Week of January 30th

UAI Staff News

Volume IV

Issue 21

Week of January 30th, 2017

This Week's Memories

Kayla, Nande & Tiara at
NYC Women's March
(photo by Ilyana)

This weekend, the POTUS signed an executive order banning immigrants from specific Muslim countries and prioritizing immigrants of one faith over all others.  The ACLU brought suit and won a stay of this order (at least for some).  There is always hope...no matter how grim things get! 

After moaning and complaining about being required to go to the movies on Monday (in order to make the classrooms free for post-flood renovations), the juniors & seniors thoroughly enjoyed the movie and some came back to school to share how they were inspired by the story of these amazing mathematicians and scientists.  

See...there it is again...that hope!

As we prepare and launch the spring term this week, no matter how challenging or hard our jobs can be, there is always hope.  We have to

Juniors & Seniors Ready to See
Hidden Figures @ UA Court Street
(photo by Ilyana)

remind ourselves to pause, reflect, and find it.  It will always be there.  Sometimes it's small - like when a student, without being prompted, turns to a peer to help her understand something in class.  It can be huge - like when a student who had previously exhibited failure and disinterest finally responds to your efforts and outreach and completely shifts her attitude and achievements in class.  It can be daily - like when your class chooses to use language of support (e.g. accountable talk vs. cursing or negative speak).  Whatever and whenever, if we make the time to look for it, our girls will always provide us with the inspiration and drive needed to continually interrogate and improve our craft.  

The work we do is not easy, but nothing this important ever is.  As we kick off the spring term and turn the corner from opening up to closing out our school year, remember to make yourself pause and find your hope!  

To Do's for this Week

[MONDAY, 30JAN17] Full Staff PD Agenda

• 8:00 - 8:30 AM Breakfast Provided 
• Optional Attendance for breakfast

• 8:30 - 9:15 AM Kiri's State of the School Address
• Update on progress towards goals
• Intro of new data tools

• 9:20 - 10:50 AM Workshops (Collaborative Reasoning or Classroom Environment)
• Collaborative Reasoning
• Choosing Texts to Engage Students and Promote Content Mastery
• Classroom Environment
• Understanding Challenging Students and Effectively Redirecting Anti-social Classroom Behaviors

• 10:55 - 11:30 AM Debrief Exams
• This is the follow up to last week's PD at home.  You'll be debriefing the exam you took with your partner.
• 11:30-12:30 PM Lunch
• Lunch on your own

• 12:30-2:30 PM Unit Planning Work Time
• The rest of the afternoon will be IWT to complete units and begin planning this week's lessons.  We will be collecting final Unit Plans at the end of the day
• 2:30 - 3:00 PM Unit Plan Share

[30JAN17] Door Decorating Competition. Ms. Kree and Girl's Inc are working hard to help get student volunteers assigned to each classroom to assist teachers in completing door decorations. We will start this work the week of January 30th. For questions, please reach out to Ms. Kree or Ms. Jen C.

• [01FEB17] Middle School Dance Tickets Go on Sale. Ms. Jen & Ms. Kree are coordinating a middle school dance.  Please encourage students to seek out tickets from Ms. Jen or Ms. Kree

• [10FEB17] February's Family Friday.  Ms. Kristina & Ms. Marsha are planning a celebratory event to have their students show off their written work with their families for our Family Friday (which occur the first Friday of every month) in February!  Thank you Kristina & Marsha for your hard work in getting our parents in to celebrate our girls' academic achievements!

• [15FEB17] Winterfest.  Our annual celebration of After School activities and display of students arts and artistic talent will be on Wednesday, 15FEB17.  Please join us in celebrating our girls in the gym from 6-8PM.

• [17FEB17] Black History Month Assembly.  We will be having our next full school assembly on Friday, Feb 17th.  This will be a slightly early assembly to accommodate a staggered rapid dismissal for the building (SLJ and AIL are dismissing early on Friday).  The Assembly will begin at 1:30 and we will rapidly dismiss at 2:15PM.

SEL Updates

So far in this SEL unit, 6th graders have covered the following techniques for de-escalating down the emotions thermometer:

• Belly breathing
• Positive self-talk
• “Flip the script”
• Envision a peaceful scene
• Take a walk
• Remove yourself from the situation
• Write in a journal
• Talk to someone you trust
• Gratitude
• Remember your character strengths

This week, we'll be covering the final two: envisioning your future and helping someone else. 6th graders will think through what they hope their lives will look like as adults and will also perform various helpful tasks for UAI teachers and staff. We'll regroup after each to process how these two activities helped the girls feel more positively.

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Per Session Posting

No new postings this week