Middle School Staff Blog April 18th - 21st
The SEMI is Friday, the 21st at 7:00pm. Students have been buying tickets during lunch.
Staff should contribute during set up, dance supervision or clean up. See Dawn to ascertain needs, please.
Please review these expectations with AC LABS on Tuesday
- Dress Expectations:
- School appropriate
- COWBOY BOOTS PREFERRED
- Collared shirts, slacks or dark jeans are expected.
- Only WMS students may participate.
- Their parents may attend if they register at the dance entrance.
- Students must be in attendance the entire school day to attend the the dance.
- ISS or OSS (Social Probation) will exclude a student from the dance.
- Guests may not leave and return to the dance.
- Library Fines must be paid by the 20th to attend.
- Snacks will be available. No outside food or drinks will be allowed.
- Students will be expected to be Respectful, Responsible and Safe while in attendance.
For the week of April 17th - 21st
BLOCK SCHEDULING BEGINS
Print a copy of write on the board to keep everyone aware of times.
When planning, think about chunking things into smaller groups, mimicking the ELA teachers typically do with the extended hours.
Monday - April 17
- NO SCHOOL - EASTER MONDAY
Tuesday - April 18
- RED/Odd Day
- Activities Committee Meeting
- Review Dance Expectations in AC LAB
- Terri is slated to join us for a training today during
- Books due to the Library this week
- Last Day to Sign up for Six Flags
Wednesday - April 19
- BLACK/Even Day
- Summer Academy Candidates - Behavior, Grades, Attendance
- EOCs at the High School - No ISS
Thursday - April 20
- RED/Odd Day
- Chess Club - Mr. Utlaut’s room
- Library Fines Due - Students will not be allowed to attend the SEMI with outstanding Library fines.
Friday - April 21
- BLACK/Even Day
- SEMI-Formal Dance at 7 in the Gymnasium
#EasyReaders
Just a shout out to this bus load of #EasyReaders who earned a
Well done crew!
Upcoming/Ongoing
- Block Scheduling begins April 18th - 28
- Step Up Days for the 5th Graders
- We have worked these days into a different type event this year. We are working on a plan to maximize our learning as well as set the minds at ease of the incoming 5th graders.
- TBD: May 15th or 16th
- All 5th grade students will visit the building together.
- They will travel, tour, explore lockers & lunch in small groups.
- Details will follow.
- Summer School Registration until April 26th - ALL STUDENTS WELCOME
- BOGO Book Fair - April 24 - 28
- NJHS Induction - April 25 at 6:30 pm in MS Gym
- Spring Choir Concert - May 2nd
- Middle School MAP Testing - May 4th - 11th
- SIX FLAGS TRIP - MAY 12
- Senior Clap Out - May 12th
- Field Day - May 15th - The Consummate Ac Lab Challenge
- Spring Band Concert - May 16th
- Six Flags - Due, Tuesday, April 18th
- Parent Permission / Registration
- Google Forms to gather student data
- Last Day of School - May 17th
- High School Graduation - May 21st at 2:00 PM
- 2017-18 6th Grade Back to School Night - Thursday, August 10, 2017
Winners, multiple years running!
Again, Winfield Middle School is #onthemap, earning #hardware after the #hardwork! Seventh grade students entered an annual writing contest sponsored nationally and hosted locally by our VFW hall. Students write and staff organizes to participate in this prestigious opportunity expressing a citizen’s perspective on the military.
#Inspirational for all!
Thank you.
Have a great long weekend!
Tom
As presented to our Board of Education:
In our school-wide Building School Improvement Plan (BSIP), we thought having “good” scores was a far flung dream!
For instance, these goals were our “Pie in the sky” goals of 15-16:
Math Goal: We will increase our Advanced and Proficient population from 17% to 34%.
ELA Goal: We will increase our Advanced and Proficient population from 35% to 50%.
Science Goal: We will increase our Advanced and Proficient population from 30% to 50%.
#onthemap???
Just a brief examination of these scores shows incredible growth and progress. Anticipation reigns.
As protocol suggests, the GREEN Boxes are this year 2016-17 and the RED Boxes surround last year’s scores.
What can we do for anyone reaching their personal best on this last April cycle of eValuate tests?
As protocol suggests, the GREEN Boxes above are this year 2016-17 and the
RED Boxes below surround last year’s scores.
We are currently on our last eValuate Cycle of the year.
BBQ Hot Dog Coupon for the Field Day Lunch
For anyone getting a Personal Record on this last test?
As protocol suggests, the GREEN Boxes above are this year 2016-17 and the
RED Boxes below surround last year’s scores.
A building wide focus on achievement and academics is only part of the progress. Questions of the Day, good pedagogy, feedback, formative testing and collaboration all seem to be contributing factors. Keep it up!
These eValuate scores put that dream nearly into focus! Our Math sits at 38% and our ELA is at 53%. If this test really is more challenging than the MAP test, our expected results look promising! Stay focused on the prize!
Last year these goals seemed so far out of reach. Hard work, singular focus, feedback, data, good teaching, pedagogy, parent support, student goals, thinking about thinking and ALL the little things we do along the way have brought us to the cusp of our quest. We stand here making final preparations for the MAP test, our final race, the ultimate contest and benchmarking event, poised to win, ready to succeed and actually get ourselves #onthemap. As caring adults, we can stay strong, intervene, connect and share with our students. They might want to self-sabotage their own success. Let’s not let them. Don’t allow them to quit. Don’t let them opt out. Skipping assignments and zeros do not teach accountability. “You get what you deserve” degrades the learner. If they had determination, they would have already done the work. In fact, trying to teach accountability only teaches them to hate school even more. Together, we ALL have worked these eValuate Scores into new territory. Our discipline has improved and our attendance is getting better. We are just about #ontheMAP.
In the news:
Published Young Adult author, Rebecca Jaycox came to Winfield Middle School. She inspired our 8th graders, sharing stories about her life, practices and career as a writer, living in New York City and chasing her dreams. She set up “camp” in the library and every 8th grade class popped in for a visit.
Here is how we compare to the past five years in Discipline:
Good Discipline does NOT Diminish Hope!
Daily discipline counts are also below years’ past. This chart shows the average number of Office Discipline Referrals per day. We can attribute this to our best efforts at keeping students in classrooms, class discussions, guiding and redirecting excited students, immediate interventions and improved consistency between classrooms. Well Done!
Attendance Comparison: Making the turn!
One of the worst cold and flu seasons in a while…
We are battling back to recover from the rough illnesses we faced in recent months. Scooters, lunch line placement, daily contests for classes with perfect attendance...
MIDDLE SCHOOL TRACK: 
From Hardwork to Hardware
Building on good success last year, our Spring Track Team is developing depth and talent to bring home hardware throughout the meets. Relays and individual events both produce metal!
Well done, coaches and athletes.
Practice makes Perfect
Students practice being nice. They don’t automatically know empathy, how to connect, what it means to be a friend and how to accept the diversity in others. That’s where we all fit it. Family discussions during a stressful event often pull a family together even closer. The middle level grades must prepare students to learn because if they are struggling, they WILL NOT be able to learn, focus or concentrate.
Department Reports
8th Grade ELA: Students are currently working on a culminating project to write an Evidence-based Argumentative Essay over the effects of playing violent video games; this is from our Lucy Calkins’ materials. We have high expectations as writing was one of our top scoring areas last year on the MAP. Regarding MAP and eValuate, there has been a dip in eValuate’s overall scores. We are working to address those standards with students, as well as congratulate those who did increase, and even reached the proficient and advanced columns. We will end the year with one final literature book study for all eighth graders.
7th Grade ELA: In 7th grade English/Language Arts, we are so excited about the direction our scores are going. We’re finding that familiarizing students with academic language and test structure through a Question of the Day translates into consistently solid skill growth. In other news, we just completed a mystery unit that focused on inferencing skills. The students were extremely engaged in the process of solving the mystery, while strengthening their ability to connect details, characters, plot and setting.
Mathematics: The math department is pretty impressed with the progress our students have made. Our big change for the year was reordering our pre-algebra curriculum. We moved around several units and teach new skills earlier in the year to allow more time for practice and application to real life situations; This has made a huge difference in both co-taught and regular classes.
6th Grade ELA: In 6th grade we have been working on data walls pertaining to our NEWSELA scores. The students are working on a persuasive paper in language arts and they are incorporating various writing techniques along the way. In 6th grade reading the classes are focusing on book clubs, in their book clubs they are concentrating on predicting, clarifying, questioning and summarizing.
In science….
Here is a blip of what we have had going on in science:
1) We have been working on constructing, spiraling and aligning our curriculum with the Next Generation science standards as well as the performance modeling it will require. (Main 8th grade Curriculum and three of the standards unpacked are attached.)
2) We have worked in small parts of chemistry into the seventh grade in our Rock & Minerals unit and again in Earth’s Weather and Atmosphere unit so we can spiral into 8th grade to be more successful in these standards.
3) We are germinating plants in 8th grade so we can use our Pasco sensors/technology to measure the rate of photosynthesis. (Afterwards, we will plant our plants around the school and at home!)
4) We have a been preparing for the MAP assessment by beginning our Final Exam review that consists of activities, experiences, labs and other educational enrichment opportunities. (This also gives us teachers opportunities to strengthen areas we have performed poorly on in years prior.)
Social Studies: Since going one to one with Chromebooks this year, Social Studies has seen a huge increase in many areas of student success, specifically in student engagement and digital literacy. We made an early push to go fully digital in our classrooms and have since continued to incorporate apps, extensions, and strategies that allow students to interact with our content in new and exciting (for us and for them!) ways. Along with the increased interaction, we have also found many tools that allow us to differentiate on the fly by using things like speech-to-text in Google Docs, multiple Lexile level readings, and the ability to assign differentiated materials to specific students in Google Classroom.
Middle School PE: We are excited to see how one of our new strategies during our warm-up can help improve our cardiovascular fitness scores on our year end fitness tests. We will be doing a data cycle with 6th grade students on volleyball skills and rules during the next two weeks. We are also glad to welcome back the Best Choice program by Thrive to all of our middle school students over the next three weeks. Our Webpage contains the updates:
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