On Curriculum Night

Dear Middle School Families,

Dear Families,

Thank you so much for your active participation in this past Tuesday’s Curriculum Night. We hope that you left with a clear sense of how the curriculum that your child will experience this year is structured and some of the essential questions that they will explore. We also hope that you will use the evening as a springboard to help you to be an active participant in the curriculum with your child. When questions about the curriculum emerge, seek out your child’s teachers. Take advantage of the blogs, which you can access through the “Digital Classroom” link on the sidebar, and use them as jumping off points for conversations. I have written elsewhere about the way in which we approach curriculum at LREI and those ideas were much on my mind as I left the building on Tuesday evening. As I imagine you were, I was truly impressed by our Middle School teachers and their ability to develop curricula that is experiential, relational and oriented to action.

While Curriculum Night is an opportunity to look at the big picture, it is also an opportunity to get clarifications about specific procedures and practices. Homework is often much on peoples’ minds. I include below some “big picture” thoughts on homework and its connection to the curriculum and to each student’s development as a learner.

Homework:
First and foremost, homework is practice; it is not a quiz or a test. Homework is not generally graded for correctness, but rather for effort and completion. That does not mean it should be done haphazardly or carelessly. It should be done in relation to the expectations established by the teacher. For example, spelling does not need to be perfect, but work should be proofread and errors that are caught corrected. In math, a problem may be done incorrectly, but students are expected to show how they arrived at their answer.

For us, the measure of a successful homework session is not one where everything is done correctly, but one where the work reflects a focused and committed effort on the part of the student. Practice is also a time for risk-taking and a natural consequence of risk-taking is error making; we learn from these mistakes.  So errors that are the result of risk-taking are useful for teachers and are an important part of the learning process. Errors that are the result of carelessness or lack of effort point to areas where students may need more support in terms of their study skills.

Homework will often be assigned as part of an on-going project. When this is the case, students are not expected to bring in a completed project when only a component of it is due. In most cases, the assigned homework will be used in class to teach students the next step in the project. So if your child is asked to write an introductory paragraph, she and you should not worry about the body and concluding paragraphs. Her teacher will take her through the rest of the process and the homework completed in the evening will often become the foundation for the class work for the next day.

It is also crucial  for us to know where your child is encountering challenges. Without this information, we cannot provide the best support. Your child should know that at some point during the year, he will encounter this kind of challenge; it is a normal part of the learning process; it is perhaps the most important part of the process.

So what can you do to best support your child? Here are a few ideas:

1. Make sure that you have read the homework section in the Student and Family Handbook.
2. If you are unclear about the particular expectations for homework in a class, first check on the teacher’s blog as this information is often posted there. If it is not on the blog, contact the teacher.
3. Each family will need to consider what level of intervention makes sense with regard to student errors and confusions. Some families will leave the identification and correction of any problems to the teacher (this is our preference), while some families will intervene more directly. As a guideline, it is helpful to address these issues by asking questions of your child rather than by telling or doing the work for her.
4. Help your child to understand the parameters of the assignment. Help him to budget his time so that assignments that are assigned over multiple days are worked on over multiple days. Extra effort is generally fine if it falls within the assignment parameters; doing more when it falls outside these parameters may not be helpful.
5. Your child should work independently on her work, but she should feel comfortable asking you for clarification and you should feel comfortable monitoring her progress.
6. Students should be able to complete most nightly assignments in 15-30 minutes. If it is taking substantially longer than this or if the 30 minutes is filled with tears and frustrations, you should intervene and stop the homework session. You can send an email or a note to the teacher or better yet you can help your child to feel comfortable seeking out his teacher first thing the next morning. This will help him to develop important self-advocacy skills that will be important for his on-going development as a learner.
7. In those cases where the level of anxiety or frustration is happening with some regularity or if you have specific questions, it is important that you bring your child’s teacher into the conversation. If you feel that this is happening in more than one class, it would make sense to touch base with your child’s advisor who can help you navigate through the problem.

One of our main goals in the middle school is to help students understand who they are as learners. As a result, it is important for students to come to terms with and own their areas of challenge and strength. This will allow them to better identify and use strategies that lead to success. In this way, students will come to see their challenges not as judgments of their worth, but as obstacles that can be overcome. Over time, these strategies will be internalized as habits and students will come to know what they have to do to produce their best work. Again, this is a process and students will work through it at different rates. We acknowledge that this can be frustrating for some students and for some families.

Homework is one medium we use to nurture excellent learning habits in our middle school students; students will over time grow into these habits. While we acknowledge that challenges can emerge because students develop these habits at different rates, students will master these habits as they move through the middle school. In those cases where a student really struggles with a particular learning skill, we will work with the student to develop alternative strategies that will help her to better manage the challenge so that she can produce her best work. It is our job to make this happens and we are most effective in this work when we are able to do it in collaboration with you.

From digital musings to the lived experience of students, here are seventh graders doing some of their initial research on their colonial topics. This research will inform their visit to colonial Williamsburg and will culminate in their exhibit at our annual Colonial Museum . . .

and the fruits of fifth graders’ labor as they explore the role that shelters play in the development of civilizations. This project is an important component of their Civilization Simulation project, which serves as a frame for their year-long study of ancient civilizations.

Of General Interest . . .

1) Click here to access the most current “At a Glance” calendar for the 2010-2011 school year.

2) For additional school news, you can follow us on Twitter and Facebook.

3) Please click here to read about the Parent Associations LREI Exchange.

4) The 2009-2010 Annual Report is hot off the press—and green on the Internet! Check it out here, and keep an eye on your mailbox for the hard copy. We want to extend a special thanks to everyone who supported LREI this year. Tuition alone doesn’t cover the cost of our unique, progressive program. We count on donations from the entire community. Every single gift helps us grow. Thank you for your generosity!

5) From Stacy Dillon, Lower School Librarian and member of the 2012 Newberry Awards Committee: Chances are you don’t think too much about book banning in your everyday lives. Even with the recent press about the burning of religious texts, book banning seems like something out of another time. Unfortunately, this is not the case. According to the American Libraries Association, over 1000 books have been reported as “challenged” in this country since 1982, and many (if not most) of these are children’s and young adult books. From Maurice Sendak to Judy Blume, books are still being restricted, challenged and banned outright. To find out more about Banned Book Week, visit http://www.bannedbooksweek.org or talk to Jesse, Stacy, Jen or Karyn in the libraries.

6) LREI is a member of NYC-Parents in Action (NYC-PIA – http://www.parentsinaction.org/). NYC-PIA provides parenting education, information and a communications network to help parents prepare their children and teenagers to cope with social pressures and to make sound choices towards a future free of alcohol and drug abuse. Click here to view upcoming events and/or to download their calendar.

For All Grades . . .

1) We are thrilled to announce that the Middle School Play this year will be…

William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream

• Performances are scheduled for Friday, December 10th at 7:00PM and Saturday, December 11th at 2:00PM and 7:00PM, 2010.
• There will be a pre-audition workshop Monday, October 4th, to help students prepare and familiarize themselves with the language and the story. Audition pieces are available outside of Mark’s office, but there is no need to learn the lines.
• Auditions (for 6th-8th grade) will be held Tuesday, October 5th from 3:30PM onwards in the eighth grade classrooms.
• Fifth graders will work with Melissa in Art classes to produce work for the set and props. Interested fifth graders will also be able to help with the stage crew.
• Rehearsals will be after school, both on Sixth Avenue and on Charlton Street at the High school Campus. Students will be walked over to the other campus by a teacher or can be given written permission to make their own way there.
• Students will not be scheduled to attend every rehearsal. The schedule will be arranged based on which scenes are being worked and what characters are available. As we come closer to the production, rehearsals will become more regular. The final two weeks of rehearsal must be cleared from other conflicts as we enter final production. In addition there will be two Sunday rehearsals (11/21 and 12/5) that students are required to attend. All students who audition and have signed a contract, thereby committing themselves to attend rehearsals, will be given a position or part in the play. PLEASE READ THE CONTRACT CAREFULLY, which is also available outside of Mark’s office..
• Please take care to fill out all the information in the contract and consider that availability after school does affect the casting. There are no “cuts” so the casting is based on skill, confidence and the availability to commit to rehearsals.

For Eighth Grade Families . . .

1) Looking ahead to the spring, click here to access the registration form for the spring Gettysburg/DC trip that will take place next May. I’m sending you this information now so that you can spread out payments over a longer period of time. If you register online, please use the following trip ID#: 55757. If you have specific questions about payment, please do not hesitate to contact me. The deadline for registration for this trip is next Friday, October 1st.

2) Please join other LREI eighth grade families for a ParentTalk on Thursday, October 14th at 6:30PM. This discussion will provide an opportunity for parents to come together to talk about a variety of issues with a trained facilitator from Parents In Action.

For Seventh Grade Families . . .

1) Please join us on Thursday, October 14, at 8:00AM for a parent meeting to discuss the upcoming Williamsburg trip. Also, if you have not done so already, please register your child for the October Williamsburg trip. Click here to access the registration form for the Williamsburg / Jamestown trip that will take place next October. If you register online, please use the following trip ID#: A76310. All families should be registered for the trip at this point. If you have specific questions about payment, please do not hesitate to contact me.

2) Please join other LREI seventh grade families for a ParentTalk on Monday, October 25th at 6:30PM. This discussion will provide an opportunity for parents to come together to talk about a variety of issues with a trained facilitator from Parents In Action.

For Sixth Grade Families . . .

1) Please join other LREI sixth grade families for a ParentTalk on Tuesday, October 12th at 6:30PM. This discussion will provide an opportunity for parents to come together to talk about a variety of issues with a trained facilitator from Parents In Action.

2) The sixth grade will travel to the Cloisters on Friday, October 15th, to view their Medieval collection. Students should bring a bagged lunch (no nuts, seeds, or glass bottles) to school on this day.

3) On Wednesday, October 20th, please join me at 8:00AM in the Sixth Avenue Cafeteria for a discussion on “Making Sense of MS Reports.” This will be an opportunity to familiarize yourself with the format of the Middle School progress report and to think about how best to prepare for Middle School Family Conferences.

For Fifth Grade Families . . .

1) On Friday, October 1st, the fifth grade will travel to the New Victory Theater to view Puss In Boots, an opera. Students should bring a bagged lunch (no nuts, seeds, or glass bottles) to school on this day.

2) Please join other LREI fifth grade families for a ParentTalk on Tuesday, October 5th at 6:30PM. This discussion will provide an opportunity for parents to come together to talk about a variety of issues with a trained facilitator from Parents In Action.

3) On Tuesday, October 12th, please join me at 8:00AM in the Sixth Avenue Cafeteria for a discussion on “Making Sense of MS Reports.” This will be an opportunity to familiarize yourself with the format of the Middle School progress report and to think about how best to prepare for Middle School Family Conferences.

4) From fifth grade math teacher Ana Chaney: Are you curious about your child’s experience learning math in the Middle School? Do you want to know how you child will be challenged and supported in fifth grade and beyond? Are you wondering how you can be involved at home? Join me for a hands-on investigation taken from the curriculum, short talk and Q&A. Everyone is welcome and encouraged to attend the Fifth Grade Math Breakfast, which will take place on Monday, October 18th, at 8:00AM in the Sixth Avenue Cafeteria.

============= For additional information, follow these links: =============

A reminder that the individual homework blog and the “feeds” for every class can be accessed from the Digital Classroom link on the sidebar (you may want to bookmark this page for easy access). These feeds provide an easy “one-click” solution to find out what has been assigned for homework. Keep in mind that a feed will only show what has been posted as of the time you check it.

Don’t forget to check the LREI website for updates and other interesting school-related information.

Be well,
Mark