News and information for staff members and the Madison community
Vol. I No. 8 - July/August, 2006
It's not all fun and games. We asked some schools' staff members to tell us what they are doing this summer to improve professionally. Here are the responses we received.
My name is Lynn Vande Sande and I teach physical education at John Muir elementary. I took a week-long 3 credit course in June at McFarland High School on wellness issues and attended breakout sessions on a wide variety of topics, including ones about working with kids with attachment disorder to "heart math" to Yoga for kids to grief counseling. In July I was a presenter at the 2 day Best Practices Seminar at UW-Stevens Point. I am presenting how to teach rhythms such as STOMP in an elementary setting. Jane Koval from Van Hise Elementary is my co-presenter.
In August, Jane and I will be attending a one day workshop held in Madison on new activities for physical education teachers.
By Amy Keys, English teacher at West High
I spent the first two weeks in class from 8 am to 5 pm, Monday through Friday, finishing two of the courses in my Masters program. The classes were (1st) Literacy (Emergent Literacy and Reading Difficulties, with special emphasis on diagnosing and overcoming dyslexia) followed by (2nd) a Neuroscience class called "Learning and the Brain." Both courses were terrific in terms of my professional and personal growth, but both were quite challenging.
Simultaneously, I was finishing four books and four accompanying papers on Gerald Bracy's latest book on No Child Left Behind and standardized testing, Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed, Erin Gruwell's The Freedom Writers and Mary Pipher's book on helping refugees acclimatize to American society and schools, The Middle of Everywhere.
I submitted these papers by the end of June, then I was hard at work on preparing the presentation for my thesis defense in mid-July, in completion of my masters in education (the topic of my project involves the teaching of annotation techniques in improving student literacy.) For another week in July, I went to LaCrosse, where I spent a week at the culminating proseminar of my Masters program.
When I returned, I went right in to school in order to organize all of my photocopies for the year, so that I can send them to the central plant for copying, as we will be greatly restricted in our copies this year due to budget cuts. Then I will start planning new materials and lesson plans for the five different courses I will teach this year. I also want to read a new book on the Mau Mau rebellion that will be helpful in teaching a Kenyan novel that I use in one of my classes, and a book on literacy among the working classes in England.
What summer vacation, right? It's worth it for the students, but few non-teachers realize all that goes into it.
This is Clara Lazimy, Spanish BRS at Hawthorne Elementary as well as Orchard Ridge Elementary.
This summer I participated in a book discussion group with teachers from ORE, facilitated by Principal Barbara Dorn. The theme of the readings is about creating classrooms that feel safe to all, that are truly inclusive of all, and that aim to teach the student where the student is at, in terms of life circumstances and experiences, cultural background, educational needs, etc. So far, we've read "A White Teacher Talks about Race," by Julie Landsman. I highly recommend it. It's an easy read, full of valuable insights.
My name is Charlie Mattison and I work at LaFollette H.S. as a physical education teacher. I thought I could add a story on summer occupations.
I am the maintenance officer of the 1157th Transportation Company of the Wisconsin National Guard. In May I was mobilized for deployment in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. I departed for duty on June 12th and I have been and will be training with my unit this summer to prepare for our mission. I will be serving on active duty for up to 18 months before I will be able to return to MMSD.
My name is Jennifer Peters and I am the French teacher at Black Hawk Middle. This year I decided to expand my horizons by leading educators and their friends to Paris on June 20th. We spent 5 days in Paris and 2 days in the Loire Valley visiting the castles such as Chateau Chambord, and Chateau Chenonceau. The journey was exciting, educational and lots of fun. I was the tour leader for 16 travelers, who were mainly teachers from Black Hawk Middle and their family and friends.
Last Updated: Wed Sep 27 09:33:50 2006
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