So much of what I put here has come from conversations where a parent says; “you should put that in the bulletin because I don’t think families understand that.”
 
This week the conversation came up about why we chose to do all multi-age across the building. As we thought about it from a program perspective, we thought about progression and what that should look and feel like as a student.
 
Kindergarten is the first experience of public school for students.  We want this to be a strong start for families as well as their children.  Kindergarten is also hard to combine with first as there are so many foundations that need to be built over the year.
 
Combining first and second grades together made sense for a variety of reasons.  Firstly, we are being pro-active in that we know every year because of enrollment, one or two classes would have to be combined. It makes more sense to combine classes in a pro-active way instead of reactive way.  Secondly, our literacy curriculum, science and other subjects except math lends itself to this type of configuration as it is differentiated and teaches to the level of the child.  Lastly, this provides the stepping stone for the students who will eventually move into a multi-age of three grades.  Students need to experience on a smaller level what it feels like to work with students at different levels.  If we sent all the first and second graders up without any experience in a multi-age classroom, the transition to our 3-4-5 experience could be extremely challenging.
 
I love these types of questions and hope to continue this dialogue in the New Year.  Don’t forget to fill out our survey.

First through fifth grade families, please go to the attached link and take our family survey on MAGIC.  We ask that you repeat it for each additional child. If your child is in kindergarten, you may skip taking the survey.  Please go to:
 
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/GreenLake2011
 
I had a wonderful discussion with a parent today about the half hour we as teachers keep saying  that the kids now have that they didn’t before.  In the discussion with the parent, it was clear that we have not been explaining this in a way that makes sense from the students’ point of view.  I will now attempt to explain how this half hour that kids are not eating in their classroom  pans out into instructional time for the intermediate classrooms.
 
Last year students ate in their classrooms and teachers supervised them.  This year, the teachers are not eating in the classroom with the students, giving them their contractual break.  This had happened during art or gym.  Now when the fifth  graders go to gym and/or art/literacy, the teacher who used to take a break is teaching a math or science course to a set of third or fourth grade students.  This rotates throughout the day.   Although your child still has the same time for recess and lunch, the time we were able to capture from all teachers eating and planning together at the same time equals out to more content area learning.  Where science had been once or twice a week, it is now every day.  Students in all classrooms have smaller math groups because of the lunchroom change.
 
We have heard from Gretchen DeDecker that a organization who sponsors big projects in the school district is interested in helping Green Lake enclose our lunchroom, help us heat it, and get sprinklers in there to make it safe and warm.  I meet with the organization and Gretchen on December 12th.  I am looking forward to working with them to solve this dilemma as soon as possible.  I do know our committee has definitely made it as warm as 53 degrees in there last Friday so even without heat, the work to enclose the space has created warmth.   Thanks again lunchroom team.

The question this week was about our MSP scores.  I will try to break it down for you below and answer the questions as well.
 
For example, last year's third graders had one student who was an excused exemption and not counted in the test calculations.  We also had three unexcused absences or refusals which were included in the test calculations.
 
Can you confirm that the Team A and Special Ed students fall under the exemptions not included in test calculations?  Am I interpreting this information correctly?  Some of Team A students took an alternative state test which is the WAAS.  The students’ scores who took this test were not calculated into our scores.  Others, who did not take the test were calculated in as 0’s.  However, we have more students than students in Team A not take the test.  You are correct, these are calculated into the formula for our school scores.
 
As a staff, I think we look at our scores and say, How can we improve? What’s the priority here?  Where is the alignment in the building?  What can we change?  What gaps exist?  One reason staff felt MAGIC was so important this year, especially for math was that small groups for math would be important to be able to work more intensely with all kids whether they were struggling with the content or might need more enrichment in the content.
 
Here is a comparison between our school and two others. You have to move the green boxes up to read it correctly as it didn’t copy and paste exactly the way it is displayed on OSPI.   I chose one school similar to us in demographics and one not similar to us. If you want to get a better view of the table, you can go to OSPI/reportcard/k-12.
 
We look at this data as well comparing our statistics and why it might be different.  For instance, Bryant, a neighboring school has 588 students compared to our 270.  Averages alone here will make a big difference. Our fourth grade reading scores although lower than Bryant by 3% are much higher than BF Day.   Our school has a much higher population of kids on free and reduced lunch than Bryant and BF Day’s population is much higher than ours.  Is this an excuse?  No but it does help us address gaps where we may need to work.
 
On November 16, you will also get the data out from the staff and family surveys completed last spring.  I am pleased with our results as I was with our MSP data.  We think our data shows what we are doing is working and what is not working we are addressing this year with MAGIC.

View report here
http://reportcard.ospi.k12.wa.us/SideBySide.aspx?schoolId=100&OrgTypeId=3&reportLevel=District&orgLinkId=100

The primary multi-age classrooms have been collaborating together this year much more than ever before.  In years past at Green Lake, teachers were able to choose whether they looped or not, so not every teacher had the experience of having students two years in a row or teaching a multi-leveled classroom.  Having a multi-aged classroom is different than having a split or combined grade. This is why having this time to collaborate is so very important. One of the strongest influences for Green Lake Teachers to choose going to multi-age is the philosophy behind the model.  Multi-age is based on teaching kids according to their academic abilities instead of age or at least a classroom organized around opportunities for students to learn from each other.
 
Teachers College Readers and Writers lessons naturally lend themselves to learners working at their appropriate developmental level.  No matter what grade a child is in, they can work at the reading and writing level where they are and a teacher can move them forward.  Even in a split or combination classroom, students would be at many levels.  Science of course is based on units and science units were designed to be taught K-8.  This is why it makes sense for us to do all the second grade this year and all the first grade units next year.  Seattle’s math curriculum is much more difficult to teach in a multi-age classroom and this is why we decided to keep teaching math to the grade level and hired Ms. Anderson to help out with math groups to keep the groups smaller.
 
We have also been talking about homework making sure that every teacher offers word study homework, some math, and reading.  We discussed that homework at least in primary should be a review of lessons and not a new concept for families to teach.  Primary grades should be the practice grades for students to get in the habit of doing their homework.
Anyway, these are just a few of the discussions we have been having as a primary team.  Many of you are benefitting from the websites teachers are setting up.  This is directly from a team meeting where they were able to share how to do it and give each other support to do this.  Keep the questions coming, it is great for us as a staff to reflect and answer.

Our Building Leadership Team will be working on a survey to get to you soon to gather data for a pre and post look at MAGIC.    This year you will also have a new report card.  Teachers have attended trainings to learn about and use it starting in December.  Please remember to schedule a conference with your child’s teacher if you haven’t already.  If you have other questions or concerns, please send them our way, we are using this space to inform and educate.

Multiage classrooms are based upon a philosophical commitment to the holistic development of each individual student. Multiage philosophy tries to change the paradigm of teaching to the average student by purposely grouping different ages together. There is a conscious decision to remove grade level designations both for the lower and upper ability students. Teachers and students stay together two or more years. The philosophy of multiage groupings supports the fostering of closer teacher – student bonds. Greater emotional security and student autonomy should lead to greater academic and social growth (Pavan, 1992.)  Multiage classrooms reflect the belief that children develop at varying rates and schools have to reflect these differences (Kaul, 1977).  They also believe that the student’s social growth is as essential as their academic achievement.

The question this week was in regards to what would have our classrooms looked like if we didn’t do MAGIC this year?
 
This was some of the data we looked at and which helped us to begin considering a multi-age approach.  Because so many of our classrooms would have been splits and because splits seem to be viewed as less than, we began looking at what is best for kids.
 
Thanks for the questions, keep them coming.

The question was posed to me last week “Why are you behind the MAGIC program at Green Lake?”
 
I think the major reason I am so behind it is because teachers developed it, tested it, and wanted it.  As I said in the meeting in June, I would never had proposed this on my own.  Green Lake was a smooth running school with supportive families, great staff, and a wonderful student body and it still is!  Why rock the boat?  I like that our staff was willing to take a risk for students.  Multi-age has been around for a long time and has proven sound for students.  We knew this would not be easy to convince our families, we knew scheduling would be difficult, and fitting in all that Green Lake treasures a huge puzzle piece.  And yet, we forged ahead.  We are into week three and it seems to be working.  Students talk about how fast the day goes and teachers are in collaborative groups working on curriculum and logistics.  Families are reporting that they like it.
 
We will be creating a survey soon for you to take about MAGIC so we can have a baseline for measuring the program’s success.  We knew we would hit bumps in the road and that we would have to make repairs and adjustments, some of this has already come up.  I am sending the FAQ again from last spring and the power point again so you can all review the reasons why we felt it was such a powerful program and hopefully see some of your questions answered in the FAQ.  If not, please send them my way and each week we will answer what we can and give you more resources for your own perusal.  The year is off to a busy start, and a very strong one.