What is my child learning?

At each grade level students have a variety of expectations for mastery of different skills and content areas.  On the Office of Public Education website you can find the exact grade level expectations for each grade level.  In our district we have reviewed all of these expectations and created Power Standards.  Power Standards help teachers focus and prioritize what is most important for students to know and be able to do in the time available for teaching and learning.  If you would like more information on power standards, grade level expectations, or curriculum please go to the LWSD website.

How will my child be assessed?

At Sandburg we use a combination of classroom instruction based assessments, district, and state testing.  On a regular basis throughout the year classroom instructional assessments occur both informally (e.g. a teacher observing a child or reviewing the lastest assignment) and formally (e.g. interviews, pen and paper testing, final projects).  If you would like to know how your child is doing please contact the teacher at any time.  Every teacher here at Sandburg firmly believes that parent input and communication is an important resource to achieve student sucess. In addition to classroom assessments, the district has also develop end of unit assessments and progress assessments that help align teaching across the district.  Lastly the students participate in state testing.  In K-2 students' reading proficiency level are assessed using DIBELS (Dynamic Indicators of Baic Early Literacy Skills).  In 3-6 students take the MSP (Measurement of Student Progress). The testing window for the grades 3-8 state test will be moved to May in spring 2010 (paper-and-pencil testing, May 12-28; online testing May 3-June 4).

What Technology does my child have access to?

Lake Washington School District is a nationally recognized leader in using technology in the classroom and has been for the last two decades. The district provides teachers with everything they need to be successful. That includes state of the art equipment and as much professional development as possible

Every classroom contains:

• four or more student computers
• a teacher workstation
• a computer with a DVD drive dedicated to a ceiling mounted LCD projector
• a digital document camera
• a VCR
• speaker system
• a mounted ACTIVboard (an interactive whiteboard)
• interactive feedback ACTIVote devices

Our school is also participating in a Pilot Netbook Program.  Every grade level has access to a class set of netbooks.  These are utilized in a variety of ways to increase student learning.  They provide students with easy access to additional information and online resources, is a tool for students to demonstrate their learning, and give students a way to collarborate and share their knowledge with others.