I will be sending you a special email blast about the East Williston School District’s Annual PTO District Wide Grant Dinner.
This is the second year of what now has become a wonderful annual event! It is a night when parents and staff from all three schools come together for a fun evening of festivity.
If you didn’t get the chance to go last year, I think everyone who did attend will tell you what a special evening it was. It brought everyone in our community together in a show of such strong support for our schools and children.
For example, many parents shared with me how special it was, among many other special things that evening, to see so many of their children’s former teachers.
I am excited to send you information about this event in the next week and also will look forward to seeing you there!
Goal Setting and Review
At this time of year, the instructional and administrative staff is busy reviewing our progress on the 2014-15 district instructional goals to make sure we are on-track to complete our SMART goals (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and time bound goals) that we have committed to for the year and/or to make any necessary adjustments in our action planning. (Go to our website at www.ewsdonline.org > click on Our District on the red horizontal navigation bar > click on 14-15 District Goals.)
Recent North Side, Willets Road and Wheatley faculty meetings put aside time to review this year’s goals and initiate discussions regarding SMART goals for the next school year, 2015-16. The SMART goals support our broad goals, which usually remain constant over several years.
This month and next, building administrators, department chairs, directors and I will be reviewing feedback from the faculty meetings and formulating the draft district goals plan for 2015-16.
Before finalizing, building administrators and I will meet with each of the content area departments for additional input.
After our new District Goals Plan is finalized, we create a staff development plan for the 2015-16 school year that directly supports the accomplishment of the goals we have set directly to student growth and achievement.
Wheatley Midterm Experience
Special thanks to ELA Secondary Chair Steven Collier and Wheatley library-media specialist Jo Beth Roberts for their leadership and planning of this special learning event for our Wheatley ninth and tenth graders that took place on Jan. 28.
Additional thanks to the Wheatley PTO that provided funding for this experience.
The return of this terrific event – during which diverse authors, poets and practitioners are invited to present workshops to our students – was truly a highlight of the week.
There was an assortment of very special two-hour workshops that students were able to select from and ultimately participate in. Our Midterm Experience is designed to give our students insight into how English can be used in future careers and activities.
I was thrilled to teach a workshop on theatre arts. The students I worked with were terrific and really gave their all during our two-hour session.
We explored drama as a marriage of language and gesture, character objectives and actions, conflict as the driving force of a theatre piece, the role of place and the impact of setting on a scene.
The importance of strong observation skills that enable the gathering of details and insight which makes acting come alive and seems real was also emphasized.
Additional workshops included:
• “From Spark to Story” presented by Cristina Moracho, author – she discussed her novel “Althea and Oliver,” answered inquiring questions about her young adult novel and her writing process and provided a scenario, which allowed students to develop their characters and a story outline and begin writing their own stories
• “Eavesdropping 10”’ presented by Jennifer Wolf Kam, a young adult novelist – she discussed her writing process and her focus on dialogue in her books, short stories and works-in-progress – using her book “Devin Rhodes is Dead,” which received an Elementary Principals’ Book Award, she discussed techniques for writing dialogue within a mystery setting and students created dialogue in a suspenseful scenario, later performing their scenes in a Readers Theater performance
• “Playwriting Workshop” presented by Molly Smith Meltzer, an award winning playwright – students were introduced to the basic elements of playwriting and guided through writing a short play of their own
• “Your Superbowl Commercial” – Jonathan Cranin, director of commercials/creative director – led students in a workshop during which they discussed famous TV commercials, focusing on what made them successful.
Working in groups, students created commercials for “Old Westbury” and presented them to the class for feedback.
• “Celebrity Interviewing … or Do you want to write for Rolling Stone …’”– presented by Jen Calonita, author of “Secrets of My Hollywood Life” – former entertainment magazine editor and young adult book author – taught what it takes to conduct a celebrity interview from research to published articles.
Students had an opportunity to skype with and interview Zach Barnett, lead singer of American Authors (who had a hit in 2014 with “Best Day of My Life”). After the interview (which included an impromptu jam session), students prepared an article for The Wheatley Wildcat.
• “Found Poetry” presenter, Wheatley English teacher Dan Burke – led students on a hands-on workshop on found poetry, which is a creative and exciting form of poetry that uses existing text in order to reframe the words into a poem. This is a fun and creative way to play with language and to explore one’s innovative side.
• “Fairy Tale-a-thon” presented by Wheatley English teacher Karen Bartscherer – students explored classic fairy tales and created contemporary versions or totally original tales … e.g. Would Ugly Ducking’s mother end up in family therapy? Little Red Riding Hood’s image would surely be placed on a milk carton, right?
• “Batman Unmasked: The Psychology of the Dark Knight” – Wheatley English teacher Natalia McMillan delved into the deeper psychology of the popular comic book and film character, Batman.
Students watched a documentary showcasing historians, psychologists, forensics experts, authors, producers, etc. that explores Batman’s psyche. Students were then asked to create their own original character to serve as a Batman sidekick or villain.
• “Storytelling” presented by Rick Leidenfrost-Wilson, Wheatley English teacher, playwright and director – based on the premise that everyone has a story to tell, Mr. Leidenfrost-Wilson helped students bring their storytelling to life. Students examined the art of storytelling as a vibrant and necessary form of communication.
Using voice, character, dialogue, gesture and song, students explored stories and their personal relationship to them.
• “Sitcom Writing” – presented by Wheatley English teacher Colin McKenna – students who want to learn to write for television learned how to write a “logline” and how to create a “spec script” for their favorite sitcom while examining some great examples of sitcoms
• “Story Cubes” presented by Wheatley English teacher Tara Jacobs – a great way to get your imagination working, students rolled story cubes that had pictures on each side that set up parameters for a story. They then weaved a story from these pictures.
• “Children’s Literature: Cute or Controversial” – presented by North Side librarian Karen Homer and ELA Secondary Chair Steven Collier – students explore children’s books that have caused controversy with parents, teachers and/or librarians and create their own writings suitable for children
• “Press Pass” – Wheatley English teacher Jen Fatone ran this hands-on workshop for budding journalists who documented the Midterm Experience through observation, effective note-taking, questioning and organizing and submitted their stories to the Wildcat, Wheatley’s newspaper
English 10P Visit
As I’ve shared before, some of my most favorite times in the district are when I get to visit and spend time in classrooms. Earlier this month, I was excited to visit English 10P, Karen Bartscherer’s class.
As described in the Wheatley Course Catalogue, 10P is the Honors English class for students who have demonstrated mastery level achievement in English 8 and 9, love to read and have very accomplished writing skills.
As part of the course, students engage in “Experimentals” which are a long-term, in-depth, student multi-disciplinary exploration of a self-chosen area of inquiry through multiple interviews and the use of other primary and secondary resources. Last spring I saw many of the students present their final projects, their “Experimentals.”
This year, I was excited to see how the “Experimentals” begin; how the seeds of their ideas are sown.
For example, during my class visit, students, working in small groups, identified shared words they had selected from a 2015 experimental words list. The groups brainstormed around their words, exploring connections that might lead to inspiration for their final project.
A related aspect of the class is student research and their creation of websites. I’ve had the opportunity to look through the websites and I think you will enjoy them too.
For example, the “Music” website has given me a great selection of music to add to my playlist! The ‘Cultures of the World’ website has given me some new ideas for our upcoming multicultural festival in May. Click on the underlined titles to the website to gain access to them.
• “Technology: World of The Future” (Steve John & Sumu Pitchayan)
• “Welcome to NYC” (Sidra Akhtar, Claire Baker, Laura D’Angelo & Taylor Kristal)
• “People of Note” (Jake Gilbert & Gretchen Keller)
• “Music” (Maya Alfia, Aileen Chowdhury & Sara Zulfigar)
• “Cultures of the World” (Nirel Gidanian, Lianna Golden & Diana Lee)
• “What’s Trending?” (Sam Hurtado, Jane Kim & Lauren Levine)
• “Current Events” (Josh Druz, Ashley Lessen, Rene Venable & Angela Yang)
• “Healthy Living” (Abdullah Hassan, Arvin Jadonath & Jeff Wu)
• “Sports” (Antonio Deodato, Jax Nussbaum & Matthew Porges)
• “The Universal Mind” (Carly Brensilber & Brittany Haber)
Congratulations Fourth Grade Singers!
What a treat to hear the Fourth Grade Concert on Wednesday.
Congratulations to North Side music teacher Ed Lattari and the fourth grade chorus students. Not only was the music performed so well, but all the learning the students had done was quite evident. In one example, as explained by one of the student narrators, the chorus chose to sing a song in this year’s concert (Oh Music) that they had also sung in their third grade concert.
Last year the students sang it in two-part harmony. This year, the students challenged themselves, singing it in three-part harmony, a very challenging task, which they did incredibly well!
Thank you also to North Side music teacher Rachel May who accompanied the students on the cello.
Congratulations and Commendations
DECA Club Members Move On to State Competition
On Jan. 10, 15 Wheatley students attended the Nassau County Regional DECA Competition. Students competed against 17 other Long Island school districts in various business related categories.
Three students qualified to participate in the State Competition to be held on March 4–6 in Rochester, NY.
Wheatley senior Joshua Jacobs qualified to compete in the Marketing Management category and sophomores Joseph Dinetz and Justin Spar qualified to compete in the Sports & Entertainment Marketing Team category.
The competitors were given specific case studies which they had 20-30 minutes to review.
Based on the information given to them they had to prepare for a “role play” type presentation. Students were judged on their communication, analytical and production skills, as well as their professional manner and ability to support their ideas and answer detailed questions, on the spot.
The judges were all local business professionals. We are extremely proud of our qualifiers and are excited to see them compete at the DECA State competition! Congratulations as well to DECA advisor and Wheatley business teacher Kristen Malik.
Have a Good Weekend
As always, please e-mail me at kanase@ewsdonline.org or call me at 333-3758 with any questions, suggestions and/or any topics you would like to see in this newsletter.
