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Welcome to the NC Ready Schools Learning
Community. This e-Newsletter has been
developed by The North Carolina Partnership for
Children, Inc. to keep you
informed regarding the Ready Schools
Initiative in North Carolina and across the
country. Please feel free to forward it on
to others or email kmccrimon@ncsmartstart.org to
add other names to the email list. We welcome your
input and
feedback. |
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North Carolina Partnership
for Children receives Ready Schools
grant |
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The North Carolina Partnership for Children
was awarded a grant from the W. K. Kellogg
foundation to support the N.C. Ready Schools
Initiative. The funds will be used for the
development of a Ready Schools toolkit, new ready
schools incentive grants to communities across the
state and technical assistance to ready schools
communities. More information will be forth
coming.
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The North Carolina Department
of Public Instruction moves forward with
Ready Schools |
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The Prek-5 Council of the NC Department of
Public Instruction (DPI) has begun working on an
action plan for implementing Ready Schools across
North Carolina. They have established work
subcommittees to work on such issues as leadership
development, prek-3 education continuum,
integration and alignment between preschool
programs and policies and the K-3 system, best
practices, professional development, and public
awareness and engagement, among others. The
Council will be exploring existing resources
within DPI and external partners to promote ready
schools and offer technical assistance to help
move the initiative
forward.
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Ready Schools: Supporting
Pre-K Transitions Using a Community
Approach |
In collaboration with the Department of
Public Instruction, The North Carolina Partnership
for Children, Inc. has created a document to help
communities utilize effective transition
strategies between the early education and K-3
systems. Ready Schools: Supporting
Pre-K Transitions Using a Community
Approach provides strategies that
link each of the transition points to address
the needs of the child, family, school and
community. Preliminary studies suggest that
the more transition activities a child and family
have been involved in prior to kindergarten entry,
the better prepared the child is for
school. Click here
to read the
document. |
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Professional Learning
Communities |
Richard DuFour, one of the national
leaders in Professional Learning Communities
(PLCs) wrote a short paper:
What is a Professional Learning
Community? In the paper he explains the
basic concepts of Professional Learning
Communities. Click here
to read the article. NC Ready Schools
believes that PLCs are an excellent way to
promote student achievement through collaboration
focused on student learning. PLCs are
consistent with the team approach promoted through
Ready Schools to plan and design improved
teaching, learning, and school structures; provide
continued professional learning for
staff; and promote professionalism and
critical staff input.
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Ladders of Learning fighting
fade-out by advancing PK-3 alignment |
The Early Childhood Initiative through the
New America Foundation prepared an issue brief
discussing Pre-K fade-out. This article
acknowledges that pre-k fade-out does
exist sometimes appearing as early as the
spring of first grade. However, the article
then highlights effective strategies for
addressing fade-out. Click here
to read the entire issue
brief. |
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What Works Clearinghouse
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The US Department of Education's
Doing What Works website ( http://dww.ed.gov/) has a
collection of researched-based tools for
teachers. Some of the items found on
the website include an analysis of
curricula and
practical classroom teacher applications
like how to use data systems to improve
instruction or ways to promote
positive student behaviors. This
website serves as a resource for educators wishing
to implement research based practices. The
titles listed below are a small
representation of the types of information
educators will find on this site. |
A Spotlight on the Ready
Schools
Pathways
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Ready Schools Pathway # 3-
Leadership |
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North Carolina will be sending a team of 10
people to the PK-3 Conference at
Harvard. The team will comprise of
school principals, local Smart Start
partnerships, Ready Schools Consultants, and staff
from the Office of School Readiness and
Department of Public Instruction. Some of the
topics for discussion during the
conference include how to ensure that
the PK-3 structure will
- Provide services to English Language
Learners
- Integrate and align pre-k to third grade
components horizontally
- Integrate and align pre-k to third grade
components vertically
- Promote parent engagement
- Promote community engagement
- Build district and community level buy-in
and leadership
- Use data driven language and literacy
instruction
This conference will provide valuable resources
for the Ready Schools Initiative. Through
the attendance and participation at the
conference the group will hopefully obtain
the knowledge necessary to be able to help
shape policies surrounding Ready Schools and
the PK-3 alignment here in North
Carolina. |
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Ready School Pathway #4-
Connections to Early Care and Education and Across
Grades |
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The US Department of Education's Office of
Educational Research and Improvement sponsored a
study outlining the public school's role
in early childhood. The
research paper was called School
Involvement in Early Childhood. The
paper explores the following questions:
- Why should schools be involved?
- What is the schools role?
- What constitutes the schools involvement?
- What challenges do schools face?
- What are the key issues for professional
development?
To read the complete paper click on the link. |
Professional
Development/
Trainings/Conferences
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High/Scope Ready Schools
Assessment Training |
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In response to many requests for training on
the High/Scope Ready Schools Assessment Tool, we
have scheduled a one-day training in Rocky
Mount. (A similar training was held in Hickory,
in mid-October.) This training will
provide a good overview of the High/Scope tool,
proven effective strategies for the use of the
tool, how to best gather and use the data, use of
the Online Profiler, etc.
Training Date:
November 19th from 10:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m.
in Rocky
Mount
Who should
attend? This training is for those
counties and school systems that are considering
and/or are launching a ready schools initiative.
Attendees should include school system or local
partnership staff that will be involved in the
ready schools assessment process for your
region.
Participation is limited to no more than 50
persons! Email kmccrimon@ncsmartstart.org ASAP
by November 10 to reserve a
space!! Cost?
Other than your travel costs, there is no cost to
attend this training. Lunch will be provided to
all participants. We hope your county
will be able to participate in this important
training. Please include in your RSVP the
following
information. Name Title Organization Address City/State/Zip Phone Email
Address |
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Mark your calendar
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If you would like to have your local
ready schools activities featured in the
e-newsletter or you have a conference you would
like to be included, please e-mail kmccrimon@ncsmartstart.org.
Sincerely,
Kirsten McCrimon
The
North Carolina Partnership for Children, Inc.
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