Greetings Teachers! Here we go with this summer's PST Altona 2.0! Every Weekend I will have a new post with guiding questins that will relate to our three goals of the PST:
1. Horizontal and Vertical Alignment of Course Syllabi and other other areas of operation.
2. Develop a generic Curriculum Map.
3. Refine DSOAH procedures.
You may cmment on the questions or other's comments, but you must comment weekly! To enter a comment you must have a user account. When you try and enter said comment you will be directed how to obtain one!
During our first meeting we reviewed Standards-based Instruction, including relooping and grading in a Standards environment. We reviewed DSOAH and had a sneak peek at the new Grading Scale. You also received your first packet (if you were not at the first meeting packets are on my desk - see Pat and she'll get you one).
Your homework before our next meeting (June 9th) are selected readings from The Art and Science of Teaching and Result's Now.
This week's question:
What do we need to do as a staff to move beyond Standards Reference to a Standards Based system? What would be the most valuable work?
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23 comments:
If Standards Based Education measures its success according to how well students are learning, then we have to get over some of the problems we have with what we are grading. Do we grade work as a Learning Experience & Activity because we need something to show what we are working on or is it really a vital snapshot of where our students are in the learning process toward mastery of a particular standard? As we continue to evaluate the new science curriculum as we head in to our second year of implementation, I feel this is a key focus we need to have in the science department. The new science curriculum is directly linked to standards with specific daily objectives identified, but how that is being translated into our evaluating students needs adjustment.
My second concern in regards to the questions posed is the continued need for differentiation. In a Standards Based system, students who need more get more. That applies across the board to every child and is a process that is fluid. It can’t be a plan that is determined once and not altered from that point. Is the child that is gifted in a particular area of science being challenged enough? Is a child with a language barrier or a special need getting the support he needs to succeed? How are children’s strengths and weaknesses in reading, writing and math affecting their learning in science? In addressing these issues, we will be moving away from being a Standards Referenced department.
Kathleen are you saying that the teacher needs to make certain that this isn't about them but the student's learning? Many times the teacher takes exception when a student doesn't do "their" assignment and it becomes a control issue.
So I realize that I'm the "new guy" here at Altona, but here are some thoughts I had from the readings...
So by standards reference system, are we saying this is when you teach your lesson and then refer it to a standard? While a standard based sytem would be starting with the standard and using backwards planning to create lessons to teach and assess the standard?
On almost every school job interview there is a question about standards. Just remember:
1. What do we want them to learn?
2. How do we know if they learned it?
3. What do we do if they have not learned it?
As far as the readings, I was most interested in the Results Now chapters discussing "The Buffer." Coming from Skyline, we did do something last year that I really liked. As part of our PLC, we had teachers go and observe other classrooms. Most teachers visted four different classrooms. We stressed that these were observations and not evaluations and we were careful to explain how an observation differed from an evaluation. We wanted teachers to have a chance to see what is going on in their school and not just in their own department. Hardly any teachers replied that they didn't want to be observed by their peers. Some of the comments made were incredible. Many teachers felt energized to see what their peers did and how the students reacted to different ways of teaching. I think the key ingredient of breaking down the buffer simply comes down to trust. Trust that everyone is working together to do the best job possible.
What we need to do at Altona to move towards a standards based system:
I think the biggest change that we should implement in our move toward a more standards based system is to use Reverse Planning. The most important thing we need to ask ourselves is: what particular skills and knowledge do we want our students to know/be able to do by the end of this year/semester. Having a clear picture of what we want our students to be able to do and working backwards from that is the best way to set up a standards based curriculum. Start with what we want them to know, build the assessments that will demonstrate that knowledge, and then plan our learning activities and instruction based on that. Assessments should be objective not subjective with detailed rubrics. If students know what is expected of them in the end, they can prepare better for it. It is also important for us to build detailed scope and sequences based on what we want our final outcome to look like that are consistent across content areas and that have some uniformity across the whole school.
I think our biggest challenge with moving towards a standards based system is Re Looping. It takes a lot of extra time and patience, but is worth it in the end. I loved Kathleen’s suggestion at the meeting about utilizing a “catch up” day at least once a month to help the students who need extra help or who need to reassess.
My "ah-ha" moment was pertaining to the chapter regarding the concept that states that schools function as a collection of independent contractors united by a common parking lot.. Wow. Are we really that blind as to not be aware of what's happening in our neighbor's classroom? And, are we that trusting to assume that what is happening next door is the right thing and learning is taking place?
Kathleen writes: “Do we grade work as a Learning Experience & Activity because we need something to show what we are working on or is it really a vital snapshot of where our students are in the learning process toward mastery of a particular standard?” I think that we do measurable amounts of both in addition to assigning grades for behaviors rather than learning (completing homework assignments, bringing and maintaining a planner, etc…). This is an area I have always struggled with. It seems to me that we can teach in a standards-based system, but then we are forced to grade in a more traditional system and however many rubrics we write, we are still assigning values to activities and assessments that are arbitrary. Here we are using a 10 point scale, in other schools I’ve used a 4 point scale and way back in the day I was scoring with pluses, checks and minuses with a few check pluses/ check minuses thrown in for good fun. In the end, the kids and the parents are more concerned about grades than having met a particular standard. How do we reconcile what we are trying to accomplish as educators with what our consumers expect and demand? Or should we not concern ourselves at all with grades and simply focus on instruction knowing that grading will continue to remain a necessary evil?
I agree with Jill’s point. Several years ago, when I first went through the Paula Rutherford training, I was introduced to the idea of backwards planning and have tried to use it since. Most of what we do in English involves reading and writing, and right now there are 4 reading and 2 writing state standards. When I plan my assessments and lessons, I just have to see which benchmarks our activities will address. My problem, particularly last year, is deciding what areas are most important and should receive the most attention. With our schedule last year, I had 2½ hours a week less time with each class, so there were several things that I knew from the beginning I wouldn’t cover. In the past, I was also able to work with Josh or Laura in Geography to plan lessons, and sometimes they would gear their assessments to reinforce certain writing standards. This was not possible last year when my kids were with 4 different Geography teachers. I look forward to returning to our old schedule this year. I have also learned that, despite my best intentions, I can never cover everything. Fortunately, we have done the CSAP enough times for me to be able to predict what types of items are likely to occur. As far as grading LE&A, mine are almost always components of the writing process or focus on reading comprehension, so I feel that I am assigning grades on the students’ progress with the standards. However, Lauren has a point in that parents are often more concerned with the letter grade than proficiency with the standards.
I attended Why Didn't I Learn This in College last week and Standards-Based Education (SBE) was one of our main talking points. One strategy that struck me was that students should be introduced to the standards early and then reviewed often throughout the given unit. This keeps students focused, and also gives them a purpose for any given activity or lesson. It also just occurred to me that the standards need to be accessible to students. By that I mean that they cannot be these lofty ideals, but relevant to our students current and future lives. We as teachers need to be able to show the applications of our standards because without that relevancy, students will have a difficult time internalizing the motivation for any given unit/lesson.
Just to hit on a couple of things others have said. I agree with what Kathleen was saying about the continued need for differentiation within SBE. As educators that use backwards planning, we can use the standards as our destination, but we can accommodate the path that aides any given student in reaching that goal.
I liked what Jill was talking about as far as making grading more objective, and I think that is what we're trying to do here with this PST. Assessments need objective criteria in the form of a rubric, but we can also apply that same criteria to LE&A's. I envision that as a set rubric given to students at the beginning of the year along with a course syllabus. We can't lose sight of formative assessments though! Not everything that we collect needs to be graded, but it can still provide us with valuable information on what our students understand of the content/standards.
As far as our current obsession with grades, I think that we'll need to work towards a pretty drastic paradigm shift where students and parents realize that the application and understanding of standards is more important than a letter grade. Maybe that is something that we can put in our syllabi or course outlines at the beginning of the year and consistently reference it throughout the semesters.
I think that when the standards were first introduced, many people in the educational system said, “Let’s just do what we have always done, and then point out which standard we are addressing.” After more than a decade of this, I think many educators are realizing that Standard Based Education requires a lot more than that.
As many have already commented, to create a standards based lesson, unit, and curriculum requires the backwards design. What do we want the students to know (the standard)? How will we know that they have mastered the standard? What and how will we teach to get them to that mastery? For anyone who is interested, there is a great book that I am using in the social studies PST this summer called, Understanding by Design. The book really helps to walk the reader through the development of units and lessons using the backwards design approach focusing on inquiry and essential learnings.
I think Patrick touched on an interesting point about trust. To work in collaboration, not isolation, we need to trust our colleagues. I think an important part of our work this next year at Altona should revolve around trust. We need to work on creating trust in each of our teams (departmental, grade level, etc.) in order to successfully collaborate.
Ok, a couple of comments caught my eye…
Yes, Wendy, in many ways some of us are blind as to what goes on in other classrooms. Not having common planning time – or any common time - hinders grade level and departmental communication, and in many cases, there isn’t even any time for connection other than a quick greeting in passing each other in the hall. I get to tune in to some of the chatting going on in my classroom which sometimes clues me in to what’s going on in different classes, but otherwise I often feel out of the loop on what is going on in other classrooms. Pat’s updates and calendars are a quick way to keep in touch with the general pulse of the school, but as to what goes on behind those closed classroom doors remains a mystery to a lot of us.
And Lauren brought up a great point about parents being more concerned about the grade than the mastery of learning. That’s an issue that has always been and will continue to be a problem; not only are the parents often more concerned about the grade than the learning, but the students themselves as well. How many of us have had parents request extra credit for their student to do (re: busy work?) to bump their student’s overall averages up? Students are admitted to colleges based on their grades and scores, yet colleges complain they can’t write, compute and use higher level thinking once they get there. It’s the same in middle school - teachers complain about the aptitude levels of the incoming students and high school teachers complain about the ability levels of their incoming students. One wonders how grades got earned in the first place without corresponding achievement and learning.
I also agree with Jill and others who have commented that reverse planning is the key, not doing business as usual and then trying to match a lesson with a standard after the fact. Asking the basic question of what is essential for students to learn and how can we get them there is where the planning should start. Re-looping is the glitch; simply working out the time logistics is part of the battle, but finding the right route to make the re-looping effective is just as tricky.
It has been great reading everyone's responses. I think we are all in agreement that a standard based system increases student achievement. Students generally learn better in a standards based environment because everybody's working towards the same goal.
While pondering this subject during our first couple of weeks of break I have concluded that there are 4 Keys to success for ALL students. These would include curriculum, instruction, assessment and environment.
1. Curriculum would include content subject matter that is the same for all groups of students.
2. Instruction should include the use of rubrics and other methods to clearly communicate student expectations. The design of instruction and assessments should be standards based.
3. Assessments should compare what students know to standards and benchmarks. Assessments should not compare what students know to what other students know.
4. Environment should support learning. The climate in which instruction takes places should be positive. This area would also include communication towards the achievement of standards.
To answer Joe's question in what would be the most valuable work to achieve a Standards Based System I believe as a school we should better communicate to our students about the standards. Teachers should be articulating the standards as well as using the standards to design instruction and assessments. Teachers should also be providing feedback to help student improve performance.
In return, students should be able to describe the standards and use self assessments and reflection to improve performance. This also eliminates any gray areas. Academic standards are a fair and effective way to give students the 'rules of the game' when they are in school.
Jill hit the nail on the head regarding the first and most necessary step in achieving a true Standards Based system at Altona. And, as Victor highlighted, next year’s schedule will allow much more for this as a viable possibility. Not only will we get more plan time, but the time to collaborate will be essential.
Additionally, I think Andy brings up a key point in highlighting that we need to make standards accessible to students. At the beginning of every new unit, I make a point to explain why we are doing this particular unit in the context of application to their future school career and the real world. However, my “ah ha” is realizing that I need to take that a step further and clearly articulate the connections the instruction bears to the standards and the standards’ relevance to their future school career and the real world. The standards being addressed are on the board everyday, but my students are really only concerned with what activities are on the agenda and what the homework is for that evening. By making clear explicit connections to the standards being addressed, students will gain a better understanding of what they are supposed to be learning and able to do; this understanding promotes retention because they can articulate what they learned.
The word that comes to mind in thinking through all of this is metacognition- thinking about thinking. We are asked to be metacognitive in all that we do in our classrooms; not only do we need to know what we are doing, but we need to know why we are doing it. Taking that one step further and letting students in on why we do what we do, giving them a metacognitive awareness about our classrooms, is an important second step in the process of really achieving a Standards Based, as opposed to just Standards Reference, system in our school.
Obviously there are some great thoughts here, and coming in late, there's not too much for me to add, summarize or steal. :) I'll try, though.
From the reading for this week, the concept that struck me as a powerful tool for moving us from standards-referenced to standards-based would be teamed reflection. On page 34 in Results Now, the author states, "our best 'plan' is to arrange for teachers to analyze their achievement data, set goals, and then meet at least twice a month-- for 45 minutes...they can help one another ensure that they are teaching essential standards and using assessment results to improve the quality of their lessons."
Of course, implementing something like this would require the trust that Patrick referred to, but I think that is definitely build-able in a school that is as cohesive and focused as Altona!
Sorry, typo I missed! :)
One other thing-- Andy's comment about really utilizing the standards often throughout a unit and making sure the students understand them in context reminded me of a teaching strategy I used to employ. I had a ginormous poster of the language arts standards on one wall that we constantly referred to. We had an arrow labeled "We Are Here!", and whenever we changed units, we would look over the standards and discuss where the arrow needed to go. Actually, now that I am fully remembering, there were two arrows-- one for reading and one for writing-- that we would slide around. I thought it worked well because the standards became common language in the class.
As a new blogger, I find that I am having some difficulty getting my comments in. I wrote a lengthy repky about UBD, backwards planning and my beliefs about grading, but they seem to have disappeared. Let's just say that I agree with those of you who believe we need more common planning to really make this work and that the ultimnate key to success is for us to be consistent in our implementation of these strategies. I hope this comment makes i through!
Yay! I did it! I knew that computers had to be good for more than playing games (try to tell that to my sons, though!)
We certainly need to make sure we are using backwards planning, which should be easier to self-monitor when we have that common planning time back, and we can get input and feedback from our peers.
Another hugely essential component to Standards Based Education -- and effective education in general -- is lots and lots of timely feedback in the form of formative assessments. This was one of the main points in a Rick Wormeli article on Differentiation that I revisited for one of my current Masters classes. Formative assessments can be graded but do NOT need to be, as their key purpose is measuring the students' progress toward the objectives and standards. They can range from a brief quiz to a paragraph summing up "what we've learned today" to simply "hold up your thumbs to show me how well you understand adjectives and adverbs." I apologize if I'm saying what a lot of you already know, but this was a great reminder for me.
In response to Wendy and Laura's comments, No, I have abolutely no idea what really goes on in most classrooms in our building. I have a pretty good idea of what Victor is accomplishing next door, but this has a lot to do with the fact that he has shared his materials and plans with me, as well as certain implied trust that my veteran "Obi Wan" teammate is doing a great job over there.
On this topic, I know that this past year involved an awful lot of changes and adjusting on the fly at Altona. Having said that, I would love to have more visits to my classroom, for both observational and evaluative purposes. I believe that this community of trust and learning form each other -- which we had with our old schedule and which I look forward to having again when we return to it -- is the biggest factor that will improve my craft and help ensure that I am employing increasingly effective Standards Based Education in my classroom. As Jenay mentioned, the standards and objectives are always posted in my room, but I could certainly make a better effort to refer to them on a more frequent basis and make sure the kids are familiar with them -- and how "what we're doing" ties in with them. I love Michelle's idea of maintaining the "We Are Here" arrow that points to the current standards, and most importantly, that these standards and objectives are written and discussed in KID-FRIENDLY LANGUAGE. Returning to my previous point, there is a lot of fantastic expertise at Altona, and I really look forward to taking more thorough advantage of that invaluable resourse -- as we already are doing through this blog discussion.
I unfortunately will not be able to attend tomorrow's meeting as I will be at CU attending my other Masters courses, but I eagerly await this continuing collegial discussion.
This post is from Jayme Margolin. She was having computer difficulties. There will be two different posts. (limited number of words allowed)
Well, by being late to post my comments, everyone else has already done a great job of hitting many aspects of Joe's question. I agree with many of you that Jill came in and clearly stated what needs to be done by using reverse planning. We need to know what the students need to learn and then address that back to the standards. The benchmarks have been put in writing, but our instruction for every content area needs to stay current with daily events. This connection to learning about what is happening now and then continually reinforcing the idea through standard teaching of general ideas and then making the correlation to current events is a useful tool. Therefore, this idea of what the students need to learn may change in as short of a time as from the original ideas in August to the end of the year in May.
Part 2 of Jayme Margolin:
Several other points not as closely related to the direct question at hand - Wendy is right about not seeing what is going on in each classroom. Each teacher has different teaching styles and will run their classroom differently. I think the students need this variation. As Andy said, not everything should be graded. If Language Arts has a spelling test every week...good, the students know what is expected of them each week. However, if students know they are doing a project or lab for a grade, they work harder. The students should be putting in their best effort for every task at hand. This is a life lesson and covers standards. If a project is covering three benchmarks and the student is thinking it will be graded, they will learn the material and know those key points even if it is not graded. I strongly believe grades are not everything. Sometimes, grades just turn students into numbers and that takes away for the student being who they are and their personality. Some students do better on tests, while others do better with projects. Either way, it will come back around on a test, other sort of assessment, or if the project was graded if that student not only showed those three benchmarks but truly learned and understood those 3 main points by using examples and applications. Teachers need to watch the students more and pick up on the feedback that they give almost daily about grades, LE&A vs. 70% assessments, and group work. I never used clickers in my classroom thus far, but each time I had the clicker cart for a powerpoint presentation, the attitude of the classroom changed when that cart became visible to the students because they immediately thought there was going to be a clicker quiz. There are many ways and types of assessments, I think teachers need to be creative with these assessments in covering the benchmarks in not just the common ways of tests and quizzes. Parents do go by these numbers/grades, but to me it is the teacher comment section on the report card that is just as meaningful as the actual grade, which can enter into a whole new topic of discussion. We need to not only do reverse planning about what the students need to know and related that to the standards, but plan out the variety of assessments and what needs to be stressed with these benchmarks and life lessons at the middle school level. This will make assessments more objective, which relates to Kelly's #3 point of grading the student for their work and their understanding of the content at hand. The teacher should make note of how the students are doing in relation to each other because that may help identify if a student may have a learning disability or having problems with peers or at home, just as some examples. This is to help the students and not hold them back with a number grade. Again, back to the idea of there being many ways and types of assessment and how we want to use them. The content is very important, but teachers covering middle school level also need to watch for more than just learning the standard benchmarks. Don't get me wrong, I do think that discussing the standards is the first priority in this type of planning and then we move onto the variety of assessments and the like.
Like others, the standards are posted in the room, but we don’t discuss them often. Each unit in Spanish deals with reading, writing, listening, and speaking, and most also deal with culture – but just for fun I googled the world language standards and see they have changed… I did plan backwards last year (I had been introduced to it my first year here and did it some the first few years, but did it consistently last year). I also have heard that not all things need to be graded, but like others, I know that if the students are getting a grade, they will tend to try harder. As I am trying to play catch up after being away for various commitments, I don’t recall which blog Victor was answering to when he mentioned preparedness. I did find it easier to have things ready for the unit when I planned backwards. Looping sounds good, but where / when is it fit in? I had reassessment contracts for kids, but the whole class cannot be held back for the one student, and how does that student find time to learn what was missed without missing the next steps as we continue on? I had three students who worked independently in Spanish as what the rest of the class was doing was not challenging enough… Will what they did be taken into account before they are placed at the high school?
There have been good points from everyone here. Thank you for getting the creative juices going. In order for us to have a truly standard based system we need to have backward planning (that includes a good mix of learning activities, formative assessments and summative assessments), re-looping and enrichment.
The SEPUP curriculum is very good at providing daily learning activities as well as rubrics and suggestions for formative and summative assessments. My goal this year is to utilize a mix of the rubrics and clickers for assessments. This gives students feedback on both their scientific writing as well as basic topic comprehension. The clickers are great because they give students real-time feedback about how they are answering different science topics.
I am having to re-visit how I will do re-looping and enrichment at Altona. At Westview, these were separate classes. I like the idea of having a re-looping time built into the Late Start schedule. I know that SEPUP also has a variety of student links for enrichment. I struggle with how not to make that busy work for those advanced kids though.
I am excited to learn that the schedule will provide for some grade level and subject area teaming. I think both are vital for student success. Grade level planning allows us to complement each others subject and can provide for the creation of some great interdisciplinary units. Subject area teaming is so important for a Standards-Based education because it allows time for vertical and horizontal alignment and for creating and grading common assessments.
The last thing I will add is the use of Virtual Campus. Last year I decided to do my daily lesson plans on Power Point and then post them to Virtual Campus. I could put dates for upcoming assessments and direct kids to all kinds of different links. I was even able to post pictures and video from the frog dissection. It was a great way to share with kids and parents what we were doing in the classroom. I think it might be a great way to share with other teachers as well.
There have been good points from everyone here. Thank you for getting the creative juices going. In order for us to have a truly standard based system we need to have backward planning (that includes a good mix of learning activities, formative assessments and summative assessments), re-looping and enrichment.
The SEPUP curriculum is very good at providing daily learning activities as well as rubrics and suggestions for formative and summative assessments. My goal this year is to utilize a mix of the rubrics and clickers for assessments. This gives students feedback on both their scientific writing as well as basic topic comprehension. The clickers are great because they give students real-time feedback about how they are answering different science topics.
I am having to re-visit how I will do re-looping and enrichment at Altona. At Westview, these were separate classes. I like the idea of having a re-looping time built into the Late Start schedule. I know that SEPUP also has a variety of student links for enrichment. I struggle with how not to make that busy work for those advanced kids though.
I am excited to learn that the schedule will provide for some grade level and subject area teaming. I think both are vital for student success. Grade level planning allows us to complement each others subject and can provide for the creation of some great interdisciplinary units. Subject area teaming is so important for a Standards-Based education because it allows time for vertical and horizontal alignment and for creating and grading common assessments.
The last thing I will add is the use of Virtual Campus. Last year I decided to do my daily lesson plans on Power Point and then post them to Virtual Campus. I could put dates for upcoming assessments and direct kids to all kinds of different links. I was even able to post pictures and video from the frog dissection. It was a great way to share with kids and parents what we were doing in the classroom. I think it might be a great way to share with other teachers as well.
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