Q4 Academic Advising

Students may use this spreadsheet to plan 4th Quarter and Final Exam goals for all of their courses:
Tip:  If you accidentally type in the BLUE boxes, just refresh your screen and try again

Final Grade Calculator

Use these Calculators to plan for 4th Quarter and your Final Exams.
Tip:  If you accidentally type in the YELLOW boxes, just refresh your screen and try again.


Use this calculator to discover how your 4th Quarter grade and your Final Exam could impact your Final Grade for a class.

Use this calculator to discover what you will need to earn on your final exam to get your desired Final Grade for a class.

High School Character Education 1/2 Day Assembly

One of my job responsibilities is to develop and implement our High School Character Education (CE) program.  From experience, I know that throwing around the words "Character Education" is a big "turn-off" to high school students- especially our students who have had Character-Ed thrown in their faces since Kindergarten.  Consequently, I have had to become creative at disguising CE...  As you would expect, a big part of my CE program is through advisory, but I have also been asked to continue our school's tradition of utilizing 1/2 days of school for "whole" school character education.  On Thursday, I created such an event.

The general ideas for the half day came from my Student Advisory Council (SAC), a panel of students who help plan advisory events.  (Right now, in their first year of existence, they mainly just brainstorm ideas.  My hope is that they will eventually take over the leadership/planning of advisory/assemblies too.  I can dream.  Right?)  The SAC had a variety of dreams for the how to spend the 1/2 day and after LOTS of talk, I finally narrowed them down to two major activities: Watch a movie (called Face to Face) and have a "Challenge" assembly.

Face to Face (F2F):  This is a CE tradition at our school where students watch a movie with a moral lesson and then discuss it in small groups.  The majority of movies watched through F2F have dealt with sad, true stories, racism, genocide, and death.  The SAC requested that we find a light-hearted movie instead (especially since this is the 1/2 day of school before spring break).  I also wanted to tie together the movie/discussion WITH the challenge assembly.  After a lot of googling- I settled on Monsters University.  I knew that I was taking a risk.  Would the students like it or think it was too childish?  Would they have already watched the movie?  Would anyone take the moral lessons of the cartoon seriously?  The overall feedback I received back from the Advisors was positive.  The students enjoyed the change in move themes.  Click on the photo below to view the discussion guide for Monster University.  I found many different discussion ideas from Common Sense Media, Babble.com, buzzfeed.com, MochaDad.com, and Damaris.com.

As a side note:  Through the wonders of Redbox, I was able to secure enough movies to show in small groups- beware Redbox will only allow you to rent 5 movies on a previously-used credit card and 3 movies on newly-used card.  Also note that your school MUST have a license to show movies in a large audience.

Minute to Win It Assembly:  The SAC had difficulty defining their  exact idea of a "Challenge" Assembly.  Ideas ranged from have a "Challenge Day" to plan a field day.  It was almost impossible to get 20+ teenagers on the same page.  As the date loomed near, I finally had to make an executive decision- especially since I was the one who:  1) would be held accountable for the event, and 2) would be responsible for organizing the entire event.  With the "ideas" of the SAC and the genius of pinterest, I settled on planning a Minute to Win It Assembly.  After lots of "youtubing", I settled on 13 challenges which cost about $200 in supplies.  The assembly lasted about 80 minutes.  I tied together the F2F movie and Minute to Win It Assembly by focusing on the lessons of perseverance, adaptability, individual uniqueness/contribution, and friendship.  Here is the presentation I used during the Assembly which explains events:

Based upon all the smiles, laughter, and  student & teacher participation, I believe the events were a success at building our high school community, therefore teaching "Character Education" without ever saying those words.  The feedback I received from our staff corroborated my "beliefs".  And we all know the importance of data.  Here is a copy of the form I used to collect teacher feedback/data:

Hopefully, you can use my ideas to create your own character education events.  Now it is time to enjoy my spring break and start thinking about my next big project- Academic Awards.

March Newsletter- Freshmen and Sophomores

Here is this month's counseling newsletter for Freshmen, Sophomores, and their parents.  The big push for this month is to begin thinking about summer opportunities.  I scoured the internet and created two whole pages on summer opportunities in (mostly) the North Carolina area.  Slowly, but surely, my newsletter "readership" is picking up steam.  At first, I felt as if no one was reading them.  Now, I have students stopping by to ask me questions related to the newsletter.  I guess the work is paying off.  Also, in March I discussed college admission requirements for high school foreign language, reminders about the end of the quarter, spring/summer timeline from Peterson's,  and an article from NPR about the cost of not going to college.
Click the photo below to see the full version of my newsletter:

  

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0ByGF4omWKhV8cFp3RU01MGJaZGc/edit

Highlights of February Advisory

 As I mentioned in my last post, this month has been crazy for the counseling department as we completed course registration for next school year.  As a first year high school counselor, this was a new and slightly stressful experience for me- although I also really enjoyed the experience.  Honestly, there is a nerdy, secretary that lives in my soul who loves to make lists, cross off boxes, form spreadsheets, etc.  Registration fed that part of my soul.  Plus add in all the student and family meetings,  the graduation requirements "puzzle", and all my day to day activies- it was a bus month.  (And I am not going to mention the 3.5 days missed due to snow during all of this!)

So with that said, I did still give out a variety of Advisory Lessons this month.  I will highlight my top 5:

1.  Our groups are continuing to do the Your Turn To Lead activity on Wednesdays.  We are about 1/2 way finished, and I have to tell you that I really like this activity.  As always, a lot depends on the Advisor- but for the ones who put forth even a tiny bit of effort, the pay off was amazing.  I have thoroughly enjoyed watching the students lead their team building activities.  (and it bought me a ton of time during scheduling!)

2.  Are You Smart Enough For the ASVAB:  We are trying to encourage our students (especially Juniors and Seniors) to sign up for the ASVAB.  I created this lesson to help students understand what types of questions are on the ASVAB and hopefully generate some interest in taking the test.


3.  Stand By Me:   This is one of the Friday Film Clips lessons which I adapted from The Source for Youth Ministry  (I think I already mentioned how much I LOVE this site for finding youtube clips and discussion questions for advisory.)  This lesson points out the importance of standing by others BEFORE you need support yourself.  I love the video

4.  College Bound:  This is a lesson adapted from Common Sense Media, a free resource for media related curriculum.  Check out their site if you haven't already for lessons on a variety of topics.  This lesson deals with how a student "digital footprint" can affect college admissions, scholarships, and employment. 


5.  The Happy Secret:  This is a TedEd adapted lesson originally created by Sonya Terborg   Students watch Shawn Achor's 12 minute talk on the secret to happiness and then discuss the difference between happiness and success. 

February Newsletter

Here is the newsletter I put out to my Freshmen/Sophomore students and families for February.  It is packed with information about this month's course registration for next year, top 10 Freshmen/Sophomore mistakes, and the reasons to begin a College List now.  Click on the photo to see the newsletter:








Once registration is over, I'll have time to post highlights of this month's High School Advisory lessons!

Film Clips Lessons Made Easier!

While searching for advisory lessons, I stumbled across this FREE resource for lessons using youtube/ short videos: The Source for Youth Ministry.   Each lesson includes a link to a short on-line video and then a list of discussions questions.  Yes, because these lessons were created for Youth Ministry, they all relate to a Bible story.  Therefore it IS necessary to edit the lessons to make them appropriate for a public school.  This is NOT difficult to do.  I cannot tell you how excited I am to find this website.  Our advisory theme on Fridays is Film Clips.  This entire year I have been scouring the internet trying to find clips that I could turn into teen-related life lessons.  This site is going to make my life so much easier- which I especially need right now during Course Registration time!
So check it out.  Here is one of the lessons I adapted from their site about Inward Beauty using Dove's Real Beauty Sketches:  Forensic Self-Image (click on the image below for the lesson.)

Advisory: Week of January 13

This week our school celebrated Health and Wellness week.  I was asked to create lessons in advisory that would tie into this theme.  With the help of the middle school counselor, we created a few activities that will hopefully spur some discussion about health and wellness and are fun too!  Check out these lessons:

• At our school, we sometimes pair up our middle and high school advisory groups into what we call our "School Families".  On Tuesday, we asked for our "families" to get together and complete this Zumba lesson plan:

BOND WITH YOUR MIDDLE SCHOOL FAMILY! "Physical wellness" involves understanding and appreciating the relationship between sound nutrition and how the body performs.  It requires participation in regular physical activities that improve cardiovascular strength and endurance, flexibility, and muscular strength. "Social wellness" is the ability to relate to and connect with other people. "Emotional wellness" is the awareness and acceptance of our own feelings and the feelings of others.  It’s the ability to acknowledge and share feelings of anger, stress, sadness, or fear, as well as joy, happiness, hope, and love.   Combine these three areas of wellness by inviting your Middle School Family to join you as you all try your best to keep up with this Zumba fitness routine: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qa2IWYs3ags   Remember this is about having fun, getting exercise, and bonding!  Laughing burns calories too!

• In October, I created a lesson called Lunch Scholars which is an adaption of Jay Leno's Jaywalking.  My high school students LOVED this activity, so I decided to create something similar specific to Health and Wellness IQ:

Wellness Week Trivia:  How much do you know about Health and Wellness?  Click on the presentation below to watch a quick Jay Leno video and then try your hand at Wellness Trivia!  

• Our Friday theme is "Film Clips".  I found a great lesson from PBS Learning about Prescription Drug abuse and adapted the lesson to meet the needs of my school advisory.  Click on the lesson below to see what I sent out to my advisors:
  

January Counseling Newsletter for Freshmen and Sophomores

At the end of last week I sent out my January Newsletter for Freshmen and Sophomores.  Since I recently went over PSAT results with my students, I focused a portion of the newsletter on student questions about high school testing.  The other major portion of the newsletter was dedicated to the many opportunities in North Carolina available to my students with upcoming deadlines.  Here is a copy of my newsletter for those of you who are looking for ideas:

January Newsletter Pg. 1

January Newsletter Pg 2

Happy New Year!

After a couple of weeks off (and fighting colds the entire time), I'm back to work with lots to do!  Here are some of this week's High School Advisory Lessons:

A Lesson on goal setting called:  Looking Back/Look Ahead:

January, with the semester change and the new year, is an obvious time of year to think about goals and focus on a plan of action.  I found this lesson from East High School and adapted it to meet the needs of my school. 

Your Turn To Lead:
OK.  I stumbled across this idea while googling team building activities:  have advisory groups create and implement a team building activity in other advisory groups.  I quickly realized that this met a number of my goals:
1) building of leadership skills
2) building relationships BETWEEN advisory groups
3) creating FUN activities related back to our school's mission
and
4) Students doing MOST of the planning.
Genius, right?  Well. I will know for sure by the end of this month.  Listed below is the lesson plan I created for getting groups started.  They had about 3 group meetings to plan their lesson/activity.

Beginning next week, my first couple of groups will begin presenting their activities.  That is when I will really know if this idea works.  I am planning to make this into a competition.  Our students LOVE a health competition!  I will have teachers evaluate the student leaders and I will have the student leaders evaluate the student participants.  Here is a copy of the student leader evaluation:

I did the evaluation as a Google Doc form, so that I will be able to easily collect the data for the winning advisory group!

Rules For Being  Human:  This is a four minute video is based off the book "If Life is a Game, These are the Rules" by Cherie Carter-Scott. 

 After watching the video, students were asked to reflect on the rules and how they apply to their own lives.  Students are then encouraged to write their own rules for life.  I found this idea over at Middle School Advisory 101.  Check out her blog for a variety of great Advisory lessons.

Where Did December Go?

Yikes!  With the rush of the Holidays, I somehow forgot to post about all my December happenings.  For starters, I put out my December Newsletter- this time focusing on Internet Resources for Career/College planning, ideas for those who hope to apply to Ivy League schools, and Q & A on Transcripts.  Again, feel free to share you ideas for making Career/College Prep newsletters easier!

Also this month, we received our Sophomores' Act PLAN results.  I was encouraged by a colleague to teach a brief class to the students on how to read those reports.  After some hesitation due to time constraints, I decided to give it a try and I am SOOOO glad that I did.  While it took most of an entire day, I was able to meet with ALL of my 10th grade students and answer their questions.  I love having the opportunity to put a name with a face, talk about career interests, and help them plan for the future.  It is a reward to see the "light bulb" go on over their heads.  Here is the presentation I used to present my lesson on the ACT Plan score report (adapted from http://www.act.org/plan/downloads.html):

As for December Advisory time, here are my favorite lessons that I either created, found, or adapted.  Hope these help someone else there!

December 12:  Lesson on Learning Styles and Studying for Mid-terms:  

December 5:  Who Gets Accepted (a great lesson on college admissions from college board):

December 6:  Story Corps (a lesson with a video that: 1) teaches that everyone has a story, 2) teaches the importance of listening, 3) teaches how to conduct an interview and/or how to be interviewed, and builds relationships within the Advisory group.)  The Story Corp website is filled with a variety of short interviews and animations on a variety of topics.  

November Newsletter

Here is this month's parent/student newsletter for Freshman and Sophomore parents.  I have struggled with deciding "what" to put in each newsletter.  For those of you who are also starting monthly newsletters, I thought I would elaborate on what I hope will be my "regular" sections.
One idea came from my student meetings.  At my Freshman and Sophomore meetings I made students fill out an "exit ticket" where they wrote down questions they had regarding graduation, GPA, testing, college, etc.  I now use those exit tickets to create a column in each newsletter titled:  Student Questions and Answers. Each month I try to focus on a different category of questions.  This month I focused on GPA questions.
In addition, I almost always include some sort of college prep time line.  I often use www.collegemapper.com as a resource for this section.  They always have unique ideas and suggestions as well as the usual, "keep your grade up; visit colleges."  What resources do you use for keeping your students and parent informed?  Leave your suggestions in the comments section.
Another section I have begun to include came to me after talking to a recent high school graduate.  As a current college athlete, he stated that he wished someone had told him in high school to begin taping his games.  I included that tip in last month's newsletter, but have started to include a section on what to do NOW if you have specific college goals.  This month's section is on planning to go to Art School.
As always, I am looking for new and unique additions, so feel free to share your newsletters, ideas, and resources.  Working together, we can help our students, and perhaps make that job a bit easier!

 

Advisory Lessons for College Application Week

This week the Counseling Office is buzzing with the details of College Application Week.  While some Seniors are frantically filling out applications, editing essays, and hunting down letters of recommendation, others completed the process weeks ago.
In an effort to prepare the current Freshmen and Sophomores for the future hustle of College Applications, I created this Advisory lesson to give them exposure to what all is involved in the College Application process:

9^th-10^th grade:  Lesson: What Does it Take to Apply to College

Goals:

• ·        All students will become familiar with the college application process before SENIOR year.
• ·        Students will become aware of the importance of maintaining the highest possible GPA and class rank, performing well on the ACT/SAT, and getting involved in extracurricular activities.

Click here for the link to the Prezi on What is on the Common Application:  

Bulletin Board: Kindness Leaves A Mark

In honor of World Kindness Day on November 13, I created the following bulletin board:

Our middle and high school students seem to love bulletin boards that are interactive.   Plus, by having them leave something behind, you have an idea of how many people actually read the board!  Now there's some data!

A lesson on Writing a Letter

I am sure most of you would be surprised to find a High School Counselor creating a lesson on "How to Write a Letter/Address an Envelope".  Yeah.  Me too.  However, it became obvious that out high school students needed a "refresher" on this life skill... and since it was going to be taught during advisory, the lesson fell to me.  The middle school counselor and I decided to tie this life skill into our recent K-12 Activity Day to give "purpose" to the lesson.  So after searching Prezi and after a lot of tweaking, here is the lesson I created (click on the photo):

Getting Ready for Nov 13: World Kindness day!

I love the Random Acts of Kindness (RAK) movement.  I firmly believe that by helping others we help ourselves lead a more meaningful life.  RAK ties right into our school's mission of Character, Community, and Challenge.  Therefore, I cannot wait for our school to celebrate World Kindness Day on Nov. 13.  Here is the lesson I sent out to our high school advisories this week in preparation: 

Tuesday:  Service Learning:  Next Tuesday, Nov. 13 is World Kindness Day.  Watch this short video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6VgNzJ04z8) to be inspired and then come up with an idea on how to celebrate World Kindness Day next week.  Click here for ideas on how to celebrate:  http://www.randomactsofkindness.org/kindness-ideas   

Now, I just have to wait and see what they create!

October Newsletter

One of the requests from our administration this year has been to create monthly Guidance Newsletters for our specific grade levels.  As someone who LOVES the chance to create, I jumped on this idea.  I have found that this is an excellent way to connect with parents and keep my students informed.  Here's a copy of this month's newsletter:

 

Advisory Lessons

One of the reasons I was selected to move to the high school level was because of my experience organizing our middle school advisory program.  Of course, this was put at the top of my list:  High School Advisory. Because this is the first year that our school has incorporated  a DAILY advisory class, our administration would very much like to see it succeed.  One of the ways that I try to support our staff is by sending daily Advisory activities.  Staff are not required to complete the given activity, although most staff do utilize the plans.  I have learned that most staff resistance to advisory is due to "not having time to plan for advisory."  I love that I am able to take this burden away!
I figured that I am not the only person out there attempting to come up with Advisory lesson geared for High School Students.  With that in mind, I decided to share my activities.

A couple of notes:

The high school staff came up with a "daily theme" to help drive the activities of advisory.  These themes were based off our school improvement plan and other areas of needed improvement.  In general the days are:

o   Monday- Academic Advising and Silent Reading or Study Hall- Advisors will meet with student individually for grades check, profile building, etc.  while all other students read or complete homework silently.

o   Tuesday-Service Learning-Advisory groups will create a service learning project specific to their group.

o   Wednesday-Current Events/Topic Time- This will be student-led* discussion/activities, possibly choosing a current event to discuss.

o   Thursday-College/Career Prep- Activities will rotate from practice with SAT/ACT questions to having each teacher become an expert on a particular college who will share with each group.

o   Friday- Character Clips- Students will watch a brief clip on TED or Youtube and discuss.

Our goal is for the majority of these activities to be STUDENT LED.  This is a work-in-progress.  To get the program off the ground, the first six weeks of advisory were staff led.  My first step in making the transition was to create a Student Advisory Council.  We meet weekly to discuss concerns, solutions, and future lessons.  I have even had a few students step up to the plate and begin creating lessons for Wednesdays' Advisories.  What a relief for me and an awesome opportunity for them!

So here are this week's Advisory Lesson.  Be sure to leave a comment giving feedback and sharing ideas!

Advisory Week October 28

Monday:  Silent Study Hall/ Academic Advising:  I have received a request for a lesson on goal setting in regards to grades.

  Click here to access the lesson.

Tuesday:  Service Learning:  

Continue your service project or start a new one!  Looking for a new idea? 

• October is Bullying Prevention Month.  What can you do to prevent bullying behavior?
• Domestic Violence Awareness Month
• Other ideas for October from wikipedia:  (google them and you will find service ideas)
• Hispanic Heritage Month
• Dyslexia Awareness Month 2012 
• National Breast Cancer Awareness Month
• National CyberSecurity Awareness Month
• National Down Syndrome Awareness Month
• National Youth Justice Awareness Month
• Spina Bifida Awareness Month
• Ideas for November from Wikipedia
• National American Indian & Alaska Native Heritage Month
• National Epilepsy Awareness Month 
• Lung Cancer Awareness Month

Wednesday:  Topic Time:  Please allow your Advisory Council Member to lead the activity- created by the Advisory Council. 

Click here to access the lesson:  Eye Contact.  This week’s lesson is meant to build trust, work on eye contact, and create fun in the advisory period.

Thursday:  College Prep:

9^th & 10^th Advisories:  Ten Years From Now
Using the handouts:

go through this on-line presentation with your students:    Click Here  

10 Years from Now: 

 Learning Goals:

·         To explore students’ dreams about the future and what they envision to be the details of their lives
·         To develop an understanding about how much income will be required to maintain an idealized lifestyle
·         To prepare for a discussion on education and career opportunities and choices

based off a lesson:  Thinking of Yourself as a College-Bound Student by www.ecmfoundation.org:  

Friday- Film Clips:  Watch:  Lunch Scholar  Click on the link.  This will open up a Google Doc Presentation.  Click on the button at the top RIGHT of the screen that says “Present” or your movie will not play.  Following the video have your group try to answer the “5^th Grade Questions”.

Sophomore Meeting October 2013

In October, I decided to have a Sophomore Meeting with all of my 10th grade students.  Since I had not personally counseled them the year before, I had no idea what they might have already known about Graduation Requirements and College Planning.  Using my 9th grade presentation as a template, I edited out the GPA parts, added in info about Transcripts and came up with this presentation:

http://prezi.com/zbf-t4xcegma/ua-sophomores-the-journey-continues/

I also wanted all my 10th grade students to create an account on CFNC.org.  We watched this short video at the end of the presentation on how to set up an account and how CFNC can help you plan, apply, and pay for college:
http://media.cfnc.org/web/tutorials/createMyCFNC/cfnc_create_mycfnc_account.html

I ended up running out of time during the meeting, so I was unable to have my students log on to the computers and create accounts.  Instead, I gave them each a challenge to create a CFNC account and to complete one of the sections under My Profile.  Now I just have to wait to see who all rises to the challenge!

Feshmen Meeting

In September, I held a Freshmen meeting to discuss graduation requirements, GPA, and college planning.  In preparation, I ran across a prezi created by Talani Nelson in Florida.  I loved her lay out and her ideas of making the presentation interactive.  After tracking her down, Talani was kind enough to also share her worksheet with me which she used with her students.   Utilizing her ideas and my own meeting goals, I recreated her presentation and edited her worksheet to meet my student needs.  (BTW if you have never used prezi.com I hihgly recommend it as a way to view and share presentations.  There are LOTS of great ideas on there!)  Here is a link to the presentation:

Following the presentation, I then began meeting with EVERY 9th grade student.  Now this idea I found on pinterest posted by JYP Counselor- called minute meetings with a tech spin.  I will admit that my meetings took more than a minute, but I did ask more questions than she did with elementary school students.  I also used her idea of using a Google doc to log all the info.  I LOVE data and this was a fun and easy way to keep it all together.  I HIGHLY recommend using the Google form.