Hypothetical Scenario

One of my favorite episodes of the Simpson's (cartoon on Fox) is one where Bart steals all of the teacher editions of the text books from his school. The teachers are in the lounge chain smoking and having apoplectic fits, wonder how they will teach. It's just plain funny, because it is true in some places.

Luckily, not here! So, what would you do next year if you had no textbooks? You've got your computers, SmartBoards, Internet, classroom libraries, support materials...but no textbooks of any kind. Oh, and you have your Standard Course of Study - with the essential skills specified.

What would learning look like in your classroom? How would you plan for learning? How would you structure your short-term and long-term goals? How would you address the needs parents have to see "stuff" come home?

How could we use learning teams to address learning in this scenario? What could the role of Bloom's Taxonomy be?

Bloom's Taxonomy

Let's talk about higher levels of learning. The new teacher evaluation instrument is based on the revised Bloom's taxonomy (click on the links to see examples - take a look at the Bloom's Taxonomy activity for lesson ideas - look at the active verbs that are used).

How do you think we can use this information with our learning teams to improve student learning?

How can you structure lessons you are teaching now to move students to higher levels of thinking/understanding/learning?

Talk about what you have read and discussed so far to make connections and extend your thinking.

90 90 90 Schools

90 90 90 Schools are schools with 90% Free and Reduced Lunch, 90% Minority, 90% on grade level. The research on these schools (and yes, they do exist) indicates they have these things in common:

1. A Focus on Academic Achievement
2. Clear Curriculum Choices
3. Frequent Assessment of Student Progress and Multiple Opportunities for Improvement
4. Emphasis on Writing
5. External Scoring
6. Non-proprietary Instructional Practices (using more that just one program to teach the curriculum)

What are your thoughts on this in relationship to what we do at school?

Something to think and talk about

Take a brief look at this article - I think you can get the gist of the article quickly - (http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3994/is_200501/ai_n9483894).

Respond to the following with your thougths: If we use educational practices that do not have a research base, are we engaging in educational malpractice? Explain your response. What implications does the idea of educational malpractice have for our classrooms and student learning?

I ask this not to indict anyone, but because federal legislation is moving us in that direction.

January 21, 2009

Please take a look at the previous post for how you will structure your learning today. We are glad to have the staff from East Bend joining us on our blog. Remember, the entire day is devoted to learning about the concept of PLC's and how we can implement them in our schools. There is no "one right way"; it will be a unique create based on our learning. Feel free to take time for lunch at that time. Remember, let your conversations be reflected in your blog responses so you can share your thoughts with others outside your teams. I will be walking around some, but will spend most of my day reading your posts. Let me know if you have questions.

I thought I had all books in, but am missing some. Let me check my Amazon order. I will fix it.

Have a great days and share your learning, Jas

Now that we have our books...

In your groups, take a look at your texts and decide how you want to structure your learning. You might want to break up the chapters over 10 weeks. I would like for us to plan to finish our study by the end of March. Be aware, this does not mean we will be experts at that point.

Once we finish with our texts we will share some ideas and maybe even share our text with other groups. Our goal will be to develop a personal plan for how you will use PLC's to increase student learning in your classrooms and grade levels/groups.

Our first activity will center around common formative assessments. In your groups, you will develop a common formative assessment around one objective from one goal in the Standard Course of Study. You will, as groups, decide on the goal to be assessed, create the assessment, administer the assessment, analyze the assessment data, then decide how to use the data to inform your instruction. Remember, this is not about grading, it's about improving instruction to meet student learning needs. We may repeat this process several times to improve our understanding of and ability to create common formative assessment. This is becoming one of the expectation for all teachers everywhere (see data regarding NCLB, IDEA, and RTI).

We will spend an extended period of time in this process via the blog on the protected workday on Wednesday, January 21. Teachers from East Bend School will be participating on our blog on that day. Be ready to share, discuss, disagree, and learn.

Common Assessments

One of the tenants of the PLC process involves the use of common formative assessments among grade levels and/or content areas. If you as grade levels or content areas have implemented common assessments, talk a little about the steps used to implement them.

What do you see as the benefits of common formative assessments on student learning?

How could common formative assessment improve your classroom instruction?

(Common formative assessments can be defined as assessments created collaboratively by a team of teachers responsible for the same grade level or course in order to improve student learning. They are developed and administered multiple times throughout the school year. Results are used to modify instruction in order to improve student learning. The value of the assessment is not in the grading of the assessments, but the feedback it offers about student learning. The assessments can also provide teachers with feedback regarding the effectiveness of their instruction.)