Where did the month go?

In the blink of an eye the month of January is gone. It has been a fast moving and very productive month at West Genesee Middle School for our students and our staff. All of our students in grades 6, 7 and 8 took part in a universal AIMSweb screening for both Mathematics and Reading. If you have read my previous posts you know that this allows us to get another piece of data on students to make instructional decisions to better meet their needs. Many of our students also took interim assessments in some of their core courses to provide teachers with a snapshot of where students are. Teachers will now use that data to help shape instructional decisions as we head into the second semester. That is sound instructional practice.

Along with improving our assessment system, we are changing our instructional practices. Infused into the new Common Core Learning Standards is the need to provide students with instructional opportunities to develop and utilize 21st Century Skills. Twenty-first Century Skills are all about having students communicate, collaborate, thinking critically and being creative and innovative. In classrooms in all grade levels and in all content areas our students are getting these opportunities. These real world, real life skills are essential for students to be ready for college and beyond. The days of memorizing and regurgitating lists and lists of facts and basic information are being replaced with the need for students to apply, analyze, evaluate and create using that information. These higher level thinking situations can and should be challenging for students. We are pushing our students beyond simply meeting minimun requirements and working towards mastery. That push can bring with it some struggle, but getting out of one's comfort zone and struggling at times is where growth occurs.  For all of our students, helping them grow and improve is our focus.



Powerful Collaboration: Teachers teaching teachers

Professional workshops days are a key component of the improvement process we are entrenched in. This past Monday our teachers had an opportunity to collaborate with their colleagues from both middle schools. Lots of terrific work tied to aligning curriculum, developing common interim assessments and sharing best practices took place. I can't say enough about the effort and commitment our staff continually puts into their work. I am inspired on a daily basis by what I see in our classrooms!


Top Spellers Advance to CNY Finals


I am also inspired by the incredible talents of our students. Our athletic and fine arts programs continue to flourish through the winter season. In addition to that, three of our eighth grade students have advanced to the Post-Standard CNY Spelling Bee Finals this Saturday, February 2nd at 2 PM. The event will be televised on WCNY and we wish all three of them, Nicholas Cantello, Brennan Costello, and Russell Graziano the best of luck as they compete against the best spellers in the area.

Some of the activities on the calendar the next few weeks include WGMS Movie Night, our building level Optimist Speech Contest, the next Olweus Classroom Meeting, and a number of club and intramural activities. As always, please check the 'Announcements' section of our web site for specific dates and times. Thank you for your continued support of our students and staff at WGMS.

Continued Success,
Steve Dunham

Improving with Change

Anyone who is in education or anyone that has children in school today understands that there is a wide range of changes occurring right now. If you look back over the last five months alone it is mind-boggling to think about all of the changes that we in education have had and are still in the midst of implementing: new standards, a new evaluation system for teachers and principals, the development and implementation of a balanced assessment system, RtI Plans, and the list goes on and on. The good news is that most of this change is fraught with good intentions: to maximize student achievement and learning and continue to get better; to improve educating our children. Let’s start thinking of the word ‘change’ as being synonymous with ‘improvement’. Any change we look to make should be with improvement as the goal.

What is exciting about being in education today is that more than ever, if you really look at what is happening, it is clear that more of our dots are connecting as things improve. What happens is one content area is impacting another and vice versa. People are no longer alone on their own islands doing their own thing. Collaboration is at an all-time high. I see that collaboration every day in action at WGMS and it is very inspiring. We are improving as we go.

Yet, we continue to reflect on our practices to see what else we can do to evolve. At the middle school level we have started to discuss building in an ‘interaction time’ into our day similar to the high school. Interaction time would allow our teachers more time to connect with students who need that time. Many of our students have very full schedules and struggle at finding time to make up science labs, get extra help, take advantage of intervention services, etc. Interaction time would also allow time for teachers to collaborate with one another in an effort to effectively do some of the things I mentioned above. The potential benefits of interaction time on student achievement and learning are tremendous.

So why wouldn’t we just do it and make interaction time happen?  Well, as I mentioned, there is a lot of change, or improvement, in the air. How much change is too much? The upside of interaction time is obvious, but it would also bring with it a slight change in our start time and the need to have some of our West Genesee Middle School students ride to school with high school students. Most districts already have shared busing between different building levels, but for us that would be new and one more change. We are also on the verge of redistricting which is another change, or improvement, going on. Like other recent changes (improvements) in education, interaction time is an idea with the best interests of our students in mind. I think that if we can make it happen it will have a tremendous impact on maximizing student achievement and learning. And isn’t that what it’s all about?

As always, I would love to hear your thoughts. Thank you for continued involvement and support of our students and staff.

Continued Success,

Steve Dunham

sdunham@westgenesee.org

Meaningful Assessment

As we near the midpoint of the school year we are very pleased at the progress our students are making and I am impressed with the instruction that our teachers are delivering on a daily basis. We have had some tremendous professional development throughout the year that teachers are participating in and they are making tremendous efforts at applying the new strategies that they have learned. The ultimate winner = our students.

Hopefully you are starting to hear about a number of different assessments that students are taking. Next week all students in grades 6 through 8 will take part in an AIMSweb Universal Math Screening on Tuesday and an AIMSweb Universal Reading Screening on Thursday and Friday. These are very brief, pinpointed assessments that do not have a significant impact on our building schedule or instruction those days. Essentially it is business as usual. In addition to those assessments, students are starting to take a number of interim benchmark assessments in some of their core and special area classes. This isn’t having kids take a test for the sake of getting a grade. These assessments are truly about gathering data on student learning to see where they are. It is a checkpoint during the year which allows us to make instructional decisions while we still have them in the building. This is true data-driven instruction: obtain some data, analyze it, reflect on the instructional practices and make decisions on how to proceed. This is meaningful assessment. This is assessment that students and teachers benefit from because we can do something about instruction right away.

On the other hand, the information that we get from state assessments isn’t timely, it isn’t specific and doesn’t allow us to  change instruction for individual students because by the time we get the information they have moved on to the next grade or even to the high school.  I would also add that having students sitting in desks for a two to three hour assessment three days in a row is not going to give me results that necessarily reflect the true abilities of that student. I’ll get off of my soapbox now.

Whatever reservations you may have when you hear the word “assessment”, I want to ensure you that the assessments we are using during the school year are truly for improving student achievement and learning. After all, student achievement and learning is what schools should be all about. 

Our focus has been, and continues to be, about constant improvement in every facet of what we do. I am going to steal an idea that I recently read about in regards to feedback. Starting next Friday, and every Friday after that, I will randomly be calling five households to get your perspective on how you think we are doing things here at West Genesee Middle School. Don’t be nervous when you see ‘West Genesee Central School District’ show up on the caller ID. Talking to the Principal isn’t always a bad thing! 

If you have any questions or concerns about anything please do not wait to be randomly called, I would love to hear from you either by calling me or sending me an email: sdunham@westgenesee.org

Continued Success,

Steve Dunham