Anticipating 2012-2013

Academic year 2012-2013 will be a year of many changes for Hixson Middle School.  This is both exciting and daunting.  We will work together on how to manage these changes, how to support one another during these changes, and how to innovate them as well.
To summarize, we will:

• Flip the master schedule,
• Return to four lunches due to an increased student population and a decrease in available teachers for lunch supervision,
• Work with different team members (those of us on team),
• Implement expectations for Discovery (click here to see a draft of these),
• Learn to use new software for our web sites (time for this learning is already being planned with Dr. Simpson),
• Develop a bring-your-own-device environment for student-owned technology,
• Participate in a district-wide book study of The Art and Science of Teaching in anticipation of a new evaluation instrument (hopefully, you will receive this text before the end of the school year),
• Receive three new copiers in the building mid-year (our current contract ends mid-year, so we will have brief, new-copier-related PD on 1/4/13),
• Introduce a new role: Building Curriculum Facilitator (Mrs. Jill Right will serve in this role), and
• Welcome some new teachers to the building.

In addition to what is above, we will continue:

• Learning about and drafting unit plans,
• Moving forward with PBIS,
• Working on responsive teaching, interventions, and implementing a Care Team,
• Meeting for an hour monthly as departments (times to be determined by the department), and
• Engage in some of our annual required staff training together.

In order to accomodate these changes, we will

• Work an additional contract day before school begins, 8/10 (this day will be used primarly for PD),
• Meet twice a month as a faculty (on second and fourth Mondays),
• Engage in district-provided PD on the Common Core State Standards,
• Engage in district-provided PD for our new web software, and
• Continue to devote as much release time as possible to our work together.

I hope this list is exhuastive, but please be patient with me if it is not.  Many of these projects are ambitious.  Ambitious projects call for powerful actions.  I believe in the power of your work and the power of our work together.  This collective effort and support can ignite collective enthusiasm, particularly as we watch our remarkable results unfold.
The key is to start small, to work collaboratively, and to think BIG.
I have great expectations . . .