Book Club Meeting Dates: May 10, May 24 and June 9 Time and location: TBA I have created this blog as a way for us to share our reflections about the book: Visible Learning For Mathematics. Just as our students benefit from the rich conversation about math, it is through our conversations that we benefit from deeper learning and connect the way we view Math to the best way our students learn. If you are like me, I like to try new things in the classroom. That is great. because new things can benefit our students. When things are new, we can expect that the unexpected will continue to keep us growing in our profession as educators and students growing as learners. Why this book? ...When considering the book to offer for this book-club, this book became the obvious choice. I was gravitating towards Jo Boaler's book Mathematical Mindsets https://www.youcubed.org/ until I saw Steve Ventura's talk at Lompoc High School. In his talk, he told us about the meta studies that John Hattie did with research based strategies, measuring and ranking their effect sizes. Note: Appendix A. Effect Sizes, page 235. We are given the list of effects with their ranking for a variety of influences. This is a book that offers research based strategies that are ranked in order of effect size. I believe that all teachers want students to have the benefit of greater growth. I think that teachers will want to start using influences near the top of the rankings hoping that we will be able to see the results. Does it make any sense to do something with a lower ranking if I can help my students get there quicker by using a strategy with a higher ranking influence? Please do not see this as anything negative about the Jo Boaler book. On the contrary, (it is on the summer reading list). If you believe that mindset is an issue for your students then her book would be a good place to start the process of sustainable improvement. The whole idea of Growth Mindset needs to be ingrained into our culture and all subjects, not just in Math. I guess that is why I don't just connect the concept of Growth Mindset with Math. Carol Dweck's book and resources http://mindsetonline.com/whatisit/about/changed my life and will always be #1 on my book list. I often hear students tell themselves "I can't do it". Both of these authors show us that we can. If you look at the data you may conclude that Mathematics is at a crossroads in our country. Do you think that this could be something we can fix? If you are familiar with the Mathematical Practices you may conclude that some students might just need to see it a different way. If used as a resource to help us shift our daily instruction, Visible Learning For Mathematics https://us.corwin.com/en-us/nam/visible-learning-for-mathmatics-grades-k-12/book255006#contents gives us evidence based research that encourages us to make those informed decisions. I encourage your thoughts. happy reading! Summer reading list: http://robertkaplinsky.com/6-non-education-books-educators-read/ Must view Ted Talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/carol_dweck_the_power_of_believing_that_you_can_improve?language=km?utm_source=tedcomshare&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=tedspread Questions for thought: What are some of our challenges in teaching Math? How do we incorporate the concept of Growth Mindset into our daily routines? Preface: The preface begins by explaining what should be obvious for most of us, "people who understand mathematics have a higher quality of life." This statement is followed up with a variety of supports from many worthy sources. If a student has a talent in Math, that talent should be nurtured. I believe that teachers have a responsibility to hlep our students to be the best version of themselves whenever possible. In order to do this, it is necessary to enthusiastically teach all subjects, especially Math, as rigorously as we can. Teachers can use the Barometer of Influence pp. 21-22 to help them plan lessons https://resources.corwin.com/vl-mathematics that offer "more growth-for-the-lesson". Chapter 1. Making Learning Visible in Mathematics I have trouble visualizing things. I can't seem to organize much in my mind, I always need to write it down, look at a calendar, pull up a web-site or something similar. I suspect many students have the same requirements. Teachers need to realize that there are many students who are visual learners while we are creating rigorous lessons. Rigor is defined as a balance among conceptual understanding, procedural skills and fluency, and application with equal intensity. (National Governors Association Center for Best Practices & Council of Chief State School Officers, 2010). So how can we build lessons that help students to visualize rigor? The book encourages us to think of the nature of learning in the categories of surface, deep, and transfer. I suggest that we think of where our students fall under each of these categories when we plan our lessons in order to better support student learning. Surface Learning: Initiation to new ideas. Deep Learning: consolidating understanding of mathematical concepts and procedures and making connections Transfer Learning: students take the reins of their own learning and are able to apply their thinking to new contexts and situations. Questions for thought: How can we increase the "rigor" in our Math lessons? How can we begin to write our Math lessons to address the three categories of learning? How can we support our visual learners? Chapter 2: Making Learning Visible Starts with Teacher Clarity Teachers know that learning intentions need to be communicated in student friendly language. I remember my first year of teaching, I was told to put the learning objective on the board and refer to it throughout the lesson. This is because students need to be able to clearly explain what they should be able to do by the end of each lesson so that they can make important real-world connections. The book suggests that we present these "learning intentions" as "I can" statements. For example, I used to write: Students will be able to... on the board but now teachers should write: I can...Visible Learning for Mathematics suggests doing this with the help from an "I can..." statement (page 60). This, combined with the suggested traffic light system in which students place their names on red, (I don't know this yet), yellow light (I'm almost there), or the green light, (I can help someone else tomorrow) The Chapter finally offers teachers two rubrics for students. The Self-Reflection Rubric for Group Collaborative Assessments give students the opportunity to reflect on how well they did in group assignments and what they need to do to improve, Figure 2.5. Then we are given a well written Rubric for Rich Mathematical Task. Questions for thought: How can we transform our classrooms through the use of "I Can" statements? How can we improve student collaboration? What does a "rich Mathematical Task" look like? Resources: 5 Practices for Orchestrating Productive Mathematics Discussions [NCTM] Mathematical Mindsets: Unleashing Students' Potential through Creative Math, Inspiring Messages and Innovative Teaching Chapter 3: Mathematical Tasks and Talk that Guides Learning "Giving students appropriate tasks at the right time in their learning cycle is crucial to move students from surface to deep and transfer learning." (pg 73) Exercises verses Problems, there is a real difference how they should be used within the learning cycle. Spaced practice or a few exercises on a concept each day over several days has an effect size of .71. Fluency exercises that are sometimes made into "timed tests" can do more harm to mathematical understandings, motivation and a students view on mathematics. Slow and steady is the best recommendation for fluency assignments. Students need deliberate practice, guided by the teacher, not repetitive skill-and-drill tasks. Could this be why students struggle to learn Math facts? Difficulty is not the same as Complexity (figure 3.1) page 77 More complex: Strategic Thinking (draw on students' ability to think strategically; Expertise (push students to stretch and extend learning) Less Complex: Fluency (builds automaticity) ; Stamina (supports perseverance) Difficulty is the amount of effort one must put in while complexity is the level of thinking, the number of steps, or the abstractness of the task. Complexity can be supported by having students work in groups and justify their thinking. This encourages collaboration, group communication and planning and meta-cognition strategies. More videos and blogs about Complexity: http://www.heinemann.com/ChildrensMath/ Four levels of cognitive demand (figure 3.2) pgs. 81-82 is a helpful tool for teachers to use when they are planning instruction making sure to balance instructional time and mathematical tasks appropriately. Examples of tasks at each of the four levels of cognitive demand are available in figure 3.3 on page 84. Lower level demands: Memorization & procedures without connections Higher level demands: Procedures with connections & doing Mathematics The discussion of making learning visible through mathematical talk begins with teacher questioning. Posing purposeful questions encourage students to explain, elaborate and clarify thinking to build understanding, revel students' current understanding of a concept and make the learning of mathematics more visual and accessible. Questions can help teachers check for student misconceptions or partial understanding and to help build and deepen students' understanding. Funneling questions can guide students down the teacher's path to find the answer. And focusing questions allow students to do the cognitive works of learning by helping to push their thinking forward. (figure 3.4) pg 92 Prompts are questions or statements used to remind students to leverage what they already know in order to think further. (Types of Prompts for Mathematics) Figure 3.5 page 95. Cues are more direct than prompts because they shift the student's attention to the relevant information required to move forward. (Types of Cues for Mathematics) Figure 3.6 pg. 96 Reflection and discussion questions pg. 97 Chapter 4 Surface Mathematics Learning Made Visible Have you ever started teaching a concept with a project or activity that gives purpose to the learning objective? This is the introduction to Chapter 4. I drive by the "new Costco" that is being built in Santa Maria almost every day. They are still preparing the soil getting ready to pour the foundation. How can we put up walls if we don't prepare the soil? If we don't pour a good foundation? So why do we wonder why our students have trouble with the objectives of our lessons if we don't give them a purpose for the learning. Surface learning is most effective when using approaches that foster initial acquisition of conceptual understanding followed by procedural skills. The mathematical practices need to be taught directly and frequently through teacher modeling. With practice, students will begin to incorporate these habits into their daily work. It is suggested that teachers teach with the mathematical practices, lesson plan with the mathematical practices in mind, refer often to them, create a bulletin board or poster for each practice and have students reflect on the practices that they have learned. They can reflect on the practices on exit tickets or during Math Talks. Ways to incorporate Surface Learning include a variety of Mathematical talk and Metacognition activities including: Number talks, a brief daily routine that helps students develop computational fluency by sharing their thinking processes: http://players.brightcove.net/268012963001/default_default/index.html?videoId=5117848323001 Guided questions are helpful to students as they make sense of what is going on and guiding them to draw their own conclusions. Worked examples are math problems that have been fully completed to show each step of a mathematician's arrival at a solution. Direct Instruction is when the teacher decides the learning intentions, makes them clear and visible to students, do some demonstrations, checks for understanding and follows all this up with recaps and closure. Strategic use of vocabulary instruction offers an effect size of .67! Formal mathematical language leading to developing a mindset for thinking mathematically must be taught for depth and transfer. Three types of words or three tiers were discussed in chapter 1, Tier 1=everyday words, Tier 2= general academic words and Tier 3 domain specific words used in a given content area. Sentence frames that can build metacongnitive thinking can be found in figure 4.7 pg 121 and is available for download.http://resources.corwin.com/sites/default/files/Figure_4.7.pdf Word walls can be a useful tool in the teaching of academic vocabulary providing visual references for students but should consistently be referred to throughout a unit of study in order to be effective. Graphic Organizers such as the Frayer model can also be a useful tool in the study of vocabulary. Stategic Use of Manipulatives for Surface Learning The use of manipulatives bridges students' learning as they move from surface to deep learning. http://nlvm.usu.edu/en/nav/vlibrary.html So what kind of Math homework should I assign is a regular question I get these days. I see lots of Drops in the Bucket being assigned and I used to use it as a daily warm-up. The book suggests a 2-4-2 strategy for mathematics homework designed to build distributed practice into the homework process. Daily homework includes 2 problems on the new skill, 4 cumulative review problems and 2 problems that support reasoning and justification by requiring students to show and explain their work. Effect Size for Spaced practice = .71 (pg 129) Feedback is best when it is provided "just-in-time, just-for-me" when and where it can do the most good. Feedback about the process, not just the task, moves students to deeper learning. Strategic Use of Mnemonics It is important to remember that mnemonics should not be used as a replacement for an understanding of Mathematical concepts. However they can be used to assist learners to recall substantial amounts of information. Reflection and Discussion Questions: How can we encourage mathematical discourse in the classroom? How can we facilitate the strategic use of manipulative s in our classrooms to support surface learning. What ways can we incorporate the mathematical practices in our Math lessons to best support student outcomes? Chapter 5: Deep Mathematics Learning Made Visible The focus of Deep Learning is recognizing relationships among ideas and is particularly linked to mathematical practices 3, 7 and 8. Deep learning can be developed through rich tasks and accountable talk. Common Core MP 3: Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others. This practice requires that students engage in deeper dialogue. Discourse reaches beyond discussion and includes ways of representing, thinking, agreeing and disagreeing. Students involved in academic discourse are able to ask questions that help to clarify an argument or justify their reasoning with evidence. Common Core MP 7: Look for and make use of structure.. This practice requires that students recognize patterns and it is beneficial for teachers to facilitate discourse Common Core MP 8: Look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning. What strategies from Chapter 5 do you see happening in this teacher's lesson? Mathematical Talk that Guides Deep Learning. The effect size for classroom discussion is 0.82. Accountable talk begins with the teacher who is consistently modeling the conversation moves and using appropriate prompts and questions to facilitate the conversation. Figure 5.6 on page 145 gives us a useful chart offering examples of accountable talk moves. Reduced teacher talk increases the opportunities for students to do more thinking and increase learning. Teachers can support additional opportunities for student discourse by incorporating accountable talk into their lessons. Accountable talk means that the conversation remains on topic, that the information presented is accurate and that the thinking is deep. In order for a teacher to better support students in accountable talk, teachers will benefit from the use of language frames, which are scaffolds that prompt the type of talk we want from students. Re-voicing, when a teacher restates a student comment or embeds the thinking in a question. And restating, when rephrase or repeat what a peer has said. Norms of Class Discussion The norms of class discussion should be explicitly taught at the beginning of the school year and consistently reinforced and maintained when necessary. Norms are the agreements of a group about how the members will work together. Four basic dimensions of norms are: trust, belonging, sharing and respect. Rules and procedures should reinforce the norms and should be developmentally appropriate. With an effect size of .82, it is recommended that 50% of classroom time be devoted to classroom discussion with teachers taking care that the tasks be complex enough, there is time in which students can agree and disagree with each other, there is sufficient language support such as sentence frames and teacher modeling, and that both individual and group accountability is provided making learning visible for students and teachers. Grouping students based on ability Grouping students strategically does not mean having students choose their own groups, grouping by ability or tracking students. The most effective grouping strategy is one that is flexible and balanced. Appropriate group size is three to five. Collaborative learning can be supported by providing groups with contribution checklists or ways students can contribute. Sample checklist is included in Figure 5.10 on page 160. Allowing students to move (effect size .53), peer tutoring (effect size .55) can also increase student learning. Individual Accountability If all students are to be accountable for group work, there are some strategies that can help to support student accountability. Writing rules such as if anyone writes, everyone writes, conversation round-table (Figure 5.11) where each group member has a section reserved for their own ideas, and individual questions for each students to answer before the group work. This can ensure that each student has ideas to share in the group. Accountable Talk within Whole Class Discourse In effort to support whole class discourse, teachers should consider the physical layout of the classroom and think creatively about ways to use the environment. Other methods are inside-outside circles where students stand or sit in an inner and outer circle. Members of each circle take turns discussing for a set period of time then switch. Strategy selection allows students to gather in areas of the classroom based on their chosen strategy for solving a problem, then discuss with the larger group the benefits of each method. Strategic Use of Manipulates for Deep Learning Research suggests that the instructional sequence of moving from physical representations through visual representations to symbolic representations leads to gains in math learning and understanding. Discussion Questions: How can accountable talk improve the mathematical discourse in your class? What rich tasks are most appropriate for supporting deep learning? Chapter 6: Making Mathematics Learning Visible though Transfer Learning The Nature of Transfer Learning Transfer Learning is about the ways students construct knowledge and reality for themselves as a result of surface and deep knowing and understanding. Transfer learning is when students take the lead of their own learning to their lives and are able to use the tools they have learned to help them solve new problems on their own. Near transfer occurs when a new situation is paired with a context students have experienced. In far transfer, students are able to make connections between remote situations. The Paths for Transfer:Hugging and Bridging Methods for Low-Road and High Road Transfer (Figure 6.1) pg. 180. Selecting Mathematical Tasks That Promote Transfer Learning Tasks that best promote transfer learning encourage connections. These will likely be higher complexity tasks with higher difficulty. Such tasks may not have a clear entry point or might have multiple entry points and multiple steps and they may have on one correct solution. Students should be able to use evidence to justify their thinking. These tasks could be inter-disciplinary and may take more than one lesson to solve. Teachers could assign an appropriate performance task or 3 Act Math lesson that is appropriate to the standard being taught. Learning becomes more meaningful when learners see what they're learning as being meaningful in their own lives. It is beneficial to students to try to consider the similarities and differences between the new and a recently completed problem. Effect size for compare and contrast new with old problems (1.23). Meta cognition Promotes Transfer Learning Meta cognition is the ability to think about our own thinking and meta cognitive strategies have an effect size of .69. Palincsar (2013) describes metacognitive awareness as consisting of three parts: 1. Knowing about out learning selves 2. An understanding of what the task demands and necessary strategies to complete it 3. The means to monitor learning and self-regulate Students need guidance in how to become more meta cognitively aware. Students need to learn how to self-question. Self-questioning is a meta cognitive strategy that allows us to track our understanding and catch ourselves when we are off target. Teachers can encourage meta cognition by administering pre-lesson and post-lesson questions. Pre-lesson questions are available on page 186 (figure 6.2). Other helpful tools are to develop a checklist of questions that encourage meta cognition and reinforce learning which can be used as writing prompts for journal entries. Self-Reflection allows learners to develop expertise and avoid repeating the same errors when solving similar problems. It helps students to understand where they were and where they are now page 188 (Figure 6.3). Chapter 7: Assessment, Feedback, Meeting The Needs of All Learners Formative evaluation is the process of gathering assessment evidence to inform instruction. The process has several key elements: Clarifying, sharing, and understanding learning intentions and criteria for success Effective classroom discussions, activities, and learning tasks that elicit evidence of learning Providing feedback that moves learning forward Activating learners as instructional resources for one another Activating learners as the owners of their own learning Feedback for teacher: Adjusting Instruction, daily formative evaluation is a chief way for teachers to make instructional decisions Feedback for student: Adjusting Learning, Feedback is designed to close the gap between students' current level of understanding or performance and the expected level of performance. Teachers need to know: Students's current level of performance, students' expected level of performance, and actions they can take to close the gap. Effective feedback needs to be timely, specific, understandable, and actionable and needs to direct attention to what;s next. Effect size for Feedback 0.75 Feedback Strategies pg. 204 (figure 7.3) There are four types of feedback. Feedback about the task, feedback about the process, self-regulatory feedback and feedback about self. Summative evaluation is when we use broader assessments with the purpose of determining what students know and are able to do at a given point in time. Meeting Individual Needs through Differentiation Differentiated instruction is the use of a variety of instructional approaches to modify content, process and or products in response to the learning readiness. A classroom that is structured for differentation has both a wide range of learning resources and a flexible classroom environment. Teachers can differentiate instruction by making adjustments in three areas, content, process and product. Adjusting Instruction to Differentiate: Our goal is to be sure that each learner is making progress mastering the grade level standards at an appropriate degree of challenge, the zone of proximal development. Intervention: Recommendations for Response to Intervention: pp. 216-223 Homework Effect Size: 0.29 Response to intervention Effect Size: 1.07 Matching Learning Styles with Instruction 0.17 and Test Prep .27 Conclusion Having access to Effect Sizes is an advantage so when we plan our instruction, we can choose strategies that have a greater possibility to be effective for our students. Summer reading list: http://robertkaplinsky.com/6-non-education-books-educators-read/ Must view Ted Talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/carol_dweck_the_power_of_believing_that_you_can_improve?language=km?utm_source=tedcomshare&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=tedspread Building a Culture of Success
BLOG POST PROMPT Based on the descriptions in Gruenert ch. 4, what type of school culture exists among all teachers at your school? Provide examples and make connections to the explanations in the text. (Be sure to authentically reflect on your school as a whole, and not a subculture.) Choose an instrument from the Gruenert text to use in order to gather data on school culture, and have at least three to five individuals at your school provide feedback using the instrument. (The more data, the better; the more diverse the individuals, the more authenitc the data is!) Building a Culture of Success The focus of this Blog Post Reflection is to identify the school culture that exists at our school site. In general, a successful school culture has to do with vision, unity and empowerment. The principal’s job is to build a vision for the school that encourages unity among the staff and gives the staff the freedom and encouragement necessary to empower them and together build a culture of success. While students come and go, the staff should continue to move the school in a positive direction by means of the established culture year after year. In order to determine that type of culture our school has I used the School Culture Typology Consensus worksheet developed by Gruenert and Valentine (2006). I surveyed our staff at our last staff meeting. I followed the survey with the Culture Typology Reflection Sheet giving the staff the chance to synthesize and to personalize the data collected. Column E, Column D, and Column F received the most points. After viewing the results and reading the comments, I have come to the conclusion that our school is currently demonstrating School Culture Type 2: Comfortable-Collaborative. I believe that this is in part because we have new leadership who brings in a new vision for our staff. In addition, our new leadership has shifted our method of instruction to the blended learning model in order to maintain the school’s viability. While the teachers are settling into our new roles at the school, there is still much for the staff to learn, including implementation of CIP practices. Our next challenge is one of crunching the numbers and creating some real goals for both our teachers and our students. Teachers in a comfortable-collaborative school culture don’t ask essential questions about their work and how to improve; they limit their conversations to sharing advices and tricks of the trade. (Gruenert, Whitaker, 2015). While we still have a way to go, our culture is much improved when compared to previous years. The motto of a comfortable-collaborative school could be, “We are all fighting the same battle, so we need to get along.” (Gruenert, Whitaker, 2015). This is a brief summary of the Culture Typology Reflection Sheets that were returned with the Surveys by the staff. All staff members agreed that we need more time to work on best practices and we need more opportunities to observe other teachers and schools. Also, we need collaborative long term and short term goal-setting. On a positive note, staff members commented that the staff share high academic expectations from our student body. We are also able to work together as a team, problem solve together and share professional development opportunities and experiences. We already have a positive school culture conductive to professional effectiveness, positive morale dedicated to student learning and success. What kind of Culture Do We Want? We want a collaborative culture at our school. In fact, I believe we are close to achieving this goal. For example, of the 5 surveys I distributed at Wednesday’s staff meeting, I was able to get 100% returned by Friday. I would attribute this to the dedication and willingness of the staff to create a culture of collaboration. While getting along is certainly an important step, we realize that our work is far from over and that there is more to accomplish. In order to move our school forward, we have to shift the mindset of our staff to more of a collaborative culture as described by (Gruenert, Whitaker, 2015). It is through the process of creating goals, both academic and professional, that we can move this school to the kind of culture we want, a culture of collaboration.
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Leadership Vision & School CultureBLOG POST PROMPT
What is your leadership vision? (Draw connections to your school's vision, as well as the vision you articulated for your school's plan of professional development.) As you begin this semester, in what ways do you see your root beliefs and leadership vision impacting your school's culture and the structures within it? Leadership Vision Our school is a ministry of the La Purisima Concepcion Parish. The mission of our Parish is to build strong Catholics who are ready to give witness to Jesus Christ. The our school enjoys a legacy of partnership within the Lompoc Valley. We believe that Catholic Education will make students become better citizens who are active participants in the community. My leadership vision for our school is to help build a community where all members serve each other. My professional development plan starts with collaboration. The faculty can more effectively support student learning by planning instructional programs as a team based on student evidence. Based on the data collected, the faculty needs to create goals for learning, collect additional student evidence, further reflect on the progress, and continuing to refine the process. This process in combination with the utilization of best teaching practices and the appropriate technology, the process is continuously repeated. Every teacher has a particular gift or talent that they can contribute to our team. By supporting each other with what we are good at we are better able to collaborate on projects that benefit all our stakeholders. This is why we are “better together”. School Culture As the school year begins I have found that our root beliefs combined with my leadership vision has slowly begun to impact our school’s culture. This in part is due to the new leadership of our school and the atmosphere of collaboration that has begun to impact our school’s culture. While our staff is open and willing to take on new challenges and to try new strategies and technology, challenges still lie in the lack of proper infrastructure and devices. Nevertheless, our staff has continued to forge forward based on our vision. The school’s culture is obvious, we aim to provide an enjoyable learning experience where students are well cared for and respected. In addition, it is a culture committed to student success. Instruction is differentiated so that every student gets what they need. Everything that our teachers say is motivating and supportive. One challenge that we are working through comes from the fact that so many of our staff members are new and we still have not had sufficient time to build relationships with each other. So as this year continues, my goal is that our staff can work on changing the school culture we inherited from the previous staff and to create our own school culture that is more aligned with what matters most. That is to create a student centered school culture that harnesses character to drive achievement. Moving forward with this mindset we can help to ensure that the mission of our Parish continues to be achieved. The great thing about technology is that it can make good lessons better. A teacher can give a previously utilized lesson new life. This is kind of like what I did with Marc's lesson. He has a solid lesson already incorporating elements of technology. All I ended up doing was supercharging his original lesson with some familiar technology. I added a clip from A Charlie Brown Christmas and planned to open a class discussion after that was viewed to see if the students could find the obvious inferences within. This lesson could really be modified by changing the book you use and you could even assign different books or passages to each pair depending on the reading level of your students. I love to use i Pads for reading and there are so many free sites that offer the classics. One of my favorites is from the Library of Congress: http://www.read.gov/books/index.html. I like to project the book on the screen for the class as we read it together but you can do it anyway you want. There are just so many more options when you supercharge with technology. There is magic when you are making the old new again! Any feedback you can give me is greatly appreciated! Thanks for reading this. Lesson Plan: Marc Iniguez
Supercharger: Joe Inverso SLE: 3, 4 St: RL 1 CCSS.ELA-LITERACY: RL.4.1 Refer to details and examples in a text when explaining what the text says explicitly and when drawing inferences from the text. Objectives: Students will be able to draw conclusions/inferences about a character in a story based on evidence (Inferences) Resources: Students, i Pads, Digitized story for i Pad, Digitized graphic organizer (readwritethink.org) & (pair Deck), Teacher: projector and laptop Anticipatory set: (Start with a Video) Prior to projecting video clip, Teacher will ask students what they think an inference is, then open brief discussion. Teacher will ask students to watch video clip and see if they can find the inference. Then have a brief discussion about the scene. Here is the video clip. Resource: A Charlie Brown Christmas (1:35) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YubVPL1X_AQ Class instruction: Introduce and Read the Story, review what inference is and how we can determine information from story (story can be projected on classroom projector and read as a class) Resource: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/free-books-23-469-classics/id364612911?mt=8 Direct Instruction: Model how to use graphic organizer, http://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/student-interactives/story-30008.html Pair Work: Complete 1 inference together with a partner then post to peardeck https://www.peardeck.com/ Student Work: Come up w/ 2 more inferences, https://www.peardeck.com/ Differentiation: The teacher can assign story based on reading level of the student. Modification: Student may be given paper story map to complete. Accommodations: Student can be paired up with more or less advanced student. Assessment: Exit Ticket:Write down 1 inference from graphic organizer on google Docs Extension: Have students write their own story and have a partner draw inferences based on evidence from the story. HW: make 1 inference about something you read or have seen on TV or the Internet then Post to classroom blog Week 1 Blog Post: BLOG POST PROMPT
"Vision" enables the staff to develop strategies to achieve the schools technology objectives and to produce desired results. My understanding of our school’s vision for implementing technology is that we are fully committed to the conversion of our school from traditional to blended instruction for the purpose of improving instruction and teaching our students how to be responsible digital citizens. It has not always been this way. Because of recent changes, specifically, a new principal who brings a fresh new vision to our school, we have had 4 teachers leave the school. Humans are creatures of habit by nature so this kind of transition has been difficult.
Our "new vision" supports the mission of both our Parish and The New Evangelization of the Catholic Church. Our vision affects what happens when we “go forth” after mass or after school and how we treat others whether that interface be in person or online. Our vision tells us that there should be no distinction. We should always project the mission of the Church in all we say, think and do. Technology is simply another tool that is necessary for Christians to learn to use in order to become more effective communicators of our faith. Some evidence of this commitment to our vision can be explained by the fact that we have begun to schedule professional development to meet the needs of our teachers to support them through this conversion. Also, the school currently has resources earmarked for the purchase of additional devices. Additionally, we have plans in place for the updating of our infrastructure in order to facilitate this commitment. Based on what I have read about the difference between structural change and cultural change, I expect that there will be several barriers in making our vision a reality. We have started to make some structural changes to our structure already for next year but these goals could become barriers to the necessary change. These structural changes include the creation of a professional learning community, focused and specific professional development and time for teacher collaboration. Cultural change that could eventually become a barrier for our vision may include the novelty of blended learning and the parental perception of what a traditional classroom should look like. Do teachers and staff really believe that ALL students can and will learn? Are our expectations and our pacing unrealistic? Will it be sustainable for the years to come? These questions have yet to be answered as we look forward to a new school year with out new vision, fresh goals, renewed hope and many expectations. WEEK 5 BLOG POSTBLOG POST PROMPT
What does a teacher leader need to do to support the growth of other teachers in using technology? First, the teacher leader needs to know the vision of the principal and the goals of the school. Also, the teacher leader needs to know each teacher in relation to his or her individual strengths, weaknesses and concerns in using technology. Finally, the teacher leader needs to know what resources are available to the teachers he or she is leading. With these things in mind, the teacher leader can begin to build an individualized plan for each of his or her teachers. The more quality professional development (PD) and teacher “buy-in” the better chances for success. Slow but steady progress is the best practice, always recognizing the individual anxiety levels of your teachers. At our school all teachers do use technology and we have a fair amount of resources to assist the teachers on this mission. However, as we move to blended learning, there have been many concerns. These concerns are real and need to be addressed by the teacher leader to help lead the school forward. So many of these concerns can be addressed through information provided within well-prepared and regular PD. In addition to professional development, the teacher leader should offer opportunities for teachers to observe other teachers using specific technologies or programs that have been previously identified and explained by prior PD. They should offer opportunities where the teacher leader would be invited into the teacher’s classroom to assist with the implementation of a new resource or to observe and give constructive feedback to teachers. It is important to form a good peer relationship in order for this to work. There should be no anxiety that information from such an observation would be shared with administration. Finally, I think that giving teachers a site where resources can be easily shared is an important part of support. For example, you could set up a web site that provides links and information to support teacher education. Additionally, you should offer an email or phone number for teachers with specific concerns and questions that they do not wish to address at an all staff professional development meeting. In short, you need to give your teachers the vision of the principal then provide the PD necessary and coach them while they build up their confidence level to implement the changes required to meet those goals. Teachers should be given support that recognizes that change can be stressful and teacher buy-in is necessary to reduce anxiety levels. June 13, 2015 Blog Post #4: Integration and blended learning framework: introduction and roll out.6/12/2015 BLOG POST PROMPT
This week we introduced blended learning. Your school is interested in enhancing technology usage through integration and blended learning might play a role in that. Building on the CIM, Adult Learning Theory, and Blended Learning, discuss how a framework like Blended Learning would be introduced and rolled out at your school site. It is detrimental that the introduction and roll out of a particular blended learning framework would include buy-in by the stakeholders (Stephanie Fagnani, 2014). The chosen framework should support the mission and philosophy of the school site. If stakeholders are included in the decision making process, then there probably will be additional buy-in. It would be necessary for parents, teachers and administrators to understand the cost and the benefits of the many options before a model is finalized. In order to create a successful program, the stakeholders must be willing to prepare the appropriate research and to plan and implement the necessary training. This would be a good time to begin researching appropriate devices and to review the infrastructure making sure that it will be capable of supporting the amount of devices that are in your plan. Selection of devices should be in part based on the desired outcomes of the stakeholders. If funding is an issue, this process may include the need to identify potential funding sources or fundraising to assist the creation of the proposed model. Another choice is to have the learners bring their own devices. BYOD could be a solution if you do not have a sufficient budget or if you have a small or no IT staff. When these details have been addressed, stakeholders should be trained on the usage of both the appropriate technology and the chosen blended learning model. Teachers will require adequate training and support at the school site in order to gain the confidence necessary to create a successful program. The amount of training necessary to implement the program may differ depending on the confidence level of each individual teacher. Stephanie Fagnani, 2014 suggests an alternate method of selecting teachers who are already drawn to data-driven instruction to pilot a blended learning program. These teachers can later be used to train other teachers at the school site. Another consideration is choosing online learning programs that will be best for the school’s plan. The stakeholders may choose a curriculum provider or go purchase programs “a la carte?” Check with the stakeholders to see if they are already familiar with online learning programs that could easily be integrated into the framework. (Alison DeNiso, 2014) suggests that some districts are using teachers to create online curriculum that can be utilized to integrate with in-class instruction. While a less expensive option, this could mean more training for the selected teachers. Idealistically, teacher training would occur when students are off-track and teachers had the time necessary to learn the system and for teacher collaboration. The technology integration specialist would use the core instructional model to guide teachers through the process. A good start would be teaching the staff standards based alignment, assessment and data analysis. The TIS should begin to demonstrate some of the tools and strategies that teachers will need to learn to use in the classroom during the training period. For example, if you want your teachers to use Plickers then you should demonstrate a lesson using the app to show its effectiveness. When working with the teaching staff it is important to go slow and try to get buy-in. One way to do this is to show your teachers how new knowledge and skills can immediately be applied to current problems. Demonstrate the usefulness of the technology and teachers will be more likely to participate. References Bailey, J. E., & Scott Schneider, Carri Vander Ark, Tom(2013, February) Digital Learning Now! Blended Learning Implementation Guide http://digitallearningnow.com/site/uploads/2013/02/DLNSmartSeries-BL-paper_2012-02-05a.pdf DeNisco, A. (2014, January) Digital Learning Now! Teachers create own blended learning courses http://www.districtadministration.com/article/teachers-create-own-blended-learning-courses Fagnani, S. (2014, August). DA District Administration. 7 steps for choosing platforms and changing the game in K12 achievement http://www.districtadministration.com/article/rolling-out-blended-learning BLOG POST PROMPT:
Identify and describe specific best practice for the use of technology for student learning, whether it is already taking place at your school or something you are looking to support your teachers with. How does it connect to a culture for learning or the core instructional model? I think that the most logical move in tech integration for our school would be to adopt the school wide use of one of the learning management sites such as schoology, moodle, edmodo. This step would begin the conversion of our school from the older method of teaching to blended learning. When I finally jumped into edmodo, I began to understand the importance of having this type of system to help communicate with our digital natives. Besides helping to manage a variety of functions both in and outside of class, students love it. The benefits are many, from offering centralized learning, tracking and reporting features, on line assessments, and of course simplifying the learning process. When all the classes have converted over to a learning management site, I anticipate the culture for learning will begin to move in the direction of additional tech integration. Learning management sites give teachers more tools to help them to guide instruction and thus students will have more interesting and challenging learning opportunities. Additionally, our digital immigrants will better able to communicate with the digital natives. So this is my goal, to teach our teachers the system before summer begins so we all can come back this fall benefitting right away from the shift in the culture of learning to the Blended Learning program with technology and the Core Instructional Model. These are steps we can take to make the learning environment more student centered and learning more successful for both teachers and students. BLOG POST PROMPT:
Which elements of a culture for learning are present at your school, and which elements are areas of growth? Where do you see the potential to lead the shift to a culture of learning? I think that all the teachers at our school truly believe in the school and really want the best for our students. However, I think that there are many areas that require growth. So the potential to lead the shift to a culture of learning is HUGE. But time is precious and we all have very little time to be wasted. I believe that the greatest area where I can lead the shift to a culture of learning is first and foremost by transforming our faculty meetings from a culture of frontloading information (and sometimes even complaining) to a culture of learning based upon the needs, strengths and weaknesses, and most importantly, the interests of the teachers. Currently our faculty meetings are at best, where information is distributed from principal to the staff. On occasion, we work as a team on a WASC document or an in-depth study that the school is required to prepare. Wouldn’t it be better if the document was broken into parts and teams of teachers were assigned to work on each part, in Google docs, then reviewed later by the entire staff for continuity? If faculty meetings were turned into professional development, we could began to distribute the regular basic housekeeping information in an email or even a hard copy before the staff meetings. Then we could buy-back ½ hour to 1 hour of time each week. Over the course of a school year, that could be up to 40 hours that could be used for professional development. So by flipping our staff meetings, we could begin to schedule productive, teacher-led professional development back into our already scheduled weekly meetings. Therefore, no additional time is required for meetings, and we can begin to move our faculty forward into a culture of learning that will benefit all stakeholders. A well-planned faculty meeting based on the needs and suggestions of teachers could be the answer to shifting the culture of learning at our school. And the benefits are many. Teachers could lead these meetings by demonstrating and modeling strategies they are already using. Other teachers can begin to try out the tools. Teachers who are skilled in social media can volunteer to lead in-services in whatever they are doing in their classroom. Other teachers can demonstrate and suggest ways to use a favorite app. If teachers choose the topic of the meetings, chances are greater that they will buy into it. When you have a faculty that is engaged, the culture shift can be a reality. I would consider myself to be a “digital immigrant” even though I have always been drawn to new technology. As a kid I was always trying new things, taking apart things, and trying to improve things. When I was taking credential classes at CSUN in 2001, Marc Prensky’s article was published. I don’t know why it has taken me 14 years to find out about it. Nevertheless, I believe that the main concept, that students are digital natives while most of their teachers are not, can explain some of the concerns our staff is facing on a daily basis.
Since I became an educator I have noticed an alarming trend of student apathy. There is less pride in work and in following directions. It is difficult to get regular homework returned by a growing number of students on a daily basis. Consequences seem to have little or no affect on this negative behavior. As a Math teacher, I have seen the impact that less or no practice has on the performance of students in the class. In response to this issue, our school has adopted an on-line Math program and some of the teachers have reported remarkable improvement. They report that students are more likely to actually complete assignments if they are on-line. Evidence that digital natives who have grown up with new technologies actually think and process information differently reaffirms my commitment to the program. Not only do we face a generation gap, but there also is a technology gap. The key to any communication is first and foremost the ability to communicate in a common language. How can you teach if you can’t communicate with your students? I would classify the teachers at our school as “digital immigrants”. Most of them have smart phones and are using them during recess time so you would hope to find more tech in the classes. However, even though teachers have become experts on their devices, I still see a reluctance to integrate more tech into lesson plans. One of the challenges that I face is to get our teachers to learn and to regularly use these new technologies as much with their classes as they are already doing in their personal lives. The Technology Integration Specialist Certificate Program has been and will continue to provide a great source of knowledge and support. Knowing that I have 14 peers, many who share the same concerns that I have at their own school sites, along with two highly skilled teacher/mentors who are willing to reach out to me whenever I need assistance is a great blessing! I am also excited and hopeful about the future of our school when we start implementing changes to our learning environment and align learning to more closely meet the thinking patterns of our student population. I will probably always be a digital immigrant as long as there is new technology. However, I am willing to try to learn and adapt to any technology that could help me to improve my skills and to better engage the digital natives in my care. I am grateful for this opportunity. |
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