Weekly Teacher Download for September 17

NEW TEACHERS

New Teacher Summit: If you are a new teacher, you don’t want to miss the New Teacher Summit on September 21-22 at Ryan Professional Development Center (4001 Hardy St., Houston, 77009). This is a great opportunity to build your teacher toolkit, strengthen your instructional skills and learn more about specific and actionable effective practice techniques. To register, click here. For more details on session topics, click here.

ALL TEACHERS

PreK-12 Writing Summit: The district’s first PreK-12 Writing Summit will be on Saturday, October 13 at Chavez High School (8501 Howard Dr., Houston, 77017).  All teachers and leaders who wish to present sessions are invited to submit a proposal by Friday, September 14^. To submit your proposal, click here. There will be multiple learning opportunities for all teachers at all levels.  Participants will also receive a $10 voucher to purchase books from the on-site pop-up store.

Student Performance—What’s New: 1) Comparative Growth will be assigned when available. Teachers can “opt-out” of its use in their SP calculations with appraiser approval except for: teachers at Achieve 180 schools or teachers who wish to transfer to an Achieve 180 next year; teachers at TSL grant schools or teachers who wish to transfer to a TSL grant school next year; and teachers currently participating in Career Pathways or teachers who wish to participate next year. 2) Appraiser Approved Assessment/Performance Task is a measure for all courses. 3) RL360/Screener is a District-Wide Student Progress measure in Grades 1 & 2.

National History Day: The Office of Advanced Academics is excited to support and coordinate the district’s 2019 National History Day (NHD) competition for grades K -12 on February 23, 2019 at Hattie Mae White.  NHD expectations strongly align with HISD’s Social Studies disciplinary practices and give students the opportunity to act as historians. If your school would like to participate or learn more, contact Suzanne Acord at suzanne.acord@houstonisd.org and visit nhd.org. You can also reference previous HISD History Day resources here.

CTE Instructors Training: Career and Technical Education (CTE) teachers are invited to attend an AutoCad 2D and 3D training on September 21 from 1-4 p.m. at South Early High School. Participants will learn the basic computer-aided drafting and techniques.  They will be introduced to 2D drawing and 3D printing.  Additionally, participants will learn setting up drawings and models form printing, plus classroom applications. Register in OneSource, course #1564009.

ELEMENTARY

Read to Succeed Competition: The district is inviting all elementary campuses to participate in the district’s first-ever Read to Succeed Competition beginning Monday, Sept. 10 to Thursday, Jan. 31. This competition is an opportunity for all pre-kindergarten through fifth-grade students to compete against each other to see who can read myON books for the most number of minutes. Students can choose any e-book available through the myON reading platform to read. Click here for more details on the competition and awarded prizes.

 SECONDARY

Secondary Early Release PD Offerings: The Secondary Curriculum & Development team will be conducting professional development offerings during the district’s first early release day on Friday, September 21. The offerings will be held at four locations across the district with a special focus given to writing across the curriculum. For a complete list and OneSource course numbers, click here.