Grade cards go home today

Time sure flies when you are having fun. It is hard to believe that the first grading period is over. Students will receive their grade cards today in class. A copy will not be mailed home. Please ask to see your child's grade card and celebrate their success thus far. I'm sure you will have questions if your child struggled in a particular area or course. Parent teacher conferences are scheduled for November 13th and 15th from 4:00 - 7:00 pm. If you would like to schedule an appointment please contact Sue Reynolds by email at sue.reynolds@centerburgschools.org or by phone at 740-625-6055 ext. 2300.  Do not hesitate to contact the school if you have any questions or concerns.

Important dates coming up:

• HS/MS Book Fair - Nov. 12th - 16th
• Conferences - Nov. 13th and 15th
• Early Release Day - Nov. 14th (Staff bully prevention training)
•  Thanksgiving Break - Nov. 21st -26th

You Should Read... (Oct. 24th, 2012)

Image By Chris Jobling

I have been following the work of George Couros for a couple years now. He is currently Division Principal of Innovative Teaching and Learning with Parkland School Division located in Stony Plain, Alberta, Canada and is the author of the blog The Principal of Change. I have read many of his blog posts including his weekly post titled "You Should Read". He uses this kind of blog post to share what he is reading.  Examples include articles, blogs or web pages that moved and inspired him. It is also a glance into his learning and what ideas he is thinking about. With his permission I plan to share my own "You Should Read" blog posts for you to see what I'm thinking and what I'm researching.  With that said...

You should read:

• Why Learning Should be Messy The folks at Mindshift discuss creativity in this post and how important it is in solving many of today's problems. Students need creative opportunities but you just can't create a "creativity hour" in school. We need to work and evolve our practice to provide more creative inquiry based learning opportunities for our students.   

• How Twitter is Reinventing Collaboration Among Educators This is exactly why I use Twitter. I have had the opportunity to collaborate with educators from literally all over the world. Educators love to share ideas and help one another. They love working with students and want to push them to their highest potential. Twitter provides easy access to individuals and extends the workday well into the night. Some of the best conversations or chats take place in the evenings and learning is not constrained by the workday.  

•  Newsweek to cease print publication; going 100% digital in 2013  The world is changing. Everything is moving to digital content. This is just one example how organizations and industries will need to evolve to keep up. Schools need to do more than just keep up we need to lead the way by  preparing students for the the next fifty years not the last fifty years.

Bully-Proofing Our Youth

Jim Bisenius will be presenting "Bully-Proofing Our Youth" on Oct 18. 7 pm in the high school auditorium. The parent anti-bullying training will cover exactly how to teach your child to respond to verbal bullying, physical bullying, social bullying, and group manipulation. Parents will walk away with concrete tools that they can immediately implement and help their child master in order to eliminate bullying from his or her life. Participants will learn specifically how “popular” bullies isolate, control and manipulate their peers. Then they will learn exactly what steps their son or daughter must take to stop them. In addition, parents will be able to use all of these techniques in their own life to deal with controlling or intimidating adults. The parent presentation is approximately 90 minutes long. Everyone is invited!

Inside our classrooms

This week I have spent a lot of time inside our classrooms. It is exciting to see all of the activities, lessons, and learning taking place. Our students are very busy throughout the day accomplishing a variety of tasks and learning new material. I was really excited to hear the choir. Currently there are over 70 students participating in the high school choir. I recorded a short clip to provide a glance of what to expect this winter.



I also spent time visiting Mr. Tocheff's Spanish 1 classroom. Learning a foreign language is not easy. But there are a variety of ways to ensure student learning is taking place. In the picture below students are using a white board and dry erase markers to write in Spanish the sentence or phrase stated verbally in English by Mr. Tocheff. Students are practicing and using the foreign language while receiving immediate feedback from the teacher. In the education world we call this a formative assessment.  

Carr Headed to State Tournament

 
Photo courtesy of the Mount Vernon News

The Centerburg Trojans finished the Central District golf tournament in 4th place with a team score of 380 on Monday. Only the top three teams will advance to the state tournament. Faithe Carr shot an 81 finishing in third place as an individual and will advance to the state tournament.  The State Tournament will be held next Friday and Saturday at the Ohio State Gray Course. Tee times have not yet been announced.

Good Luck Faithe!

 

Math Help!

Students: If you need assistance with your math courses help is available after school. Math Help is every Tuesday and Wednesday after school from 3:00 to 3:30 (or longer if necessary)

Ms. Boehmer runs the Tuesday sessions, Mr . Altizer runs the Wednesday sessions.

Students need to bring their math materials with them to Math Help.  Students are not obligated to stay the full time.

Any student in grades 6-12 are welcome to attend.