Middle School Teacher Expectations

Middle School Specific Homeroom Duties

We've talked briefly about homeroom already but there are a few nuances specific to being a middle school homeroom teacher. The biggest expectation is to be available to students and their families to answer questions (and probably the same question multiple times). Review the specific areas below and let your Middle School Department Chair know if you have any questions.

Your list of homeroom students is available on the Student Information Sheet and in the SIS. Accessing this information is covered in the next sections of training.

Homeroom Meetings & Outreach

Teachers meet daily (except Wednesdays) with students for a group homeroom meeting we call Morning Roll Call. While students might not attend every one of these sessions, you must have at least one point of synchronous contact with every homeroom parent and student (this is a requirement of the family) each week. This meeting can be a part of Morning Roll Call, or can be an individual meeting. Students not meeting progress and attendance requirements will need more frequent individual meetings. Meetings should take place in your Zoom room with both the teacher and student on webcam. If a student is not attending your Zoom sessions a phone call can count as a homeroom meeting, but should not be the norm. It is important that we routinely "see" students via Zoom so we can ensure their health and well being. A student may turn on the camera, wave at you, and then turn it off to meet the minimum video requirements.

During these meetings you will review with the student their progress, grades, attendance and activity logs. This is also a good time to ask students how they are doing on a personal level and invite them to share events going on in their lives. This will help you build relationships and get students to open up.

It is also good practice to send a weekly homeroom email update/newsletter to students and parents. Information should include upcoming school activities and reminders, grades and progress for all classes, fitness log reminders, and any other information the parent and student needs for the week. It is helpful to include reflection questions for students to respond to as a way to build responsibility for reviewing their learning and progress.

Find a communication system (phone, text, email, live session room) that works best for you and the parent, but make sure you are picking up the phone and calling struggling students right away. There should be multiple forms of contact made to students who are difficult to reach to show that every attempt is being made to connect with the student and their family. Please also be mindful about setting professional boundaries. You are not expected to be available to families on weekends or after school hours. We'll cover more about communication in the SIS training coming up.

Progress Monitoring

As the homeroom teacher you are responsible for monitoring your homeroom students' grades and progress in all classes. You will use the dashboard in Edgenuity to help you keep track of student performance. Support student success by helping students reach out to their content teachers for tutoring and reviewing how to navigate their courses. Content teachers are relying on you to keep students informed about their progress.

If you notice a student is struggling, please reach out to the content teacher(s) and see what supports can be used to help the student improve. It is a team effort to get students to succeed and often times building up foundational study skills can make the difference in improvement.

Progress Report Templates are available in the Middle School Teacher Resource Folder.

Parent Portal Accounts

Please set-up parent portals for all of your students. This can be done the first week of school so you do not need to do it right now.

• • The first document is directions on how to set-up the parent portal accounts for your HR students.

  • The second document is a template email you can use to send their activation codes and explain how the parent portal works.

  • The last document is a parent guide that you can attach to your email.

Mail merge is a great way to quickly send your activation codes! You can enter all of your codes into an excel document and then mail merge them. If you need a reminder about how to mail merge, look at the "Email" portion of this training.

Middle School Specific Content Duties

While you will be working with students as their homeroom teacher, there are also specific content duties that guide instruction delivery and engagement.

Familiarize Yourself with the Curriuclum & Learning Management System

Middle School students use Edgenuity curriculum in the content areas of English Language Arts, Mathematics, Science, Social Science and Physical Education. Each content area covers 36 weeks of material, divided into Modules or Units and is aligned to the California Common Core Standards. Checklists, assignment calendars and pacing guides are provided as a resource.

Live Sessions

Every Wednesday you will host a one 1 hour live class meeting for each class you teach, followed by a 30 minute support session in your Zoom room. Middle School teachers use Google Classroom to provide supplemental materials to their students for live sessions. This is also where they record live session attendance. Make sure to create a live session environment that builds student confidence to share.

The Middle School Live Session Schedule is as follows:

9am Math 7

9am Social Studies 8

10:30am Math 8

10:30am Social Studies 7

12:30pm Language Arts 7

12:30pm Science 8

2:00pm Language Arts 8

2:00pm Science 7

All sessions need to be recorded and recordings posted in your Google Classroom. You will also record student attendance and participation on the live session grade sheet (see resources). These grades will be added to the live session assignment section in the Edgenuity gradebook. Information on how to use your live session room is covered in the Zoom training later on.

Students may miss and make up 2 live sessions each semester. If a student has outside engagements, such as sports or routine acting lessons, that get in the way of attending your session a live session accommodation may be available. If you have a student that falls into this category please notify the assistant principal for approval. Students with live session accommodations will still need to make up missed sessions by watching the recording and completing any session assignments.

Middle School Department Duties

"We're not just a department, we're a family!"

As part of the middle school team you are expected to bring a positive attitude, be open to trying new things, and be willing to collaborate on ideas. Since we work so closely with our students as both their content and homeroom teachers it is easy to reach out to one another about individual student needs. Don't be afraid to communicate with your fellow teachers.

And please don't hesitate to share if something is not working for you. There is a lot of flexibility with our department and different approaches to instruction are encouraged. Just make sure students are coming first with any changes and that you let your DC know.

Department Meetings

We have department meetings monthly. It is important that you attend these meetings for updates and to participate in discussions on how to better support student success. Calendar invites will be sent for scheduled meetings. We will set our meeting times together during our first meeting before school starts.

Department Tasks

Make sure to notify your department chair when school wide and department specific tasks have been completed. This includes updating live session and PE log grades, entering final grades, etc.

K-8 Assemblies

The middle school team hosts varies middle school only activities and assemblies for students and parents. You are encouraged to volunteer to support these activities. More information will be provided in department meetings.