January Happenings

Good chilly day to the Lake Harriet Community.

I find myself in an abandoned ship once again due to extremely cold temperatures. A perfect time for a long blog post.

The past few weeks have been wonderful at Lake Harriet Upper. On Saturday, January 11, there was an exciting robotics tournament held here. I was amazed at the number of teams we have and the quality of their work. For those of you who haven't seen it, students work in teams to research a topic and devise a solution that would help (this year it was natural disasters). They also have to program lego robots to complete tasks on a large table. While doing all of this they have to live up to the core values of the tournament and learn to work successfully as a team. It is quite a challenge. All of the teams I saw had done excellent work, and throughout the day I noticed that students were supportive of one another.

The following week, our top teams moved on to the MInneapolis tournament.  After competing in five categories, four teams from Lake Harriet are headed to the State Competition on February 8th at Washington Technology Magnet School in St Paul – The Rubies, Live Breathe Robots, Jenius Joules and Fuego My Eggo.  Congratulations to all of our fine teams.

On January 16 we had our first middle school dance. It was put together with the help of many students and Gregg Townsend, a parent volunteer DJ. It seemed to me that everyone had a wonderful time. I was very happy with the amount of dancing that the students did. Sometimes in middle school dances students stand around on the side, but at our dance the students were actively participating. At one point we did the Cupid Shuffle and the Cha-Cha-Slide and had over 200 students involved. It was fantastic. For students who find these events to be too loud we had the media center open for reading or playing board games, and the lunch room was used for snacks. I was very happy with the way it turned out and I look forward to our next dance on May 9. That one will be held after school so we will be looking for parent volunteers. More information to follow.

Finally, Lake Harriet Upper is once again going to send a group of students to the U.S. Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama, April 10 - 14. This is a partnership activity with students from Olson Middle School.  Fourteen of our eighth grade students and two chaperones will be driving in a coach bus to Alabama with stops along the way at the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, and the Field museum in Chicago on the way back.  New this year, our students will have an opportunity to visit Olson Middle School and Olson's students will visit us before the trip.  It should be a great opportunity to learn about science, visit two major Midwestern attractions and learn more about our own city at the same time.  The entire trip (with the exception of some food costs) is paid for by a grant from the Office of Equity and Diversity.  Thanks to Robert Rand, a district office area learning center coordinator, for making this happen.

Well, I have just been informed that there will be no school on Tuesday, January 28, either. So stay warm.  I look forward to seeing everyone back here on Wednesday.

 

New Year

Good morning everyone and happy new year.  Having two days off for cold weather is an odd way to start, but in some ways it makes sense given that we had two days off for hot weather at the beginning of the school year.  Speaking of cold weather, our building is old and the heat is inconsistent. Some classrooms are too cold and some are too warm. I know from personal experience that students at this age are all over the map when it comes to organizational skills, but try to encourage your son or daughter to keep a sweatshirt or sweater at school just in case they are in a room that is too cold (and to check the lost and found when they misplace it).

Many things have been happening at school, but most of them are in the early stages, so I am unsure of how much to report.  Here are a few of the topics that we have been discussing as a staff:

1. Advanced Learners and the Advanced Math Pathway -
• Interestingly, I have heard from parents who are concerned that our school environment is too stressful and demanding and I have heard from parents who are concerned that we aren't challenging their students enough.  That is why the current "gold standard" in education is differentiation.  We are trying to find ways to challenge all students at the level they are at.  This is a difficult task for all teachers, but the staff at Lake Harriet have been adding to their bag of tricks for several years now and will continue all year.  The teaching teams meet in what we call Professional Learning Communities (PLC) to look at student learning and talk about ways they can help struggling students and challenge students who have already met the standards of the current unit. 
• Lake Harriet has an advanced math pathway for students who show a special aptitude for math.  Having this option is great for students who grasp concepts quickly, but it is also tricky because some students may be quick in some concepts, but require more time in others.  It can also be tricky to schedule and align classes from one grade to the next, so our middle school math team is going to meet with the 4th and 5th grade (and hopefully teacher(s) from Southwest) to make sure our pathway is consistent from year to year and that it prepares students for what they need in high school (and at the same time to make sure it doesn't push students too fast).
• Finally, our Site Council has a sub-committee working on Advanced Learner issues and with excellent volunteer help from Lora Aadelen Joshi has created a new section on our website that seeks to explain these issues in more depth.  It is a work in progress, so please send me your comments if you have any.
2. School Improvement Plan (SIP)
• Every school in Minneapolis has an individualized SIP.  In past years, a team of staff and parents created the plan with guidance from the district.  Once the plan was created it was stable for the year.  This meant that some SIP plans became buried by the onslaught of new projects and initiatives.  To ensure that the SIP really guides the school's work, this year the Associate Superintendent of each area is visiting each of his/her schools once per quarter to receive an update on progress toward SIP goals.  At Upper Campus we met with Assoc. Sup. Saddler on December 10.  Together with several staff members we talked about our major goals and then went on a tour of the building to see how teachers were working toward these goals in the classrooms.  We were looking for evidence that teachers were making progress implementing the district's Focused Instruction plan; how much differentiation is happening in classrooms; how much STEM is happening in classrooms; how well Reader's Workshop is working in grades 4 &5; and how much descriptive feedback students were receiving during class time.  After our tour we talked about what we saw and how we can improve in each area.  As a result of the new SIP strategy, we will be working throughout the year on our plans and will be continuously updating our strategies and actions to ensure we are making progress towards our goals.
3. Middle School Offerings/Academic Support
• For the past two months the staff has talked about how we can offer more choice and/or academic support for middle school students. This is definitely a work in progress because any changes to our current offerings/schedules means something else is going to have to change.  At this point, we are recognizing the need for middle school students to have experiences in different subjects and the need for some students to receive extra support, and trying to determine how we can add these without losing important parts of our current system.  Stay tuned for more updates as we move from brainstorming to actual proposals.

Well, that is probably enough for one blog post.  I look forward to seeing all the students tomorrow and to a great 2014.