Mississippi Bend AEA Media Montage

During a meeting last week, we were encouraged to share our personal or professional goals for 2022. I waited to the end as I needed to synthesize many small goals. I landed on the word enjoy. I want to soak in the good both personally and professionally. To do this, I reflected on how necessary it is for me to focus on the positive and the task at hand, feel emotions, forgive myself, and fail forward. Making these actionable is not as easy as typing them. I believe one of the pandemic benefits is the emphasis on self-care. I challenge you to set a goal related to your social and emotional health, and most importantly, make it actionable.

Tara Meyer Robson nailed it with her quote. The majority of this newsletter provides resources or avenues to empower students, educators, and families with social-emotional health. I encourage you to reach out anytime. Here is to a fabulous 2022!

After learning about this resource at the counselor academy, the secondary counselors were excited about all the potentials. The broad scope and up-to-date information around health and wellness offer many applications:

• Resource for an individual seeking up-to-date and reliable information
• Lesson planning support - Incorporates literature, video, student stories, myths, glossary, and resources for further learning and includes standard alignment for health, physical education, language arts, science, and social-emotional learning.
• A platform for student's voice
• Resource for families and community members

Features Include:

• Instant translation into 90 languages
• Text-to-speech supports challenged readers and ELLs
• FREE Teen Hotlines mobile app for iPad, iPhone, and Android tablets Personal Story Project
• Iowa hotlines for local community resources

Please share with your health, PE, and counselor. During the afternoon session of the Media Academy on Jan. 31st, there will be an optional 45-minute session to walk participants through this excellent resource! If teachers desire a personalized tour, reach out to me to arrange it.

Meet the moment with Rosen's "care package" for YOU, your students, and colleagues.

As part of the Teen Health and Wellness community, you have ready access to the Calm Room. The room began to buzz during counselor academy when looking at the puppy playroom in the nature and animal cams area. Some mentioned having the live cams on in the cafeteria or counseling areas.

The Calm Room is a place for anyone feeling overwhelmed or needing to take a break as it can help relax, de-stress, and refocus.

Calm Room Features:

• Visual Relaxation
• Sound and Music
• Nature and Animals Cams

Please share this with staff, families, and students to support them through these trying times. Look for a flyer coming soon.

Teen Health and Wellness allows students to share experiences, provides an authentic learning opportunity, and meets curriculum standards.

Student Video Challenge

• Lesson plan created by Ruth Thoresen from Johnston Community Schools
• Includes Soundzabound royalty-free tracts; others are available on the Soundzabound database

Personal Story Project:

• Guidelines
• Editing and writing for publication

Design Innovative Robots with LEGO SPIKE Prime: Seven creative STEM robotic designs to challenge your mind
by Aaron Maurer

What you will learn

• Discover how the LEGO SPIKE Prime kit works, and explore its parts and the elements inside them
• Build and design robots that go beyond basic robotic designs
• Create interactive robots with the help of sensors
• Explore real-world robots and learn how to build them by yourself
• Find out challenging ways to remix build ideas with your imagination and skills
• Develop coding skills using the Scratch programming interface

Reach out to administration if interested in this opportunity.

The Department of Education is seeking applications for 2021-22 grants for the Computer Science Professional Development Incentive Fund (CSPDIF) from school districts, accredited nonpublic schools, AEAs and collaboratives. The funds will assist with implementing a 2020 state law that requires high schools to offer computer science instruction starting July 1, 2022, and middle and elementary schools to provide computer science starting July 1, 2023.

The Computer Science Professional Development Incentive Fund will provide $500,000 for the 2021-22 school year. A portion of the $500,000 will be designated for teachers to earn computer science endorsements and a portion will be designated for proven computer science professional development.

Effective January 2022, the endorsement portion of funding may cover the Computer Science endorsement as well as the 5-12 CTE Information Technology endorsement. Educators receiving the 5-12 CTE Information Technology endorsement may also apply for the Computer Science endorsement through the Board of Educational Examiners.

Grant applications for the Computer Science Professional Development Incentive Fund are due February 11, 2022. More details about the application and timelines are available on this web page.

Are you looking to purchase or update items in your makerspace area? Mackin compiled a list of their top-selling products for 2021. This is not an endorsement to purchase through Mackin; rather, it is an opportunity to evaluate the latest trends to support purchasing.

• Terrapin Bee-Bot
• Ozobot Evo Educator Entry Kit
• Strawbees STEM Starter Kit
• Makey Makey Classic Kit
• Buddha Board Original Board
• Wonder Workshop Dash Robot
• Lego Education BricQ Motion Essential Set
• KEVA Deluxe Brain Builder

On January 14th, Governor Kim Reynolds will sign the official proclamation declaring January as the official prevention month for our state. On my way to work, I listened to a guest speaker on talk radio that discussed ways to help end this awful practice. Along with multiple news articles, she stated that the FBI has been tracking statistics about online predators and their actions and believe there are more than 500,000 online predators active each day. And to make matters worse, they have multiple online profiles.

So how can educators help? Continue integrating digital and information literacy into lessons. She encouraged us to help children understand that not everything online is true. Teach them how to evaluate sources. Remind students to reach out to people they know and trust and be aware. By teaching best practices with information literacy and safety, we are being proactive.

• Teen Health & Wellness Resource
• FBI- Protecting Your Kids

An elementary counselor shared that she regularly uses Pear Deck with individual or small group sessions. It provides a safe and private way to collect feelings and thoughts as not all students are able or desire to share their feelings orally. Are you seeking new ways to integrate SEL into presentations? Check out these free SEL templates.

Pear Deck has offered some great webinars this month. Registration, recordings, and resources are available here. I encourage you to listen to the webinars to discover new ways to enhance best practices.

All districts have access to the premium version of Pear Deck courtesy of the Iowa AEAs. When ready to launch a lesson, login to Peardeck using Google or Microsoft login. Are you just beginning to explore the tool? No worries, use Pear Deck support or reach out to me.

Librarians value literature almost as much as breathing. Maybe I exaggerated a bit, but it is probably close. There is magic in a great book! When collaborating with educators or communicating through newsletters, encourage literature to connect students and support social-emotional health.

• Confirm how well young people are interacting and reveal an increased connection to self
• Expose the rich alchemy of an effective program's influence on self-awareness, skill-building, and interpersonal development.
• Illustrates trauma, poverty, violence, racism, sexism, homophobia, marginalization, new opportunities, and any variety of historical and current forces that overwhelm or uplift participants
• Touch hearts
• Make a lasting impression and lingers in the soul
• Is fun
• Help build bridges among people
• A gentle and effective way to pass on lessons and values

Kibel, Barry, and Melinda Lackey. "Using Stories with Numbers to Reveal Social-Emotional Impact." Measuring SEL: Using Data to Inspire Practice, CASEL, 9 Jan. 2020, https://measuringsel.casel.org/using-stories-with-numbers-to-reveal-social-emotional-impact/.

Prince, Erica, Buckmire, Alexandria, and Christina Devonis. "Storytelling and Restorative Practices are Key to Social-Emotional Learning" Education Post: Better conversation. Better Education. 5 Mar. 2021. Education Post, https://educationpost.org/storytelling-and-restorative-practices-are-key-to-social-emotional-learning/. Accessed 4 Jan. 2022.

Strauss, Kevin. Story Solutions: Using Tales to Build Character and Teach Bully Prevention, Drug Prevention, and Conflict Resolution, Libraries Unlimited, 2011.

Just in! Here are the newly released IASL 22-23 order forms. With delays in printing and shipping, I encourage everyone to order by March 31st to guarantee availability and the free poster(s). Be on the lookout for an update on the IASL site to purchase spine labels, posters, or medallions for next year's books. I would also like to do a quick shout-out to Iowa AEA Purchasing as they work hard to secure the best pricing for schools and all the IASL committee members and volunteers who do the behind-the-scenes work.

The 21-22 Award winners are announced in April. Voting specifications and ballots are due April 1st. Nomination criteria are also available on the site. Encourage students to vote and nominate books.

• Goldfinch (K-3)
• Iowa Children's Choice (3-6)
• Iowa Teen Award (6-9)
• Iowa High School Book Award (9-12)

The Iowa Library Association, Iowa Association of School Librarians, and the State Library held a special joint session promoting intellectual freedom and supporting Iowa librarians in their efforts to provide library materials to their community on January 11th. Topics included a jointly-published resource list, sound policies and procedures to support teacher librarians and staff through challenges, and time discussing questions from the audience. Missed it? No worries, reach out to me for the recorded webinar link.

This same group is collaborating on another Intellectual Freedom program on March 9th. It will also be online throughout the day and include some day and evening offerings. If you have questions about this upcoming opportunity, please reach out to IASL members Michelle Kruse and Dianna Geers at iaslwebpage@gmail.com. Further information will follow.

Jewish synagogues in the Quad City area have consolidated, and space has become an issue. They are offering a wide variety of World War II and Holocaust resources to schools and other organizations.

Please share this information with your social studies teachers. All books and materials are free.

• 85-100 books, including reference guides, teacher instructional guides, historical timelines, biographies, non-fiction, and fiction. There are approximately six sets with multiple copies that can be used in a classroom setting for instruction
• 35+ DVD’s – Mostly brand new, wrapping still on the container
  
  

Various furniture is available for reduced prices as well.

• Student Desks – Blue fabric seats – 9-15 chairs
• Pre-K-K Chairs – Yellow and Red – 18 total
• TV Stands – 6
• Older Student Desks
• GBC Image-Maker 2000 – Booklet maker hand machine with supplies
  

Reach out to Robin Kroloff with further questions.

rkroloff@netins.net

563-320-6468

Materials Location - Temple Emanuel 1115 Mississippi Avenue, Davenport

Join us for our authentic learning party with the fabulous Laura Williams this month. Discover and expand knowledge on how to provide authentic learning experiences for students while incorporating the universal constructs and resources from the Iowa Clearinghouse for Work-Based Learning.

Participants will have time to work through the PARTY template and their plan of action that they will turn in at the end of the course.

Next Dates:

• January 31, 2022
• March 28, 2022 - Digital Party

REVIEW SOME EXCELLENT FUTURE LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES

Professional Learning Registration System

AEA Learning Online - Employment-related training

Your login information is the same for both sites. If you don't remember your password, click Forgot Password at the bottom of the page. Have trouble with your username? It may be your personal email, not your school email.

Contact Us

staffdevelopment@aea9.k12.ia.us

JANUARY

National Mentoring Month
January 1- New Year’s Day

January 6- National Technology Day

January 9- National Law Enforcement Appreciation Day

January 17- Martin Luther King Jr. Day

Please email or call us at 563-344-6459 anytime for appointments, assistance with usernames/passwords or any other media related questions!

Check out all our services here! We are here to support you!

Email: hwhitman@mbaea.org
Website: https://www.mbaea.org/
Location: 729 21st Street, Bettendorf, IA, USA
Phone: 563-344-6526
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/missbend9/
Twitter: @MBAEA

The Mississippi Bend Area Education Agency does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, creed, gender identity, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, religion, age, socioeconomic status, or disability in its educational programs, services or employment practices. Inquiries concerning this statement should be addressed to Kim Hofmann, Equity Coordinator, at 563-344-6415.