Big Picture

Generally I move from big picture to detail, but today I'm moving from details to big picture. I spent the morning prepping for this week's conferences, and I found the work to be positive since our team has put so much collaborative time into this effort, and our time has been well spent because we are experiencing what strong parent-teacher-student collaboration can do for the teaching/learning program and student success.

The effort may me think deeply about the elements that make our collaborative grade-level teaching program strong, efforts I know that we'll continue to develop including the following:

• Worthy, meaningful, productive, and enjoyable field studies
• Terrific expert visitors and presentations
• Standards-based, multi-modal, student-centered, differentiated learning experiences
• Project/problem based learning
• Family member-student-educator(s) conferences
• Progress reports
• Showcase portfolios
• Celebrations and special events
• Cultural proficient programs and meaningful orientation events
• Time for teamwork and collaboration