Wows, Wonders, and Worries

Each month the PTA Board, Booster Club Board and several school administrators come together for sharing session. We hear wows, wonders and worries from across the school. Some highlights of those shareouts are captured below:

WOW: FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS!

SAS Booster Club organized a Friday Night Lights events this week that exceeded all expectations with over 1,000 people at the event! With assistance from the PTA and central administration, the evening brought organizations from all three divisions together, while rallying around our season one student athletes. Involvement was seen from the elementary marathon club, Boys Scouts and Girls Scouts, vocal performances, dance team, student council, service clubs and more. This is the first of three Friday Night Lights events this year and goes down as a huge step toward school wide community spirit!

WONDER: HIGH SCHOOL PRINCIPAL

After a competitive global search, we are excited to announce that Dr. Darin Fahrney has been selected as the new Executive Director of Teaching and Learning. Beyond having a strong understanding of the strategic direction of SAS, Dr. Fahrney has a focus on systems and structures that move theory into practice. He will begin his new role in July 2019. This role will focus on the implementing the strategic direction of the school.

With Dr. Fahrney's move to this new role, the high school principal position will need to be filled. We will be conducting a global search for the new principal. Because it is a principal's position, we will provide opportunities for representative faculty, parents, and students to meet the finalist candidates. We will not be beginning this process until the new superintendent is identified so he or she can play a role in hiring the new principal. We will share out when this process has begun.

WORRY- ELEMENTARY MATH ENRICHMENT

The elementary school is shifting how math enrichment is approached in first grade to fifth grade to better serve students who need enrichment. The intention is to move from a "pull out" program to more of a "push in" program that is responsive to in-the-moment learning for our students.

In first and second grade we previously offered math enrichment pullout support to a limited number of students who were demonstrating ability beyond the scope of the traditional math program. Math enrichment will now be done within each classroom for all students who demonstrate the need for this work- meaning we can now serve more kids with math enrichment! Ms. Jill Carpenter will be supporting the first and second grade teachers and students to ensure we can offer appropriate enrichment activities for students demonstrating this need. As students are exposed to curricula, teachers gather evidence as to whether students have already mastered the content, or need the immediate lessons to deepen their understanding of a concept. If a student shows solid understanding, the teacher will then provide them with enrichment activities. Ms. Carpenter is available to ensure the teachers have appropriate support to meet the needs for these enrichment students.

Third grade will take a similar approach. As teachers implement pre-tests for each math unit, they will get immediate feedback on student's abilities. When students demonstrate mastery of unit content, they will receive math enrichment support directly in the classroom. Our math specialists, Ms. Jill Carpenter and Mr. Dan Gach are a resource for teachers and students to help provide appropriate enrichment experiences for students. When students consistently demonstrate mastery of math content through several data points, Ms. Carpenter and Mr. Gach will work with those students to develop a personalized learning plan in math. Personalized Learning Plans will help guide their instruction in areas of interest in mathematics based on student assessment data. Students will confer with Mr. Gach and Ms. Carpenter on a regular basis to see how they have grown, what further resources they need, or if they are ready to move on and set a new goal. This will ensure that students have an appropriately challenging level of work to be done when in their regular classrooms during math time.

There will be no changes to the Advanced Math Problem Solving (AMPS) and math enrichment program for students in fourth and fifth grade for this year. In subsequent years we will continue the same program described above for third grade into fourth grade during the 2019-20 school year. Following that, in 2020-21 we will be bringing that same model forward into fifth grade which will then ensure total alignment of a more personalized learning approach for students from first through fifth grade.

from Singapore American School https://ift.tt/2Rmdp5u