Roles

2017-2018:

Daily Tasks Team: Mon = Andrea, Tues = Diane, Wed = Hoda, Catherine Thurs = Craig, Frank, Tafesse

Writing Coaches: Jane, Ellen

Book Clubs (Mondays): Pooja, Joel, Shilpa, Barbara, Teresa

Math: Hang, Kushlani

Selectives/Enrichments: Bill, Rob, Thomas, Andrea, Ruben

2016-2017

Daily Tasks Team: Mon=Karina & Sheila, Tues=Sally, Wed=Debbie, Thurs=Alma, Fri=Brian

Writing Coaches: Marie, Aislin, Tara, Isabelle, Sharina

Book Clubs: Cristina, Helen, Jim, Kristin, Anna-Maria

Intensives: Parthavi & Alena (physics), Maina & Cahn (Constitution)

Resource Management: Sarah (books/periodicals)

How We (Chris/8th Grade) do Workshifts Differently

1. parents can be untethered from homeroom

2. intensive assistants work in bursts then not at all

3. overnight trip coordinator per TRIP, not per classroom

Room 25 Classroom Helper Roles

1. Daily Task Team (preferably one per day from 12:00 to 1:00, which is my prep): Parents who help with the routines or special needs in the classroom.

   • various activities and errands (see the "To Do Lists" page samples from previous years)

   • scoring assignments

   • create missing work lists for students

   • copy the daily schedule from the site, paste it to the Word doc, format to the standards, print it, and tape to a board

2. Literature Circles: Six parents for one hour one day a week (preferably 11:00 to 12:00 to avoid conflicts with intensives) to work with students discussing books and helping them with assignments regarding the book(s).

3. Writing Coaches and Essay Readers:

4. This is a big thing for this year, and it consists of group of parents who are willing to read students written pieces and meet with them to offer feedback, editing, and coaching. They can do the work anytime, in a pull-out scenario once every one or two weeks to meet with the of kids. I'm hoping that they can work with the same group of about 4 kids for a semester. The students will be writing essays almost every two weeks, so there will be a great deal of material to use to facilitate improvement in their writing. What could be more valuable to a student than a 1:1 coach?

5. Intensive Assistant: One person for physics, one for government, one for Civil War, and one for poetry. The parent helps the teacher run the intensive each of the times it happens. For physics, for example, the parent would work from 9:00 to 10:40 each day during 4 weeks in Jan-Feb and again for four weeks in Mar-Apr. During the rest of the year, they would be off. This person can be from any homeroom. See Chris for details about physics and government, and see Bonnie for details about CivilWar and poetry.

6. Task/Form/Assignment Completion Monitor: This person keeps track of the myriad things that kids (and sometimes parents) need to do, and facilitates their completion.

7. Library & Resource Library Maintenance & Improvement: Help get some better books for our small classroom library, and help maintain the Science World and Kids Discover collections that I have as well as the online database of article summaries and curricular connections.

8. Construction/Projects: One or two parents to help with some building/landscape projects in the room and in the alley. This is a flexible job but I'd estimate that it would take about an hour a week (anytime).

Here is how I described each job in the Coupla Things v2

Email from Chris to Marcy, about parent workshifts (9/7/15)

Hi Marcy. (in response to the parent requests for morning block workshifts): The writing coaches can meet with kids anytime that fits their schedule, so the 8:40 to 10:40 (with recess duty after that) could work for them. Same is true for the library person and computer-health person since they are also "anytime you want" jobs.

Daily Task things are best done as a partnership with me, so 12 to 1 really is the best time for that (with lunch duty after that). I've found that writing out effective instructions for so many of the odd tasks and routines takes so much time, and so I prefer to have parents there during my prep so I can explain stuff, help out, and/or troubleshoot as needed.

Parent time in the class is valuable to me (and them, I'm sure), so I want to have useful and meaningful things for them to do the whole time. Therefore, I don't think that a parent would be utilized well enough if they were just a "helper" from 8:40 through recess as a weekly routine all year. Although I do understand that the weekly-timeslot routine is what most parents are used to and what is most commonly done around school.

So, here is what works best for me: In addition to the book club parents on Wed at 11 and the computer-health person whenever, you can schedule a person for the morning block each weekday, if they are willing to do writing coach as their primary & default job; I'll ask them to help out for in-class activities on an occasional basis as needed. I'll let Dan and Bonnie know that my kids will be pulled out of their intensives, one at a time, for 20ish minutes about once per week -- they are both likely to tolerate that and hopefully it won't set any kid behind in their intensive.

2014-2015

Monday: Pilar, Erika, Gina, SoonHee (1:35 to 3:20)

Tuesday: Maina (11:00 - 12:00) & Jill

Wednesday: David or Stacy, 11 to 1

Thursday: BookClubs Julie, Tarek, Fernando, Lavi, Ashok (9 to 10)

Friday: Michelle 8:40 to 10:40

2013-2014:

Classroom Helper Roles (2014-2015)

1. Daily Task Team (preferably 12:00 to 1:00, which is my prep): Parents who help with the routines or special needs in the classroom.

   • various activities and errands (see the "To Do" lists below for samples from previous years

   • correcting papers

   • create missing work lists for any students with 0s in the grade book

   • keep Science World and Kids Discovery library & databases up to date

   • copy the daily schedule from the site, paste it to the Word doc, format to the standards, print it, and tape to a board

   • Wednesday is Stacy or David, Thursday is Tarek, and Friday is Colleen

2. Literature Circles: Six parents for one day a week (preferably during ELA which is 11:00 to 12:00) to work with students discussing books and helping them with assignments regarding the book(s).

3. 1. Fernando, 2. Lavi, 3. Pooja, 4. Tarek, 5. Julie

4. Writing Coaches and Essay Readers:

5. This is a big thing for this year, and it consists of group of parents who are willing to read students written pieces and meet with them to offer feedback, editing, and coaching. They can do the work anytime, in a pull-out scenario once every one or two weeks to meet with the of kids. I'm hoping that they can work with the same group of about 4 kids for a semester. The students will be writing essays almost every week, so there will be a great deal of material to use to facilitate improvement in their writing. What could be more valuable to a student than a 1:1 coach?

6. 1. Ashok, 2. Stacy, 3.

7. Computer Health: One or two parents to help maintain the 14 PCs and 3 Macs in our room. The machines often run slow for various reasons and need to have files organized/deleted, desktops reset, and plug-ins/extensions kept up to date. This is a flexible job but I'd estimate that it would take about an hour a week (anytime).

8. 1. Alejandro, 2. Conrad

9. Theme Study: (Monday PM) Erika, Gina, SoonHee

10. Student Assistance: This is the more traditional "parents in the classroom" role. Parents work with kids to execute and expand the activities and assignments that are part of the daily schedule in any of the subjects (or combination). I won't always have a specific role or task for you, so this person should be good at observing the room and feel comfortable stepping they perceive need. When student needs are low, this person could shift into jobs 1, 3, and 4 above.

11. Lesson Formation, Delivery, Assessment: The parent pool in our class contains tremendous expertise and talent. I'm hoping to get many of you to create interactive lessons on topics of your choosing and execute them with the class and assessing their knowledge.

Classroom Helper Roles (2013-2014)

1. Daily Task Team Amoreena

2. (preferably 11:00 to 12:00, which is my prep): Parents who help correct papers and support routines or special needs in the classroom.

   • correcting papers

   • copy the daily schedule from the site, paste it to the Word doc, format to the standards, print it, and tape to a board

   • create missing work lists for any students with 0s in the grade book

3. Literature Circles: Jeanne, Suku, Jennifer, Tarek, Roseanne, Shilpa

4. Six parents one day a week (preferably during ELA which is 12:00 to 1:00) to work with students discussing books and helping them with assignments regarding the book(s).

5. Writing Coaches and Essay Readers: Jeanne, Roseanne, Ashok Raman, (Maya's Dad), and David

6. This is a new thing for this year, and it consists of group of parents who are willing to read students written pieces and meet with them to offer feedback, editing, and coaching. They can do the work anytime, in a pull-out scenario once every one or two weeks to meet with the of kids. I'm hoping that they can work with the same group of about 6 kids for a semester. The students will be writing essays almost every week, so there will be a great deal of material to use to facilitate improvement in their writing. I will have a tray on my desk that says "Writing Coaches" on it. What could be more valuable to a student than a 1:1 coach? I have high hopes for this process.

7. Tech Team: Conrad and Amit

8. 1 or 2 parents to help me to create, refine, and manage online items (update website lists using Diigo, organize student websites, and create various online activities). Obviously a moderate (but not necessarily advanced) level of tech/web familiarity is preferable. They can also do some work from home, but meeting with me, perhaps during my prep, would be most efficient.

   • using the assignment page, transfer information & links to the google calendar and the assignment spreadsheet

9. Student Assistance: Muffie, Stacey, Gina, Jennie, Ashok Raman, Suku, (Rahul's Dad) Louise, and Roseanne.

10. This is the more traditional "parents in the classroom" role. Parents work with kids to execute and expand the activities and assignments that are part of the daily schedule in any of the subjects (or combination). I won't always have a specific role or task for you, so this person should be good at observing the room and feel comfortable stepping they perceive need. When student needs are low, this person could shift into jobs 1, 3, and 4 above.

11. Resource Libraries: Gina & Amoreena.

12. This person helps to organize, maintain, and expand the various "libraries" of curriculum support materials such as student magazines (Science World, Scope, KidsDiscover, Smithsonian), and current events articles and student annotations.

2012-2013

Classroom Helper Roles

1. Daily Task Team (usually 8:30 to 9:30): Parents who help correct papers and support routines or special needs in the classroom.

   • Monday = Quyen and Dione

   • Tuesday = Stephanie and Barbara

   • Wednesday = Cindy and Shannon

   • Thursday = Roseanne, Carolyn, and Tamara

   • Friday = Elizabeth and Kerry

2. Inactive: Literature Circles: 6 parents on Tuesdays from 8:30 until 9:15 to work with students from my class. There will be another set of parents that will work with Denise's kids (in here, with me) from 9:25 to 10:15. These parents will facilitate group meetings regarding various pieces of literature, as well as occasionally assist students with writing.

   • Heumann: Canh, Stephanie, Cindy, Marcie, Tricia, Cristina

   • Stuart: Denise, Debbie, Barbara, Meagan, Moira,

3. Writing Coaches and Essay Readers: This is a new thing for this year, and it consists of group of parents who are willing to read students written pieces and meet with them to offer feedback, editing, and coaching. They can do the work anytime, in a pull-out scenario once every one or two weeks to meet with the of kids. I'm hoping that they can work with the same group of about 6 kids for a semester, then rotate. The students will be writing essays almost every week, so there will be a great deal of material to use to facilitate improvement in their writing. I will have a tray on my desk that says "Writing Coaches" on it. What could be more valuable to a student than a 1:1 coach? I have high hopes for this process. Debby Nelson, Roseanne Smith, Mitch Aronen, Stephanie Bainbridge.

4. Tech Team: 2 parents who help me to update website lists, organize student websites, and create various online activities. Obviously a moderate (but not necessarily advanced) level of tech/web familiarity is preferable. They can also do some work from home, but meeting with me, perhaps during my prep, would be most efficient.

Classroom help at a glance:

September 2010: