Huddle Boards
I learned about this strategy in an online schools workgroup and I wish I had known about it before.
Huddle boards come from the medical field and are a way of mapping out what needs to be done for the class, day or over an extended period of time.
Using a Google Doc, an electronic whiteboard, Nearpod, or another means the teacher and students complete the three sections: Not Started, In Progress, and Done. At the bottom is a section called Roadblocks. This section most often can be filled in by the student. Because it is completed in real-time, students and teachers are able to use the huddle board to communicate, monitor progress and provide feedback.
The first section of the huddle board can be pre-populated by the teacher with the learning tasks or the students can populate this. The teacher can differentiate the tasks as well.
Why huddle boards?
- They provide clarity of instruction and learning for students and families.
- They provide an element of interaction and progress monitoring ensuring student accountability and building their confidence and self-efficacy.
- They are a great resource for monitoring student progress and self-monitoring progress; the latter building metacognitive skills for students.
- The roadblocks section is valuable for both teachers and students if acted upon promptly.
Tips and Tricks
- At the beginning of their use, like everything, they will require more modeling and attention to detail.
- Students can work with partners to share their huddle boards. For younger students, prompts and question stems may be helpful.
- Older students can develop their own tasks, especially when working on individual or group group projects that require higher level thinking and processing.
Elementary Announcements
Monday: https://youtu.be/xfeYx9ZxILQ
Tuesday: https://youtu.be/QN88DCNbBzg
Wednesday: https://youtu.be/y1oFLaceYrQ
Thursday: https://youtu.be/DsTel4o6ZWQ
Found this great New York Times website with photographs for Noticing and Wondering (What’s Going on in this Picture) See all images in the series
Announcements are a little longer because of weather announcements from our 2nd graders.
Secondary Announcements
Monday: https://youtu.be/44MUP1yseVM
Tuesday: https://youtu.be/cC6sZXPsNw8
Wednesday: https://youtu.be/AURt0kY-J1k
Thursday: https://youtu.be/YYlumLjNbGc
Announcements are a little longer because of weather announcements from our 2nd graders.
Mindful Messages
Mindful Message | Prompts | |
Monday | Compliments make you feel good. Give yourself time to compliment yourself. | I am ____. I am ____. I am ___. I am a good person. |
Tuesday | At the end of the day, at the end of the week, at the end of my life, I want to be able to say that I contributed more than I criticized. ~Brene Brown | How is this a positive message? How can you contribute? Can you think of a situation where you made the decision to either criticize or contribute? What would have been different if you did the opposite? |
Wednesday | Having light, we pass it on to others. Share your light with others, but keep some for yourself. | What are your lights? What gifts can you pass on to others? |
Thursday | Sometimes the easiest way to solve a problem is to stop participating in the problem. | How can you remove yourself from problems? Share a time where you didn’t like what was going on in a situation and you stopped participating or stopped others. |
Staff Wellness: Jar of Gratitude
The “Why”: According to psychologist, Robert Emmons, practicing gratitude has been shown to have a positive impact on physical health, psychological well-being and or relationship with others. Gratitude contributes to positive emotions, lessens negativity, builds resilience, and improves self-worth.
Supplies: Large mason jar or a decorative book, index cards or smaller sized papers, markers.
Steps:
- First, if you’re the creative type, decorate a large jar or box with “Jar of Gratitude.”
- Next, every evening before going to bed, reflect on one thing for which you are grateful.
- Then, take a deep breath and notice the sensation in your body when you think about it.
- Last, write it down on a slip of paper and put it in the jar.
Periodically, you can look at the slips when you need a positive reminder.
What I like about this is twofold. First, it “forces” one to be positive and reflective. Secondly, it’s similar to keeping positive notes from colleagues, students, and families, but those are not regular enough.
Philibert, Tantillo Carla, et al. Everyday Self-Care for Educators: Tools and Strategies for Well-Being. Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020.
Staff Information
Timecard Change. Well apparently I was supposed to remove teacher schedules (the times) from your timecards but I wasn’t aware of that. So next week—assuming I can figure out how—you won’t see times on your timecard. What’s the wager that I can/cannot figure it out?
Upcoming PLCs: In addition to the equity audit continuing on Tuesday, we will also have some guests from tech and communication to help us learn about new features in BrightArrow communications.
Working conditions survey We have about 2/3 teacher completion. Let’s get to 100! https://tinyurl.com/VASS22ADTAdult access code: VIR87A
Micro-teaching. As part of our March 22 PLC please bring a short (less than 5 minute) video clip of a teaching practice that you would like to have as part of a discussion.
- Volunteer teacher introduces the educational strategy they were using and explains the context. I am really trying to ensure that I bring ignition to my lessons and grabbing the student’s attention. What Zaretta Hammond calls: Ignite: Bring the Brain to Attention. I used a story technique called Crick-Crack where I try to involve the students. I found that even if I tell a short story that I can’t read the “room” very well because of Zoom, so I was hoping this would help. When I say Crick they respond with Crack. Then they shout answers to riddles and I jump into the story. So the crick-crack is an attention getter and signifies a shift in instruction. This is my second time doing it. You’ll see the Crick-Crack and the first part of the story and it went better this time than the first. I’m hoping you can provide some feedback on whether this was a good means of grabbing their attention? I also tried to use riddles that were related to the subject? I’d also like a little feedback on other ways to activating/priming the brain and whether this worked for all students especially (student names) who seem to struggle with transitions. You can also think of some prompts/questions you may want to ask your group. This is a high-trust, highly collaborative process which I’m so glad you are ready to undertake. We’ll rotate through the process over a couple of weeks
- Watch the video.
- Clarifying questions from the group members
- Questions from the presenter. This ensures his/her comfort level is understood.
- Questions from slide 13 to the presenter (see slide 13 in the presentation although this slide is mostly questions that you could start with, your answers will help you think about questions to ask) that you would like to address)
Elementary Information
Parent-teacher/student-led conferences are scheduled for March 22. I will send out information schoolwide next Wednesday. Based on your responses, you wanted to have students’ families individually schedule these conferences. If you have information, like a sign-up that you would like me to include in the message, please let me know.
Some ideas for before:
- Have students write a letter inviting their family to the conference.
- Organizing the conference: Share data with students. This could include report cards, reading levels, performance scores, SEL information.
- Create action plans with students (goals for the last part of the year)
- Have students chose a piece of writing or another product to share with their family
- Practice
- Solicit information from parents about what they would like to know and explain how the conference will occur.
- Our Middle School letter:
By reflecting on their personal learning and growth, communicating what they have learned and identifying further learning goals, students will take greater responsibility for their learning.
Over the past several weeks, students have been setting goals, reflecting on their progress, and analyzing their learning. Instead of meeting with individual teachers, you will schedule a time to meet with your child’s advisory teacher. During that time your child will present their learning portfolio/slideshow. The portfolio includes information and work samples from each class, student goals, an opportunity for you to provide your child with feedback and support, and a period of time for you to ask questions.
During
- Explain your role and their child's role.
- Student begins by sharing the report card, discusses strengths and weaknesses.
- Student shares work sample/product.
- Ask parents if they have any questions.
After
- Debrief with students
- Parent evaluation feedback
- Plan to review and revisit goals
- Parent homework
- Parent survey
Why?
- Help students take ownership of their learning and see the value of school and improve student self-efficacy.
- Helps the student see the relevance and importance of their learning and effort.
- Students become problem-solvers and advocates.
- Builds collaborative partnerships (student-teacher-family)
Secondary Information
- Each teacher needs to add comments for students that they teach.
- For students in tiers 1-2, click the hyperlink and add any comments on that page. Initial next to comments that you agree with.
- For students in tier 3-4, add the comment to the master spreadsheet (middle and high school)
- Contacting families
- We have approximately 65 families to connect with. That would be about 6 for each of us, knowing some Tier 3 students are doing poorly in individual classes.
- The goal is for us to conference with families. This strengthens the partnership and nobody knows the child better and has more impact than a family. Of course, some families are skeptical, distrusting of schools, but we have the power to change that! Interpretalk and Script
- When the family requests a conference or more information, please add that to the spreadsheet. Conferences should be added to the Conference Slots tab.
- Add your zoom link to the spreadsheet and invite other teachers. Please invite me as well, although I will not be able to make many. I will work at adding the school counselor and others as needed.
- We pledged to have the comments done by yesterday so please add comments during your planning periods today and begin making phone calls.
- Zoom authentication has been turned off.
Student Climate Survey
We will re-administer the survey to grades 9-12 on Tuesday during 3rd period We recognize some students did take this; we’ll take their word for it. We’ll ask to see completed screens and use the read aloud script to ensure others complete this important survey.
Monday and Thursday Academic Support
- While attendance was not perfect, we did have over 10 students attend the various sessions. If an assignment is assigned, it’s worth doing. If it’s worth the student doing, let’s require it to be done. Before signing a student up, contact the family. I also follow up with an email/text to the family. Please share the Zoom link as well (it’s on the top of the spreadsheet).
- Here’s the spreadsheet https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1P8TNWtKQBCZEmiUCK2r2Fz5DT1QYAvf5J8QVZOw7a1Q/edit#gid=0
- This a great way of modeling high expectations and high care.
March 22: 7th grade advisory > Pathway Exploration
March 23: SAT for juniors who signed up; CCRA+ for 12th graders
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