The Washington County School District Organizational Strategies Essay

With differentiation in mind, I came up with a daily schedule of learning and instruction time for my students. Entry 4 artifact 3 is a copy of my daily schedule and lesson plan format for instructing my students. I begin my day of learning using whole group instruction with a whole group instruction reviewing the calendar, music/movement activity, and read aloud. During these activities, I ask the students question based upon their ability and grade level. The students are really engaged during our introduction. They get to move and meditate to reflect on their day.

As a teacher I use formative and summative data to drive my instruction. As I start with the state standard for the lesson and plan a formative assessment on that skill before a summative assessment. In years prior our school district used the platform of Performance Matter to collect data of that grade level standards three times a year. This type of information set in with Dr. Scott McLeod (20??) essential concepts. “The five major elements of data-driven instruction are: good baseline, measurable instructional goals, frequent formative assessment, professional learning communities, and focused instructional interventions (pp. 1-2, 20??). The assessment gave teachers a baseline, mid-year, and end year focus. When the teacher delved into the platform each question was broken down each standard and concept, thus allowing teacher to provide adequate instructional goal to meet the students’ needs. Teachers would also look at past state standardized testing to determine what if any remediation is needed. As a principal, he/she/I needs to understand the data elements to schedule necessary people and aid for the professional development communities.

Our students come from a wide range of elementary and middle schools and enter our building without consistent levels of instruction that they would receive if they were all coming from a feeder middle school, which leads us to have students with an incredibly wide range of abilities and skills sets when they enter our doors. In response, we have had to create strong structures that hold teachers accountable to sharing and using data to modify their lessons because it is infeasible for us to level our classes perfectly. To do so, we have our instructional coaches work one on one with our teachers to create and update 6-week plans every single week to ensure that their instruction is actually meeting the needs of the learners that are in front of them. Due to these strategies, we had the highest growth in our entire network on the PSAT in quarter one for our ninth and tenth grade cohorts and we are on track to exceed our growth goals for the year. However, it is important to note, that our students have a high level of learning and emotional needs, which means that we have to approach classroom management and social work services differently than another school might. Our classroom management system has to incorporate a high emphasis on relationship and coalition building. It also means that we must approach our instruction in a way that is culturally responsive, culturally sustaining, and data driven. Another strategy that we have implemented to ensure that students have access to rigorous and challenging work is to consistently use data not solely to tell them where they are, but to empower and reinforce to students their worth and capabilities on a daily level. We have VIP lunches, ceremonies that recognize growth, and jobs well done. It is imperative to create a culture of celebration when it comes to acknowledging their hard

Being able to develop a culture of collaboration and high student achievement requires rigorous curriculum development at the school and district levels. Curriculum and instruction work together to enhance student learning. Curriculum revolves around what is taught in school and instruction centers around how something is taught. (Sorenson, 2011, p. 32-35) To be more specific instruction can be defined as, “the strategies, techniques, materials, media, and place where the curriculum is implemented in schools.” If instruction, or the how, of a teacher does not match up to the curriculum, or the what, then student achievement will suffer. Vertically and horizontally aligning curriculum with the instruction that is happening within the classroom and school will in the end lead to greater student achievement which will be reflected on student assessments. (Sorenson, 2011, p.

Danielson’s framework is much more detailed and can be divided into 4 main frameworks: planning and preparation, classroom environment, instruction and professional responsibilities (Danielson, 2007). The HSTW framework is not as detailed, because here we find only 10 key practices that should be applied: high expectations from students, plan of study, academic studies, career and technical studies, work-based learning, teachers working together, students actively engaged, guidance, extra help and developing a culture of continuous improvement (Virginia Department of Education, n.d.).

Our professional development sessions are conducted weekly in a variety of subject areas, and the monthly school-wide session, using interactive reform activities, align with the Danielson Framework for Teaching (Danielson, 2013) to showcase best practices of teachers and to develop grade-level performance tasks, looking at students’ work to provide individual feedback that is aligned with the teaching rubric in order to show academic progress and growth in the target areas of ELA and Math.

In part 2, I will provide a critical reflection on my own teaching practice during recent placement by making detailed connections to an appended lesson plan.

For example, teachers make sure the practice assessments they give out to their students mirror the format of the state assessments. Especially in third grade, where students are taking the test for the first time and have some troubles with filling out bubble sheets and following directions. Across classrooms, teaching practices are aligned to the curriculum and reflect and express set of beliefs about how students learn best through student work products and discussions. In a math lesson, some students worked with the teacher in the front of the room answering a series of tiered questions using large visual representations and some worked with their tables as well. This helps keep students not only engaged but, working together as a team.

Teaching is moving from an individual to a collective activity. The level of agreement and alignment across classrooms around powerful practices are increasing. The school is aligning its organizational resources around support for instructional improvement.

Principal Mark Burge is the leader of Blanding Elementary in San Juan School District. Mr. Burge has been in this leadership role the past 4 years. Blanding Elementary School (BES) has an enrollment of 575 students Pre K thru fifth grade. The student population is 44% Native American, 55% Caucasian, with 65% of the students are free and reduced lunch.

The leadership team discussed specific outcomes that they want accomplish, taking into consideration the issues they want to address. After careful deliberation, they decided that they wanted to create a process of implementation with a feedback loop in which teachers and staff discuss each lesson. Documentation would be written down of what worked and what did not work and modifications could be done for the upcoming lessons. This could be accomplished by setting time for staff to meet and discuss lesson implementation, areas of strength and weakness. After discussion the staff would discuss and change the lesson plans to meet the needs of classroom. By crating this process of implementation staff can course correct

The Module 2 is covering Interstate Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (InTASC) Standards’ Standard #7: Planning for Instruction. Oh, I have a long list of questions related to objectives and lesson preparations. How to determine which parts to teach? When should I teach them? Are there any guidelines? Will I be able to choose books to use for the unit? Do I decide what is necessary and what is not? Planning is part of the job. I have no problem with it because I thrive from precision and planning. However, the amount of planning is excessive – to a novice. I have to check with the curriculum of my school district and the State. Also, I will have to ensure that my lessons abide the federal/state laws. But, that does not stop there. I have to acknowledge my students’ needs. There are several steps to validate my teaching.

After the training, the administrators in my building met to discuss the direction of Russell

Slide set two discussed the normative model. This would help this administrator identify, analyze, and develop solutions to the issue of a mediocre scope and sequence chart. A Garbage Can model will simply not do. Teachers need to understand the problem before taking action. Everything we do in education must be purposeful. Therefore, an effective leader must be able to communicate the issues and solutions with clarity and precision. In slide set three, advice was given stating, “Anything worth making a decision over is worth time, effort, and commitment.” This is an adaptive problem that will require time, thought, input, and empowerment of both the faculty and

The following data was gathered while fulfilling duties as a principal intern at Theresa Bunker Elementary School. The data was observed during five to seven minutes of classroom observation as part of a walk-through in the spring of the current school year. My cooperating supervisor for my internship was able to go on these walk-throughs with me in order to have a productive reflection meeting afterwards. This elementary school has two of each grade level from Kindergarten to sixth grade. Since it was more feasible in this small school setting, I actually was able to do a walkthrough in eight classes. Here I will report my observations from five of those walk-throughs. As I went in to each room I was looking for four