels can carry five acorns at a time. There is a pile of 24 acorns. A)

How many trips would a Brown Squirrel need to make to store all of the acorns in the pile?

B) How many trips would a Gray Squirrel need to make to store all of the acorns in the pile? C) How many trips would a Black Squirrel need to make to store all of the acorns in the pile? D) If all three squirrels worked together to store the acorns how many trips would the squirrels need to make to store all of the acorns? E) How many different ways could the three Squirrels divide up the 24 acorns and not leave any left over? Each Squirrel must carry his maximum load on each trip. F) How do you know that you have found all of the ways? G) The squirrels are rather smart. They realize that they can carry less than their maximum loads. How many different ways could the squirrels divide up the 24 acorns? H) Suppose there are a different number of acorns than 24. Determine a generalization for finding how 3 squirrels can divide up any given number of acorns. Answers: http://www.insidemathematics.org/assets/problems-ofthe-month/squirreling%20it%20away.pdf

and click on . Like the page and you are connected! The latest post has a link to the Dash Activity guide that they just recently added to the website! Here is the direct link if you are not interested in facebook… https://connectedmath.msu.edu/teacher-support/planning/using-dashstudentactivities/? utm_source=Web&utm_medium=Twitter&utm_campaign=Teacher+Support

Book Club idea: Mathematics Formative Assessment: 75 Practical Strategies for Linking Assessment, Instruction, and Learning Author Page Keeley and Cheryl Rose Tobey This book is a joint publication of Corwin Press and NCTM. The authors provide 75 formative assessment strategies and show teachers how to use them to inform instructional planning and better meet the needs of all students. Research shows that formative assessment has the power to significantly improve learning, and its many benefits include:     

Promote student thinking Uncover student ideas or misconceptions Increase student engagement Promote self-assessment Improve instruction based on specific goals

Page 5

STATE TESTING UPDATE

Please be sure that you are keeping up to date with Michigan’s new state assessment, M-STEP. You can find detailed info by clicking on the following link: http://www.michigan.gov/mde/0,4615,7-14022709_70117---,00.html An early preview of sample questions from the M-STEP assessment can be found at the link below. Please copy and paste the following link in Google Chrome (must be in Google Chrome or it will not open successfully) https://wbte.drcedirect.com/MI/portals/mi/ott1

Starting in 2016 high school juniors will now take the SAT instead of the ACT. On January 7, 2015, the Michigan Department of Education announced that beginning in 2016 all high school juniors will begin taking the SAT as the state-administered and required free college entrance exam instead of the ACT. The College Board won the three-year bid from the state of Michigan. The state of Michigan, as required by law, underwent a competitive bidding process to choose Mich-

igan’s college entrance exam. The SAT bid was 15.4 million less over the three-year contract than the next bidder and scored 10 percentage points higher by the Joint Evaluation Committee (JEC). It is believed that the SAT is better aligned to Michigan’s new state standards and it is important to test what is being taught. The SAT is a globally-recognized test accepted by nearly every college in the nation. Nationally, about the same number of students take the ACT and SAT each year. It is anticipated that students will do well on the SAT just as they have done well on the ACT in the past. Beginning in the spring of 2015, the College Board will provide all schools and students with free test prep materials and online practice tests to help students prepare for the redesigned SAT in 2016. The College Board will also provide extensive support and training for teachers, parents, and students in understanding the test and analyzing the results. Attached is an article about the revisions regarding SAT.

ATTACHMENT 4

See article on-line at: http://www.detroitnews.com/story/opinion/ editorials/2015/01/09/michigan-chooses-sat-act/21458857/

 

    

We were aware that the Michigan Department of Education had issued an RFP for a college entrance exam for Michigan students. We were not aware of the timeline for the announcement. Educators were notified January 7, 2015, via email that MDE had chosen SAT as Michigan’s new entrance exam. Nationally, about the same number of student take the ACT and Sat each year. Most colleges accept both tests and more students take both tests each year. It’s believed that the SAT is better aligned to Michigan’s new state standards. It’s important that we test what is taught. While the test is different in some respects, we anticipate that our students will do well on the SAT, as they did on the ACT. MED has indicated that SAT will be providing extensive support and training for our teachers, parents, and students in understanding the test and analyzing the results. This will be welcomed support for our educators and families.

Teaching and Learning

Page 6

Recommendation…... Julie Gutman, Director of Special Education suggested viewing the website below to check out presentations done by Peter Pappas, titled Five Ways to Engage Students and Other Audiences— Tips for Teachers and Presenters. Julie thought this could be beneficial to all. To see the entire article/website: www.peterpappas.com/2010/08/five-ways-to-engage-students-audiences-tips-teachers-presenters.html

MICHIGAN MERIT CURRICULUM REQUIREMENT REVISIONS There have been a few revisions in the Michigan Merit Curriculum graduation requirements that we are required to implement for future graduating students beginning this spring. The purpose of these revisions is to provide students more flexibility in their high school schedule. These changes are not related to specific curriculum or the common core. In the areas of math, science, world language and applied arts; students in a career technical program are now allowed to count those credits toward their required graduation requirements. This will provide students in a CTE program more flexibility in their schedule while providing recognition to CTE classes. These revisions are a benefit to students and do not significantly impact Lake Orion. There are two areas that Lake Orion requires as part of our graduation requirements that the Board has approved to revise. We currently require speech in 9th grade. Beginning next year this requirement can be met with several classes for students to choose from instead of just the one speech class. We currently

offer a few classes that would meet the speaking and listening requirements that are included in speech. In addition, we currently require this half of credit in 9th grade. This half credit elective can now be taken in 9th - 10th grade. Again, offering schedule flexibility to our students. The other Lake Orion requirement that we currently have is a 10th grade computer elective. We are dropping this requirement due to the fact that our current curriculum includes great redundancy with regard to the State requirement for a high school “computer experience”; therefore, the reduction of this .5 computer elective does not impact our students negatively in terms of content received. This allows for this half credit to become an elective rather than a required class. In addition, the 9th grade Business Foundations class name is being change to Career Foundations to better describe the class..

Attached includes our current and revised graduation requirements. The revisions by the Sate and Lake Orion are minor and ultimately provide students with more choice and flexibility. Attachments 5 & 6

Page 7

TECHNOLOGY UPDATES

Phone System

Microsoft Student Advantage

The IT Services Department has kicked off

Microsoft Student Advantage program is

the Voice over IP (VoIP) Phone and Voicemail project.

This much needed pro-

ject will be implemented during the summer and replace our current phone system which is over 20 years old. We will be researching, analyzing and developing our data and past processes to implement with the new system.

This is a very critical

project because of emergency and public communication and accessibility.

now being offered to staff!

The Ad-

vantage program will allow staff to have the same 5 downloads to their personal devices as well as the Microsoft apps with full functionality.

submitted all necessary data to our

vendor and hope to hear from Microsoft within the next couple of weeks. We will notify all staff when those licenses are available.

ATTACHMENT 1

Great Start-Oakland

S AVE t he DAT E

Discovering Your Parenting Village

2015 Parent Conference & Resource Fair Saturday, March 28, 2015 9AM-2PM

strengthening

families

Saturday, April 25, 2015 9AM-2PM

Norup International School 14450 Manhattan, Oak Park

Community Education Resource Center 455 East Scripps, Lake Orion

Questions: 248.209.2513

Watch for registration information at: www.oakland.k12.mi.us/earlychildhood Oakland Schools does not discriminate on the basis of sex, race, color, national origin, religion, height, weight, marital status, sexual orientation (subject to the limits of applicable law), age, genetic information, or disability in its programs, services, activities or employment opportunities. Inquiries related to employment discrimination should be directed to the Director of Human Resources at 248.209.2059, 2111 Pontiac Lake Road, Waterford, MI 48328-2736. For all other inquiries related to discrimination, contact the Director of Legal Affairs at 248.209.2062, 2111 Pontiac Lake Road, Waterford, MI 48328-2736.

Great Start-Oakland

S AVE t he DAT E

Discovering Your Parenting Village

2015 Parent Conference & Resource Fair Saturday, March 28, 2015 9AM-2PM

strengthening

families

Norup International School 14450 Manhattan, Oak Park

Saturday, April 25, 2015 9AM-2PM Community Education Resource Center 455 East Scripps, Lake Orion

Questions: 248.209.2513

ATTACHMENT 2

Historical Fiction Book Club Boot Camp! Get tips/ideas and learn more about forming groups, making the most of your groupâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s small group time, conducting table conferences, managing groups, building background knowledge, assessing speaking and listening standards, and reviewing resources. For even more information check out this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yynXGZnoQkU&rel=0 Where:

Webber Elementary

Who:

4th-5th Grade Teachers

When:

February 4, 2015 Choose a Session . . . A.M. 7:45-11:00 Session 1 P.M. 12:45-4:00 Session 2 Afterschool 4:15-7:15 Session 3

(The afterschool session includes dinner and $40 worth of Historical Fiction books; minimum of 5 teachers are needed by 1/30 to run this session)

Bring: One copy of each Historical Fiction book that you have 4 or more copies How do I sign up??? Register no later than 3PM on February 3rd. Follow the link below to sign up on Google docs: https://docs.google.com/a/ms-lakeorion.org/forms/d/1WX_jFLwNbUfNVvTl9nLT-pO04GIkgS_epqM_N-L5Iw/viewform?c=0&w=1 LOCS NOTE: In addition to registering using the google doc a separate KALPA registration AND a conference request (with Kate DiMeoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s name on it) must be filled out prior to attending the workshop. Subs for this workshop will be covered out the teaching and learning budget. Conference requests received after Feb. 3rd will be the responsibility of the building and not paid out of the teaching and learning budget. Sharing of subs is encouraged. OUT OF DISTRICT NOTE: In addition to registering using the google doc, you will need to bring payment of $35.00 in a personal or district check made out to LOCS. Out of district participants who attend the afterschool session will receive dinner, however, are not eligible for the $40.00 book stipend.

QUESTIONS? Contact Kate DiMeo kdimeo@lakeorion.k12.mi.us

ATTACHMENT 3

Clarkston Community Schools, Lake Orion Community Schools Oxford Community Schools

BOOK CLUB TOGETHER host

Falling in Love with Close Reading Christopher Lehman & Kate Roberts Tuesdays 4:45-5:30 PM Recommended for Teachers Grades 2-12 But . . Everyone is welcome!

2/24 Clarkston Community Schools Bailey Lake Elementary 8051 Pine Knob Rd Clarkston Collaborate across districts. Grow your understandings. Meet new people.

3/10 Oxford Community Schools Clear Lake Elementary 2085 West Drahner Oxford Let us know if you need childcare. We’ll even have snacks!

3/24 Lake Orion Community Schools Webber Elementary 3191 West Clarkston Rd. Lake Orion Register Here: http://goo.gl/forms/e697oy1NnZ

Questions? Contact Kate DiMeo, Maureen Magdeleno or Phyllis Ness

ATTACHMENT 4

ATTACHMENT 5

ATTACHMENT 6