Early Release Wednesday

Just a quick note about tomorrow.  We will start our Early Release Time in the library with the entire staff and view some web-based resources.  We will then move to my room to continue our discussion of the music curriculum.  I have posted our agenda as well as the final drafts of Level I and Level II on google docs.  Thanks! :-)

OTES, OTES and More OTES!

The topic of OTES continues to dominate many meetings and conversations.  Recently, OMEA published a few resources on its website related to OTES and the implementation for music teaching in the state.  You can find those resources here.  (You will have to log into the sight in order to view them.)  While the OMEA OTES Information Center doesn't contain a lot of information, what it does have is all relatively pertinent to music education and it does contain links to material on ODE about this process.  I strongly encourage everyone to take a look at this material and become somewhat familiar with it, as this will be our new reality in the very near future.

The administration continues to be concerned about the progress we are making in developing our maps and assessments for next school year.  Our goal is to complete the mapping of the performing ensembles by the end of November and then turn our attention to developing quarterly assessments and end of course exams for each of these groups.  I would like to believe that we will have some things in place so we can pilot them during the second semester of this school year.  It makes me extremely nervous to think that I am going to be giving as assessment for the first time and those results will be part of my evaluation.  I would like to be able to edit the tests after a real life group of students use them.

Finally, this is just a friendly reminder that we are all to be utilizing some form of goal setting activity with all of our students and that we need to complete one web-based project with one class each semester.  The Excel spread sheet to report that on is available on Google Docs

If you have any questions or concerns about any of this, please don't hesitate to ask.  

Happy Friday! :-)

Happy Friday!:-)

Here is an update from yesterdays department chair meeting.

• The Program of Studies is in the process of being formatted.  All changes have been reviewed and submitted.  The document will now include a section called "career clusters".  If students are interested in pursuing a career in a health care field, classes offered here at CFHS related to these jobs are included.  The clusters include careers such as hospitatliy/tourism, legal, medical, business, finance, marketing, arts, information technology, education . . . . .  you get the idea.  The hope is to have this document finalized and presented to the board of education for approval so scheduling can begin in January.  If you have questions or concerns about this, please let me know.
• At the staff meeting on Monday, 11/5/2012, we will be discussing goal sheets.  This is a district initiative that we will begin during this second quarter and each quarter for the remainder of the school year.  We will basically be asked to assist students in developing one academic goal and one behavioral goal for each class.  Students will complete a document, recording this information and the teacher and student should keep a copy.  At the end of the quarter, teachers will review this document with the student individually to discuss their progress at meeting their goals.  At our department chair meeting, we discussed the possibility of making a goal for the students or addressing a need department or grade level wide.  For example, we could create the goal of increasing individual practice time as the academic goal for the students.  Anne was fine with this idea, only wanting to ensure that students would be able to work on the goal in a way that was meaningful to them individually.  We will find out more details on Monday and I will set aside some time for us to discuss this on Wednesday during our Early Release Time.
• At this time, the school year is 25% completed.  Anne expressed concern over meeting all of our goals related to the mapping and assessment that needs to be completed by the end of the school year.  In short, we are being asked to create maps, some form of quarterly assessments, and end of course assessments for every class that we teach.  I myself feel terribly overwhelmed by the colossal amount of work in front of us.  To that end, please plan to arrive promptly in my room for our Wednesday time ready to discuss the maps for the performing ensembles.  It is my intense hope that we can complete these by the end of November (yes, this month!) so that we can move on to the assessment piece.

Thanks for taking the time to read this!  Please let me know if you have any questions.