KARCHER STAFF BLOG
Student's of the week for
February 8 - February 12
- Tyler Honzelka (Diamond)
- Tyler is always respectful and friendly to everyone at Karcher. He always has a positive attitude and a smile on his face.
- Tyler Hunter (Onyx)
- Tyler consistently displays "The Karcher Way" in both his attitude and his academics. Keep up the great work Tyler!
- Courtney Hegemann (Applied Academic)
- Courtney has really stepped up this semester and shown "The Karcher Way" by exhibiting all traits during band.
- Payton Lueth-Lunetta (Silver)
- Payton is consistently a positive influence on his peers; he truly leads by example.
- Alex Peterson (Hive)
- Alex continues to be kind and compassionate with all of his peer interactions in the classroom and the hallway.
- Lauren Beachem (Not in Picture)
- Lauren is very kind to her peers and responsible with completing her work. She does a great job following "The Karcher Way".
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Kudos
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- Kris Thomsen was chosen as the KCB STAFF OF THE WEEK! Congrats Kris and thank you all for continuing to reinforce our 8 character traits.
- Thank you Marilee Hoffman and all of the students who made Culver's Night a success on February 9th! Great job and thank you to those who went out to Culvers to support Karcher activities :)
- Thank you Molly Ebbers for taking on and leading Tech Tuesdays for our staff! We all really appreciate the time and effort you put in to assisting with technology needs as we move to 1:1 next year.
- Kudos to Hans Block and Marilee Hoffman for going outside of your comfort zones by integrating technology into your fitness unit! Students created iMovies in order to demonstrate their understanding of specific fitness techniques.
- Here is an amazing letter written from a Pewaukee coach about our coach - Mike Jones. Thank you Mike for instilling positive character traits in all that you do for our student body!
Here is the email received regarding Mike Jones:
Dear Mr. Hoffman,
I am one of the eighth grade volleyball coaches in Pewaukee. My team played against your eighth grade A team, and I want to pass on some of my thoughts from yesterday's game regarding your coach.
I was incredibly impressed and appreciative of the coach from the eighth grade A team. We played his girls yesterday afternoon in Pewaukee, and it was clear from the start that his team had a superior skill set over my girls. With an easy first game victory, he challenged some of his top players to play different positions than what they usually play in order to make them more versatile players. He also replaced some of the stronger servers, even after they started serving, to get the lesser skilled girls more practice in serving in a game setting.
The Burlington team won both the first and second game, thus already securing the victory. Then in game three, he didn't revert back to a must-win mentality when my team started pulling ahead. My team ended up winning the third game, which is a huge confidence booster for my team.
Your coach made several classy moves where he emphasized competition and skill development over a must-win mentality. I have coached against other coaches in the conference who would not and have not made the same decisions.
In my opinion, you have an excellent coach. Thank you.
Scott Roehl
8th Grade Black Volleyball Coach
Asa Clark Middle School
Pewaukee School District
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Reminders
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- iTime changes will begin February 15th with the focus of all iTime groups on: English/Reading, Math, SSR, or Compass.
- February 15 -BLT meeting @ 2:40 in the library
- February 16 - Tech Tuesday with Molly Ebbers in room 24.
- Focus: Organizing Google Drive
- Start time of 2:40 and stay as long as you want to stay!
- February 17 - Literacy PLC - staff will meet in the library and work with their content area teams to discuss the strategy determining importance and how each teacher will infuse the strategy into your classroom lesson design.
- February 19 - All course selection sheets are needed back from the academic teachers.
- Starting the first week in March we will be working on scheduling students for the 2016-2017 school year. All applied academic sections have been entered into Skyward and I will begin working on the schedule this week.
- Teachers:
- Just a reminder to make sure you are taking your attendance within the first 5 minutes of advisory and ensuring it is accurate.
- Please check your sub folders and adjust necessary items to reflect courses you have for second semester.
- Budgets are due to Kim by February 19th.
- Reminder: If you are taking supplies from the main office and you are taking the last item or close to the last item please let Jane know the supply item is getting low so she can order more.
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Pictures from the week
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Ms. Hoffman's students working in groups integrating technology with fitness!
Ms. Rummler's social studies students working on Rube Goldberg machines to mimic/explain historical events.
Article of the week:
Focus on Learning, Not Grades
In the Classroom with Brad Kuntz
I used to hear this often from students: "I didn't do very well on the test. Is there any extra credit I can do to raise my grade?" Or: "I'm so close to a B in class, how can I earn some more points?" Less often did students inquire about improving upon a particular component of the unit's content.
The past decades of education have trained students and teachers to focus on grades rather than learning. Unfortunately, grades are generally an account of points earned through various activities that are influenced by artificial deadlines, grade inflation, extra credit, and subjectivity. It's time for us to change the student mind-set currently focused on reaching a particular percentage and instead empower them to take charge of their learning and measure their own success.
Proficiency-based education focuses on specific learning targets and the demonstration of a student's proficiency with the content. It allows students multiple opportunities to prove their understanding, and incorporates flexibility for individual learners rather than pushing all students through the content at the same pace regardless of their comprehension of the material. It creates a partnership between the teacher and student with regard to a student's progress, and it increases a student's ownership of her own learning. At that point, grades actually do indicate what a student has learned and is able to do.
Although entire schools are discussing transitioning to a similar system, it's possible for individual teachers to include the core concepts of proficiency-based learning immediately. First, condense all of the standards you teach into a manageable set of learning targets phrased in a way students can understand. Provide students with a checklist of these targets. Review the targets daily to remind students which ones were covered previously and which ones you'll be working with today. Refer to these targets each time you cover new material. Label all homework and classroom activities with a learning target so students understand the focus and can refer to the appropriate notes for a reminder of how to work with the content.
Engage students in a conversation about what it means to demonstrate proficiency. Give them opportunities to show proficiency with each target as you move through a unit. If a student does not meet a satisfactory level of performance on one target, provide another opportunity, rather than simply recording a poor quiz score in the gradebook and moving on. Before attempting the assessment again, however, the student must come in for additional support, prove he's practiced more, or complete some enrichment activity so that he's not just trying again before he's ready. When students show proficiency on each learning target throughout the unit, they can move to the final assessment of that unit.
With a proficiency-based learning system, teachers can more accurately pinpoint which concepts an individual student is struggling with. It gives order and structure to the content, like a path on a map. Students can clearly see what is expected of them, they can monitor their progress through a unit, and they can self-evaluate their comprehension as they prepare for assessments. If implemented well, a student will no longer ask for extra credit, but rather for an opportunity to demonstrate that she understands the content. She will know exactly what to do in order to reach her academic goals. For the teacher, you can finally speak with your students about their learning rather than their points!
Calendar for February and March:
