RMS Monday Minute

How it Works:

Each participant shares a 5.00 gift to their Secret Santa starting on Monday, December 15th, Tuesday, December 16th and Wednesday, December 17th then on Thursday, December 18th you deliver your final 10.00 gift in person at our Annual Ugly Sweater Breakfast.

• Thank you to everyone who hosted a high school student for their 2nd Annual Day of Service. It was great to see the students as role models for our students. It really was a great day!
• Thank you to all who participated in our 2nd Annual Turkey Trot Staff Game. We hope you all had fun!
• Thank you Forns Family for being at the Rochester Tree Lighting to support our students singing holiday songs.
• PLC this month-December 4th will be grade level PLC and December 18th will be the administrative PLC. We will look at student data and start to create MCAS groupings in grades 3-6, (I still want to check in on student data in grades 3-6 first).
• MCAS groupings: The goal is to think about the number of groups we create and how often some staff are being used. I would love for Lisa M and Noelle to only be used for 2 grade levels each as all the students receiving intervention miss many reading groups during MCAS testing dates.
• Please note, all the math resources from Susan Looney are listed at the bottom of this newsletter. Many classrooms are off to a great start setting up stations and planning for differentiation within their lessons.
• Remember we want to continue and hopefully finalize a new dismissal plan at our December 10th staff meeting.
• Heidi is out on Thursday and Friday for the CACE conference, (I am still available via email, phone and texts).

Hour of Code:

"Hour of Code" will take place during Computer Science Education Week, from December 8-14.

Holiday Shop:

The week of December 8th will also be Holiday Shop for our students.

Fly Five:

Vocabulary Reference Guide for all grade levels:

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?ogbl#inbox/FMfcgzQcqlCTxpfFBBPsSfNsvrNZmlKg?projector=1&messagePartId=0.1

Envisions Pacing Guide-Information Needed:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1w5LwkdhuusqjzTItL4PjL3Sao7GsTkbZvp4yJvlTXVk/edit?gid=0#gid=0

Our schools are filled with incredible faculty and staff. We would like to spotlight staff members, nominated by their peers, for their dedication to our school system and their ability to inspire students. Please complete this Google form to nominate a staff member.

*This information may be shared in an upcoming Superintendent's newsletter.

December:

• Reports Cards to the Office & Progress Notes Completed: Monday, Dec. 8th
• Thursday, December 4th and 18th: PLC Meeting Day
• Wednesday, December 10th: Staff Meeting 3:15-4:15 PM
• Thursday, December 11th: SLLT Meeting
• Friday, December 12th: Report Cards go Home
• Monday, December 15 through 17 Rehearsal for Winter Concert
• Thursday, December 18th: Winter Concert - 9:15 for whole school, 2:00 for families
• Tuesday, December 23, 2025: Early Release Day

Additional Early Release Days — Students begin dismissal at 12:25 pm

Wednesday, November 26, 2025

Tuesday, December 23, 2025

Wednesday, January 28,2026

Wednesday, March 4, 2026

Wednesday, May 27, 2026

Progress Monitoring Expectations:

Please continue to reference the assessment calendar to stay on top of your Progress Monitoring Timelines. Last week was week one of PM for this year.

• Students who are at risk/red must be progress monitored every 2 weeks
• Students who are Strategic/yellow must be progress monitored every 4 weeks/1x a month
• New this year-Students green or blue will be progress monitored once a month to maintain moderate to high student learning

District Literacy Plan -

FY 25-26 Assessment Calendar

Into Reading Pacing Guide

Assessment Framework by Grade Level

Old Rochester Into Reading Pacing guide 25-26 SY.docx

SLLT and DLLT Meeting Schedule

Hill Activity Timeline

Math Instruction:

• Thank you all for engaging in conversations around math centers. Many of you have already began thinking about how to best implement math centers in your classroom.
• Susan shared an outline for this model that includes an opener/activator, mini-lesson, stations that could include-independent work, math hands-on games, compute math practice such as IXL, and small group check-ins or reteaching, followed by a summarizer. Slides 19 and 20 have more information for your review, see link below.
• If you want to brainstorm ideas and logistics on how to make this work for your classroom a couple times a week, I am happy to help.
• Hopefully, we can get everyone to try this model once a week after February vacation. I know this is year one of Envisions, so let's keep an open dialogue about what is working and what is not working. If you have particular topics that you would like Susan to address that she has not already shared, please let us know so we can support you.

• K list
• 1 List
• 2 List
• 3 List

Math Resources:

• MA DESE Quick Reference Guides:

• Standard Algorithms for Addition and Subtraction

• Multiplication and Division

• Achieve the Core Priority Standards:

• Grade 5 Focus Standards

• Grade 6 Focus Standards

• Lesson Planning Template:

  A tool for focusing on what matters most within each lesson: Lesson_Planning_Template

• Place Value Resources:

• Link: Place Value Cards and Slider

• Beaded Number Lines