Data-Driven Instruction

Yesterday Dr. Stanley and Dr. Tubbs presented at the California Charter School Association Conference in Long Beach.  They asked the attendees to post exit reflections on the way out. We were really impressed by their reflections and wanted to share them here.

• DDI can increase student achievement by making sure that information is retained rather than instantaneously assessed
• At my site, I am going to begin to dialogue with all stakeholders about how we can better use data to drive instruction, especially through grade level and between grade level collaboration
• Personalized instruction
• Engage students and help them to be vested in their own learning
• teachers know what their students know and don’t know in order to provide the right instruction to each student at the time the student needs it
• Its about changing instruction. Just looking at data is not enough
• Student progress should be celebrated and recognized. We have monthly  success celebrations for our students. Certificate is given out with an explanation of their achievement. In the fall we also have a special activity for students who show growth and progress based on goals set and test results
• I wonder how we could recognize teacher progress and share best practices breaking down competitive venues
• Formative assessments can be embedded in content lessons through a variety of activities from formal questioning to very informal assessing techniques as a group
• summative assessments can become celebrations of content mastery by setting personalized goals students set and work towards accomplishing
• High stakes tests are a snapshot that the state takes of your school’s effectiveness at teaching difficult educational concepts
• I’m going to share the information that I learned with my colleagues. I really like the idea about making the classes personal. “Extra” instruction should be tailored to meet each student’s needs
• By ensuring students are receiving equal instruction in the same curriculum and teachers are instructing students with the same understanding of skills
• Use Power Learning
• Summative assessments become celebrations of content mastery by, giving the student proof of ability (builds confidence), giving the teacher a baseline of what students’ strenghts and weaknesses are.
• Focusing on using formative instruction in the daily reflection of ongoing content- particularly in spiraling or scaffolding content
• Effective implimentation of DDI can increase student achievement by providing student buy-in if you are able to show them specifics they have mastered and specifics that are holding them back
• Cultivate a new culture of accountability in your school. Allow time for staff to review data and converse about the results. Also have grade level teams work on supplimental lessons for students that fall below proficiency.
• In an effort to create a “new culture of accountability”, I will begin to employ a more “relaxed” environment where teachers feel more comfortable with discussing their successes or weaknesses. I will work extremely hard to have teachers reflect on their instruction as it relates to student success.

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In Georgia, the Burke County schools were trying diligently to match teachers with the type of students they were most effective teaching, believing this was the best way to ensure success in the classroom. They were also motivated by the need to satisfy standard state testing requirements.

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WestEd’s SchoolsMovingUp website will feature two free webinars during the first half of February which will highlight free online professional development modules and resources on Response-to-Intervention (RTI) provided by the IRIS (IDEA ’04 and Research for Inclusive Settings) Center for Training Enhancements. Both webinars will take place from 10:30 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. Pacific Time (1:30 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time).

The first webinar, on Wednesday, February 4, is “Response to Intervention: Online Professional Development Modules and Resources for Implementation.” In this presentation, Silvia DeRuvo, Senior Program Associate at the California Comprehensive Center at WestEd; and Naomi Tyler, Co-principal Investigator for the IRIS Center; along with Kathy Strunk, Director of Response-to-Intervention for Tennessee; and Debbie Williams, Program Specialist, Hardeman County, TN, will discuss how these resources are effective teaching tools for professional developers, district and site administrators, and teacher trainers involved in RTI implementation.

The second webinar, on Wednesday, February 18, “Response to Intervention: Online Professional Development Modules and Resources for Classroom Assessment,” will showcase the online professional development resources to support the validated practice of monitoring students’ progress and curriculum-based assessment. Silvia DeRuvo, Kimberly Skow, Project Coordinator of The IRIS Center, and Debbie DeBerry, practicing School Psychologist in Hardeman County, TN – will discuss how these resources have been used to assist teachers in the essential RTI practice of progress monitoring.

Both webinars are cosponsored by SchoolsMovingUp, the IRIS Center, and the California Comprehensive Center at WestEd.

See the webinars page on SchoolsMovingUp for further information, including specific topics to be addressed by this webinar, at http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/webinars.

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REGISTRATION

To sign up for these webinars, please visit the following web pages:

Feb. 4, “Response to Intervention: Online Professional Development Modules and Resources for Implementation,” http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/webinars/irisimplement

Feb. 18, “Response to Intervention: “Online Professional Development Modules and Resources for Classroom Assessment,” http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/webinars/irisassess

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Iredell-Statesville School located in North Carolina is a recent recipient of the prestigious Baldrige Award. Their Superintendent, Terry Holliday, attributes data driven decision making as one of the strategies that has led to the success of their district.

The district also uses Follett Software’s TetraData data warehousing and analytical software to facilitate fact-based, data-driven decision making from the classroom to the district level.

“Teachers [give] an assessment, and within three days they have comparative data across the district. Teachers and principals can track any information,” Holliday said. “Even students use data notebooks for their student implementation plan. They use data from the data warehouse to keep track of their improvement.”

Read more

Article in ASCD about the importance of Teacher Collaboration http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational_leadership/dec08/vol66/num04/Collaborative_Inquiry.aspx

This list comes from SETDA’s action plan for national, state, and local education leaders. The list was created with input from more than 100 national policy makers and 50 state educational officers.

1. Ensure that technology tools and resources are used continuously and seamlessly for instruction, collaboration, and assessment.
2. Expose all students (pre-K through 12th grade) to STEM fields and careers.
3. Make ongoing, sustainable professional development available to all teachers.
4. Use virtual learning opportunities for teachers to further their professional development, such as through online communities and education portals.
5. Incorporate innovative, consistent, and timely assessments into daily instruction.
6. Strengthen the home-school connection by using technology to communicate with parents on student progress.
7. Provide the necessary resources so that every community has the infrastructure to support learning with technology, including assessments and virtual learning.
8. Obtain societal support for education that uses technology from all stakeholders–students, parents, teachers, state and district administrators, business leaders, legislators, and local community members.
9. Provide federal leadership to support states and districts regarding technology’s role in school reform by passing the ATTAIN Act.
10. Increase available funding for the e-Rate so that schools can acquire telecommunication services, internet access, internal connections, and maintenance of those connections.

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 10, 2008

10:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. Pacific Time (1:30 p.m. - 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time).

Would you like to know how formative assessment can improve student learning? This webinar, presented by Margaret Heritage and Ellen Osmundson from the Assessment and Accountability Comprehensive Center, will provide information on the knowledge base for formative assessment, ways to elicit evidence to guide instruction, how to provide effective feedback to students, and how to involve students in the assessment process. This webinar is co-sponsored by SchoolsMovingUp and the Assessment and Accountability Comprehensive Center.

To sign up for this webinar, please visit http://www.schoolsmovingup.net/webinars/formassess

RIT stands for Response to Intervention. According to the National Center on Response to Intervention “Response to intervention integrates assessment and intervention within a multi-level prevention system to maximize student achievement and to reduce behavior problems.  With RTI, schools identify students at risk for poor learning outcomes, monitor student progress, provide evidence-based interventions and adjust the intensity and nature of those interventions depending on a student’s responsiveness, and identify students with learning disabilities”. You can learn more at their website at http://www.rti4success.org .

They are having a free webinar on Tuesday, December 2 from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. ET on English Language Learners and RTI.  More information is available at http://www.rti4success.org/flier/webinar_ellrti.html .

http://www.thejournal.com/articles/23551

Free Online Chat

When: Thursday, November 13, 2:30 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. Eastern time
Where: http://www.edweek-chat.org
Submit questions in advance.

Join us for a lively chat with leading experts on implementing response to intervention in your classroom and school.

Response to intervention is the process of identifying and addressing student learning needs with a tiered approach to early intervention. RTI has been used most frequently with reading instruction, but it has also been stretched to include additional subjects in middle and high school classrooms. Despite its growing use, however, there is no clear answer for how best to implement RTI.

What should a successful RTI model look like? What are the roles of the general education teacher, the special education teacher, and the school psychologist in the RTI process? What are the challenges? What must an administrator know to encourage staff buy-in? Where does current research stand on the effectiveness of RTI? Our guests will answer your questions about RTI and how it plays out in the classroom.

About the guests:

Judy Elliott is the Chief Academic Officer for the Los Angeles Unified School District. Elliott has trained thousands of staff, teachers, and administrators in inclusive schooling and assists districts, national organizations, state and federal departments of education in their efforts to update and realign curriculum, instruction, and assessment for all students. Elliott was a lead author on the Response to Intervention Blueprint: District Level Edition (NASDSE, 2008).

Douglas Fuchs holds the Nicholas Hobbs Endowed Chair in Special Education and Human Development at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University, where he is also the co-director of the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center Reading Clinic. Identified as one of 250 most highly cited researchers in the social sciences, Fuchs’ most recent book is Response to Intervention: A Framework for Reading Educators (IRA, 2008).

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