Friday, January 5, 2018

January 5, 2018

Reflective

In Chapel this week, we introduced the Learner Profile "Reflective," the attribute we are focusing on during the month of January. Often, reflection is misunderstood as a passive and soft endeavor, but the IB's definition of it challenges that perspective.
We thoroughly consider the world and our own ideas and experience. We work to understand our strengths and weaknesses in order to support our learning and personal development. 
In this light, reflection becomes the link between experience and development, or between what has been done to us and what we do with that. The great American philosopher and educational pioneer John Dewey identified reflection as a critical element for learning, and for Dewey, as Carole Rodgers outlined, reflection is a meaning-making process; is a systematic, rigorous, disciplined way of thinking; needs to happen in community and in interaction with other; and requires attitudes that value personal and intellectual growth.

As a community, we not only reflected on reflection; we also reflected on kindness in our community. Finding some inspiration in this short video, we invited students to identify examples of kindness that they have experienced and to draw some meaning from them. Next week, we'll continue to reflect on kindness in our community. As we begin 2018, we invite the entire community to reflect on kindness in our community - in our interactions and communication with each other, in our work together, and in our support of our extraordinary students.

What we are learning...

Ms. Angelica Calcote, Language Acquisition (Spanish) Teacher
What is your favorite color? Blue and Yellow.
What is your favorite book? Any kind of cozy mystery book.
What is your favorite movie? "Airplane!"
If I hadn't been a teacher, I probably would've been... a traveling missionary. I love experiencing and learning about new cultures and languages and being able to do that while devoting my life to the Great Commission brings a tremendous sense of satisfaction and fulfillment, much like teaching!
Who is your favorite musical artist? I love Alice in Chains and Van Halen.
If you could travel anywhere in space and time, where and when would you like to visit? I totally loved and rocked the 1980s era with the big hair and tons of hairspray, neon bracelets and Walkmans! Plus the 80s music was THE BEST.
Where were you born? Tacoma, WA.
Any interesting trivia about you? My husband and I went to a lot of rock/heavy metal concerts like Van Halen, Scorpion, Judas Priest, Queensryche, Alice Cooper, Def Leppard, Metallica, Motley Crue, etc.
Where did you attend Middle School? Baker Middle School in Tacoma.
Who was your favorite or most influential teacher? My high school principal, Mr. Mancuso was the best principal ever. The students loved him and his office door was always open to welcome students in to either say "Hi" or just to talk. Back when I thought I wanted to become a lawyer, he allowed for me to take several days off from school so that I can shadow various attorneys, interview them, and research about the profession. Because Mr. Mancuso was genuinely interested in my future career goals, he always had time to listen to me, ask me how my classes were going and helped look over my college applications and essays. Without his help and mentorship, I am not sure I would have attended college at all. .

In 8th grade, our class is currently in the unit, ¿Qué se celebra? In it, we get to learn about various festivals, traditions, holidays and celebrations from through the Spanish-speaking world and the history behind them. It has certainly peaked the interest of our students and has caused us to look to our own celebrations and holidays that we celebrate with our families while embracing new traditions. While we are learning about this fascinating topic, we are also learning more about challenging grammatical topics, such as the imperfect. Students will have the opportunity to conduct more research about a selected Spanish-speaking holiday that they want to learn more about. 

Ms. Holly Drown, Physical & Health Education Teacher
What is your favorite color? Purple.
What is your favorite book? The Catcher in the Rye.
If I hadn't been a teacher, I probably would've been... working in technology or marketing. 
What is your favorite song? Any song by Ben Howard.
If you could travel anywhere in space and time, where and when would you like to visit? I would love to go back to when my parents were in high school.
Where were you born? Nashua, New Hampshire.
Any interesting trivia about you? I am a BIG New England Patriots fan.
Where did you attend Middle School? Elm Street Junior High in Nashua, NH.
Who was your favorite or most influential teacher? Mrs. Gingras, my high school Math teacher - for making each class full of purpose and inspiring a love for Stats.

I am thrilled to be apart of the Annie Wright community this year! I teach Physical and Health Education (PHE) for each grade level in a format that combines the elements of physical fitness with health and wellness. This week we launched our Team Sports unit where we will focus on the components of team work while also learning sport-specific skills. The goal of the unit is to set students up in an environment that encourages leadership, sportsmanship and collaborative learning.  In addition, we will continue to dig deeper into social awareness and relationship skills and welcome experts from the community to speak on topics including but not limited to substance abuse prevention, gender diversity and healthy decision making.

Technology: Update your devices!

A security vulnerability has been discovered in any device that has an Intel Computer chip manufactured since 1995 (including Windows and Mac computers, iPads, Surface tablets, iPhones, Apple TVs etc) which is just nearly every device.
What you need to do:  Make sure your computer/iPad/device/smartphone is up to date and on the latest operating system
This is an ongoing and developing story, more action or further updates may be required at a later date(next week). As always, if you have any question or problem updating, please contact Mr. Erik Weiss or Mr. Eric Shandrow in the technology office. 

 More details if you have time to read…..

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