DePue High School-USD #103

DePue Middle and High School (Grades 6-12) began the Focused Instruction Process in December, 2010 and January, 2011 with a initial four day workshop for the school leadership team facilitated by Patricia Davenport, author of "Closing the Achievement Gap-No Excuses" and SLI staff members: Terezka Jirasek and Karen Morris. The workshop was designed to provide the school administration and teacher leaders the opportunity to become familiar with the 8-step process, develop an Action Plan for implementation, review school data, identify gaps in student achievement, design an instructional calendar based on the Illinois State and College Readiness Standards and select assessments that provide data on student mastery.

Click on the collage, for a larger view

Implementation of the Process began across the entire Middle and High School in late January 2011. Instructional Focus Lessons in English/Language Arts and Mathematics were taught on a daily basis, mini-assessments were administered on a scheduled basis and Success Time provided students with tutorials and enrichment on the skills they had been taught.

Focused Instruction Process

Please check out our new video about the Focused Instruction Process!
FIP: The Road to Success

Cardenas School - Early Childhood Workshops 2010-2011

Our first year of Early Childhood workshops at Cardenas School has come to an end. Everyone was sad to see this year end. We are hoping we will return next year!


We are pleased to announce that 5 parents had perfect attendance for the Early Childhood workshops at Cardenas school. They attended all 10 sessions.  They received a framed certificate and a goodie bag filled with educational items to use with their children.

7 parents at Cardenas attended 8 workshops and received The Grouchy Ladybug book and a CD with all of the songs that we learned this year.

We hope that the 2011-2012 year will be as successful as this year! Kudos!

Early Childhood Workshops at Cardenas School

One of our Early Childhood workshops focuses on environmental print. That’s print in everyday life: symbols, signs, numbers, colors, etc.Some resources are: billboards, newspapers, food packages, menus, catalogs, coupons, sales ads to name a few. It’s a great way to start teaching children to read and write.

Here’s a picture of parents at Cardenas school creating a “Baggie Book” using pictures from sale ads, magazines and clip art.

A finished product – “My Favorite Foods” book

We ask parents to bring the work that they created at home with their children to the next workshop.  Here are a few examples from Cardenas school.

In the first picture one family created a letter matching game using large letters from the newspaper.

In the second picture one family created a picture matching games using grocery store sale ads.

In the next picture one family created a memory matching game using newspaper sales ads.

Congratulations to all of the parents who came to the Early Childhood Workshops at Cardenas School! You are dedicated to helping your children succeed in school and in life!

Parent Workshop Video on You Tube

Check out this fascinating Parent Workshop that was recently featured on You Tube!

http://youtu.be/suEVPisqpKE

Thanks to the amazing Parent and Families Working Together team at SLI! Keep up the wonderful work!

Edwards' Center for Young Learners

The Edwards School Center for Young Learners and Strategic Learning Initiatives recently completed a fantastic year together!

11 parents had perfect attendance for the Early Childhood workshops at Edwards Center for New Learners. They received a framed certificate and a goodie bag filled with educational items to use with their children!

Everyone in attendance at the last workshop received The Grouchy Ladybug book, a book titled Look How We Did It! - that’s filled with creative ways that the parents extended the workshop activities and a packet of 18 additional Learning Games!

The principal of Edwards School, Judith Sauri, sent a cake congratulating the parents for completing the program.

Pictured above are a Mom and her son having fun learning number skills.

After the last workshop a small celebration ensued.  The parents planned a surprise “Pot Luck” to “Thank” the facilitators for sharing with them all of the fun-filled educational activities to do with their children. Everyone was sad to see the program end, but shared the many exciting things that they learned this year!!

Early Childhood Program at Cardenas and Edwards Schools

The Early Childhood Program for this school year is coming to a close at Cardenas School and Edwards School, both located in Chicago’s Latino communities. This was the second year in the Early Childhood Program for Edwards School.

The SLI team delivered a series of 10 fun filled, educational and interactive workshops at both schools for parents and caregivers with children 3-5 years of age. The workshops began in November of 2010 and will end in June 2011.

In this year's workshops parents/caregivers were focused on: helping their children learn skills with numbers, predicting with a sink and float activity, identifying colors through movement and singing, learning about environmental print, matching letters and sounds, learning concepts about print (CAP) and many more necessary skills to prepare their children to enter kindergarten.

In this picture a mom from Edwards is sharing how she implemented the activities that she learned in the workshop with her child at home.

Newly added this year is the“Train the Trainer” component. Volunteer parent facilitators were trained to facilitate the workshops. They facilitated 4 of the 10 workshops and did a tremendous job! Congratulations for a job well done to: Erika Cárdenas, Rosa Bahena, Rosa Díaz de Nava, Rosalba Martínez, Viviana Martínez, Llarene Romero, Marisol García and Yuridia Ramírez.