November 1, 2013

Curriculum Connections...

Happy TGIF and Happy November to everyone! Hope you all have a great weekend planned ahead. If anyone is up tomorrow (Saturday) morning between 7:30am and 8:30am, please join me as I will be a Guest Moderator on #satchat, which is a weekly chat for educators. The topic is homework and how we can enhance the process. If you that is too early, then join #NYedchat on Monday night at 8:30pm for a discussion with other NY educators. I co-founded this chat with Bill Brennan, who is the Director of Technology in Farmingdale and we recently re-launched the chat and it will be happening every other week - I hope some #Cantiague folks might be available to join. Just as a tip, if you plan on joining the discussion, I suggest using www.tweetchat.com instead of Twitter.   

Thank you all again for making our PARP Week experience such an awesome one for our children, families and the entire community! Tuesday was an incredible highlight with the families in and out of our building all morning between the magician and the important PARB experiences. Although it is disruptive and exhausting to open our space all day, it is an important part of telling our story. We need the community to understand what we value in our school and inviting them in is one of the best ways to make that happen. Thank you for helping to create such an awesome environment for kids in our space! Finally, a special thank you to Lorraine for organizing the teacher swaps for special read alouds and for selecting the magician - BRAVA!  

On another note, I want to thank everyone who brought stuff in for Eryka, the new 4th grader. We filled four boxes of clothes, jackets, shoes and toiletries - the generosity was impressive. Laura and I dropped the stuff off at the motel and the parents were extremely appreciative. Of course, seeing that one of our children is sharing one room and a bathroom with her parents put things in perspective. There didn't seem to be a desk in the space so Eryka was doing her HW on the bed while her parents were watching television in the same room. Although this is an extreme example of living conditions, our community is diversifying and our children are coming to school from a spectrum of situations - families who speak no English, families where the grandparents are the primary care givers because both parents are working late, families where there is little or no furniture in the home because all the money coming in is going to pay for living in Jericho. I share this because it is another reminder of how important it is that we get to know our children and their families well so we can better support them in school, understand where they are coming from and help them grow.    

Over the last week, as I walked around the building, I spotted these awesome things...

• Melissa's class was having reading workshop and while most of the students were independently reading there were two book clubs in action. I had a chance to listen in on both groups while they were meeting and I was blown away by the way they managed the discussion. They were responding to each other, respectfully disagreeing with each other and building on each other's comments - all with evidence from the text, which was impressive. Finally, one group was using Evernote on the iPad to document their conversation and plan moving forward - AWESOME!

• Lorraine, who was dressed up in some awesome Native American gear on Halloween, was reading the fifth graders a Native American spooky story and we could literally hear a pin drop in the Library. The kids were so engaged because Lorraine was reading in a low voice and they were hanging on her every word. Whether she is reading in a loud and dynamic tone or in a low and serious voice everyone in the library cannot help but stop what they are doing to listen to her read- WOW!   

• Laurie was working with the fourth graders in the Science Lab using the stream/water tables to help the kids deepen their understandings of erosion. The children considered how both water and gravity and other variables might impact erosion and their understandings and comments at the end were pretty impressive!

• In case you missed it, here is the Video Update of the Week featuring Tali's & Marissa's students - please show it to your class...

Tech Tip of the Week...

I have recently been checking out SCRATCH, which is a very basic coding program for kids out of MIT. It is a really cool resource and it gives kids the opportunity to learn basic coding, which may be of interest to some of our children - maybe an enrichment project? Independent study? Not sure - but I thought it was worth sharing because enhancing the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) experience is always a goal. Research shows that many of our students do not pursue careers in this area yet this is where the need will be as they grow up.  


SCHEDULE OF THE WEEK... 

Monday, November 4

"A" Week
ELA Benchmark for Grades 3, 4 & 5
LOCKDOWN Drill at approximately 9am

Tuesday, November 5

Happy Election Day - enjoy the day off!

Wednesday, November 6

Happy Wednesday!

Thursday, November 7

CST at 1:20pm
Brian Heinz Visits 3rd Grade - Library Closed
Cultural Arts Begins
Visitor Shadowing Tony all day!

Friday, November 8

Happy TGIF!
Grade 5 Sports Night - 6:30pm to 8pm!

Kids' Korner

On Tuesday, during the PARB experience one of our dads and I were engaged in a conversation when the man's son walked by and said, "Mr. Sinanis, you remind me of my dad because you both have the same sized belly!" LOL! Really?!?     

Pics of the Week...

Check out Cantiague's Week in Tweets - click on the following link to see our Pics of the Week...

WEEK IN TWEETS - NOVEMBER 1