From WGSD Human Resources: AST/PBTE/iObservation

From Linda Holliday

This year we will be continuing, as a district, our study of Marzano's "The Art and Science of Teaching." We will also continue to provide professional development surrounding Design Questions 2, 3, 4 and 5. In preparation for this important work, please consider taking some time to review these chapters within your book.

As you also know, we will be implementing Webster Groves School District's new Teacher Evaluation process this school year. There are several things we would like you to do to prepare for the August 9^th professional development. First, please take some time to review the Marzano Teacher Evaluation Scales which can be found at http://www.webster.k12.mo.us/pages/WGSD/Departments/District_Departments/Human_Resources.  These scales, a portion of which were provided to you last year, provide the foundation of the evaluation process we will be using.

In addition to the scales, a new feature of the teacher evaluation process will be an online component called iObservation which will allow teachers and administrators to maintain a dialogue centered on their instruction, create an opportunity for teachers to develop a relevant growth plan to be used during the evaluation process, and provide for online professional development opportunities. It will be important to log into iObservation and set up your profile before we meet on August 9^th. From there you will also be able to start to create your growth plan. The link http://www.webster.k12.mo.us/pages/WGSD/Departments/District_Departments/Human_Resources  provides a series of videos that will explain how to set up your profile and start to develop your Growth Plan by completing the Self-Assessment.

If you choose to move ahead with work on the Self-Assessment and Growth Plan, you may be able to utilize some of the time on August 9^th to work in your classrooms.

 *You must be logged into Edline to view the training videos.

Beginning the Year: 2013-2014

There is much to share at the beginning of the school year.  Please give yourself enough time to be thorough as you read and complete the tasks in this post.  You will need to login to your WGcloud account to access the links in this post.

The Hixson Staff Calendar on the Network has dates, times, and other information regarding our opening three days. Click here for more specific information about the meetings on 8/9.

Teacher Observation and The Art and Science of Teaching
This first year with the new observation instrument will require more time on the front end than in subsequent years.  If your Growth Plan is shared with me before 8:30am on 8/9, you will be excused from an hour of the faculty meeting that morning.  Ultimately, your Growth Plan is due to Dr. Heisserer before school begins on 8/13.  Click here to read more.

Click here to read some FAQs about the WGSD Performance Based Teacher Evaluation process and instrument.

Grading and Retake/Redo Practices
Beginning with the 2013-2014 school year, Hixson Middle School will implement

• consistent, across-the-school practices for retaking assessments and re-doing homework and other assignments, and
• consistent grade weighting practices.

I made this decision after several thoughtful conversations initiated by teachers and parents.  I also reflected on feedback collected last year with post-its on my wall and on my own beliefs as a leader and educator.  Click here to read more background and to review this expectations.

Other, Year-Long Development Opportunities
Three ongoing learning opportunities are available for faculty this year.

1. Fourth Monday Faculty Meetings will run from 3:30-4:30pm.  You will be able to choose how you use that time.  Please plan to stay for the entire time period.  More details will be published prior to each fourth Monday faculty meeting.
2. A Critical Friends Group designed to provide ongoing collaboration and feedback among faculty members who choose to participate.
3. A justice and equity cohort designed to provide opportunities for ongoing conversation and learning about a variety of identities from a personal (or stance) perspective.

Click here for more information about all three.

A New Room
The shape of our building as changed, somewhat.  A wall has been built upstairs next to the elevator door creating an addition room.  As of right now, I am not quite sure how I will allocate that space; however, for now, it can serve as a much-need conference room.

Required Staff Training
We must engage in required staff training annually around some very specific topics. I rely on you to review this information on your own. The PowerPoint is lengthy, so Mrs. Teter divided it into six sections so you can review it more easily over time.  We will review aspects of this staff training via the Network and at faculty meetings throughout the year.

• Click here for the PowerPoints.
• Click here for the Training Tracker.  The training tracker is due to Mrs. Edwards by October 4th, 2013.  I am giving longer this year given how much time setting up iObservation may take.

Building Hours

The building will be open from 7am to 5pm the week of 8/5-8/9.  On 8/12, the building will close at 3:30pm.

Other Information
Click any of the links below to get more information about that topic:

• Meeting and Release Dates and Topics for 2013-2014
• Discovery Expectations
• Teaming Expectations
• Department Expectations
• Master Schedule
• Student Handbook
• Faculty Handbook (Or click the digital briefcase button on the dock above)
• School Improvement Plan: 2013-2014 (draft)

April 15, 2013

After several conversations in the building, I can tell that we, as a school, may have benefited from a weekend as beautiful as this one.  These past two weeks have been challenging, I understand, and your diligence and attention are both appreciated and valued.  Thank you.

Hixson High Five Awards
It's time to begin thinking about whom you might nominate for the Hixson High Five award.  Please take sometime out of your busy schedule to recognize students, who may not otherwise be recognized, for their readiness, respect, and responsibility.  Students really do value and benefit from this personal feedback.  Click here to read more information about the High Five Award.  Click here to e-mail Mrs. Davis your nominee.

8th Grade Recognition
This year, the plan for 8th grade recognition is changing somewhat, and I will need your help.

• Essentially, we will only be recognizing students during the program who receive awards and recognitions from Hixson only (e.g., the Franey Award).  In order to recognize all students and to account for recognitions beyond school (e.g., participating in an all-suburban band or a Destination Imagination competition), Mr. Anderson and Mr. Heisel have created a PowerPoint in the WGCloud with a slide for each student.  
• I will send an e-mail soon with instructions for how you might add to this presentation which will run twice before the event begins and once after; the presentation will be open to all faculty and staff.  Click here to see a sample slide; I'll do my best to answer any questions you might have.

. . . from an earlier blog post:
Art and Science of Teaching: DQs 7, 8, and 10
Given that our faculty meeting time is running short, you will be left on your own to review Design Questions 7, 8, and 10 in The Art and Science of Teaching. I do not anticipate that review the following chapters will be difficult or take a long time:

• Recognizing and Acknowledging Adherence or Lack of Adherence to Rules and Procedures,
• Communicating High Expectations for All Students, and
• Developing Effective Lessons into Cohesive Units.

If you are interested in the PowerPoints provided by the district, you may click here to review them.  Reviewing the action steps in the text will also be helpful.  Taking some department or team time may expedite the process as well.  

 . . . and thank you, Dr. Miller, for arranging THIS for us!

Learning Goals

Good afternoon,
Today, I visited 46 learning spaces and ready 72 posted learning goals.  Several teachers have begun posting 1-3 learning goals.  The pie graphs below summarize what I learned from my walk. Click here to see the proficiency scale for learning goals.  These data only account for how the goal is written and posted, not for whether or not I observed the teacher connecting activities and assignments to the goal (although I did in some cases).  If you are ever interested in where a goal you are using might fall on the scale, send it to me or invite me into your classroom and we can discuss it. 
Sincerely,
Jason Heisserer, Ed.D.
Principal, Hixson Middle School
314.963.6450
schools.webster.k12.mo.us/hixson
hixsonprincipal.wordpress.com

See the full gallery on Posterous

Proficiency Scale for this Year's Expectations for Learning Goals

This week, I am publishing a proficiency scale for this year's expectation for posting learning goals: All teachers will post a learning goal every day in every class.  I added one more piece to this expectation: not only that you post, but that you use the goal as part of the learning and part of your teacher talk.
The proficiency scale is my best draft so far and has 5 levels, 0-4.  Each level contains a descriptor and some examples.  Remember, that Level 3 is the target: applying.  Level 4 represents the next level: paring learning goals and proficiency scales.  Three teachers shared drafts of their scales for us.
I tested this scale by walking around the building and rating the goals I saw.  I was in 46 learning spaces, including the library and the clinic (both of which have posted learning goals).  The pie graph below will give you a sense of where we are a school.

Proficiency_Scale_for_Learning_Goals,_8-2012.pptx Download this file

Thank you to the teachers who suggested I share a proficiency scale, gave me feedback on multiple drafts, and practiced using it with me.
To see the scale, please click here.

Clarifying Learning Goals

"Arguably the starting place for all effective instruction is designing and communicating clear learning goals" (Marzano & Brown, 2009, p. 9).
This week, I shared e-mails noting our progress toward the expectation that all teachers will post learning goals each day.  Part of Design Question 1 in The Art and Science of Teaching is to track progress.  You can see on the table below our progress throughout the week. 

You will notice there are two lines.  The blue line tracks how many learning spaces had posted learning goals when I dropped in. The red line tracks how many learning goals were both posted and specific to the curriculum of the learning space.
There is a difference between learning (or curricular) goals and goals for behaviors.  Learning goals can be traced back to district curricula or other established standards (TILS, CCSS, GLEs, etc.).  Behavior goals can be traced back to established expecatations (PBIS expectations, team or classroom rules, etc.).
In order to precise to the framework in The Art and Science of Teaching, goals should be viable.  Viable goals are connected explicitly to the curriculum and can be taught to understanding in the time given.
So, what about goals for things like behavior, learning expectations, and community building (particularly given that design question 6 is about teaching processes and procedures explicitly)?
Posting a goal, any goal, meets the expectation surrounding learning goals at this time (so if you posted behavior goals this week, you were not wrong); however, I encourage you to make posting learning goals that are tied to curriculum your habit.  Already this week, I have had conversations with teachers about the difference between the two, and I will begin offering feedback now that I have made this clarification.
So, where do you account for expectations regarding behaviors? If you are planning to teach behaviors, all of which are in support of learning, make them a part of your agenda.
Yes, but . . . I understand that at the beginning of the year teachers may chose to focus on community building, procedures, and expectations; however, classrooms that focused on curriculum day one did not appear, from my observation, to suffer any lack of community or understanding of procedures and expectations.
Quick Quiz
Which of the below are learning goals per The Art and Science of Teaching (AST) framework?

1. Students will understand the importance of team community.
2. Students will be able to construct tables, graphs, and equations to represent linear patterns of change.
3. Students will understand how words work together in a sentence.
4. Students will be able to state Hixson's three PBIS expectations.

Tips

• Work as a department and with coordinators to determine the best learning goals for your curriculum.
• Include an objective with your goal to account for any behaviors you may be teaching.
• Note in whatever sub plans you may leave the learning goal the sub should post and/or review.

(Numbers 2 and 3 in the Quick Quiz above are learning goals that are most precise to the AST framework.)

Anticipating The Art and Science of Teaching

We will spend some time introducing The Art and Science of Teaching on August 10th.  However, I wanted to post so that you might anticipate before 8/10 (and review after) the planning model and the design questions we will spend the year studying.
Essentially, the ten design questions (DQs) that we will be studying this year can be organized into three interdependent lesson segments:

• Routine Segments
• Content Specific Segments
• Segments Enacted on the Spot

Routing Segments include those aspects of our teaching practice that we do routinely (that is for every lesson, every day).  They include:

• Learning Goals and Feedback (DQ 1) and
• Rules and Procedures (DQ 6).

We will review these on 8/10.
Content Specific Segments include those aspects of our teaching practice that we implement to help students learn the skills (procedural knowledge) and content (declarative knowledge) included in our curricula. They include:

• Interacting with New Knowledge (DQ 2),
• Practicing and Deepening (DQ 3), and
• Generating/Testing Hypothesis (DQ 4).

We will review these in October, November, and January.
To help connect last year's and this year's learning, you can think of

• Interacting with New Knowledge as acquisition,
• Practicing and Deepening as making meaning, and
• Generating/Testing Hypothesis as transfer.

Click here to refer back to last year's post about this. Consider also that I asked that you code your learning plan activities last year as A, acquire new or basic knowledge or skills, M, make meaning or gain a better understanding, or T, practice transfering knowledge, skills, and understandings to new situations.
Segments Enacted on the Spot include those aspects of our teaching practice that have the most variables and over which we have more influence than control.  They include:

• Student Engagement (DQ 5),
• Adherence to Rules and Procedures (DQ 7),
• Teacher-Student Relationships (DQ 8), and
• High Expectations (DQ 9).

We will reivew these in September, February, March, and April.
Design Question 10, organizing lessons into cohesive units, we will consider in May.  Last year, we spent a lot of time planning backwards from this.  Marzano does not put DQ 10 in any design segment above.

Example: KUD + Assessment Evidence

This week I will attach an example of a completed assessment evidence section of the unit design template.  Earlier this year, I attached an example of a completed KUD template that the Department Chairs had brainstormed.  I chose one of those and completed the assessment evidence template based on those KUDs.
Please remember that there are several correct ways to account for the assessment evidence of the KUDs you have been crafting.  What is most important is that both sections align.  You will notice that I did not attach a sample assessment.  Once you have described the assessment evidence you can vet your actual assessment against to see what revision you may need.
If you have any questions, please let me know.  To see this example, click here. Scroll to the second page for the example of a complete Assessment Evidence template.

Stage 1: KUDs; Stage 2: Evidence of Understanding

I have seen several examples of KUDs from most departments. These have been excellent drafts, and from my perspective, worth the time, effort, and thinking.  Thank you for participating as you have been.  I have mentioned before that there will be three parts to the unit: KUDs, Assessment, and Learning Plan.  I've been alluding to assessments in a couple previous posts here and in the Quick PD section.  I want to share a little more specific information now.
At this point in our learning, I do not expect departments to attach sample assessments; I am more interested at this point in the thinking behind the assessment.  This thinking is divided into three sections: evaluative criteria, performance task(s), and other evidence.
The evaluative criteria answer the following questions:

• What criteria will be used in each assessment to evaluate attainment of the desired results?
• Regardless of the format of the assessment, what qualities are most important?

The performance task(s) respond to the following:

• Students will show that they really understand by evidence of . . .
• Consider: How will stuents demonstrate their understanding (meaning-making and transfer) through complex perofrmance?

Other evidence may be guided by the following:

• Students will show they have achieved goals in the KUDs by . . .
• Consider what other evidence you might collect to determine student understanding.

If you're interested in what this might look like as part of the template we started with KUDs, please click here.
Let me know if you have any questions about this or how it might affect your current work with assessments.

Developing a Unit, Part 1.2

"To 'understand' has two general connotations: (1) applying your understandings, knowledge, and skill effectively in new situations results in successful transfer; and (2) making inferences and grasping connections, to culminate in understanding" (Wiggins & McTighe, 2011, p. 14).

I wanted to use this post to clarify a few terms:

Transfer

The ability for students to transfer their learning to new and different situations is the ultimate goal of education.  We do not want students to parrot back and not retain.  We want students to know, understand, and use what they know beyond the context of our classroom.  We want students to be able to size up a new challenge and transfer learning efficiently and effectively; rote knowledge alone will not support this ability.  Therefore, when students can transfer their learning they can use it in multiple contexts on their own.

We identify transfer goals when we identify what we want students to be able to DO as a result of their learning.

Meaning

Meaning is divided into two sections on our template: understanding and essential questions

• Understanding

Students come to an understanding by reflecting on and analyzing their learning.  They demonstrate their understanding by being able to make important generalizations and connections, sharing new insights, or discovering useful ways to make sense of prior experience or learning. When students can make meaning of what they are learning in broad, theoretical ways, we know that they understand. Understandings can be based on content or process.

• Essential Questions

Being able to pursue quality questions at the heart of a discipline facilitates our understanding of that discipline.  As students discover answers to essential questions, they are active in the process of making sense of what they are learning.  Students make meaning actively when they continue to consider quality questions.

We identify meaning-making goals when we identify what we want students to UNDERSTAND as a result of their learning.

Acquisition

Acquisition is divided into two sections on our template: knowledge and skills:

Knowledge (facts, vocabulary, basic concepts, etc.) and skills (basic know-how, discrete skills) are the necessary tools of understanding and transfer.  Avoid listing picayune facts or definitions; instead, list core building blocks that fit naturally within the unit and that you plan to assess.

We identify acquisition goals when we identify what we want students to KNOW as a result of their learning.

Further Thinking about Unit Design

"We do not start with content; we start with what students are expected to be able to do with content.  What would real use of content look like? What should students ultimately be able to say and do with content if they 'get it'? And if that's what real learning looks like, what should be taught--and how--to make it most likely that teaching leads to fluent, flexible, and lasting learning?"  --Wiggins & McTight, 2011, p. 7.
As we continue to think purposefully about our planning, I wanted to offer some further thinking about unit design.  Once you have determined what is essential in your curriculum, or what is essential to the two units you department has decided to revisit, you will organize your unit information into three parts:

1.  Desired Results: What students will know, understand, and do (KUD).

2.  Acceptable Evidence:  What the summative assessment will look like and what level of proficiency is considered acceptable.

3.  Learning Experiences and Instruction: Some sample learning experiences.

I will spend some time in future blog posts writing about each of these three parts.  I will also spend some time with department chairs and anyone else who is interested explaining this information.
One of the keys is to balance when you read and access this information.  My goal is to have it accessible to you so that when you begin the work on your unit plan, you have had an opportunity to read and think about these expectations.
My goal for putting this out here now is so that you can begin to get a sense of what all of this will begin to look like.  Our School Improvement Plan (SIP) is written using a similar format.  You may want to take a look at it to see a kind of example.
This work will be challenging, and I believe it will be rewarding as well.

Next Steps: Thinking About Unit Design

Taking the time to determine High Priority Standards and Essential Curriculum (particularly for the two units on which your department will be focusing this year) provides background, context, and entry points for unit design.  This process is not linear; it is recursive and will require you to think back and forth across several elements as you and your department work to conceptualize and describe your units.
We are engaging in this process for several reasons:

• Focusing our teaching on what is essential deepens our capacity to teach for understanding rather than just teaching to cover the curriculum,
• Teaching what is essential provides more room for all students to access the learning and for us to plan and give feedback on student work regardless of whether we are intervening, extending, or holding steady on their behalf, and
• Engaging in these conversations is to the benefit of our learning community and to our students.

Thinking about unit design is our next topic and following are some thoughts about it:

• The "unit" by definition should embody a meaningful and connected chunk of learning events that build toward some important intellectual outcome in a way that short (often disconnected) daily lessons cannot (Wiggins, G. & McTighe, J., 2011, pp. 38-39).
• Excellent units focus on transfer and how facts and skills are related to an overarching understanding and can be related to the "real life" discipline; excellent units do not focus on discreet facts or skills alone.
• Lessons in a unit build toward complex performances and products.

There are many entry points into unit design.  For example:

• Standards/Curriculum that have endurance, leverage, and readiness,
• Important big ideas, or understandings, themes, or theories that are at the heart of a discipline and worth understanding,
• Compelling questions which can be revisited at several levels of study within a discipline,
• Performance strengths and weaknesses revealed by assessments,
• A strong assessment that indicates a quality level of proficiency,
• A powerful process or strategy that uses many important skills, or
• An inquiry into a complex issue or problem.

Eventually, no matter what the entry point, the unit should provide evidence of all of the above.
In futher posts, I will share more about the structure of the unit as well as a template for creating the unit plan.

In Review: The Curriculum Audit

The Curriculum Audit as I described it included three steps:

• Identifying High Priority Standards by "testing" each for endurance, leverage, and readiness,
• Comparing High Priority Standards with our current curricula to identify what is essential, and
• Unpacking Essential Curriculum in terms of rigor, prerequisite skills, and other imporant aspects of learning design.

The Curriculum Audit is designed to help manage our curricula so that we can teach for depth rather than breadth.  Because what we are teaching is essential and supported by standards that have endurance, leverage, and readiness, students who demonstrate that they understand (versus just know a lot) will be able to transfer their understandings, knowledge, and skills to new, different, and potentially more challenging situations (like unfamiliar questions on a state test, for example).
In addition, these three steps are important content for valuable conversations among your colleagues.  There are several advantages to working on the work:

• Increased professionalism and colleagiality,
• Increased student achievement,
• Lower stress levels, and
• Improved teaching.

Your expertise is important in the process.  I trust what you know of your content and the methods of teaching that content.  There are several right answers, and your discussions, arduous and time consuming as they might be, are valuable and important.
Based on some excellent feedback and conversation with teachers, I would like to clarify a couple things as well:

1. Please try to let the templates work for you.  If you find that they are time consuming, counter-intuitive, or redundant, let me know, so we can work through it.  I trust your judgment, so if there is general consensus that standards meet all three tests, skip the explanations and work through either exceptions are where there is disagreement, for example. I appreciate everyone trying to work through the template exaclty how it was written, but in some cases it was more of a detriment than a support
2. All GLEs and relevant CCSS should be audited, particularly those that apply to the two units your department will be working on this year.  The entire curriculum should be audited as well.
3. Hold a flexible mindset, please, and be prepared to revise.  This work is recursive: we may return to other steps and other work as we learn so that we can continuously improve and as we learn more about our new state test in 2013-2014.

Some teachers have expressed anxiety over coding the Board-approved curriculum in such a way that not all of it is taught.  Just this week, John Simpson and I met, and he acknowledges your work as being a prototype for the kind of work he would like to facilitate in the district from his role.
Finally, I wonder if a timeline might be helpful.  I think it might be best if I met with each department, and we determined a timeline together.  The goal, overall, for the year is a curriculum audit and two drafts of unit plans by the end of the school year.  Keep moving through the process, and if you get stymied, please ask for help.
If you have any questions or concerns, please let me know how I can be supportive.

Curriculum Audit, Part 3: Unpacking Essential Curriculum

Having identified High Priority Standards that have leverage, endurance, and readiness and using these standards to identify Essential Curriculum, there is an important, albeit potentially time consuming, third step: Unpacking Essential Curriculum.  Working through this step now has several advantages because unpacking essential curriculum:

1. Anticipates other areas of knowledge or skills students may need to demonstrate understanding (this may help fill in gaps and will be useful when writing unit plans later),
2. Anticipates performance criteria (this will help when writing assessments for the essential curriculum you have identified), and
3. Anticipates interventions and extensions (this will help when planning for learning activities).

My suggestion is that you begin by working through the attached template, Unpacking Essential Curriculum, for the two units your department has chosen as a focus for this year's departmental curriculum work.  You will do this by answering the following questions:

1. Essential Curriculum: What in the curriculum is essential for students to learn as a part of this unit?
2. Rigor: What does proficient student work look like?
3. Prerequisite Skills: What prerequisite knowledge, skills, and understandings will students need in order to demonstrate proficiency with this standard?
4. Interventions: What will we do when students have not or are not learning what is prerequisite to demonstrating understanding?
5. Extensions: What will we do when students demonstrate that they already understand the essential curriculum?

It is important to unpack curriculum so departments can anticipate exactly what students need to learn in order to master what is essential. Answering the above questions and embedding those answers into unit plans can save time and energy as you re-think units and as you implement them in your classrooms.  Unpacking essential curriculum also creates a context for discussion and collaboration as you support one another with teaching, intervening, and extending on behalf of the essential curriculum you expect all students to learn and understand.
Thinking deeply about high priority standards, endurance, leverage, and readiness, and essential curriculum is to your benefit as a teacher and collaborator.  The process may seem daunting, but please trust the process, yourself, and your colleagues.
Let me know how I can be helpful to you.

Curriculum Audit: Part 2, Identifying Essential Curriculum

Identifying high priority standards for endurance, leverage, and readiness is an excellent way to keep us accountable to expectations beyond the district.  If the standards we identify have endurance, leverage, and readiness then they have the capacity to inform student learning in compelling and lasting ways.  Since we also have an obligation to the district, we must use the standards we have identified as high priority as a kind of code for our curriculum.  We must use this code to choose aspects of the curriculum that are the most engaging, coherent, and purposeful.
Part 2 of the audit is just three steps:

1. Identify high priority standards (see last week's blog),
2. Compare to your curriculum,
3. Organize essential curriculum into units.

To explain further:
If you list the high priority standards in one column, you can use a second column to connect those standards to language in your curriculum.  Click here for a template.  In my experience in Webster so far, I have found that our curricula are not written in a universal format and that many of them rely heavily on the GLEs.  You may find that some of the language is redundant.  Since you also examined common core standards and/or the standards from your professional discipline's organization, you may find that these do not connect with much (or with anything) in the district's curriculum.  This puts us in a difficult position; one that I will discuss with each of department on a case-by-case basis. If you find holes, missing information, or feel strongly as a department that certain things may need to be added, we can discuss this as well.
Once you have completed this exercise, you may wish to go back and code the rest of the curriculum, the curriculum that you did not list as essential, as either important or good to know.  You may find that you need some of this information later.
Finally, grouping essential curriculum into units may be a helpful final step in this process so that you can easily see how what you have chosen fits (or does not fit) together.
Once you have identified essential curriculum, you may want to get feedback.  I would recommend asking for feedback from the other grade-level represented in your discipline, from your currciculum coordinator, and/or from me or one of the other principals.  Sometimes it is good to ask for feedback from colleagues who are not in your same department.  If you are interested in this, I can help facilitate it.
Hopefully, once you have identified what is essential in your curriculum, you will feel like you have more time and/or can prepare better and/or be more flexible

Curriculum Audit: Part 1, Identifying High Priority Standards

To begin our work with curriculum this year, each department will perform an audit of its curriculum.  Each curriculum will be audited for what is essential, important, and good to know.  This will involve a commitment to quality and (sometimes) difficult conversation.  As a department, you will be stronger as a result of these conversations, and you will have prioritized your curriculum besides.  In order to audit your curriculum effectively, you will need to identify high priority standards which inform your curriculum.  These high priority standards will act as a kind of DNA code for how you prioritize your curriculum.  You will choose aspects of your curriculum that meet this code in the most engaging, coherent, and purposeful way; this will help you identify what is essential.
So before you begin determining what is essential, important, and good to know in the district curriculum, please engage in the following:

• A student who understands retains more, can think more flexibly, transfer more knowledge and skills to unfamiliar situations more accurately, and can make connections between/among disciplines.  A student who just knows a lot may struggle with some or all of the above.  In your discipline, what can a student who understands do well? Compare this to what a student who just knows a lot can do (or not do).

Understanding the distinction between understanding and knowling a lot will help your department determine what is at the heart of, or essential to, your discipline.  It's an excellent warm-up for identifying priority standards.

• Determine which GLEs and Common Core Core State Standards (CCSS) are priority.  GLEs are generally more content-based, and CCSS are generally more skill- based.  Consider the following when prioritizing GLEs and CCSS, ultimately priority standards should meet all three below:
  • Endurance (Importance to Life): Will this standard provide students with knowledge and skills beyond a single test date?
  • Leverage (Importance to School): Will this standard provide knowledge and skills that are of value in multiple disciplines?
  • Readiness (Importance to the Next Level): Will this standard provide the students with the essential knowledge and skills that are necessary for their success in the next level of schooling?

Those standards which meet the test for all three (that is, they have endurance, leverage, and readiness) are your highest priority standards.  Keep this work because as you move forward, you may determine that others, which may meet only two of the three tests, for example, may also be priority.  Click here for a template to assist with this work.

You may also wish to consider (now or later):

1. The standards published by your discipline's national organization (prioritize them if it's helpful).
2. Any historical data regarding which standards are tested on the MAP (or the EXPLORE or the SRI, etc.) and how are students fair on assessments.
3. Any current data about your current students that can help shape decisions around planning and teaching. (This question is sometimes better applied once you have crafted units around essential curriculum.)

Once you have determined which standards are high priority, there are two possible next steps which I will describe in a subsequent Learning Designs post. Ultimately, this will result in two revised/revisted/reconsidered unit plans for this year.  (More information on this to come; please trust the process or ask questions in the meantime.)
Please let me know how I can be helpful to explain, facilitate, or participate.

Why Dr. Heisserer Uses the Network (and how it could help us have fewer and shorter faculty meetings)

The Hixson Network is one of my favorite projects.  I focus weekly time and attention on updating it so that it can serve our learning community better.  Many of the reasons I have for designing and implementing such a network are similar to hallmarks of 21st-Century learning and learners.  Students have access to a variety of innovations outside of our classrooms and school.  It is to our (and their) advantage if we learn to leverage these on behelf of teaching and learning.
Let me explain why I prefer . . .

• Multi-Tasking to Single-Tasking
• Geometric to Linear Thinking
• Collaborative to Independent Work
• Sharing to Individual Ownership
• Inductive to Deductive Thinking
• What and Why to Just What
• Multi-Media to Text
• Virtual to Physical
• Multiple to Single Sources
• Creative to Mechanized
• Self-Directed to Other-Directed

 . . . and how these preferences relate to why I use the Network, how it helps us leverage our time, and how all of this relates to designing learning opportunities for our students.
The Hixson Network allows us access to multiple tools that support the multiple tasks of teaching; whether these are management or learning tasks, they are represented on the Network.  In addition to access to support for multiple tasks, the Network allows for multiple voices (this year, the PBIS committee and our coordinators will have dedicated Network space, faculty and staff will have access to posting on the bulletin board, and I have plans for representing other voices as well) and allows us to collaborate given that we can access the information virtually as long as we have an internet connected and given that we can comment and give feedback directly to posts and surveys.  The asynchronous and non-linear presentation of the information allows for multiple ways to access and prioritize the information on the Network.  This means that I can explain what we are working on and why in creative, non-linear ways that you can access according to a variety of options. Even though I have some expectations about when and how frequently you access the Network, there is still some room to choose when and how you access this (some teachers read these posts on their phones, other Monday morning, others at home on Sunday).
The Network allows us to leverage our time.  The Network is an excellent source of information and learning that we can embed in our lives in a variety of self-directed ways.  If using the Network as a resource becomes a matter of habit we can trust in one another and for which we can hold one another accountable, we can use faculty meeting time for other things.  For example:

• We may have shorter faculty meetings given that the background, rationale, and context for topics or projects have been set and reviewed prior to our arriving in our meeting space,
• We may have shorter faculty meetings because we have taken it upon ourselves to heed the information and learning on the Network in such as a way as to avoid the need for reminders and/or nuts and bolts agenda items.
• We may use faculty meeting time as extra team, department, and/or plan time as necessary.

As a faculty, we should plan to gather to think and learn together.  Although the Network allows us to this virtually, asynchrously, and together, this cannot always replace time together.  However, if our time together can be made more purposeful (and if we can use faculty meeting time for other and better purposes), I beleive that we should pursue it.
Finally, these preferences, reasons, and principals for the design of the Hixson Network are comparable to the learning environment preferred by our students.  How can the Network be a model for how we design learning, use our own virtuals spaces, and think (or re-think) the principles of learning that guide our work?
I'm interested in your feedback.  Go ahead, leave a comment below and begin the conversation. =)

Student Intervention Cycles

One of the keys to developing interventions for students is to plan for them in advance. When developing an intervention cycle, establish an escalating series of red flags and interventions and be sure to examine student progress regularly.  Interventions should support student achievement and should not be punitive (an intervention cycle around behavior may result in punitive interventions, however). Intervention cycles can also be created for when students exceed mastery or expectations. Be sure to communicate this cycle to students and to parents and be sure to enforce the cycle regularly.
Here is an example of a student intervention cycle for a students who falter.  It can be revised, of course, as there should always be room to customize interventions for students.

Red Flag	Example Intervention
Student’s average falls below a 75% in any two-week cycle.	Conference with teacher, team, and/or parent to develop a plan to get back on track (this is also an opportunity to determine why the average has fallen).
Student’s average remains below 75% for any consecutive two-week cycle.	The above and mandatory attendance at a before- or after-school or lunch help session.
Test grade below 75%.	Mandatory corrections or test make up.
Missing three homework assignments.	Mandatory attendance at a help session so the student can make up the work.
Student completes homework but has trouble turning it in.	Designate a teacher with whom the student can check in to help organize homework to be turned in.

Questions to consider when building an intervention cycle:

1. What are your red flags? Be specific about patterns so that you can spot them easily. 
2. What interventions will you or your team put in place once a red flag has been raised? Why have these been chosen (in general and if the intervention has been customized)? And how will you know the student is back on track once the triggered intervention has been put into place?
3. How will you share this cycle with students and parents?

You can also create intervention cycles for students who exceed mastery or your expectations.  The process is the same. Consider what level of achievement or what behaviors would flag an intervention and plan for it.  This does not always mean more or different work.  The intervention could be that you look for ambiguities and complexities within the material you are teaching and remove scaffolds and support so that the student is more challenged.
While some students may need help understanding processes, procedures, or implementing implied skills, other students may benefit from the challenge of having to determine this themselves. Planning interventions ahead of time is a benefit to those who will be implementing, receiving, and supporting the interventions (teachers, students, and parents).
Let me know if I can be helpful with this.
[adapted from Jackson, R. R. (2009) Never work harder than your students and other principles of great teaching. ASCD: Alexandria, VA.]