|
|
|
Washington Elementary is focusing this year around the theme H.A.P.P.Y. (Have A Positive Productive Year).
The USD 490 Board of Education received an update on what is going on at Washington during their meeting Monday evening.
“At the end of last year, I told my staff I want to come up with a theme for this year,” said Washington Principal Stan Ruff. “They took it a step further. They got shirts; they wear them on Fridays.”
The shirts have a smiley face on the front and the theme on the back.
Ruff went on to talk about progress at the school.
“Last year I came to you and said our goal for state assessments was 100 percent in both reading and math,” he said, adding that they did not quite make that.
They achieved 96.8 percent in both reading and math.
“So we are short,” he said. “The thing is in four years this isn’t going to be good enough. For this year’s goal again we’re talking about 100 percent.”
He said the question was how to get there.
There are several things they are doing.
They are looking at formatives, AimsWeb and NWEA in reading and math, as well as MTSS in academics and behavior, student data and having students setting goals for themselves.
In MTSS they are setting aside an hour for each grade level for tier 2 and 3 students to get help with their weaknesses and it is a time for tier 1 students to get enrichment activities.
With the formatives, students take four comprehensive formatives in math and four within reading.
“Before students take state tests they (teachers) have to give at least four formatives to know where those kids are,” Ruff said.
In addition, students set goals for themselves before they take the formatives and track their progress in their data notebooks.
Washington also has math and reading words of the week which are posted on the school bulletin board.
The final item on the bulletin board is the PBS SOAR (Safety, On Task, Act Responsibly, Respect Other) program.
“These are our school-wide expectations,” Ruff said.
He said they have daily announcements for the expectations of the week. In addition the teachers spend two to three minutes every morning talking about these things with the students.
Washington Elementary is focusing this year around the theme H.A.P.P.Y. (Have A Positive Productive Year).
The USD 490 Board of Education received an update on what is going on at Washington during their meeting Monday evening.
“At the end of last year, I told my staff I want to come up with a theme for this year,” said Washington Principal Stan Ruff. “They took it a step further. They got shirts; they wear them on Fridays.”
The shirts have a smiley face on the front and the theme on the back.
Ruff went on to talk about progress at the school.
“Last year I came to you and said our goal for state assessments was 100 percent in both reading and math,” he said, adding that they did not quite make that.
They achieved 96.8 percent in both reading and math.
“So we are short,” he said. “The thing is in four years this isn’t going to be good enough. For this year’s goal again we’re talking about 100 percent.”
He said the question was how to get there.
There are several things they are doing.
They are looking at formatives, AimsWeb and NWEA in reading and math, as well as MTSS in academics and behavior, student data and having students setting goals for themselves.
In MTSS they are setting aside an hour for each grade level for tier 2 and 3 students to get help with their weaknesses and it is a time for tier 1 students to get enrichment activities.
With the formatives, students take four comprehensive formatives in math and four within reading.
“Before students take state tests they (teachers) have to give at least four formatives to know where those kids are,” Ruff said.
In addition, students set goals for themselves before they take the formatives and track their progress in their data notebooks.
Washington also has math and reading words of the week which are posted on the school bulletin board.
The final item on the bulletin board is the PBS SOAR (Safety, On Task, Act Responsibly, Respect Other) program.
“These are our school-wide expectations,” Ruff said.
He said they have daily announcements for the expectations of the week. In addition the teachers spend two to three minutes every morning talking about these things with the students.
