November 22, 2019

Happy Friday! I hope everyone had an enjoyable week. Since we only have 2 days of school next week, I won't be sending out another Friday Focus until December 6.

In you mailboxes you will have or will receive the ISASP sheets for your advisory students. I am asking that you conference with each student to go over their scores and set a goal with them for this April. Have the students write that goal on the goal sheet they filled out at the beginning of the school year. I would like you to collect the ISASP sheet and then keep them until we get closer to the testing in April. At that time, you will pass them back out to help remind them of where they scored and what their goal is for this year. 

We are starting the registration process for next school year. Last night we met with a majority of the 8th grade parents and students to get them signed up. Judd and Melissa will be visiting classrooms of our current students to pass out the 4 year plan and to have them make revisions. Once we have our numbers, I'll start to schedule department meetings to go over the numbers. I expect these will take place in January sometime. 

I want to take a moment and remind you all to always think students or someone may be recording you. There have been instances in other schools where students will set a teacher up. They try to get the teacher to blow up and start screaming at them or get you to say something that can be construed in other ways. Always remain calm and don’t fall into the trap of saying something that you don’t want on social media or in the news.

Looking ahead, we get out at 2:30 on Tuesday and we have a shelter drill on December 4 at 1:10 pm. Our extra hour meetings in December are on the 4th and the 18th. The 2 hour early out in-service is on December 11. During advisory on December 2, we will give our first Star assessment of the year. We will start with the reading texts and then on December 9 we will give the Math test. The trainer discussed custom tests that test specific skills. This may be something you want to use for your classroom. These could be a great way to see what skill level the students are at prior to covering material. It may let you know for sure where the gaps exists and then you can plan for them in you day to day instruction. 

Have a great weekend!
Mark

Assistant Principal's Happenings

The Blood Drive is today!  Hopefully, some of you can make a donation or have encouraged students to donate. Please keep an eye on any student who may have given blood to make sure they are feeling okay throughout the day.  I think most students do care but I enjoyed the meme down below.  We also had a great turnout for the bake sale!  We sold almost everything that was donated.  Thank you for everyone that helped.

We still are having too many students wandering the halls.  Please send them back to their classrooms and if they are repeat offenders, give me a head's up.  We have now had three vandalism incidents in the boy's bathrooms.  Do not let more than one student go at a time and encourage students to let you know if they see anything.  We have students that are in there every single period.  I encourage you to keep track of who leaves and at what times so we can curve some of these behaviors.  

Notes from the Librarian

One of the library purchases this summer was a Cricut Explore. It is available for all to use, though users may have to supply their own paper or vinyl if a lot is going to be used. The Cricut is hooked up to a computer in the side room with all the windows, and the user name and password is listed next to it. I am new to the Cricut too, so I don't know how much I can help a person out, but the Cricut is available! 

Senior teachers: please have students open their email and vote for a prom theme. Voting is open until Tuesday, November 26. They will then vote again on the top choices. Thank you so much. 

Success Center Update

Thanks for your attention at the Getting Started With STAR session on Wednesday morning.  We will be giving the first STAR screening test in advisory the first week in December.  That way, when we meet again with the Renaissance trainer on December 11th, we will be able to explore reports and scores for our students.  I will be emailing your individual username and password to get into our testing site.  The first time you log in, you will be prompted to change your password.  Once it has been changed, the testing administrators will not be able to see what you have chosen, but if you forget, we will be able to reset it.  The program was setup so that students will log in with their powerschool usernames and passwords.  Like with any new technology, there may be little hiccups we need to work through (like the ZOOM sound not playing through the tv), but it will be worth it in the long run.  Please let me know if you have any questions or feedback!

Tracy's Technology Tidbits.

Thank you Google! You can now customize which sections to add page numbers to and which number to start counting from in Google Docs. To access this feature, go to Insert > Page Numbers > More options. The rollout for this feature started November 18 so hopefully we get it any day now. (While you currently have the ability to insert page numbers in the current form---the "new and improved" form should be rolling out any day now)

If you are interested Google opened a beta for originality reports. The feature scans a student's work for matches across billions of web pages and books, which can make it easier for instructors to evaluate the academic integrity of work and provide constructive feedback to the student. Originality reports can be used within Google Classroom and Google Assignments. Click here to read the official Google release. Click here if you would like to sign up for the beta.

I haven't had much chance to explore this one yet--Google Assignments Beta. It appears to be the ability to give assignments to students similar to Google Classroom but without actually using Google Classroom. There are a few benefits though. 1--It has a built in ability to build a rubric and use it to score assignments. 2--It has the built in ability to use Google Originality Reports. 3--Students automatically get their own copies of any files you attach to the assignment. It might be worth signing up for the beta and checking this out.

Upcoming Activities

Friday, November 22

All State Music Festival @ Ames

6:00 pm JV Girls Basketball - Hall of Pride Scrimmage

7:30 pm Varsity Girls Basketball - Hall of Pride Scrimmage

Saturday, November 23

All State Music Festival @ Ames

Monday, November 25

3:30 pm JV/Varsity Bowling vs. Sioux Central

6:00 pm JV Girls Basketball @ Spencer

7:30 pm Varsity Girls Basketball @ Spencer

Monday, December 2

1:00 pm JV/Varsity Bowling @ Sioux City North

6:00 pm Freshmen Girls Basketball @ Sioux Center

7:15 pm Freshmen Boys Basketball @ Sioux Center

Tuesday, December 3

6:00 pm Spanish Club Party

Thursday, December 5

4:00 pm JV Boys and Girls Basketball @ SBL

5:30 pm Varsity Girls Basketball @ SBL

5:30 pm JV/Varsity Wrestling @ Heelan

6:00 pm Freshmen Girls Basketball vs. Sioux City North

7:00 pm Varsity Boys Basketball vs. SBL

7:15 pm Freshmen Boys Basketball vs. Sioux City North

Friday, December 6

4:30 pm JV/Varsity Wrestling @ Hinton

6:30 pm Madrigal Dinner


Saturday, December 7
6:30 pm Madrigal Dinner

Monday, December 9
4:30 pm JV Wrestling @ MOC

Tuesday, December 10
4:00 pm JV Boy/Girl Basketball vs Council Bluffs AL
5:30 pm Varsity Girl Basketball vs. Council Bluffs AL
7:00 pm Varsity Boy Basketball vs. Council Bluffs AL

Thursday, December 12
3:30 pm Bowling vs. OABCIG
5:30 pm JV Girl Basketball @ Heelan
6:00 pm Freshmen Girl Basketball vs. MOC
7:00 pm Varsity Girl Basketball @ Heelan
7:15 pm Freshmen Boy Basketball vs. MOC

Friday, December 13
1:00 pm Bowling @ Council Bluffs
1:00 pm Wrestling @ Council Bluffs
4:00 pm Freshmen Basketball @ Heelan
5:30 pm JV Basketball @ Heelan
7:00 pm Varsity Basketball @ Heelan


Saturday, December 14
9:00 am Freshmen Girl Basketball @ Gehlen
10:00 am Wrestling @ Council Bluffs
10:00 am Girl Wrestling @ Oakland, IA
10:15 am Freshmen Boy Basketball @ Gehlen
1:00 pm JV Boy/Girl Basketball vs. Western Christian
2:30 pm Varsity Girl Basketball vs. Western Christian
4:00 pm Varsity Boy Basketball vs. Western Christian

Monday, December 16
3:30 pm Bowling vs. Sioux City East
5:00 pm Girl Wrestling @ SBL
7:30 pm HS Holiday Concert

Tuesday, December 17
4:00 pm JV Boy/Girl Basketball vs Council Bluffs TJ
5:30 pm Varsity Girl Basketball vs. Council Bluffs TJ
5:30 pm Wrestling @ Western Christian
7:00 pm Varsity Boy Basketball vs. Council Bluffs TJ

Thursday, December 19
4:00 pm Freshmen Girl Basketball @ Sioux City North
5:30 pm JV Girl Basketball @ Sioux City North
5:30 pm Wrestling @ Council Bluffs TJ
7:00 pm Varsity Girl Basketball @ Sioux City North

Friday, December 20
4:00 pm Freshmen Boy Basketball @ Sioux City North
5:30 pm JV Boy Basketball @ Sioux City North
7:00 pm Varsity Boy Basketball@ Sioux City North