Hello Team!
We’ve had a pretty heavy reliance on Slack over the last 8 months to get information out to you, and it has been a fantastic addition to our toolbox this year. That being said, I thought an old-fashioned note would also be in order, especially as we roll into a new calendar year. There are a numerous things in this missive, which you should take care to read well.
- Performance Reviews are due
- Make-up Week Attendance
- Sync Your Schedule to Your Google Calendar
- Lessons Begin Jan. 3 & 9
- Teachers Only Updated
- This is the most important time of the year
Performance Reviews
Your reviews are due December 31st. Begin yours now. New or Part of the TFS team? This is not required of you at this time.
We will aim to have appointments early- to mid-February. Your punctual submission is appreciated.
Make-Up Week Attendance
Be sure you have your make-up week attendance up-to-date before we start back to our regular teaching in January.
Sync Your Schedule to Your (Mobile) Calendar
A recent update to our scheduling system makes it possible to sync your lesson appointments to your calendar. Here’s how you do it:
- Log into your schedule using a desktop browser.
- Click on your image in the upper right-hand corner
- Click on ‘Profile’
- In the right-hand side column you will see buttons for Facebook, Twitter, and Google. Click the Google button.
- If necessary, log in.
- You will be prompted to allow WellnessLiving to access your calendar/account. Accept, and you are done!
ABC Lessons Begin January 3, 2017
Make sure you are ready to go, and have consulted your schedules. A number of you have new students, or schedule changes. Note that this is a week earlier than school goes back this year, so it is more than likely that some families will not be showing up, even though we have been repeatedly clear about the early start.
TFS Lessons Begin January 9, 2017
Our new teaching effort at Toronto French School begins on January 9th.
Teachers Only Update
There have been some updates to Teachers Only. Some of these are visual, but the Teacher Ops Manual has been updated with new sections for Music Together, and Offsite Contracts. It is recommended that you familiarize yourselves with the Offsite Contracts portion of the document.
If you are on the TFS team, I have also uploaded the Code of Conduct and Offence Declaration. I recommend you review it now, if you did not get a chance to do so, before. There is also a Tab on Teachers Only that lists this document. There will be others shortly.
Why This is the Most Important Part of the Year
The next 6-8 weeks can be vital for you and your student’s music experience. The back-to-school rush and holiday season are depleting for everyone, and combined with the weather, these things can really slow us down. With this in mind, a little proactive effort will help to keep things on track and moving forward.
Be a little more involved: lean on your students’ Parents and ask every couple of weeks how things are going and how you can be of more support. Remember that you can use the homework post to tell parents to come in at the end of the lesson (or shortly before). If they don’t respond, cut out 5 minutes early, and have the kid bring them in.
We are their education team, and if we can work a little bit harder through this part of the year, it will be much more fulfilling as an experience, with a much greater amount of growth.