I would request that we travel with our 1^st period class instead of our 3^rd period class since that one is up in the air how we are going to do it with the RTI and grouping. I would rather not explain and go into that on Survivor Camp. Mrs. Moore & Mrs. Penland can take the band students and separate them into purple and gold groups.  

 

We could have the teacher’s names on signs like in morning duty and as they come in they could sit by the teachers name so they are already divided out and if anyone doesn’t know the side of the hall or who their 1st period teacher is we can figure that out ahead of time so it will be smooth when it is time to divide up. 

Also, I would BEG for the teachers to meet with the parents as teams so we can discuss with them the expectations as well. I would LOVE if we could use this as our open house since it is usually just a week or two after this day. We could go ahead & give them the remind information to join as well as anything else they need.  We usually have more parents that attend Survivor Camp then Open House anyways so let’s utilize this time where we can accomplish both in one day. There is no reason to have both survivor camp and open house. 

We could meet and talk to the students in teams. Working as a team from discipline/teaching/rules it is imperative we do it as a group that way they know we are working together and a "united front and team" If we have agendas & schedules printed out for the day it would save time in explaining what is going to happen. I will gladly make the agenda and can pass them out. The elective & PE teachers can talk to the parents for their presentation once we split up so that will save more time. 

8:05-8:15 Welcome/Introduce Faculty 

8:15 Students go with teachers

8:15-9:00- Administrator/Counselor Parent Session

8:20-8:40- Purple Side tour and Gold Side talk to students in rooms

8:40-9:00- Gold Side tour & Purple Side talk to students in room 

9:00-9:30- Teachers break into teams to talk to parents and students together (Lunchroom/Library) this will represent 6^th grade Open House

9:30- Parents dismissed to car lines/ Students get “goodie” from PTA in gym or outside awning area 

9:35- Dismissal 

I personally feel that survivor camp is not that productive.  When we started having survivor camp was when Mr. Kirkham was here and he was using that as something he needed for his doctorate. Before that, kids did fine (even better than today) and that is when they traveled all over the school.  A lot of children don’t show up for survivor camp and the information given has to be given again the first days of school but……… if we are going to have survivor camp I would like to have it on a day that we are required to be at work, but not a day that we lose time in our rooms.  It has always bothered me that the 7^th and 8^th grade teachers get the morning to work in their rooms while we are “working” and then in the afternoon we have meetings to attend.  6^th grade teachers lose a lot of time.   I also don’t feel that the students need to run through their schedules especially since they don’t have far to travel with us being on teams.  When we started this process we were not teamed.  Kids that don’t have their schedules with them have to follow along with a friend anyway.  I think if we are going to have this, then the kids need to be sorted by purple and gold team.  They can travel around with all the team teachers for a tour.  The teachers can take them to the lunchroom and show them how the lunchroom works, take them to show them the location of the elective classes.  Although this doesn’t help because they are overwhelmed and don’t remember anyway. We can then talk about what we teach etc. related to our team and then we can take them to the hall and have them practice opening their locker because that is truly what they are worried about when coming to the middle school. It does not need to last a half of a day either.  I personally can’t tell that having a survivor has helped anything at all in the past.  I think it gives the kids a false sense of how things are going to be and they already come in pretty bold these days anyway.

             I think we should not do survivor camp because open house is more beneficial.   The topics to be discussed with the parents at survivor camp are topics that can be discussed at open house.  The parents are overwhelmed as well and they will not process all of this. Once they have had their child in school here for a couple of weeks, talking about these things at open house is clearer.   Open house is usually about 2 weeks after school starts.  Things on the agenda about hours of operation, drop off and pick up location can be put in a letter and attached to the schedule when they pick it up in the summer.

                I mean,  first time students in elementary school that have never been away from their mother doesn’t even do a tour of the school like a survivor camp and they handle it fine.  They just do a meet the teacher day.

If I could see that this was beneficial and had evidence to support it, then I would be all about having a survivor camp.