WARWICK PUBLIC
SCHOOLS
NEWSLETTER
Spring 2007
Vol. 10 No. 1
SUPERINTENDENT’S
MESSAGE
I want to
take this opportunity to thank the students, parents, and citizens of this great
city for allowing me to lead this school system into the 21st
Century. The teachers and
administrators have provided an excellent education frequently reflected in our
outstanding test scores as well as the numerous awards won by our students and
teachers.
A good school system does not occur by accident but rather by support
from all segments of our city. This
includes both the political and economic interests that value the results of a
good school system as the cornerstone of future growth in the city. Future parent support of this school
system is essential and must be reflected in a partnership that will allow
parents to be an extension of the classroom. This can be accomplished by your
continued involvement in school curricular and school
programs.
I am confident that the new
Superintendent will continue the academic success of this district and bring the
schools to ever greater heights.
I wish you much success and happiness in the years
ahead!
Robert J.
Shapiro,
Superintendent of
Schools
The word “literacy” is a frequent subject of discussion among members of
the Warwick School Committee, school administration, and teachers alike. Usually literacy is discussed within the
context of how we, as a school district, can ensure that all of our students
possess the ability to read and write so as to succeed not only in school, but
also in life after graduation as well.
Obviously, as with any other ability, there exist different levels of
prowess associated with literacy.
Our goal as a school district must not be so basic so
as to make sure each student can merely read and write. Comprehension of what one has read, and
articulation of thoughts and ideas are necessary components of literacy as
well.
The educational path upon which I embarked lead
me through both college and law school.
Success at the graduate and post-graduate levels was not merely the
product of hard work. Instead, the
ability to read and write, which were instilled in me at a very young age,
provided the foundation upon which success was based. Particularly, as it pertained to my
studies in law school, it was not enough simply to know how to read. The ability to comprehend and understand
what one has read is necessary as well.
Likewise, it was not enough simply to be able to write. The ability to succinctly and
articulately express one’s thoughts and ideas is likewise essential. Effective communication does not
terminate at the completion of one’s studies. There is a continuing need to possess
these abilities in whatever job or profession you may embark.
We, as a school district, must continue to focus on literacy until such
time as each and every student graduating from our schools possess the ability
to read and write to the level necessary to guarantee success at the collegiate
level and beyond.
Christopher E. Friel,
DEPARTMENT OF CURRICULUM,
INSTRUCTION, AND PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
The curriculum department has been
hard at work this year developing standards-based curriculum to improve student
achievement. During the 2006-07
year, curriculum was developed for K-12 Health, K-12 Physical Education, K-12
Visual Arts, K-12 Music, Junior High School Social Studies, and 7-12 English
Language Arts. The documents are
being brought to the school committee for approval and will be implemented in
the 2007-08 school year.
In addition to curriculum, the
department developed course proficiencies in math and science for grades
7-11. The purpose of the
proficiencies is to determine if students are “literate” in their subject
matter. In other words, do they
understand and can they apply the skills and concepts that have been
taught. This is new to
Students in grades 7-11 will be
using a new math book next year.
Following a year-long pilot, the school committee approved the purchase
of new math textbooks. One of the
components of this series is that students may use an online copy of the text at
home. This means that students will
not have to carry the heavy text home every night. We have rights to the online version for
the next six years.
At the elementary level, a new
standards-based report card is under construction. Teachers from every grade level along
with principals are working on this project. Once completed, students in grades K-6
will receive a report card specific to their grade level.
As a result of these initiatives,
students will be better prepared when they graduate.
Dr. Anne
Siesel,
Curriculum Coordinator
TITLE 1 AND PARENTS AS
TEACHERS
The Parents as Teachers Program
was included in the Family Resource Room at the YMCA’s Healthy Kids Day on April
14. The informational booth was
visited by parents who received information on topics such as discipline, school
readiness, and reading to children, while their children created their own
bookmarks. The event was attended by more than 1500
people.
Parents as Teachers also received
a mini grant from the Warwick Coalition to Prevent Child Abuse for a nutrition
based parent workshop. Johnson and
Warwick Title I Program will hold
its annual End of the Year Celebration on Wednesday, May 30 at 7:00 PM at
Deborah Meiklejohn, Parent
Coordinator
Stephen Lowery, Coordinator
Grants/Title I
Shaping
Literacy
Literacy is lived and breathed on a daily basis in the English Language
Arts Department. Presently, teams
of administrators and teachers are revising curriculum to align to the Rhode
Island Grade Level and Grade Span Expectations. The expectations are meant to provide a
more detailed guide to implementing national literacy
standards.
Based on the Rhode Island Literacy Policy, pre-school and kindergarten
instruction must build knowledge of phonemic awareness, which is the ability to
work with individual sounds in spoken language; readers must utilize phonics,
using knowledge about the relationship between letters and their sounds;
instruction must include an emphasis on fluency, enabling students to read text
with smoothness and expression; vocabulary instruction should be an everyday
occurrence; comprehension strategies and text structures must be taught
explicitly; students must have opportunities to integrate oral and written
language; students must write for a variety of reasons in a variety of
genres.
Our teachers and administrators continue to discuss and refine the
teaching of literacy on a regular basis, and when parents support their child’s
literacy efforts as well, a dynamic formula for success is created! Thanks to all for a successful
year!
Kathleen
Desrosiers,
Supervisor of English Language Arts K-12
MATH AND
SCIENCE
The mathematics and science
disciplines have done a bit of work on improving literacy in our students. The mathematics teachers have focused on
having teachers improve the ability of their students to read problems and
respond to those problems both using mathematics correctly and explaining their
mathematical reasoning in clear and accurate English. This process has been aided by our
efforts at training teachers to look at student work through the use of NECAP
constructed response released items at the elementary level. In the secondary schools, the teachers
created common assessments at the end of the first semester. They used a rubric to score one extended
response item, which involved written explanations of their thought
processes. The science teachers
have done ongoing work on having students read for content at the secondary
level. This included sources from
current sources (science magazines, newspapers, online articles, etc.) as well
as the textbooks. Secondary
students were required to write expository pieces as well as persuasive
essays. At the elementary level,
teachers were involved in a process to select appropriately leveled readers to
supplement work done in the classroom as well as to introduce new topics.
Math and science are disciplines in which literacy plays a big part. Information is shared largely via print and electronic media. One of the very important skills we try to impart to our students is the ability to critically evaluate information readily available on the Internet. As this resource continues to expand, this skill will become increasingly important.
Ron
Poirier,
Math/Science Supervisor
ACHIEVEMENTS IN
A.L.A.P.
The Accelerated
Learning Activities Program (A.L.A.P.) has had a busy and exciting 06-07 school
year. Students in A.L.A.P. studied
the genre of mysteries during the first half of the school year; they also used
their creative abilities to develop and write their own mysteries. Some groups made their stories into
interactive mystery solving kits that will be shared with other groups as
culminating, end-of-year activities.
It was fun listening to other students' stories.
The fifth annual
3 through 6 to choose from over 30
workshops such as Chess, Theatre, The Human Brain, Reptiles and Amphibians and
Chemistry, to name a few. Teachers of these classes, who were
experts in their fields, represented organizations such as Trinity Repertory
Company, Roger Williams Park Zoo, and
In April, 2007, the
three ALAP teachers put together two special Activity Nights at Winman Junior High.
The evenings focused on the students' math research projects which
included research reports, tri-board visuals, and interactive activities for
parents and other students to try out.
The evenings were a great success!
Three ALAP students
gained notoriety on the state and national levels this year. Amalia Ross, grade 6, from
State-Wide Spelling Bee. Carly Bennett and Jake Bittle,
both sixth graders from Cedar Hill, were winners in the Rhode Island Council of
Teachers of English Writing Contest.
Carley received first place in the poetry
division for her poem called “Every Breath”. Jake was awarded third place for his
fictional piece titled “Water Drops”.
They attended an awards ceremony with their families hosted by
This year we are
pleased announce the expansion the ALAP program to include after school classes
in Latin! This unique opportunity
was offered to ALAP students in fifth and sixth grade. We offered our first 8 week Latin I
class in January and had so many interested students we had to develop a waiting
list! As this school year closes we have offered two Latin I classes and one
Latin II class. Next year we hope
to continue with these classes and add two more levels to the
program!
In closing, to our
dedicated supporter of A.L.A.P., Mr. Robert Shapiro, we will surely miss
you. You have come to all our
A.L.A.P., events large and small.
You realize how important A.L.A.P. has been to our students as many
students over the years have become published authors and winners of regional
and national competitions.
You have witnessed the
pride the students feel when their work is on display. We appreciate your
staunch support of our program, Mr. Shapiro. We wish you a happy and healthy
retirement, and we welcome you to attend all of our future
events.
Donna Fennessy, Lissa Scarpellino and
Thomas Hornstein,
A.L.A.P. Teachers
WARWICK PUBLIC SCHOOLS SPECIAL
SERVICES
The Special Service Division supports the
mission of the Warwick Public Schools by providing instructional and therapeutic
services to students who require assistance in meeting learner goals and
standards. The Special Services
Division accomplishes this by providing professional and classified staff,
developing teacher and parent training and by collaborating with all levels of
faculty in designing instructional programs to meet the individual needs of all
students.
Meeting the needs
of all students is a very challenging statement and covers a very wide range of
support whether it is academic, physical, emotional and especially environmental
with the most recent school tragedies.
Training was provided
by Dr. Ann Balboni, a nationally recognized authority
in the field of crisis intervention.
All the latest strategies and policies from the Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA) were included in the training and provide the
guidelines from the level of crisis intervention to “hot wash,” a procedure for
closure and feedback after a crisis intervention has been terminated.
A major component of
the crisis intervention has been the establishment of the “connect-ed “phone system.
This phone system has the capability for notifying the entire school
system, families, students, teachers and all other personnel in the school
system within minutes and all at the same time. The system also provides a report to the
number of successful calls, busy numbers and if there is no answer. The system
was successfully employed during the health crisis that was experienced by the
schools and their families in January.
This system has also been used by the superintendent to notify staff and
students of early and late openings of school due to inclement
weather.
By developing this
Emergency Response Team, the school system has also created a link between the
RI Department of Health and the RI department of Education in reporting health
incidents. All schools in RI will
be linked to this site to report these common incidents. An example of the inter city link
between the fire, police and schools was the mock incident that was conducted in
October of this year at Pilgrim High School, in which response team members were
called in to provide support for a simulated plane crash.
Richard D’Agostino, Ed.D
Director of Special
Services
TECHNOLOGY LITERACY
This year all administrators,
teachers, support staff and students in grades 9-11 have been introduced to our
new email and communication system called FirstClass.
Many schools have embraced the system and are using it to communicate in an
almost paperless environment.
We have also introduced an
automated call system, ConnectEd for informing parents
of events at each of our schools as well as Mr. Shapiro sending district wide
messages to parents and employees concerning issues. The three high schools are
now using the system to notify parents daily about their child’s
attendance.
Students in grades 9 and 10 along
with teachers of English, math and special education have been introduced to the
Rhode Island Electronic Portfolio System. Teachers post assignments for their
classes and students who then upload their completed work, to use as evidence in
showing proficiency for the new Proficiency Based Graduation
Requirements.
Denise Bilodeau, Technology Applications, Assessment
Coordinator
PHYSICAL EDUCATION
There has been a great deal of
progress made this past year. The physical education and health curriculum have
been completed and will be presented to the school committee in June for final
approval. Under the direction of Dr. Siesel and a dedicated committee, we were
able to develop two comprehensive instruments for our district. The curriculum
will be fully utilized beginning in the fall of 2007. Emphasis in our programs
will be placed on physical fitness and health wellness. This will be a district
goal next year and will be reflected in our District Action Plan. A great deal
of time and effort has gone into the strategy and planning for successful
achievement of these goals.
I am also happy to announce that we are in the planning stages of
building separate weight room facilities at all three high schools. The
recreation bond proposal for funding these facilities was passed in October,
2006. The weight rooms will be available to our gym classes, after school sports
teams and the general public. Many of the schools that we compete against
already have these facilities making competition unfair. These additions to our
high schools will allow for a more level field of competition for our athletes.
The facilities will also serve to enhance our District Action Plans which is to
improve the health and wellness of our students. A heavy emphasis has been
placed on physical fitness
Emo DiNitto,
Supervisor, Athletics, Health & Physical
Education
MUSIC EDUCATION
DEPARTMENT
This year the music department
focused on assessment. The faculty
work diligently creating ways to assess students across the system. Students participated in Rhode Island
Music Educators festivals that included all-state auditions, solo & ensemble
festival, band festival, jazz festival, senior division choral festival, and
elementary choral festival. These
festivals give the students and staff a chance to be compared with a standard
that is set at the state level.
Through this process, the department has had a chance to measure the
music literacy that is being taught in
To further develop the music
literacy, a committee was established to review and revise the curriculum. This committee of 12 music teachers
developed a document that will go before the School Committee at the end of this
year. This curriculum was developed
with the new “Proficiency by Graduation Requirements” as the standard. Starting in grade one and going through
grade 12, the students are challenged with a rigorous menu that will allow the
students to graduate with a proficiency in music that will meet the standards
establish by the R. I. Department of Education through its work with the Rhode
Island Arts Learning Network. The
music department looks forward to continuing this work in the future.
Allen
Tinkham,
Supervisor of
Music
VISUAL
ARTS
Student achievement
in the visual arts and visually literacy has been the focus of our program for
many years. During January, our
students in grades 7 - 12 participated in the Annual Rhode Island Scholastic Art
Awards.
During March, Youth
Art Month, we presented our Annual elementary and junior high school exhibition
at the Warwick Public Library. Over 200 outstanding artworks were exhibited from
all of our elementary and junior high schools.
During May we
presented the Annual All-City grades 1-12 Exhibition at
the Warwick Public Library. The concept of the exhibition this year was
Transformation, a concept that is explored in our visual arts curriculum. More
than 400 wonderful artworks were exhibited and we had a great opening reception
for our students, parents, teachers, administrators and school committee
members.
The visual arts
program is also revising our curriculum that will address the new graduation by
proficiency standards in the arts. Visual arts teachers at every level worked
throughout the year on the curriculum revision project that will be titled
P.A.C.E. 21, Project to Advance Creativity in Education - Visual Literacy in the
21st. Century.
Stephen Saunders, Supervisor
Visual Arts Education
Stephen P. Kirby, Principal
Throughout the 2006-2007 school
year, teachers have been “pulling best practices
together” by “Balancing Literacy” into their elementary classrooms. This model incorporates professional
development that allowed district training in, Harcourt, Empowering Writers,
6 Traits, Connie Prevatte, GLE’s, NECAP, and the RI Literacy Project. As a result of intensive training,
teachers have put ideas, practices, and visions into focus and have created
active Literacy classrooms of readers and writers. A goal targeted this year was
to improve and to increase student performance in
Ken Rassler, Principal
JOHN BROWN
FRANCIS
During the 2006-2007
school the faculty at John Brown Francis have been
working to improve the Literacy Curriculum.
The teachers have been
working with Literacy Coach, Lauren Wasserman and Reading Consultant, Kathy
Hayes.
The faculty has also
attended the following workshops:
Balanced Literacy, Empowering Writers, Differentiating Instruction, Kids
Writing’s Comprehension Took kit Training, The Rhode Island Reading Council
Conference, Patricia Cunningham’s conference on Reading Comprehension, Reading
Recovery Institute and Grade level meetings.
John Brown Francis has
been ranked as a high performing school by the RI State Department of Education
based upon the NECAP testing results.
Frank G. Ricci,
Principal
During the 2006 -
2007 school year, John Greene teachers attended literacy workshops including
Empowering Writers, Balanced Literacy and Comprehension
Toolkit.
In one perfect
example of purposeful writing, our 3rd grade students opened their hearts last
fall to the 1207th Transportation Company.
These brave men and women serving our country in
This spring brought
a renewed letter and card writing effort.
Sergeant Daniel Delayo, whose daughter is one
of our 3rd grade students, and all of the 1207th Transportation Company will
remember the letters and kindness for a long, long time.
Bonnie Robinson, Principal
During the past year,
Rosemary Hunter, Principal
Another exciting year is winding
down and what a busy one it’s been.
Our journey began with a great opening. The next stop was NECAP testing. For two weeks our students worked
diligently on them to do their best.
And they did!! We were, again, classified as a High Performing
school. Then we hit the holiday
season, with our Fall Festival and Haunted House that was huge success. We raced into Thanksgiving and then the
Christmas Holiday season with all the excitement little ones could show us. In January we all returned, rested and
ready to get back to work! Before
we knew it the second quarter closed and we were already halfway through the
school year. As the third quarter
got underway we prepared for our winter recess and returned to finish the
quarter. As the weather started to
change, we also saw changes in our students and all they had been learning. The teachers have worked so hard all
year, teaching, training, reading, learning, meeting and a myriad of other
duties! Now with the end of the
4th and final quarter approaching, we are reflective of all we have
done to make our students the best they can be.
A new summer is upon us, with
rest, relaxation, reading and a refreshing new look at the next group of little
ones who will sit in front of us in September anxiously awaiting us to work our
magic!!
Happy
summer!
Kathleen Adams, Principal
Our efforts this year have focused
on the literacy skills of reading and writing. Throughout the year our teachers have
worked with our district literacy coach and reading teacher to learn new
strategies to teach reading comprehension skills at all levels. Teachers have
also worked together to examine student writing in order to plan instruction
which will support greater student achievement in writing.
We will end our school year by
encouraging all students to participate in our annual “Summer Reading Program”.
The program will culminate with an awards program for all readers in
September.
Kathryn Keenan, Principal
At
To address the
To address the Writing goal,
teachers continued to implement a balanced literacy program in writing that
included the strategy of “writing across the curriculum” to improve the writing
skills of all students. Throughout the school year, several teachers also
participated in “Empowering Writers” training to assist students in meeting the
rigorous, new, writing standards. Currently our NECAP data indicates that 75% of
our students are proficient in writing.
Dr. Colleen M. Limoges,
Principal
Lippitt Faculty and Staff
members are looking forward to continue securing training and professional
development opportunities that will help us improve curriculum and instruction
in our classrooms. Key instructional areas of focus for our teachers will
include identifying and implementing research-based best practices and skills in
math problem-solving school wide. Furthermore, school improvement team and
professional development committee members will continue meeting periodically to
assess and evaluate our action plan(s) and how well we are progressing towards
meeting school goals and objectives. We look forward to meeting the upcoming
challenges of improving our school performance and rankings on the
NECAP.
Roy Roberts, Principal
We are very proud that the annual
“School Report Card” from the State Department of Education has once again
designated
A balanced literacy curriculum
continues to be the focus of classroom instruction this year. All teachers have received the new
State of RI Literacy Policy and the ELA district framework, along with
the necessary professional development by the district to implement the
framework in their classrooms. Also, the literacy consultant has been in
classrooms to model lessons for teachers and students. Writing across the content areas and
home reading with parental involvement are critical components to balanced
literacy. All of the above will
continue into the 2007 – 08 school year.
Nancy Plumb,
Principal
Our Books and Beyond Reading
Program, linking home and school with reading at all grade levels, began in
October and culminated with an April awards celebration. This program is designed to motivate the
love of reading in and out of school. Students had to read daily, and parent
volunteers maintained weekly charts for us. 85% of our students participated and 216
earned gold medals! Thanks to the tremendous efforts of the students, parents
and Oakland Beach Staff we have had a very exciting and productive literacy
year.
Robert W. McKenna,
Principal
In order to establish a more
cohesive Literacy Program, the Park School Faculty and Staff have participated
in staff development training and continue to work closely with Dr. Nancy Cloud
from
The primary teachers have been
exploring the book Reading With Meaning by Debbie Miller and applying her
theories of teaching reading comprehension to daily lesson plans. Our intermediate teachers are using the
Comprehension Toolkit to teach strategies that support our students to
construct meaning as they read.
These two programs complement each other and will give us a common
language to use across the grade levels.
Dr. Nancy Cloud provided us with
two full days of training in the area of “Teaching Writing to English Language
Learners”. She incorporated the
6 + 1 Writing Traits and Empowering Writers within her
presentation by taking these two programs and dovetailing them into a seamless
approach to improve all student writing.
This compliments what our teachers are currently using in the
classroom.
Joseph Peltier, Principal
During this school year, the Potowomut faculty and staff have worked on refining
mathematics problem solving and writing strategies. A cadre of teachers worked
with the Mathematics Supervisor, who modeled a successful set of problem solving
strategies. Staff replicated them and created grade appropriate problem solving
graphic organizers, which are consistent between grade levels and throughout our
K-6 continuum.
Similarly, teachers have led
curriculum meetings that have assimilated the training they received in Write
Traits, Empowering Writers, and Connie Prevatte to
help their colleagues create clear and consistent strategies and models to
enhance writing at all grades levels.
As a result, we are feeling positive about the approaches we have
implemented to meet the challenges of No
Child Left Behind legislation.
Dr. Ronald J. Areglado, Principal
For the past six years, Christopher Rhodes School has been
ranked as a HIGH PERFORMING SCHOOL by the State Department of Education
based upon the results of the State’s NECAP Testing Program. In the fall all 3rd,
4th, 5th and 6th graders were tested in
language arts, writing and mathematics by the State.
Throughout the year,
John Vuono, Principal
E.G.
During the 2006-2007 school year
teachers at
A major School Improvement goal
for this year was to increase student proficiency in reading comprehension. During the year teachers were grouped
into learning communities in order to read and discuss
techniques of ways to enhance reading comprehension using The Comprehension
Toolkit and Reading with Meaning. Strategies of engaging students more
actively with text are being utilized.
Students are also given the opportunity to read independently, in small
groups and as a class.
Teachers are making text available from a variety of sources, including
classroom libraries and the literacy closet. The literacy coach and literacy teacher
are facilitating and supporting teachers by meeting with teachers and conducting
model lessons. We look forward to
more students meeting or exceeding grade level expectations as a result of these
initiatives and continuing to be a high performing school.
Lynn Conti,
Principal
The 2006-2007 school year proved to be a very
busy and productive for everyone at
Our PTA continues to be extremely active and supportive at
Virginia Bolano,
Principal
We have been teaching reading
comprehension strategies to students in grades 3 – 6 this year to elevate their
overall academic achievement. The focus is on comprehension instruction,
including monitoring comprehension, activating and building background
knowledge, asking questions, inferring meaning, determining importance, and
summarizing and synthesizing. These strategies help our students learn and
understand what they read.
We encourage you to have books,
magazines, newspapers, and poetry available in your home for our children to
read. Please take them to our beautiful Warwick Public Library on a frequent
basis to help bring the larger world into focus for them as they read engaging
and exciting books in a variety of genres. As our students read, write, talk,
and think about different text, they expand their thinking and develop insight.
This will help them negotiate informational text, to think about what they are
reading and to hold that thinking so they understand, remember and use
it.
Maureen Areglado, Principal
The 2006 – 2007 school year at
The Reading/Literacy teacher
worked with our K – 2 students and continued the Reading Recovery Program for
grade 1 students.
She also led a book discussion
group for Reading with Meaning by Debbie Miller.
The intermediate teachers continue
to use Literature Circles to enhance comprehension.
Ann Stratton,
Principal