Mr. Seaton's Blog

Board Happenings from February 16, 2012 Regular Meeting

2012-02-17T08:07:00.000-08:00

Board Happenings from February 16, 2012
(All Present)

Student Discipline Hearing
None

Leave Of Absence
· None

Resignations
· Debra Doyle, Elementary Special Education Teacher, Effective 3/1/2012 – APPROVED
· Sherry Mitchell, Title I Math Teacher, Effective End Of 2013-2014 – APPROVED
· Kent Ingrum, RHHS Golf Coach -APPROVED

Employment
· None

Other Executive Session Issues
· Superintendent Evaluation – Discussion Only
· RHEA Unfair Labor Practice Charge – Tabled
· Personnel For 2012-2013 – Discussion Only

Consent Agenda Approval – Special Mention
Trips:
· RHHS Team Quest – Mt. Vernon, IL – 3/3/2012
Fundraising:
· SAC 6th Grade – Fannie Mae Candies
· SWAT Team – Marquee Advertising
Approve Destruction Of Audio Tapes From Executive Session For June 2010

Public Hearings
Item Addressed: None

Old Business
None

New Business
· 2nd Reading And Adoption Of Policy Revisions - APPROVED
· 36 Month Contract For Electricity With Direct Energy - APPROVED

Scheduled Meetings/Events
Finance Committee Meeting TBA
Building/Grounds Committee Meeting Was Held February 14, 2012
Policy Committee None – Meeting TBA
Curriculum Committee Meeting Was Held February 8, 2012
Transportation Committee None
Board/Faculty Committee Meeting Was Held January 26, 2012
SESE Committee None

Boys Sectional Basketball Tournament At RHJR/SRHS – February 28, 29, & March 2, 2012
Spring School Board Association Meeting – Robinson – Tuesday, March 6, 201
RHHS Dinner Theater – March 9-10, 2012, 6:00 P.M.
Spring Break – April 2-9, 2012

Upcoming Agenda Items For Consideration:
School Security

Red Hill Receives Big Awards!

2012-02-08T13:12:00.000-08:00

All of the Red Hill Schools received great news this past week! Both Bridgeport Grade School and Sumner Attendance Center were named as Illinois Spotlight Schools. Red Hill Junior/Senior High School received an Academic Improvement Award.

These awards are based on our students' performances on last years ISAT and PSAE results. In order to be a Spotlight School, the school must be making Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), which requires that at least 85% of the students must pass the state achievement tests in both reading and mathematics. At least half of the students in each school are from low-income families. As the AYP requirements continued to rise, the number of schools achieving this award leveled off in 2008 and has declined in succeeding years. The Spotlight Schools demonstrate that low-income students and schools with limited resources can show impressive academic performance. These schools know how to help all students succeed.

The Academic Improvement Award honor schools for substantial gains in performance over the last several years. The awards range across all levels from schools where 20% of the students are meeting the Illinois Learning Standards to schools where 93% are meeting standards. The median state test score for these schools was 72.5%, which is above the state average.

Located throughout the state, the award winners represent every type of school — large and small; elementary, middle, and high schools; both regular and charter schools; all funding levels; urban, suburban, and rural; and low performing and high performing. They demonstrate that exemplary progress is possible at every level and can be sustained.

Congratulations to all of our students, staff, and parents for making Red Hill Schools such a great place to learn!

Snow Day Procedures

2012-01-11T07:31:00.000-08:00

As we get into the months when we typically take emergency days for snow-related reasons, I wanted to let everyone know how the procedure typically works. During any chance that there will be a snow-related closure, myself and our bus mechanic will travel out onto the roads very early. We are usually out sometime between 4:00-5:00 AM. We travel many roads in the district and try to travel as far south and west as the county line and as far north as Chauncey.

Once we determine the status of our roads, we contact other area districts to gauge their situations. We always talk people from the districts that border us, East Richland, Oblong, Robinson, Wabash County, and Unit #20. When a decision is made to close school for the day, the media are notified immediately. The first media outlet to be notified is 103.1 WAKO. Following that, other radio stations and the Terre Haute and Evansville television stations are notified. The decision to close school is made before 6:00 AM unless there are some type of extenuating circumstances preventing the decision from being made by 6:00 AM.

Sometimes it is obvious that we should not have school and other times it is not so obvious. We have such a large population of our students that live in rural areas that even though the main roads may be passable, sometimes the condition of the backroads still prohibit the buses from traveling. Many times I am asked the question as to why the Indiana Schools will close or have a delay when we do not. The answer there is simple. They are getting their buses out an hour earlier than we are, thus making their decisions a little bit tougher because the roads may not be as clear at those early hours.

We do not use the delay of school to often because in order to count school as an entire day for the Illinois State Board of Education, we must have five clock hours of instruction (not including lunch or passing periods). This means that we can start school no later than 9:30 AM to get a whole day in. Unfortunately, our road conditions do not change much between 6:30 AM and 8:00 AM when we would be rolling our buses for a school day. The state highways are always clear, but the county roads don't start to get cleared until 8:00 AM.

I hope I have given you some valuable information that you can refer to when a decision is made to close school. If the weather stays warm like it has been recently, we should not have to use any emergency days!

Update on Energy Efficiency Grant Project

2011-12-19T08:23:00.000-08:00

As many of you know, Red Hill received a matching grant to complete work to Bridgeport Grade School and Sumner Attendance Center to improve energy efficiency. From the beginning of this project, we have been dealing with setbacks in the time frame for completion of this project. This week's blog post is simply an update to the status of this project.

Because of some trouble with the windows that need to be ordered for the project, the final plans and orders were not made until this week. This means that a 6-8 week lead time is needed for construction of the window inserts before window replacements can begin. Window replacements at BGS and SAC should begin sometime between the middle of January and the beginning of February.

The delay has opened up the opportunity to have some work done over the holiday break though. The most intrusive of the work to be completed will be the HVAC and electrical work that will be done at BGS and SAC. Fortunately, most of this work will be completed over the break, thus not causing any disruption to regular school business.

I will try to keep everyone posted as to the status of the project as it unfolds. Thank you all for your patience and please feel free to email me with any questions at mseaton@cusd10.org.

Have a Happy Holiday Season!

Whatever You Are, Be a Good One

2011-12-06T09:08:00.000-08:00

Whatever you are, be a good one. - Abraham Lincoln

I have this quote hanging in my office and was looking at it yet again today thinking about its meaning. What did Abe mean when he said that? Did he refer to being good at your job, other activities, or did he simply want us to use the inherent good found in each of us? One thing I'm pretty sure of though is that Abe wanted us to be just in what we do. I don't think he meant that if you are going to be a thief, be a good one!

I have always worked to be the best that I could be regardless of the task that I am given or that I undertake. I continually am working to learn new strategies about being a teacher and an administrator. I seek out people who I trust and know to be better than I am at what I do. This is what a good student does. A good student works to develop knowledge through a variety of ways. Some ways work for some students, and other ways work for other students. Students still must seek out information from self-learning (reading or discovery learning), direct instruction, or through networking. The student's best group of people to network with include his or her parents, peers, and teachers.

So how does one become a "good" student? It may seem very elementary, but children and adults have to be taught to be good students. Teachers and administrators cannot make the fundamental mistake of expecting people to learn or better to "be taught" when they make lack the skills to do this. I once had a college professor to told me that college does not train people to be teachers, that is impossible. Good teachers are people who better themselves as teachers through constant learning. College is there to teach people how to be good students and to learn in a variety of ways from a variety of different people. That makes sense to me now (even though I had no idea what he was talking about then).

As I write this, I recall telling my 3 (soon to be 4) year old son to listen. Listen to me, I said! Well, that is nice to say, holler, yell, or preach at someone, but if he doesn't know how to listen, how can you be upset with him when he doesn't listen? It is a fundamental skill that he has not been taught yet. Instead of telling him to listen, I should be reading to him and teaching him how to listen. That's the skill that will benefit him in the long run.

As adults, I think that our listening skills sometimes need to be worked on. We get so preoccupied with our own opinions, our daily grind, our family demands, or any other tasks that we cannot clear our minds for a few minutes to truly listen to someone. What does that teach our children? Maybe we should take sometime to foster our own listening skills so that we can model how to be a good listener.

Regardless what Abe meant when he first said "whatever you are, be a good one", I can easily apply it to many different areas of my life. Work to be a good listener, student, teacher, parent, or whatever you are!

Moving Forward in Education

2011-11-30T06:45:00.000-08:00

The Principal at Red Hill Jr./Sr. High School sent me a link to an article about 21 things that will be obsolete in 20 years. You can find the entire list and commentary at this link. I like reading these type of articles. I'm also a fan of "futurists" or futuristic writers. As I was looking through these predictions, I was pondering what the traditional classroom may look like in 20 years. Since I am only in my 11th year in education, I will see these classrooms during my career. It will be interesting to go back and re-read this blog post in 20 years to see how many actually came true.

The first item that is predicted to be obsolete is the desk. The student desk is part of the foundation of the traditional classroom. It also symbolizes the act of teaching and learning at the basic concepts. The author suggests that desks will be gone, replaced by furniture or rooms that promote collaboration on a daily basis. Personally, I don't think this one will take 20 years. I already look around our district and see elementary teachers with desks pushed together to create "tables", and other teachers who are actually using tables instead of desks.

The next one I found intriguing was the elimination of computers (well, sort of). As technology advances, the prediction is that information gathering, interpretation, analysis, and application will all occur on mobile devices. Again, I think this one will not take 20 years. Many schools have already enacted programs where every student has his or her own laptop or tablet computer (even as far down as the lower elementary grades). I hear different versions of this quote at different times, but it is strikingly true - for many young people graduating college in the near future, their careers have not even been created yet! Think back to ten years ago. What careers that students are interested in now didn't exist back then? Video journalists, bloggers, internet business managers, content managers, etc. We must take the technological steps to prepare our students to succeed in environments built on these devices.

I'm not going to go through all of the predictions, but one that strikes me the most is the centralized institutions. I recently had a conversation with another Superintendent and we were talking about going 1:1 and what that would mean for the traditional classroom. We concluded that there would be minimal need for most students to be in a traditional classroom if they could collaborate and succeed in a project-based learning environment with some guidance from the teacher as needed. What is the problem with this concept? State law. In Illinois, we have mandatory attendance laws saying that all students must attend at least 95% of the days of a school year to not be considered a chronic truant. Our state funding is also based on attendance, not enrollment. These are two different animals. Enrollments are easy to calculate and are a better gauge of the funding required to educate students. Attendance is the total number of days that every students actually attends. What is misleading about this is that if a student is absent, we still turn the lights on, pay the teacher, and buy the textbook, but if he is absent, we do not get state funding for that student for that day. Makes sense huh? If we eliminated the attendance requirements and told students to complete so much material is so much time and then provided the facility for them to use at their discretion, would the students be able to learn as much?

I don't that that answer, but I can tell you that there are some very successful students right now who are being "home-schooled" going through programs just like the one described. Fundamental changes will be needed in the structure of the public schools in Illinois before this can ever be considered a possibility.

Please read through the article. It is a short read and very insightful.

Holidays are Coming!

2011-11-14T07:09:00.000-08:00

I decided this week to stray off of the education topics and write about my favorite time of year. I think this is my favorite time of year because I have four children ages eight and under in my home! No what really made me think about this subject was the fact that I saw a house Saturday night (you know who you are Greg McKinney) with Christmas lights up - already! I know that all of the stores have been blaring Christmas music over the PA's for a few weeks now, but it still seems early for this - but is that a bad thing?

For the past few years, I have really been focused on giving at the holiday season. I asked the ladies that work in my office to buy toys to donate to low-income children instead of buying me gifts. We also, with the cooperation of the Board of Education, made the Board's annual dinner event a giving event too, and brought in dozens of toys to donate on behalf of the Board of Education.

Seeing the Christmas lights up sparked that same feeling in me this year. I know - there's no snow yet in southern Illinois, and in fact, it's about 70 degrees outside, but why can't we go ahead and get into the giving spirit? Start planning now to give a little more this year to families that could use the help. In my opinion there is nothing more gratifying and special than to see pure joy on a child's face, whether that child is yours or not. Please consider making a small donation this year to help families in a season that may be very stressful to them. In respect to the amount of money and time many of us spend on the holidays, a little more for someone else is not too much to ask.

Enjoy the season as it approaches! I'm going to get my Christmas lights out this week!

Ah, Memories

2011-11-04T09:47:00.000-07:00

I was recently cleaning out some boxes and bins in my garage and came across several items from my days as a high school music director. I found many books, my conducting batons, and many pictures. This post may end up being more entertaining than educational!

I was looking through these items thinking that is has only been 4 years since I was in the classroom, but then felt like 4 years seems like a lifetime today. I love to tell stories about the years that I was a music director. Granted, I was only in the classroom for 5 1/2 years, but we made those 5 1/2 years count. During those years, my band and choirs went on performing tours to Atlanta, The Bahamas, New York City, Memphis, Disney World, and Colorado Springs. One funny story that my former students like to tell is this. We were at Disney World and had just finished marching on Main Street USA. It was such a neat experience. We were all standing around and the students had bottles of water. They acted like they were going to douse me with their water bottles, so I turned around to run away. With my first step, I stepped into a mud puddle and went face first into a drainage ditch full of muddy water. This happened in the morning, and we were staying at the park until dark, so I wore the mud all day.

I still have former students and parents of these students come up to me and tell me stories about what they remember - like having 114 people in the middle of Times Square and trying to keep track of them all! One young lady comes to mind in particular. She was a quiet but great student. Not the best musician - but it was clear she genuinely enjoyed being in our music groups. This young lady was not from a financially stable household, in fact, she was not able to do many things because her family simply did not have the money.

For any activity we did for the students, we fundraised. One year alone we raised over $120,000. This young lady would always be in the top sellers of any fundraiser we did. I had a system of keeping track of money that required each students to either fundraise or pay a certain amount to be able to attend these large trips. This student would always have to raise her part, but she worked hard to do it. She was able to raise enough money to go to The Bahamas with us and compete in the "Caribbean Competition" in 2002. We won best Choir in our class and Grand Champion Show Choir while there. This girl thanked me and told me then that she would never get to do anything like this again when she graduated from high school. I corrected her and told her she could, as long as she worked as hard after high school as she had for me when she was in high school.

The point is that we make a difference in every student's life as long as we take the opportunity. What kind of teacher or administrator do you want to be remembered as? It was nice to be able to visit some classrooms this and last week to have conversations with some students. I miss that part of not being in the classroom. Building positive relationships with students and engaging them in ways that are important to them are essential to be remembered as the kind of teacher you want to be remembered as. We don't have to take kids half-way around the world to make the material meaningful to them, but if we don't make the material meaningful to them, then they will not be engaged in their own learning. Why does a student strive for an "A" in class? Is it because they want to learn the material, or they want the "A"?

Talk to them, learn from them, teach them, care for them, respect them, be positive with them, work for them, and by all means love them. I love the students I work for, regardless how many times I have to see them in the principal's office. If we can do these things, then we will develop relationships with these students that are meaningful, and the students will learn in the process.

Lesson Planning for Higher-Level Thinking Skills

2011-10-27T11:17:00.000-07:00

Since we are beginning to transition to teaching more to the Common Core, I have been having a lot of conversations about how teachers are supposed to plan in this way. I continually tell them that most teachers are already teaching in ways that will line up with the Common Core, they just don't realize it yet. The same goes for project-based learning. Nearly every teacher at Red Hill has done a project in their classroom at one time or another. The goal now is to take those current projects and tweak them so that more higher-level thinking is required to complete them.

There are many resources available to assist teachers with developing higher-level thinking lesson plans and projects.

There is a site that is specifically for Gold-Seal Lessons here. However, this is a membership site that requires a $95 annual fee. If you Google "Gold Seal Lesson" or "Quadrant D Lesson" though, you will find that many teachers and districts have developed their own sites with free access. Here is one example from Roosevelt High School in Hawaii (where it is probably much warmer then in Southern Illinois!).

I was able to find several examples of great ideas to use in the classroom. Some subject areas I had to dig for a little bit, but others were readily available.

Please keep in mind that this is a transition. A transition by definition takes TIME. It is not expected that every teacher will grasp onto this immediately, but what is very clear to us is that we will be expected to teach this way in the not-so-distant future.

If any of you have resources that you are using that I didn't find, please email me the link so I can add them to this post!

Can We Be the Change in the Classroom?

2011-10-18T07:25:00.000-07:00

"Be the change you want to see in the world." - Mahatma Gandhi

I stumbled across this quote courtesy of another educator, Eric Sheninger. I only mention him because he got me thinking about the changes in the classroom that will be coming due to the Common Core Standards. At Red Hill, we have been working very hard to adapt our classrooms to accommodate for this change. As I have posted earlier, the Common Core Standards focus on teaching students in a manner that focuses on higher-level thinking, project-based learning, and technology.

I recently attended the National Dropout Prevention Conference and heard the same theme over and over again. Why do students drop out? Because school is boring, or they don't get along with their peers, or this or that. So what is the answer? Consistently, we were told that we MUST engage the students differently that we have in the past. What does this mean? It means we have to structure our classrooms so that students are involved in learning about subjects that are relevant to them. There was also a significant emphasis on technology at the conference, specifically, about going to a 1:1 Computing Program where each student has his or her own computer.

So, let's take Gandhi's statements at the top and spin it a little - Be the change that you want to see in the classroom. This statement applies to all of us, teachers, administrators, parents, Board of Education members, all of us. We must start thinking about education differently, because we are not teaching the same students that we were many years ago. In fact, when many of us were students, we were still being taught in the same manner that our teachers were taught decades ago.

Look around you - things have changed. Kids have changed. We have changed. Has the classroom changed all that much? Some have, but some haven't. Is use of technology having kids work math problems on a SMART Board? Isn't this basically the same thing that we did years ago on blackboards? I know I have lots of questions, but the point is that we need to be thinking about how we can "update" education to meet the needs the 21st century students.

We have begun the process at Red Hill of supplementing education with project-based learning. We are always looking at ways to improve the way students interact with technology. We are on the right track. This transition will take flexibility in the classroom. We are going to be doing things that we have never done before and some will work, and some will not. This is the point where we learn from them and move on to make an even better educational experience for our students.

Be the change that you want to see in the classroom.

14 Signs Your Classroom is Behind the Times

2011-10-06T12:48:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of the Red Hill Technology Department - Thanks Tammy!

14 Signs Your Classroom is Behind the Times

1) Your students turn in their homework on printed paper...instead of digitally.

2) For poster assignments, your students need glue, construction paper, and scissors...instead of using an online tool like Glogster.

3) You still have chalk. Or a Dry Eraser

4) You don't get interrupted by a cell phone ring, text message, or tweet alert at some point during the school year.

5) You spend most of your class time lecturing students...rather than getting them collaborating and learning from each other.

6) You have a set of Encyclopedias

7) You consider using a PowerPoint presentation as satisfying the need to integrate technology in the classroom.

8) You create more content than your students do.

9) Your students aren't teaching you something new (likely about technology) at least once a day.

10) You don't have a classroom website or blog to post class information, homework assignments, and parent information online.

11) You don't have a classroom set of computers, netbooks, ipads, or other device for group work.

12) You don't find at least one thing to call the IT department about every week.

13) A student has never requested to complete a project using a new digital tool you've never hear of.

14) You've never used or heard of: Collaborize Classroom, Prezi, Evernote, Glogster, MyFakeWall, Typewith.me, Storybird, JayCut, Wordle, or Tiki-Toci.

School Attendance Matters

2011-09-30T10:57:00.000-07:00

One of the goals of any school system should be promoting regular attendance at school. The process of promoting attendance at school is necessary for a variety of reasons, including increased academic achievement by the students and increased funding for educational activities.

In Illinois, students are mandated by law to attend school from their seventh birthdays through their seventeenth birthdays. Any child who will be five on or before September 1 of any school year is eligible for Kindergarten. There are penalties for not sending children to school in manners that violate these laws. Until this current school year, the definition of a chronic truant in Illinois was missing 10% of school days dating back 180 school days into the previous year. This meant that a student was considered a chronic truant if he or she has missed 18 school days in the past year.

This summer though, that criteria changed. The definition of a chronic truant changed from 10% of the school year to 5%. This change means that now, if a student misses only 9 days during the past year, he or she would be considered a chronic truant. Any student or parent found guilty of chronic truancy can be convicted of a Class C Misdemeanor and may be subject to 30 days in jail and/or a fine of up to $1500.

At Red Hill Schools, we constantly monitor attendance. We reward good attendance and intervene with poor attendance. Good attendance has a strong influence over academic achievement. Many studies have shown this correlation. Some people get upset with the schools when we send home letters about children who are missing school on a regular basis. We attempt to contact each and every parent of a child who is on the path to truancy, regardless of the reasons for the absences. The State of Illinois allows some absences, including those for illnesses that are documented by a medical professional, funerals, family emergencies, and others. These days do not count towards the minimum days to be considered a chronic truant. If a student is in danger of falling into chronic truancy, a referral may be made to the county Truancy Review Board. These boards were created by the Regional Superintendents and Judicial Systems to prevent students from falling into chronic truancy. If this Board intervenes and no progress is made, the parents and student may be charged with chronic truancy and sentenced as a judge sees fit. We are fortunate in Lawrence County to have a supportive judicial system as there have been cases where a student's attendance improved only after being court-ordered to attend school.

As a teacher and administrator, I get phone calls from employers asking about student attendance. Employers are looking for people who are reliable and will show up for work. Parents and other adults should work to encourage students to attend school every day when possible to ensure that the children are capable learners and reliable future employees. Let's not let our children fall into ways that promote absenteeism. Get your kids on a schedule and stick to it. I hear frequently that all my child does is stay up all night on his cell phone or computer, and then doesn't get out of bed for school in the morning. We as parents must step up and limit this use. We do have that power.

Before your child runs the risk of poor attendance, set up parameters in your home to foster responsible behaviors and bedtimes. If it is already a problem, contact your school to see if there are any supplemental supports available, or even to just ask advice on methods to help the situation. Parenting is hard, I think we all would agree with that. It will be hard to change these behaviors too, especially the later in life you try to change them. However, one almost guaranteed way to set a child up for failure is to not teach them the importance of attendance at school, or work, or any other activity that is important.

Modeling Behavior - What are we teaching our kids?

2011-09-22T07:25:00.000-07:00

I was reading a post by the Paris, IL, HS Principal Dave Meister. You can find his blog here. This is somewhat a follow up to my post from last week about teaching students respect. Dave has some very interesting thoughts and ties them to the behavior of people in general around September 11.

Dave says that our children have seen us at our best, just like around September 11, 2001, when patriotism was high, people were connected, and people were truly concerned for each other. He then elaborates about how children see us at our worst - such as when we avoid helping a neighbor with a small task because it is inconvenient.

How do we model behaviors on a regular basis that we would want our children and students using in their daily routines? We are all human and all of us have outside influences that affect our moods, demeanors, and actions. So how do we focus on modeling positive and appropriate behaviors for our children to see?

Every morning, I get my kids out of bed and tell them that I love them and that it's good to see them this morning, which is usually followed up by a hug. A small gesture that takes less time than yelling at them to get them out of bed. Our mornings are usually calm and my kids (ages 8, 5, 3, and 1) get out of bed in relatively good moods. I take the time to help dress them and then make them breakfast which we have around the table, not in front of the TV. Oh yeah, and I don't sit on the internet or my cell phone either.

We all need to make a focused effort daily when around kids (whether they are our own kids or not) to model positive and appropriate ways of handling conflict, reacting to stress and fear, and most importantly interacting with others. Various studies have shown that 95% of all children's behaviors are learned from modeling and only 5% is from direct instruction.

Treat your own kids like you treat other kids. Sometimes, we are nicer to other kids that we come into contact with, but then will turn and be not-so-nice to our own kids. I’ll leave you with this popular poem. It’s called Children Learn What They Live by Dorothy Law Nolte.

Children Learn What They Live

By Dorothy Law Nolte, Ph.D.

If children live with criticism, they learn to condemn.

If children live with hostility, they learn to fight.

If children live with fear, they learn to be apprehensive.

If children live with pity, they learn to feel sorry for themselves.

If children live with ridicule, they learn to feel shy.

If children live with jealousy, they learn to feel envy.

If children live with shame, they learn to feel guilty.

If children live with encouragement, they learn confidence.

If children live with tolerance, they learn patience.

If children live with praise, they learn appreciation.

If children live with acceptance, they learn to love.

If children live with approval, they learn to like themselves.

If children live with recognition, they learn it is good to have a goal.

If children live with sharing, they learn generosity.

If children live with honesty, they learn truthfulness.

If children live with fairness, they learn justice.

If children live with kindness and consideration, they learn respect.

If children live with security, they learn to have faith in themselves and in those about them.

If children live with friendliness, they learn the world is a nice place in which to live.

Teaching Students Respect

2011-09-16T08:03:00.000-07:00

As a former high school music teacher, high school principal, and now a current school superintendent, I am constantly reminded of the lack of respect that some students have for their peers, their parents, and especially their teachers and principals. I'm not talking about the 95% of students that are respectful and act appropriately throughout the school day, I'm referring to the 5% that simply show no respect to anyone they encounter.

I came to a frightening conclusion recently with my own children. My kids would watch TV shows on a regular basis, as many children do. One day, I sat down with them and spent some time watching the shows that they were watching. Without doubt, I was shocked. First of all, my kids were watching shows that they were too young to watch (i.e. Disney shows such as iCarly). These shows are very entertaining, in fact, I caught myself laughing a few times. But then I started watching and paying close attention to how these characters on these shows interacted with each other, including watching younger characters interact with older characters. I realized that when I thought my kids were being disrespectful to me by using sarcasm and talking back in disrespectful tones, they were sometimes mimicking behavior that they saw on TV. I am well aware that this is not the TV's fault solely, but I do think that these TV shows may reinforce behaviors that I do not want my children doing.

My kids fight and argue regularly. I don't think that will come as a surprise to anyone who has more than one child! After watching some of these shows, and then relating that to my own kids behaviors, I realized that there were a lot of similarities. The sarcasm and antics that occur on these shows has influenced my own children's behaviors in a negative way. By the way, just because it is a cartoon doesn't mean it's alright either! Some may disagree with me, but I do now monitor what my kids are watching on TV much more closely.

In so here is the lesson. Our children will act as they see and similarly to what they are exposed. They will become smaller versions of ourselves if we let them. We should always be cautious about what we want our children exposed to, on TV, at home, at school, or anywhere. We will never be able to eliminate these types of behaviors, but we certainly can redirect it to a more positive interaction when we have an opportunity to do so.

Dr. Michele Borba give us 35 activities that we can use to bolster respect in our homes and classrooms:

Every day this week give a sincere compliment to someone. Create a weekly planner that will help you track your behavior. Each day you must write who you gave the compliment to and describe their reaction.
Look up the definition of respect. Write it down. Now describe ways you have acted respectfully or disrespectfully this week.
Make a list of people you think are respectful and why you added them to your list.
Think of someone who is respectful and talk about why they would be a good friend.
Discuss why acting respectful is important.
Work alone or with a partner to create a song, a rap, or a chant about respect. Your words should tell why respect is important and how it could make the world a better place. Write the rap on a piece of paper and be ready to respect it to the group if called upon.
What are three ways you can show your teacher respect?
What are three ways you can show your parents respect?
Make a list of things people say who are respectful. Here are a few: “please.” “Thank you.” “I appreciate that.” “May I hold the door?” “Pardon me.” “I’m sorry I offended you.”
Make a list of things people do who are respectful. Here are a few: hold the door open for someone who needs help, listen without interrupting, don’t talk back, whine, or sass, throw away trash.
Watch a half hour TV show. Who was respectful or disrespectful, and why?
Interview someone and ask what’s one way to show respect to another person. Write it.
List five ways we could show greater respect for our environment.
What would you do if an adult was disrespectful to you? Suppose the grown-up yelled at you for something you didn’t do. What do you say? What do you do? Describe your answer in 50 words.
Design a bumper sticker about respect. Include on the bumper sticker: the word Respect, a motor or slogan for why you should use it and at least three words that describe it.
Describe a respectful way to answer the phone.
Suppose you’re invited to your friend’s home for a family dinner. What are some ways you could show respect and courtesy when your first arrive? At their table? When you leave? Write at least 50 words.
Cut a long strip of butcher paper 3 x 36” (or use adding machine tape). Roll each of the ends around a pencil and tape the ends to the pencil. Use crayons, colored pencils or ink pens to draw a scene of what respect looks and sounds like in action. Roll up your movie and be ready to share your story.
Make a campaign poster about respect. Make sure you include the word “Respect” and two reasons why someone would want to vote for having respect at your school. You could use construction paper, felt pens, crayons, magazine cut-outs and templates.
Look up the word “respect” in a dictionary. Find at least 10 different words that mean almost the same thing as “respectful.” These words are called synonyms. Write each synonym on a paper strip. Link your paper strips together to make a chain and staple the ends of each link.
Use glue to write on bright-colored paper a few statements that respectful people would say to put a smile on someone else’s face. Now carefully sprinkle the letters with glitter. You’ve made Sparkle Statements!
Design a mobile using paper, string, and a clothes hanger. The mobile must show at least four different ways you can show respect to yourself, other people, and property.
Read about John Muir. How did he show respect to the environment?
List at least five synonyms for the word respect.
Draw a picture of your head and cut it out. Or make your silhouette by standing in front of an overhead projector. Have a friend trace the silhouette that appears on a piece of paper taped on the wall. Cut out your silhouette. What kinds of things would a respectful character do? Write or draw at least 8 characteristics of respectful people inside the silhouette. Circle ones that you do.
Make a banner about respect. You could make it from cardboard, burlap, material, wallpaper or construction paper. Decorate your banner with pictures and word cutouts that show respect. Include at least 10 ways to show respect to other people.
Cut out a newspaper or magazine article about a person who showed respect. What did they do to demonstrate respect?
Write a commercial about respect. Try to sell respect so others will want to start using it. For instance, say something positive that might happen in the world if more people showed respect to one another.
Write a word for each letter in the word respect that means almost the same thing.
List five antonyms for the word respect.
Make a collage for respect on a piece of poster board. Draw pictures or paste magazine pictures that show different ways you can show respect to tohers.
Find at least five pictures of people showing respect to others. Make a collage.
Write a paragraph describing how the world would be different if more people showed respect toward one another.
Create a recipe for respect. What ingredients do you need?
Design a campaign button that would help someone understand what respect means.

Please consider this when you are speaking with people, especially in front of students. Also, please consider this when you are addressing a student or students directly. Teaching these type of skills will greatly benefit them throughout their lives.

Funding for Red Hill Schools

2011-09-09T10:50:00.000-07:00

As many of you know, the State of Illinois on-going budget issues have caused great delays and reductions in payments to Red Hill Schools along with all school districts in Illinois. Currently, the State of Illinois owes our school district $256,438.25 in past payments dating back to June. This is a considerable improvement over last school year when the state was behind six months to a tune of over $500,000. However, we do not receive any new state funding for "Mandated Categoricals" (MCATS) until the old ones are paid.

I wanted to take an opportunity to explain the basics of school funding so that if you hear these terms, you know what they mean. MCATS are our funding for very specific areas such as Transportation (Buses and Bus Drivers), Special Education Transportation, Special Education Personnel, and Special Education Program costs. Another frequently late payment is the money for our Pre-K program.

For those without a strong knowledge of school funding, our finances are broken down into very specific areas. Each area has certain criteria for the use of the funds in that area. The nine areas are:

1. Education Fund (Salaries for Staff, Classroom Materials, Meal Programs, etc.)
2. Operations and Maintenance Fund (Building Maintenance and Utility Bills)
3. Debt Service (Payments on Borrowed Money)
4. Transportation (Bus Service and Salaries)
5. IMRF/Social Security (Retirement Payments for Select Employees)
6. Capital Projects (Large Building Projects)
7. Working Cash (Emergency Fund)
8. Tort Immunity (Payments for Services Related to Risk Management)
9. Life/Health/Safety (Building Projects for Improvement of Safety)

Each fund has dollars in it from local, state, and federal sources. The Four-Fund (Education, Operations and Maintenance, Transportation, and Working Cash) are called this because money can be transferred to and from these accounts fairly freely. The other funds are considered "restricted" funds and cannot be transferred to and from other accounts. So, we may have large balances is one fund and need money in another fund, but if it is restricted, we cannot make that transfer by law.

This is why sometimes we have a balanced budget, but still have to make cuts. Instructional materials all come out of the Education Fund, as well as teacher and staff salaries, breakfast and lunch services, and equipment for the classrooms. This fund gets used the most and if we find that we are going to have a shortfall, we must cut back in these areas. The same is true for the Transportation and the Operations and Maintenance Funds.

Red Hill has been able to weather this financial storm by using up portions of our reserves while we wait for the late payments. Up until this year, we have basically operated normally. Because of monies such as the 1% Sales Tax for School Buildings, Red Hill has avoided laying off teachers and other support personnel. This year, though, we have made small cuts such as buying less ink for printers and reducing bus routes in order to meet the shortfalls and tardiness of the state funding. Hopefully the state will continue to get back on track and meet some of these past obligations so that we may return to normal operations.

Common Core Standards

2011-09-01T11:40:00.000-07:00

This year at Red Hill Schools, we will begin transitioning to the new Common Core Standards. Information about Common Core Standards and what exactly they are can be found here. Basically, the Common Core Standards are designed to increase Rigor and Relevance in school work. Another component of the standards is to increase the level of thinking involved with school work.

Increasing Rigor and Relevance (R&R) is key to implementing the Common Core Standards. In order to increase R&R, we will be moving away from the typical lecture and test model that some of our classrooms still use. We will be gradually replacing that with more thought-provoking work that will challenge our students in a different way. To relate to my own school education, I think about the many times I was asked to memorize certain information only to take a test that was mostly multiple choice or essay. Once the test was completed, I likely did not remember the information. By teaching students to memorize information only for the test, are we not simply preparing students to be better Jeopardy contestants? Are we teaching these students how to use this material to draw conclusions? Very rarely in the workplace will someone be asked to memorize a bunch of information only to take a test on it. At some point, we have to apply that information, and that is the part that we frequently are missing in our schools.

For those of you who are not familiar with Bloom's Taxonomy, please see the diagram below:

If you read the words that are placed into the various sections of this diagram, you can see what we are going to be expecting of our students as this transition continues. The goal is to get the students working in the higher levels of the taxonomy (levels 4-6) as much as possible. Instead of simply coming up with the answer all of the time, we will be asking our students to analyze, synthesize and evaluate information with a high R&R.

This transition is a large step for all of us in the learning community. Teachers will teach differently and learners will learn differently. For example, let's say that a teacher has an annual project of students doing research and then giving a presentation on George Washington. This is a lower level thinking project. It requires students to organize and prepare information for delivery. Now, let's take the same project and "flip" it into a higher-level thinking project. The students could be required to find three to five resources online about George Washington. Then they could be asked to review the information, evaluate it for accuracy and depth, and then write an opinion on which source is the best source for review on the subject of George Washington.

Both teach the same material, but the latter requires the students to evaluate, summarize, and give an opinion. Not only are students more likely to retain more information, but they also have utilized technology, found different web-based resources, and learned which ones may be more reliable than others. This is one simple example. I encourage all of our teachers to get creative with these type of projects! The possibilities are endless!

As we work to redesign our classrooms, I encourage all of us to think outside the box and be creative!

First Week of School

2011-08-26T10:50:00.000-07:00

As we wrap up the first full week of school, I wanted to thank all of the staff members and students for a great kickoff to the 2011-2012 school year. The staff members are using the PBIS methodology well and the students seem to be responding to the program in a positive manner. All school employees have the ability and opportunity to affect students' lives in a positive manner. Most of these students will remember the impact that a teacher had on them for years to come.

I can still remember the teachers that had a grand influence on my life. My high school band director, Mr. Hudson, history teacher, Mr. Shoaff, and principal Mr. Leonard are just a few of the many great teachers that I had going through school. I'm sure you all can remember at least one teacher who cared enough to make your school experience a little better.

I challenge all of us, administrators, teachers and aides, custodians, secretaries, cooks, bus drivers, and parents to take the opportunity to better a child's school experience by getting to know the student and truly caring for the student's needs and learning. Parents send us the best children that they have - if they had any better children, they would send them! It is our task to be the best we can be for these children!

Tonight is the first football game at Casey and next week is Homecoming. If you have the chance, please come out and support your schools at many of the upcoming events!

Go Salukis!

Cell Phone Use in School

2011-08-23T18:58:00.000-07:00

I came across and interesting article (you can access it here). It always makes me think about how we as educators are our own worst enemies sometimes. Don't get me wrong, I'm very hesitant to adopt an open cell phone policy, but I do think that we are fighting a losing battle. At some point, we all are going to have to accept this as a useful tool in our classrooms.

Teaching students responsibility with mobile devices can be great extended learning projects spanning the course of the school year. It is a social lesson that we must teach our students; or they will abuse the technology and not learn to use it in a responsible, ethical, and legal manner. Also, what a great disciplinary tool to use! If everyone in the school can use a cell phone, who would want to violate an acceptable use policy and risk losing that privilege?

Students should be taught to use these devices efficiently to find information and make educated evaluations of that information. Change is difficult, even for me with this one. I think though that if we approach it with an open mind and look at the benefits of these devices instead of always focusing on the negatives, we will find many useful applications for them in the classroom.

Energy Efficiency Grant Projects

2011-08-23T12:54:00.000-07:00

The Energy Efficiency Grant Project that was initiated during the 2010-2011 school year is moving along quickly at this point. Thanks to the grant, Red Hill will be able to do over $300,000 worth of work to BGS and SAC this school year. Improvements will include new windows and new doors as well as new air conditioning systems in some of our classrooms and offices.

Work to the buildings is to be carefully scheduled to avoid disruption of student learning at both buildings. Keep posted to the blog for updates throughout the process.

Thanks to all for their interest in Red Hill Schools and as always, please feel free to contact me with any questions!

First Post

2011-08-23T12:13:00.001-07:00

Hello Everyone! I'm going to start using a blog to highlight important achievements of Red Hill students. I will also be using this as a general communication tool for anyone interested in educational news, especially news about Red Hill Schools!