Curriculum Leadership Institute

Pathways to School Improvement

E-Hints Related to Governance and Leadership

Below is an archive of E-Hints related to the governance and leadership of curriculum, instruction, and assessment work. We welcome you to use them to make improvements district- or schoolwide, or share them with a colleague who might benefit.

Thank you for ensuring that your staff is doing what's best for kids!

Leadership Tip - Participate in the development of curriculum. Select a subject area that you are most familiar with and be an active member of that committee. You'll have a better understanding of what is involved and how the curriculum is intended to be used.

Maintain Learning Expectations No Matter the Setting

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African-American mother supervises her teenaged son as he studies on his computer

The “start of school” has come and gone, and school district officials have made some of the hardest decisions they have ever made. Decisions that require re-evaluation nearly every day. The building preparation, bus preparation, and schedule concerns have all been addressed to the degree that gets the school year going. Now, it’s time to focus on teaching and learning. Ensuring that all students, whether entirely on-site, fully online, in a hybrid setting, or even homeschooled, reach a level of learning such that they are prepared for their future, as unsure as that may be.

Districts have long had curriculum, instruction, and assessment conversations. They have made decisions as a district regarding their local curriculum and expectations for student performance.  Those conversations and decisions are critical within a district to ensure equal opportunity for students and smooth transitions from grade-level-to-grade-level and course-to-course. The professional staff has, in turn, had detailed conversations about the importance of those decisions and any ramifications for instruction and assessment.  Those decisions, though, have probably only been communicated generally to parents. 

In a typical school year or school environment, as a district, you are covered! Let’s get started!  However, there is NOTHING normal about this school year. Students are attending school in a myriad of ways. For the decisions made by professional staff to be implemented for all the varieties of ways that students “attend” school, communication must be carefully planned and executed. Without good communication, unintended results might occur. Those unintended results might include:

  • inequity issues among students,
  • missed building blocks within the learning process,
  • an unclear vision of what is “good enough” for student success,
  • and students may work very hard but misunderstand expectations. Therefore, when they re-enter the in-person setting, they may feel their hard work was wasted.

For the most part, parents are engaged with helping their children succeed as students; investing in their children’s success is a high priority. However, parents have jobs, multiple children, past experiences with school, and rarely do they have professional training or experience as educators. Some of the decisions that the district made will make complete sense to their staff, but not necessarily to the people charged with monitoring and implementing the remote portion of a student’s instruction. 

Often, it isn’t the “what” that non-educators can’t understand, it’s “why?”  Having not been present for discussions among professional staff, decisions are communicated as, “Here’s what we are going to do,” not as, “Here’s what we are going to do, this is why we are doing it, and these are the expectations for your child because of what we’re doing.” In other words, the expectation has been to communicate decisions to stakeholders and parents without necessarily explaining “why” that decision was made.

This school year, with so many variables for how students are being educated, why is just as important to parents as what. Knowing why a particular decision was made could go a long way toward alleviating unintended consequences. It may also help parents determine appropriate steps to help a struggling student without losing sight of the expectation. The time spent designing this communication might pay big dividends when students come back together in a more “normal” setting. 

The Importance of Teacher Leaders in a District

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Teachers at school in the classroom ready for work
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Academic leadership need not rest solely on the shoulders of district and building-level administrators, but can often be more effective when shared with classroom teachers. Unfortunately, some teachers may feel less willing to go the extra mile or create quality work when tasks appear as a directive with no teacher input. But, when teacher leaders are utilized to lead the work and provide examples of quality, their peers tend to buy-in. Many of our partner districts have chosen this route as they work through their curriculum, instruction, and assessment work.

What is the role of a teacher leader? Primarily, teacher leaders are expected to support and lead positive gains in student achievement.  Some responsibilities may include mentoring or coaching other teachers, developing or leading professional development sessions, serving on leadership teams and committees, or collecting and monitoring data.  Districts often hire teacher leaders in the role of instructional facilitator, to work with a specific range of grade levels or to be content specialists. They are often expected to serve as experts in a particular field or grade level and to lead curriculum development efforts.  One of their most important responsibilities is facilitating the lines of communication among all parties.

Why is there a need? There are numerous reasons.  Teacher leadership programs emphasize the concept of shared leadership in a district. A facilitator may attend a conference as a district representative and, upon return, share the information with staff through local professional development.  This approach is helpful for districts experiencing financial cutbacks or those trying to minimize lost student contact time with teachers.  It can also relieve an additional initiative from the plate of the principals.

Teacher leaders are also beneficial when it comes to making decisions based on data.  The need to increase student learning results has encouraged educators to collect and analyze data and respond to student needs accordingly.  Classroom teachers can save valuable instruction and preparation time by relying on a teacher leader to pinpoint data trends and suggest instructional strategies for improvement.

Retaining quality teachers is critical to the success of any school district and the educational field as a whole.  Even though college programs have extensive training for young educators, it is impossible to prepare them for every aspect of their actual teaching experience.  Many districts now incorporate a mentoring program directed by the instructional coach, which provides support in instruction, resources, and classroom management.           

Why does it work? A coaching relationship with another colleague can benefit the classroom teacher through modeling, team teaching, or mentoring in a non-evaluative way.  This personalized support provides immediate feedback that allows for noticeable improvement as changes are made in previous practices.  Research shows that using cooperative learning with peers at any level translates into significant gains.

Shared leadership provides a balanced foundation for any initiative.  Whether it is curriculum development or implementing a new instructional strategy, the coach’s job is to support practices and share responsibility for ensuring success.  Some coaches are specialists in content, and others are experts of specific grade levels. Either way, this knowledge and experience allow coaches to help teachers prepare for student learning transitions and make sure content and skill development builds when curriculum is addressed. Districts utilizing teacher leaders create a critical communication link in the school improvement process.  When educational leaders have the necessary training and are used correctly, the qualitative and quantitative gains a district can make are immeasurable.

The End of the School Year is in Sight

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High School Pupils Celebrating End Of Term
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Yes, the end of the school year is in sight.  Teachers are worried about finishing the curriculum, checking in books, taking posters off the walls, entering grades, and all of their other year-end tasks.  Administrators are ticking items off of their unique building goal lists and sending out reminders and final instructions for the last days of school, all the while contemplating their summer worklists.  In anticipation of the end of the year, we experience a seemingly abrupt conclusion followed by a collective sigh.  Afterward, the thoughts of “Oh, no, we forgot… “ settle into our minds.

Let’s start now to check off the tasks and items that are complete or need follow-up.  

We can then take time to reflect and celebrate the positive accomplishments that we might otherwise overlook in a rush to the end.  The provided checklists are republished to serve as a guide to districtwide and classroom reflection and to remind us of all the tasks that require completion or monitoring to start the next year.

Illustrate Your System for Teaching and Learning, Literally

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One of the best parts of working with amazing school districts across the country is being able to highlight their awesome ideas for promoting positive changes in teaching and learning. Sweetwater County School District 1 in Rock Springs, Wyoming, identified a need to better communicate their district-wide expectations for teaching and learning. In a large district like theirs, they realized that not all teachers understood the system for curriculum, instruction, and assessment and therefore were not following it. To better communicate these processes with all teachers, they created the following graphic:

In this graphic, you’ll note that at the center of all curriculum work is the question of, “What’s best for students?” Sweetwater CSD1 is a PLC district and have aligned the four PLC questions to each phase of their system. The foundation for teaching and learning is curriculum (they call curriculum maps). This clarifies the curricular targets for teachers and students. Teachers are then able to create aligned instructional plans (IPRs), including short-cycle, formative assessments. Following their initial instruction, PLCs meet to go over data and determine ways to prepare students for common assessments. This may include re-teaching or further differentiation strategies. Then, they give their district-created common assessments. Again, PLCs meet to analyze local data gathered from their common assessments and determine if re-teaching and reassessment are necessary. Lastly, they revisit their IPRs to update them or make notes on what worked and what didn’t. The intent behind all of these steps, of course, is to improve teaching and learning for their students.

Your district may not implement the exact steps represented in their graphic. But, if you’re using the CLI Model, your process should include curriculum, instruction and the use of pacing guides and Instructional Planning Resources (although you may call them something else), common assessments, and analysis of data. A more generic version of this graphic might look like this, created for Sublette County School District 1 in Pinedale, Wyoming:

In this graphic, the district added pacing guides to plan out roughly when the curriculum is going to be taught and to ensure that teachers stay on track. The analysis of data is maintained, as well as re-teaching and reassessment.

Although the graphic for your district might look slightly different, an illustration of your teaching and learning process both appeals to visual learners and can easily be distributed and posted in all schools, classrooms, teachers’ lounges, etc. in your district. It will help to close the gap between teachers who understand district-wide expectations and those that don’t.

Finding Time

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A teacher’s job has always included more than just what takes place while students are in the classroom—and always should.  Besides the obvious lesson planning and grading, teachers need to be involved in curriculum development, data analysis of student learning, problem-solving, and other professional development activities related to teaching/learning research and strategies.  These activities are necessary if we are to make a difference in student learning.  However, they all take time, and to be effective, they will require more than just a few minutes grabbed here and there. So, where do we find this time?  That question has become a significant problem for many schools.  Here are some ideas that various districts are using.

Make Your Current Meeting Time More Efficient

Many scheduled meetings could be much more productive if the district would establish a set of rules, called norms, and adhere to them without exception.

  1. Have a clear purpose and expected result for the meeting. Communicate these details to all who will attend in advance.
  2. Make sure everyone has sufficient notice of the meeting, the timeframe, and location to enable them to participate.
  3. Start on time and have all your materials ready.
  4. Have an agenda for the meeting and stick to it. If an additional topic comes up as a result of the meeting, put it on the next meeting’s agenda. 
  5. Do not waste meeting time on topics or announcements that can be delivered electronically or by memo. 
  6. Keep phones on silent and close laptops and tablets unless the meeting tasks require them to be open.
  7. Avoid sidebar conversations during the meeting.
  8. End on time. 
  9. Have someone in charge of leading and organizing the points above.

When to schedule shorter meetings

A late start or early release. Starting school an hour later or ending school an hour sooner allows the entire staff to meet.  Even though this isn’t always accepted with a lot of enthusiasm by parents, communicating the change in schedule far enough in advance can generate support over the feelings of inconvenience. 

Common Planning Time. Because there is a definite time limit, staying focused on the agenda is critical to a productive meeting.  Districts whose teachers meet daily have a fixed routine down to make these meetings productive.

Using teams. Many school districts use the team approach, where several teachers work with multiple classes at one time.  While this frees up other teachers for additional time to collaborate, it also allows for blocks of time for rotations through “specials” like music, art, and physical education.

Before or after school. Once again, this type of meeting has a time limit, but it can be a quick way to touch base.  If a district has an online meeting platform, teachers can gather virtually without leaving their classrooms.

When Extended Time is Needed

Summer work. This option is becoming the most popular.  Teachers can have a “boot camp” to meet for consecutive days.   The amount of time could be full, half, or three-quarter days for a week or two. Extended days allow teachers to accomplish quite a bit during the sessions.  There are no plans to make for substitutes, and teachers’ focus will be less divided.

Release time- one day a month. A full-day meeting allows teachers to start fresh at the beginning of the day with minimal interruptions.  Usually, all colleagues are available because it is during a contract day.  While a substitute is required, the cost of this is less than paying for out-of-contract teacher time.

Release time – consecutive days. Even though it is challenging to be out of the classroom for successive days during the school year, it does allow teachers to get “on a roll” for the task at hand.  Productivity tends to be higher when workdays are back to back.

After school meetings. This choice is the least desirable option and should only be scheduled if there is no other alternative.  There are no substitutes needed, but teachers are tired after school.  Some may even have extra duties, which may prevent a full team from meeting at the same time.

The solutions for “how to find time” presented in this E-Hint are simply the ones most commonly used now.  However, each district should think creatively and explore other options. What’s essential is for boards of education and district leaders to recognize the impact that the additional teacher-time has on student learning.  With higher achievement as the result, it should make “finding time” a number one priority.

Do Standards Improve Learning?

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Eight years later, did the Common Core Standards help or hurt? This might be the million-dollar question with equal numbers of supporters on each side of the debate. While this question can be posed regarding any set of state or national standards followed by a district in the past or present, one important distinction to remember is that not all districts providing scores started the implementation of the Common Core Standards at the same time. The debate rages based on measures of learning and implementation of instruction, which both might be valid or invalid to varying degrees. A look at some factors could lend skepticism in the use of data collected at this point, both positive and negative. No matter on which side of the debate one finds themselves, some common arguments cannot be easily dismissed. However, the cause of the success or lack of success is harder to pinpoint without taking a closer look. 

In an article published by Matt Barnum in Chalkbeat, April 2019, there is a list of pros and cons of the Common Core and a summary of the reasons that student learning data is or is not as strong as expected. The descriptions of positive statements about the Common Core Standards mostly refer to the standards themselves. However, the negative statements about the Common Core Standards mostly refer to the implementation of the standards within the classroom or the district.  Researcher Mengli Song of the American Institutes for Research summarizes the results of the Common Core Standards in much the same way, as Meador reported in an article for ThoughtCo in September 2019. Song also cites the lack of consistent data collection techniques and the fact that the research is lacking in reports on success.

We at the Curriculum Leadership Institute (CLI) have been working with districts for more than 25 years in finding solutions for districts to overcome the shortcomings in student success. Our hands-on research has led to conclusions supported by district and state data across the country.  CLI finds that the solution is often not limited to the existence or non-existence of standards. Our use of a specific model to establish a systemic process of determining curriculum, implementing curriculum, and developing and implementing measures of success within the district affect positive gains in student learning regardless of the standards in place.

Standards are essential and can lead to comparisons across various districts and currently across states. However, standards are not curriculum, and it requires collaboration among district teachers and stakeholders to define standards as curriculum.

Curriculum without thoughtful implementation produces less success in improving student learning than expected. Collaboration among classroom teachers for best practice and in seeking professional development for improving instruction produces positive results across the district.

Developing valid student assessments to measure success also requires the collaboration of classroom teachers and other professionals within the district. Following the administration of the assessments, analysis of the data is critical to critiquing and improving instruction. 

Structured, consistent collaboration among district stakeholders, classroom professionals, and local specialists produce positive results as long as there is a systematic approach to making and monitoring systemic efforts for improved student learning. 

All of these pieces have been critical parts of the CLI Model and the evolution of the model is in reaction to current research and current mandates at the state and federal levels. Need help to get it going? Contact us and we will get you started!

References:

Barnum, Matt. “Nearly a decade later, did the Common Core work? New research offers clues” Chalkbeat, April 29, 2019.  https://chalkbeat.org/posts/us/2019/04/29/common-core-work-research/

Meador, Derrick. “What Are Some Pros and Cons of the Common Core State Standards?” ThoughtCo, Sep. 3, 2019, https://thoughtco.com/common-core-state-standards-3194603.