Practice for “A Sporting Chance” bowling tournament begins tomorrow with over 30 special needs students signed up for participation.  The lanes will be full of activity as our students prepare for the November 17 tournament in Springfield. Two additional practices will be held on Oct. 27th and Nov. 3^rd and will provide bowlers opportunities for honing their bowling skills, socialization and earning bragging rights! 

There is no charge to students for the practices or bowling tournament; however, opportunities for fundraising to help with t-shirts and other event expenses include raffling donated quilts and taking pictures with Santa at the Willard Parade. Please come support our students through these events and at tomorrow’s practice which will be held from 12-2:00 p.m. at Sunshine Lanes.

Thanks to the district’s generosity and to the efforts of our maintenance staff, WIS has some new playground equipment that was unvailed today to the students.  Last year, we were only able to afford some swings and soccer goals,  but with additional funds made available to us this year, we have purchased some climbing apparatus and more swings.   The kids enjoyed the chance to try it all out, and decided the wait was worth it.  Special thanks to our maintence staff and Director of Operations, Mr. Staley, for getting the equipment installed and operational for us!

Fall is full of fun activities for the entire family.  Here at Willard South the fun is just beginning!  We had several very special events that took place this week.  Tuesday was our annual Kindergarten Fire Safety night for parents and students.  Families were busy eating fire engine snacks, making books, meeting firefighters and even climbing aboard a fire truck.  Wednesday was our Title One Parent Information night.  Our Title One teachers presented information to parents while students constructed “All About Me” posters.  Afterwards everyone enjoyed pizza, drinks and cookies!

Don’t miss Willard South McTeacher Night on Tuesday, October 9th from 4:00-8:00 at the McDonald’s on Chestnut Expressway!

Kindergarten Fire Safety Night

A night out on the town and “mom” doesn’t have to cook?! Join us Tuesday night at the Willard McDonald’s for a night of fun and fun-draising! All proceeds will help enhance the technology at Willard East.

Celebrate, celebrate, celebrate!!! Willard East hosts monthly Tiger Pride assemblies to recognize and celebrate the successes of our school community. Last week was our 1st Tiger Pride assembly for the 2007-2008 school year! Character Ed made a celebrity appearance, we had class pictures taken in our new Tiger Pride shirts, we had a school-wide picture taken at the football field and we recognized over 100 students for various achievements.(Attendance, Students of the Month, prize winners, student council, etc.) If you have been to one of Willard elementary schools’ Tiger Pride assemblies you are missing out! Join us each month or make connections at one of the other elementary buildings and see what all the hype is about!!!

It’s official…TigerMania has struck Willard! Before an esitmated crowd of over 3,000 people in Tiger Stadium the football tigers defeated Branson 35-28 in overtime last Friday to move their record to 5-0 and 1-0 in the COC. They are currently ranked 10th in the state and the Newsleader has them ranked 3rd in southwest Missouri in classes 4-6. The Tigers will take their show on the road tonight in Nixa. Kickoff is at 7:00pm. Come out and support the Tigers!

Congratulations to the softball Tigers on their quarterfinal victory over Rogersville last night as the district tournament has begun. The girls will take on top seed Marshfield today at 4:00 in the semifinals. The other semifinal pits 2nd seed Ava vs. 3rd seed Bolivar at 6:00pm. Finals will be Saturday at 3:00pm. All games are being held at the newly renovated Willard softball field.

The volleytigers are continueing their excellent play with victories over Rogersville and Bolivar this week. This runs their record to an impressive 18-5-1 for the season! The girls will play in the Licking Classic this Saturday before returning to COC play next week. The will host Buffalo on Tuesday and Nixa on Thursday. The game vs. Buffalo will not start until 6:00 since they do not have a freshmen squad.

Congratulations to the following runners that won medals by placiing in the top 15 at the Reeds Spring Cross Cournty meet last Monday: K. Hession – 3rd, A. Bird – 6th, J. Bird – 12th, R. Cook – 3rd.

The soccer Tigers will look to get on track as they host New Convenant tonight at 4:30. They will then host Ozark next Tuesday and will be at Carthage on Thursday.

It’s Good To Be A Tiger!

Jeff Staley, Director of Operations

Special area classes are often one of the most enjoyable times in a student’s day.  PE, music, art, computer lab and library time appeal to student interests and give them a chance to share their abilities in a different setting.  For this reason, this time is an invaluable opportunity to reach students academically in areas that they may share a special interest or have special skills in.  WC is blessed to have special area teachers that realize this and harness students’ interests while connecting their activities to the learning that is taking place in the classroom.

There are several ways that special area teachers connect classroom learning to their curriculum.  Mrs. Bailey consciously connects her art lessons to teaching math concepts such as geometric shapes and symmetry.  She also has students routinely complete constructed response questions about their artwork.  Coach Brown connects math concepts in her lessons through calculating heart rates during exercises and working math problems during games.  Mrs. Chatman also connects math concepts with musical notes and beats while she is connecting songs and musical genres to social studies units and literature.  Mrs. Roth has created a blog for students to create book reviews for their library books.  During her library lessons, Mrs. Roth also teaches and reinforces classroom reading strategies.  Mrs. Bougher has partnered with Mrs. Roth to have students type their book reviews for the blog  and to publish other works on the web in the computer lab.

These activities are just the tip of our special area teachers’ instructional iceberg.  By connecting classroom learning to student interests in special area classrooms, we know students will be more successful in learning and retaining information.  This is evidenced by WC’s significant rise in student achievement on the MAP test this last year.  Thank you to our special area teachers for your part in this success and for all of your hard work.  Teachers like you are why they are called “special” classes. 

Have a great weekend and continue to Reach for the Stars.  –Shane Medlin, Principal

The Special Education Administrative staff have just returned from a very thought-provoking conference at TanTarA.  The Missouri chapter of the Council for Administrators of Special Education sponsor an annual conference to address current and upcoming issues in special education.  Much of the focus of this year’s conference was on the topic of Response to Intervention (RTI).  This three-tiered model involves identifying appropriate scientifically-based interventions needed by at risk learners, the methodical implementation of those interventions, and rigorous record-keeping to determine if progress is being made. 

We were excited to acquire more information about RTI because it is a topic that our department has been exploring in conjunction with the elementary and intermediate administrators for some time now.  We have had two administrative team meetings to brainstorm, several members of our staff attended an RTI informational meeting put on by the Carthage School District, in addition to our recent conference in which we were able to attend multiple break-out sessions discussing different components to this new process.  Our next step is to bring in an RTI trainer to work with our district CARE teams.  It is very exciting to be on the cutting edge of a process that will help us to meet the needs of our ever-growing at risk and special needs population.  We would like to thank those administrators for taking such initiative to explore this new approach with us, and we look forward to seeing how this approach will impact student learning in our district.