November 6, 2015

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Happy Friday! I just wanted to take a moment to celebrate and recognize our accomplishments this first quarter. We have no students who are on the 2nd quarter in-eligibility list, this means all of our students passed at least 4 full-time classes. In the Success Center, 36 of the 48 students assigned for assistance in reading comprehension have increased their scores. In addition we have had 5 students who have exited the Success Center and are back in their regular study hall. Several students have won honors or made All-State groups in various activities. The Student Council earned the honor council distinction. It has been a great start to the school year.

Next week we have our last night of parent/teacher conferences. If you haven't seen an at-risk student's parent please call and personally invite them to come Monday night. This would be an excellent time to have a PASS Plan meeting. The more we communicate with the parents, the better chance we have of reaching the students.

Speaking of next week, Mrs. Ohrlund and the Thespians will be holding their fall play on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Please bring the family and friends and come to the play one of those nights. They always put on an excellent show!

On the 11th, we will observe Veteran's Day at 11:00 am with a short program over the intercom.

We also have a shelter drill on 11/12 at 2:05 pm. Please make sure you review your classroom procedures with all of your classes prior to that day.

Thank You For All That You Do and Have a Great Weekend!

 Students as Leaders
On Friday, October 30, Jeff Ahlers, Jacob Beyer, Glen Clark, Jonathon Hovden, Gabe Jensen, and Kyle Zenk went to the middle school and spoke to the 7th grade science classes about the Robotics Club team (Geared Up 9967 is the team name). They did a fantastic job and there are a large number of students who now want to be a part of the club when they are in high school thanks to the introduction to robotics provided by these amabassadors of the program.




Congratulations to Coach Amy Davis, Madi Martin, Janae Casson, and Cassidy Pravecek as they received Division 1 ratings at the State Dance Solo competition on Saturday. Madi got 3rd place out of 65 girls. Great Job!



Congratulations to Coach Megan Mortiz and the Football Cheerleaders for placing 3rd in 3A at the Triton Challenge in Fort Dodge.


Staff as Leaders

Colleen Bortscheller, Sherri Permeswaran, Rhonda Beach, and Neal Utesch attended a workshop on Thursday and today on formative assessment. They will be bringing this training back for the Math and ELA teachers for District In-Service.

Assistant Principal's Corner
LCHS Student Council was able to collect enough items for 40 care packages, $1,382.08, and multiple boxes of extra food for veterans program!  Thanks to all who donated!  This next week several of our student council students will be going with Mrs. Isebrand to the Support Siouxland Soldiers headquarters in Sioux City, IA to deliver the food and money that we collected and to help serve veterans in the area that are coming in to celebrate Veterans Day.  It will be a great experience for our students and a chance to see the impact that LCHS has made on a few lives in our area.

Fun Facts: (Items collected by students and staff)
4,116 fruit snack packs
314 cups/boxes of macaroni and cheese
113 bags of hard candies
200+ granola bars
160 packages of oatmeal
200+ tubes of toothpaste
160+ envelopes of tuna
400+ pudding cups
200+ packets of popcorn
100+ jars of peanut butter
120 peanut butter or cheese snack crackers
40 individual packs of peanut butter
100 snack packs of cookies
40 boxes of crackers
700+ drink mix packets (individual)
+ Many canned soups, canned peas, and canned veggies

Librarian's Corner

The library now has a permanent "green" screen. With permission from Dr. Wendt, the maintenance staff painted one wall of our small conference room a bright green. More classes and students will have opportunities to film projects. The sophomores all got this opportunity last year when Mr. Wingert introduced iPad apps and green screens in the World History classes. Windows Movie Maker will also work, though it is not as user-friendly and some other programs. Regardless of the software, the steps are about the same: 1. Use the camera to shoot the video in front of the green space. 2. Select the picture or video you want to include in the background. 3. Import the green screen video into the software. 4. Add the footage you have selected for the background and combine it with the green screen video taken.  Ideas to incorporate into your curriculum: acting out day-to-day job of intended career; how-to videos, cooking show, historical reenactment, poetry/literature presentation, animations, news broadcast, explain a math problem, or even daily announcements. If we need to, we will create a scheduling calendar for the room.

 Instructional Coaches' Corner
How to turn a smartphone into a 3D hologram. https://youtu.be/XHNWHPuXJag

 Remember when meme's were the hot item? They may have cooled down some but here is a neat idea to use them in a productive way in your classroom. http://www.emergingedtech.com/2015/10/creating-and-using-meme-images-in-the-classroom/

Did you know that you can prevent people from downloading, copying, or printing your google drive files? https://youtu.be/rNNp7-z_p2U

Will Google be answering your emails for you soon? Not exactly: https://t.co/t2PPnQQoOW

As always, if you have any

  • technology related PD class that you would like to see offered 
  • technology related project you would like to try in your classroom 
  • technology related activity that you would like assistance with, 
let me know and I will do whatever I can to help!

Tracy

Articles Worth Reading

Strategies and Resources for Supporting English-Language Learners
The 8 Minutes That Matter Most
Edtech's Next Big Disruption Is The College Degree Making Failure Harder Work Than Passing

Video Worth Watching

Just a little fun video - Morning Announcements


Up Coming Events

Saturday, November 7         NWI HS Honor Band Auditions, Storm Lake
                                             8:30 am MOC-FV Quiz Bowl

Monday, November 9           5:00 - 8:30 pm Parent/Teacher Conferences

Tuesday, November 10         7:00 pm CTE Advisory Committee

Thursday, November 12        7:00 pm Fall Play - Little Theater

Friday, November 13             7:00 pm Fall Play - Little Theater

Saturday, November 14         7:00 pm Fall Play - Little Theater

Monday, November 16          7:00 pm Music Booster Meeting



Be Extraordinary
Mark


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