Reach Higher Maine has developed this series of free webinars designed to help support school counselors in their work exposing students to career and college opportunities.

Each webinar is recorded and posted to our Google Classroom (join code 1bs991n) and available to counselors as an alternative professional development session for use during In Service Days at their school.  The Google Classroom also hosts handouts from sessions, a discussion forum and a way to request a certificate of completion to use for continuing education credit.  Note:  You will need to be logged into a Google email (@gmail.com) account to get access to the Google Classroom.

December’s Webinar: Overview & Preparation Tips for the NextGen Accuplacer

When:  December 15^th at 1:00 PM (recording will post to Google Classroom within 1 week after live session)

Description:  The Accuplacer has long been a viable testing alternative for many Maine students. The College Board has revised its entire suite of assessments, and the NextGen test will be here in Maine soon. This webinar will be a practical and succinct overview of NextGen and a discussion of how school counselors can prepare for these changes. We will also address how the colleges plan to help schools who used to have their own Accuplacer licenses test students and how the community colleges’ admission and placement policies will be shifting towards a statewide multiple measures approach.

 Presenter:  Mercedes Pour, State Director, Early College for ME, Maine Community College System

Register at:  https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/2084232428926025729

Upcoming webinars include:  Second Semester Seniors, Summer Options for Career & College, as well as Helping Career Bound Seniors

For more information please contact Reach Higher Maine at ReachHigherMaine@gmail.com

 

This is a reminder that the Maine Department of Education is sponsoring a workshop addressing Purposeful Integration of Technology in Mathematics for new and experienced math educators at Keeley’s Banquet Center on 178 Warren Ave in Portland on September 21, 8:30am – 3:30pm and at Jeff’s Catering, located at 15 Littlefield Rd. in Brewer on September 22, 8:30am – 3:30pm.

The workshop will consist of two all-day sessions, grades K-5 and grades 6-12.   Pam Buffington, PhD, and Peter Tierney-Fife from Education Development Center (EDC) will present sessions for K-5 with Jenn Vadnais, a representative from Desmos presenting for the 6-12.

Registration to attend the above sessions closes September 6^th, 2017. Please note, due to limited capacity, each district has the opportunity to register ONE representative to a K-5 session and ONE representative to a 6-12 session.  Districts are encouraged to sign up extra participants in the event there are seats available. A notice will go out on September 7^th, 2017 to confirm attendance to the workshop.   Educators interested in registering should utilize the appropriate registration link below:

Thursday, September 21, 2017
Keeley’s Banquet Center,
178 Warren Ave,
Portland, ME 04103

Grades K-5 Registration 

Grades 6-12Registration

Friday, September 22, 2017
Jeff’s Catering and Event Center
15 Littlefield Rd,
Brewer, ME 04401

Grades K-5 Registration

Grades 6-12 Registration

Further questions should be directed to Daniel Weeks, Title V Coordinator at Daniel.R.Weeks@maine.gov or (207) 624-6749.

Further information regarding session content and presenters is provided below.

Pam Buffington, PhD, is an education researcher and practitioner who specializes in technology integration in mathematics and science instruction. During a 35-year career, she has provided critical guidance to states, local education agencies, teachers, and administrators in investigating and implementing strategies to improve students’ learning outcomes.

Pam has been at the forefront of the classroom technology integration movement in New England and more broadly. She has led partnerships with both rural and urban school districts to improve student mathematics learning through the integration of interactive mobile technologies and has worked to expand access to high-quality virtual manipulatives and mathematics simulations. She also works to support researcher-practitioner partnerships, with an eye towards using evidence-based strategies to improve student outcomes in mathematics.

Peter Tierney-Fife works primarily on mathematics professional development and research projects. His expertise includes professional development materials creation and technical work such as applet and database development. He loves collaborating with teachers to improve student experiences with mathematics. His current projects focus on the areas of technology integration in mathematics and professional development for mathematics teachers with diverse student populations, including students who are English learners. Prior to working at EDC Peter taught middle school mathematics, was a Field Researcher for a technology-infused mathematics professional development research project, and was a carpenter and furniture maker.

Jenn Vadnais started out teaching in the Bath-Brunswick area.  For her first year, she taught geometry at Morse High School in Bath and then spent 15 years teaching 8th grade at Brunswick Junior High School.  In the summer of 2009, she relocated to Southern California with her family where she was hired as a 7th grade math teacher for Redlands Unified School District. In 2014, Jenn stepped out the classroom to become a Middle Level Math Coach for RedlandsUSD. During her time as a math coach, she was introduced to Desmos and was accepted into the first Desmos Fellow Cohort in 2016 and became a Desmos Certified Presenter in 2017.  About the same time, Jenn switched positions to join her district’s brand new Instructional Technology Department as a k-12 Instructional Technology Coach.

K-5 Session Details:

During this session you will learn meaningful technology integration strategies and about digital tools for improving grades K-5 mathematics learning and teaching. Example tasks and related resources will concentrate on numeracy and the Standards for Mathematical Practices (particularly MP3, MP4, and MP5) aligned with the Maine’s College and Career Readiness Standards. We will focus on improving student mathematical communication and discourse while using digital devices in rich, open, problem-solving contexts. You will learn about interactive apps and Web sites with information and strategies, engage in the use of open tasks with the interactive apps, and reflect on and discuss the use of the digital tools and related resources. We will also discuss strategies and tools to manage student-created rich media artifacts such as screencasts and photos. You will leave with handouts and links to free digital resources suitable for use with students to enhance your classroom practice.

6-12 Session Details

Polygraph

Participants will experience how Desmos brings joy to vocabulary development through Polygraph. The focus of connecting informal and formal language will be discussed.

Level up your calculator skills

1. Awesome Graphs. See what’s possible in the Desmos graphing calculator by exploring this collection of course-specific graphs for Grades 6-12.
2. Desmos Calculator Scavenger Hunt. Level up your Desmos graphing skills by working through a series of beginner, intermediate, and advanced graphing challenges.

Activity Builder Lesson

The Activity Builder platform allows students to interact with, explore, reflect on and write about math.  Participants will experience Desmos’ Activity Builder, including the Classroom Conversation Toolkit, as a student by diving into a rich mathematical situation. The Toolkit includes three features: Pause Activity, Anonymize and Teacher Pacing.

Marbleslides

Participants will explore the connections between equations and graphs with Desmos’ Marbleslides activities.

Getting Started

Participants will set up a teacher.desmos.com account, turn on the lab feature which activates the Marbleslides and Card Sort options as well as, learn how to search, bookmark and edit premade activities.

Depending on time …

Introduction to Creating an Activity Builder

Participants will learn the basics of creating their own Activity Builder.

 

Earlier this month, educators from around the state completed the six week graduate course, Introduction to Dyslexia. The course was offered through a partnership between the Maine Department of Education’s (DOE) Office of Special Services and the University of Maine at Farmington (UMF).

The online and in-class course introduced educators to current research in cognitive neuroscience and evidence- based teaching practices and how the two may interact to help children with dyslexia.

The class learned the benefits of early identification of students at-risk for reading failure. Through early screening, dyslexia can be predicted and the severity can be reduced using evidence-based intervention. Appropriate intervention brings the majority of at-risk children to grade-level reading levels. Presently, it cannot be predicted which children will respond to intervention. Additionally, early intervention reduces the risk of the difficult-to-remediate fluency deficit that often emerges in 4^th grade.

After being introduced to concepts regarding the neuroscience of reading, the class took part in 3 full-day workshops to learn practical classroom techniques that work well for all learners.

The course was taught by Lisa Whitis, MEd, JD who serves as the Dyslexia Coordinator at the Maine DOE. Contact Ms. Whitis at Lisa.Whitis@Maine.Gov to discuss professional development opportunities for your district or technical assistance for issues regarding dyslexia.

The Maine Department of Education is sponsoring a workshop addressing Purposeful Integration of Technology in Mathematics for new and experienced math educators at Keeley’s Banquet Center on 178 Warren Ave in Portland on September 21, 8:30am – 3:30pm and at Jeff’s Catering, located at 15 Littlefield Rd. in Brewer on September 22, 8:30am – 3:30pm.

The workshop will consist of two all-day sessions, grades K-5 and grades 6-12. Pam Buffington, PhD, and Peter Tierney-Fife from Education Development Center (EDC) will present sessions for K-5 with Jenn Vadnais, a representative from Desmos presenting for the 6-12.

Registration to attend the above sessions closes September 6^th, 2017. Please note, due to limited capacity, each district has the opportunity to register only ONE representative to a K-5 session and ONE representative to a 6-12 session. Educators interested in registering should utilize the appropriate registration link below:

Thursday, September 21, 2017

Keeley’s Banquet Center

178 Warren Ave,

Portland, ME 04103

Grades K-5 Registration

Grades 6-12Registration

Friday, September 22, 2017

Jeff’s Catering and Event Center

15 Littlefield Rd,

Brewer, ME 04401

Grades K-5 Registration

Grades 6-12 Registration

Further questions should be directed to Daniel Weeks, Title V Coordinator at Daniel.R.Weeks@maine.gov or (207) 624-6749.

Further information regarding session content and presenters is provided below.

Pam Buffington, PhD, is an education researcher and practitioner who specializes in technology integration in mathematics and science instruction. During a 35-year career, she has provided critical guidance to states, local education agencies, teachers, and administrators in investigating and implementing strategies to improve students’ learning outcomes.

Pam has been at the forefront of the classroom technology integration movement in New England and more broadly. She has led partnerships with both rural and urban school districts to improve student mathematics learning through the integration of interactive mobile technologies and has worked to expand access to high-quality virtual manipulatives and mathematics simulations. She also works to support researcher-practitioner partnerships, with an eye towards using evidence-based strategies to improve student outcomes in mathematics.

Peter Tierney-Fife works primarily on mathematics professional development and research projects. His expertise includes professional development materials creation and technical work such as applet and database development. He loves collaborating with teachers to improve student experiences with mathematics. His current projects focus on the areas of technology integration in mathematics and professional development for mathematics teachers with diverse student populations, including students who are English learners. Prior to working at EDC Peter taught middle school mathematics, was a Field Researcher for a technology-infused mathematics professional development research project, and was a carpenter and furniture maker.

Jenn Vadnais started out teaching in the Bath-Brunswick area. For her first year, she taught geometry at Morse High School in Bath and then spent 15 years teaching 8th grade at Brunswick Junior High School. In the summer of 2009, she relocated to Southern California with her family where she was hired as a 7th grade math teacher for Redlands Unified School District. In 2014, Jenn stepped out the classroom to become a Middle Level Math Coach for RedlandsUSD. During her time as a math coach, she was introduced to Desmos and was accepted into the first Desmos Fellow Cohort in 2016 and became a Desmos Certified Presenter in 2017. About the same time, Jenn switched positions to join her district’s brand new Instructional Technology Department as a k-12 Instructional Technology Coach.

K-5 Session Details:

During this session you will learn meaningful technology integration strategies and about digital tools for improving grades K-5 mathematics learning and teaching. Example tasks and related resources will concentrate on numeracy and the Standards for Mathematical Practices (particularly MP3, MP4, and MP5) aligned with the Maine’s College and Career Readiness Standards. We will focus on improving student mathematical communication and discourse while using digital devices in rich, open, problem-solving contexts. You will learn about interactive apps and Web sites with information and strategies, engage in the use of open tasks with the interactive apps, and reflect on and discuss the use of the digital tools and related resources. We will also discuss strategies and tools to manage student-created rich media artifacts such as screencasts and photos. You will leave with handouts and links to free digital resources suitable for use with students to enhance your classroom practice.

6-12 Session Details

Polygraph

Participants will experience how Desmos brings joy to vocabulary development through Polygraph. The focus of connecting informal and formal language will be discussed.

Level up your calculator skills

1. Awesome Graphs. See what’s possible in the Desmos graphing calculator by exploring this collection of course-specific graphs for Grades 6-12.
2. Desmos Calculator Scavenger Hunt. Level up your Desmos graphing skills by working through a series of beginner, intermediate, and advanced graphing challenges.

Activity Builder Lesson

The Activity Builder platform allows students to interact with, explore, reflect on and write about math. Participants will experience Desmos’ Activity Builder, including the Classroom Conversation Toolkit, as a student by diving into a rich mathematical situation. The Toolkit includes three features: Pause Activity, Anonymize and Teacher Pacing.

Marbleslides

Participants will explore the connections between equations and graphs with Desmos’ Marbleslides activities.

Getting Started

Participants will set up a teacher.desmos.com account, turn on the lab feature which activates the Marbleslides and Card Sort options as well as, learn how to search, bookmark and edit premade activities.

Depending on time …

Introduction to Creating an Activity Builder

Participants will learn the basics of creating their own Activity Builder.

If you hired a new nurse for your school over the summer be sure to encourage them to attend the New School Nurse Orientation on September 29th in Augusta.

New School Nurse Orientation is a specialized program designed to help nurses transition into the educational setting. Some of the topics included in day one will be: professional requirements, resources, overview of the School Health Manual, data reporting requirements for nurses, screening requirements and procedures as well as educational rules and laws. There will be two more days covering different topics for new School Nurses scheduled later in the school year.

When: September 29, 2017 8am – 3pm
Where: Augusta, ME Burton Cross Office Building
Cost: FREE
How to register: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/NewSchoolNurseOrientation1

If you have any questions please contact Emily Poland, RN, School Nurse Consultant for the Maine Department of Education at 207-624-6688 or Emily.poland@maine.gov.

The Maine Department of Education will sponsor a mentoring workshop for new and experienced gifted and talented (GT) educators at the Division of Transportation (DOT) Building on 66 Industrial Drive in Augusta on September 14, 9am-3pm.

Workshop topics include: reviewing this year’s renewal application process, exploring identification tools, discussing curriculum options aligned with regular education initiatives, organizing and managing GT programs, evaluating program effectiveness, and discussing budget concerns.

The morning will consist of a workshop designed for teachers and administrators who are looking for information regarding this year’s renewal application process. The workshop will also provide a forum to discuss GT programming.

Depending on the needs of the participants, in the afternoon, attendees will be broken into two groups. One group will be educators who are fairly new to the field. They will continue their in-depth discussions on the topics listed above. The second group will be educators who have been in the GT field for a longer period and may have far–reaching concerns and challenges. The mediator of this group, Lee Worcester PhD, asks that the advanced GT educators suggest a topic for the afternoon session by September 7 at lee.worcester@yahoo.com or 943-8804.

To register by September 10th at: http://events.egov.com/eventreg/ME/event.htm?name=giftedtalentedmentoringworkshopfall2017. Due to the location, lunch and refreshments will not be provided.

For any questions regarding the workshop, contact Educational Consultants: Lee Worcester at lee.worcester@yahoo.com or Patti Drapeau at ptdrapeau@aol.com.

The Maine Department of Education (DOE) will be offering training sessions for superintendents and support system chairs to learn the new online certification system this spring and summer (online training for educators will also be available later this summer).

At each training session participants can expect to learn how to log in, navigate the system, approve educator certifications, and manage their own certification. Participants will need to bring a lap top.

Training dates, times and locations are as follows:

June 19, 2017
8:30am – 12:00pm
University of Maine at Augusta, Jewett Hall, RM 190

June 20, 2017
1:00pm – 4:30pm
University of Maine at Augusta, Jewett Hall, RM 190

July 26, 2017
8:30am – 12:00pm
University of Maine at Orono, Donald P. Corbett Business Building, RM 100

July 27, 2017
1:00pm – 4:30pm
University of Maine at Orono, Donald P. Corbett Business Building, RM 100

Please RSVP to Brenda Vigue at brenda.vigue@maine.gov or (207) 624-6852.