Week Ending December 4, 2015

Week Ending December 4th

We are in December. We barely took the last bite of stuffing and onto the holidays. With only three (two by the time you read this) weekends before our break I am determined to enjoy the week the students are not in school. I hope you do, too.

Teachers as Learners

Janice Strain was recognized by Dr. Auger for the work she has done for advancement of the Arts and the work she did this past year to bring the STEAM workshop to North Kingstown. She was the first "Shining Star Award" recipient from the high school. This is a new program that Dr. Auger will be presenting monthly.
Janice is not slowing down, she was on her way to meet with Donna to promote a second annual STEAM workshop when Drs. Auger and Humbyrd surprised her with the recognition for a job well done. Congratulations Janice. Included below are some words from her colleague, Tara Harrington.

"I have had the pleasure of working as a fine arts teacher alongside Mrs. Strain over the past 14 years. During that time she has been a friend, a supporter, a teacher, an inspiration and my mentor.

As a professional she balances many roles, in addition to being a Visual Arts teacher, she is a member of the Validation committee, NKSD Art K-12 curriculum coordinator, the curator for AOT for traveling student art work and she is a passionate artist who exhibits her own work in several galleries throughout the state."

Students as Learners

Mrs. Schiavone was feeling blessed at her annual NK Portuguese Thanksgiving Day Celebration, the

week of Thanksgiving. She says, “It was a great day with our Portuguese family, friends and alumni. We even had a 20lb turkey with all the fixings thanks to our wonderful parents. That was an interesting call from Carole when it arrived at the front office.

Love my meninos and our Portuguese Program here at NK.

Last week Mr. DeLucia’s Spanish V students gave an Adaptive Spanish lesson to students in Ms. Culbertson’s and Mr. LaCroix’s classes. In room 121 they began the class playing a Spanish version of Hangman to guess how to say common phrases in Spanish. Some of the students in Ms. Culbertson’s class remembered what they learned last year and were very quick to guess the correct answer. Mr. LaCroix’s students were working in groups with the Spanish students on Word Search puzzles. All of the students, both the presenters and the receivers were having a good time. There are plans to have these

Searching for Spanish Words in
Mr. LaCroix's class.

groupings continue throughout the year. 

Upcoming Events/Important Dates

Dec 8th – School Committee Meeting 7 pm Auditorium

Dec 11th -- First Aspen update for the second quarter is due, Leslie has opened Aspen

Dec 12th – Holiday Craft Show – 9 - 3

Dec 15-18th -- Advisory Assemblies Seniors, Juniors, Sophomores and Freshmen (in that order) to recognize Honor Roll students and have a discussion on “Boundaries” with Cindy Normand.

Dec 17th – Choral Concert – 7 pm

Dec 22nd - Band Concert – 7pm

Dec 24th – Jan 3rd:  Holiday Recess

Jan 12th -- School Committee Meeting, 7 pm, Auditorium   

Student Services Office/Deans

Donna and I attended a RI Emergency Management Agency course this past Monday and Tuesday. You may have seen a group of visitors in the building on Tuesday. Dave Young, from the maintenance department and our own John Dyer showed the group around the perimeter of the building as well as all other areas where we may have vulnerabilities. We left with a plan on how to mitigate areas of our building for greatest impact.

While having these plans and sharing them with the faculty, students and staff is important, nothing is more important than, “If you see something say something.”

Community-School Culture

The Leadership Team raised $888 at the annual Dodgeball Tournament. It is a wonderful night for charity. They will use 100% of the earnings to help families during the holidays.

Darrell Sutton’s AP European students are enjoying their teacher and his class. He told me he had the pleasure of briefly attending the Dodgeball Tournament.  His AP European class had put together a team called "Sutton's Soldiers", consisting of eight historical figures ranging from Plato to Lenin.  As you can tell by the smiles, everyone had a good time.  He wanted  to give a shout out to the organizers of the tournament and the volunteers who made it happen.

Videos Worth Watching

Schools planning no homework weekends. Win-win for all: students, family and faculty.

From Rick Powell:

This is the link to the news footage I saw about Norwell High School's no homework weekend policy.  Weston high school, also in Mass, has a similar policy.

http://www.necn.com/news/new-england/Making-the-Grade-Homework-351218771.html

Articles Worth Reading

Rich Garland wrote the article below for one of Christine Costello's upcoming newsletters. Christine Costello is Lou Costello's youngest daughter from the “Abbott and Costello” team and publishes a newsletter going out to thousands of folks who enjoy the legendary comedy team. You may enjoy reading Rich's work and see how it may give you more ideas on leveraging humor to inspire lessons.

Professors Abbott and Costello

Abbott and Costello as Educators

There’s a huge push in public education for the integration of technology in classrooms.  Creating inspiring lessons has always been a challenge and students today want to be entertained.  Cell phones, I-Pads, PC’s (IBM-compatibles), Macs, Chrome Books, etc., electronic white boards, and video displays are all being leveraged as tools for learning.  Thanks to the Internet and Wi-Fi, these are effective tools for bringing the outside world further into the classroom; all this to develop a culture for learning.  Teachers are expected to be coaches, mentors, and now actors, and need help from the experts; experts like the legendary team of Abbott and Costello – giving us intelligent humor.  With the Internet we now have access to their brilliance – as educators, not just comedians.  Here are a few examples:

Google “Abbott and Costello” and “Education”.  You’ll find numerous references, with ‘7 X 13 = 28’ being the number one favorite of teachers for math lessons…my opinion.  Math teachers seem to use the skit to segue into the correct vs. incorrect process for multiplication (“mulsify” according to Lou Costello), division, and addition.  I use it to inspire “out of the box thinking” in my entrepreneurship course.  If we are to maintain, or better yet, return to the standard of living we enjoy, we need innovators, critical thinkers who see challenges from a different angle or lens, and innovate.  Referencing Jack Welsh, former Chairman of GE, “…for a company to survive, they need to innovate – every day”.  The students love the routine – it makes the point.

How about the Telephone Skit where Lou Costello attempts to call Mr. Field’s employment agency at Alexander 4444!  I also teach computing technology at my high school and use this routine to demonstrate the difference between active and passive communication when discussing networks.  The students love it – it makes the point.  I also used the skit to demonstrate “virtual reality” to a group of teachers in my lecture on Future Technology for the Classroom.  Are you familiar with Oculus’ Rift – the virtual reality platform?  Google it!  To demonstrate the concept of VR in the classroom – I used the skit.  Water through a phone line?!!  Maybe not, but students can now experience a walk on the moon using the VR goggles and software. The teachers insisted on watching the entire A&C routine!

There are other examples of the team’s value in education.  Who’s on First, for example; used to demonstrate the importance of each party agreeing on common terminology for effective communications, or to enlightening students on the roles of primary, secondary, and tertiary positions in English literature.  Hmmm…I think I’ll use the skit to inspire the understanding of stocks, bonds, and mutual funds in my Finance and Investments course!

There are plenty more examples, I’m sure.  Regardless, we owe a great debt of gratitude to Abbott and Costello. They had vision, were innovators, expert communicators, they shaped our culture, and they inspire…qualities of great teachers.  Maybe it’s time they receive their honorary degree!                  

Food for Thought

“As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.”

~John F. Kennedy

Until next time, Think Create, Innovate...Denise