Attendance Awareness Month

September is Attendance Awareness Month!

It's been a busy month, but here's how we celebrated:

1) School wide challenge:

Our PTA theme this year is "sweet." This made me think of pop rocks which lead me to our "attendance rocks challenge."

*Each class with get an attendance rocks sign and letters to spell out “rocks.” I used Savvy School Counselor's Attendance Rocks Packet to get us started. I used her cover to make signs for classrooms and then I gave them each cut out letters to spell "rocks." 

*If a class had perfect attendance that day they stuck a letter on your sign. When the class spells out the word “rocks” they let me know and they won a book for their classroom library or other prize. 

*If they got "rocks" they had a second challenge, focusing on tardies.

Just like before they added a letter each day they had zero tardies. When they spell out “rocks” they got a book prize. 

Rooted in Reading- Attendance Small Grps

This year I got to work with Tiffany Buckles (not Buckles for too much longer 😊 ), an incredible intern from CNU. Attention all HR departments- if she ever applies to your district hire her immediately.

We called ourselves the "counseling girls" (an ode to the amazing Gilmore Girls) and I gotta admit I think we were an amazing team. We combined my addiction of children's book/biblotherapy and her wisdom/love of owls and thus the "Whoooo Loves School" small groups were formed. I can't brag on these groups enough, but the data speaks for itself!

Read more about our "Whoooo Loves School" small group.....

Back To School Book Wish List

How I plan on using it:
*Collaboration with our school librarian and teachers for non fiction research. I got this idea from Sarah Svarda, librarian genius. She had her students research about an animal and then write a script before they used Chatterpix to make a fun recording about what they had learned.  You can read all about it here. She also had one of our friends, C Jayne Teach, write about about a similar lesson, where the students used persuasive writing to talk themselves into liking certain creatures. I am going to try and collaborate in a similar way, but with a career focused twist.

*One of Sarah's students branched outside the box and created this amazing Chatterpix. So here is my prompt for students. After researching your animal, what job should/would they have if they were human and why? Or, what job should they not have or why? They need to talk about skills, talents, hobbies, interests of the animal and connect it to that career. For example, social animals might make great helpers. Animals that run a lot might not want to work in schools, but would make a great police officer.

Read all about this amazing book here: http://www.upworthy.com/this-adorable-kids-book-lets-boys-know-tough-guys-have-feelings-too

How I plan on using: in my boys small groups, morning meetings with boys, and even in classroom guidance. 

How I plan on using it: Connect, compare, and contrast with When Pigasso Met Mootisse. Then partner students to create a friendship Venn Diagram.  Here is a great lesson idea.

Book Clubs As Small Groups

This year my SMART goals were: 

To increase reading achievement amongst students with disabilities by 2% in a year.

To decrease the number of students who self report that they disagree that student behavior is usually positive from 11.6% to 10%.

To increase reading achievement amongst economically disadvantaged students by 2% in a year.

When I was writing my closing the gap action plan I was thinking about what services I currently provide and could provide to reach these goals. I knew that I have about 400 books (yep not kidding check out my list here. So I aligned each of my lessons with a book. So every guidance lesson they heard me re aloud.

	Aug./Sept.	Oct.	Nov.	Dec.
K	Back To School “The Kissing Hand”“David Goes To School”	Listening Skills “Howard B Wigglebottom Learns To Listen”	Tattle vs. Tell “Armadillo Tattletale”	Fire Safety “Firehouse”
1	Back To School/ “David Goes To School” “Dog Gone School” Listening Skills “Howard B Wigglebottom Learns To Listen” “Interrupting Chicken” “Z Is For Moose”	Problem Solving/ Conflict Resolution/ Point of view “Duck!Rabbit!” “Howard B Wigglebottom”	Citizenship “Michael Recycle” Responsibility “What If Everybody Did  That?”	Friendship “Little Pink Pup” Tolerance/ Jealousy/ Conflict Resolution “Say Hello To Zorro” “Mineosaur”
2	What Is A School Counselor School Rules “Why Do I Have To Eat Off Appreciating Differences Potato Heads  The Floor?” “A Friend Like You”	Tattle vs. Tell “Don’t Squeal Unless It’s a Big Deal”	Personal Safety “Scoop”	Dog/Personal Safety Safety “Please Don’t Tease Tootsie”
notes 3	School Rules/ Consequences “What If Everybody Did That” Conflict Resolution/ Respect “The Sandwich Swap”	Tattle vs. Tell “A Bad Case of the Tattle Tongue” “I Didn’t Do It”	Citizenship/ Decision Making “Win Or Lose By How You Choose!”	Friendship/ Inclusion “The Invisible Boy”
4	School Rules/ Consequences “How To Be A Good Dog” Learning Styles	Fairness Self Confidence “It’s Not Fair” “Exclamation Mark”	Needs vs. Wants Fairness “Those Shoes”	Friendship/ Inclusion “The Invisible Boy”
5	School Rules “How To Be A Good Dog” Perseverance Goal Setting “It’s Tough To Loose Your Balloon”	Decision Making/ Peer Pressure “Peer Pressure Gauge”	Bullying/ Conflict Resolution “Weird “ “Confessions of a Former Bully”	Bullying “Dare”

	Jan.	Feb.	Mar.	Apr.	May
K`	Feelings/ Anger “Howard B Wigglebottom” “Dog Food”“How Are You Peeling?” Belly Breathing	Responsibility “I Am Responsible” Honesty “Howard B Wigglebottom”	Friends “Howard B Wigglebottom” “Chester’s Way”	Fairness “It’s Not Fair” Sportsmanship “Howard B Wigglebottom”	Problem Solving “I’m Bored”
1	Rules Review Skills for Success “ I Just Want To Do It My Way”“Library Lion”	Courage Self Esteem  “A Bad Case of Strips”	Managing Emotions “How Do Dinosaurs Say I’m Mad” Belly Breathing Apologize	Fairness “It’s Not Fair” “Rainbow Fish” Sportsmanship “’Michael’s Golden Rules” “Howard B Wigglebottom”	Fire Safety “Firehouse” Personal Safety “Scoop”
2	Rules Review/ Bucketfiling “Halle and Tiger” “Have You Filled A Bucket Today” “Clark The Shark”	Caring Respect “Do Unto Otters” Self Esteem “Molly Lou Melon”	Conflict Resolution “Pirate, Viking, Scientist” “When Pigasso Met Mootsee”	Decision Making “If You Give A Dog A Donut”	Conflict Resolution “Ping and Pong Are Best Friends Mostly” “Enemy Pie”
notes 3	Bullying Bully Scoot “Nobody Knew What To Do”	Bullying/ Power of Bystanders “Marlene Marlene Queen of Mean” “The Recess Queen” “One”	Perseverance “Three Ninja Pigs” “Woe Is Moe”	Test Preparation “The Big Test”	Stress and managing emotions “Silly Billy”
4	Accepting Differences “The Brand New Kid” “Carla’s Sandwich”	Bullying/ Kindness “Each Kindness” “Just Kidding”	Perseverance “It’s Tough To Lose Your Balloon” Test Preparation	Stress Managing Emotions “Wilma Jean Worry Machine”	Career “I Can Be Anything” I Can Be- jobs “Someday”
5	Bullying Peer Pressure “Tough”	Stress/ Managing Emotions “How To Do Homework Without Throwing Up” Brain Pop Relaxation Centers	Test Prep Courage/ Perseverance “Thank You Mr. Falker”	College and Career “When I Grow Up” Reality Day	Middle School Transition “The Numberlys”

Why? Well if you are coming to #ASCA16 you can find out then, but if you aren't coming to New Orleans then I'll let you learn why it's so important here and here.  If your brain is ready for

summer I'll summarize and share some data:

Research collected on middle school read-alouds showed that 58 percent of teachers read aloud to their students – and nearly 100 percent of reading and special education teachers. (http://ww2.kqed.org/mindshift/2013/05/14/why-reading-aloud-to-older-children-is-valuable/). There is a ton more research out there, but you get it.

Ok so how else was I going to reach that goal? I shifted some of my small groups to become book focused/based. So I created some book clubs. It's been amazing. I've gotten positive perception data back from everyone involved and I can't wait to get my data at the end of the year.

Who: 3rd- 5th grades- I have them split up into boys and girls groups. There are about 6 students (max) per group.

Where: my office

When: lunch. You know how lunch bunches go. They come in a few min. late because they've been going through the lunch line. They are so busy eating that they can't talk or they talk so much they don't eat. Then you have to let them leave a few min. early so they can clean up and be back in class. So, I read aloud for the first few min. as they eat. When they are done they pick up the book and follow along. Sometimes we run late, but I haven't had one teacher complaint and I think it's because they know we are reading. 

What: Here are the books we are reading and a little about the activities we might do.

5th Grade Boys-

If you haven't read this book before you should. It's about a student that doesn't work (academic), doesn't have friends (social) and struggles to cope (emotional). He gets sent to the counselor and well enjoy. After we read we have our study guide that I got here. We talk and then spent time connecting to their own lives. This is my favorite group- I can't even begin to explain how amazing they are. In fact they are so amazing they each came up with their won academic, social, or emotional goal based on a connection they made with the book.