Task Force Tasks from Grange

Attendance: We will reach out to families of chronically absent students over summer and also send a letter to all students at the start of 16-17 about the importance of attendance (using the letters from Count Us In!). We will also continue our mentoring groups, check ins, and incentives for our chronically absent students.

Community Engagement: We have been working with Celebrations Church next door. We have tried to arrange a couple site visits but due to unforeseen circumstances had to reschedule. We look forward to a site visit from one of their youth pastors soon!.

We had Ernie from Solano County Office of Education come to walk our campus and interview one of our students who will be receiving an "Every Student Succeeds" award. We were thrilled to have him here.

Customer Service: It was a pleasure to see our customer service results. We shared the positive comments with our front office staff and discussed ways to improve our service.

PBIS: Teachers completed the School Assessment Survey during our staff meeting. Additionally, we are working on developing a PBIS handbook for teachers. Initially we were thinking flip chart of resources but then decided to try a blog to share this information!

Teach for Success: Data was shared at our March staff meeting with teachers. We decided to continue in our focus areas for next year. We also mad a draft action step in our SPSA.

T4S Instructional Practice

The PSA Sweeps results showed growth in almost every area during the 2015-2016 school year.  One of the areas of focus for our staff this year was Academic Discussions.  There was an overall increase in the number of Academic Discussions that were observed.  The staff has chosen to continue working on this instructional practice, with the plan of increasing the DOK level of conversations.  An action step is funding/release time for additional professional development, as well as release time for teachers to observe other classes on site and at other schools.

RHS T4S Instructional Practice

After looking at the new T4S instrument, analyzing sweeps data, and discussing the data with staff we have decided to put our attention on the instructional practice of academic conversations. We see this as a critical area that will increase the rigor happening in our high school classrooms.

Throughout our 2016 -17 SPSA we have created action steps to bring more knowledge and practice in the area of academic conversations. Professional development, peer collaboration and observation, and materials are all attached to the goals of Mathematics, Science, English Language Arts, Professional Development, The hope is that our focus on academic conversations across the curriculum will engage our students with rigorous standards and improve upon the other components of the T4S instrument.

A Dual Vision

At Fairfield High we cannot have a vision for Academics without a vision for Educational Technology. Conversely, we cannot have a vision for Educational Technology without a vision for Academics. After reflecting back on our year so far we have focused on two very important areas for the end of the 2015-2016 school year and for the 2016-2017 school year. We want to see teachers regularly using technology in instruction with the goal of reaching DOK 2 or higher and SAMR: Augmentation or above

Our Ed Tech Vision: "At FHS we see that educational technology will be a quintessential and indispensable part of the teaching and learning process; teachers will use edtech as facilitators of learning relevant to the students' lives, and students will use edtech to become empowered, self-directed learners who realize their potential to impact their community and the wider world."

Teach For Success Instructional Practice

At our Staff Meeting on Tuesday, April 5th, we compared the fall/spring sweeps data and identified academic conversations as the T4S Instructional Practice for us to own and master during the 2016-2017 school year.  Our SPSA includes an action step focusing on academic conversations and related funding for instructional walks.

T4S

Compare:

 Comparison of our Fall/Spring Sweeps Comparison Data has been discussed at our Staff Meeting and in weekly newsletter to staff.  

Chosen:

Staff has chosen as their T4S goal to own and master "Academic Conversations" during the 2016-2017 school year.

Action Step:

Teacher Cohort will present Professional Development at Staff Meeting.
 

T4S Data and Goals

The Leadership team looked closely at the T4S Spring sweep data. We have committed to raising our Academic Conversations to 70% in the fall. In addition, we want to increase the number of classrooms with students working at a DOK 2 or higher to 85%. To support these goals, we will organize a cohort of teacher experts to help plan and implement professional development, time to collaborate with grade level teams, and substitutes to assist with visiting other classrooms. This information will be brought to the staff at our next staff meeting.

T4S

After reviewing the fall and spring SWEEPS data the staff at MGCCA collectively agreed to focus on DOK for the 2016-2017 school year since increased rigor will be our #1 goal area.  Teachers requested classroom/school visits to see what a classroom that operates at DOK 3+ looks like as well as PD on how to create lessons that go beyond an average of DOK 2.

Tech and T4S Student Engagement alive at GVMS!

Oakbrook Election!  In the pirmaries Academic Conversation swept the delegate votes for 2016-2017!

Teach for Success @FHS

Teach for Success strategies are an integral part of moving our students and school forward. In addition to the key Instructional Strategies that we focus on we are also placing a heavy emphasis on increasing the Depth of Knowledge or DOK in all settings to at least a DOK 2 or higher.

The results of the Fall Teach for Success sweeps was shared with Department Chairs who then relayed that information to their departments and continued the conversation on strengths and weaknesses.

At Fairfield High we are continuing to run our Plan/Observe/Debrief, or POD, sessions this year. We added our Physical Education, Foreign Language, Special Ed, and Visual Performing Arts departments to the POD cycle this year. Our department chairs who are also instructional coaches are leading the POD sessions and planning and guiding side by side with their colleagues in their department. This is extremely valuable time spent as the department works to increase DOK and key instructional strategies. Observations are held the second day and then we get back together on day three to debrief and talk next steps. The POD cycle allows for ongoing refinement and reflection on teaching practices. The sweep data is therefore no longer information that is shared in isolation. Instead it is now incorporated int our next steps of POD.

We are also taking our remaining POD sessions for the year one step further. We will be incorporating our Ed Tech Specialist into the planning day. That way we can work on incorporating our educational technology alongside our increasing rigor and focus on key instructional strategies. We want to emphasize that integration of educational technology complements instructional strategies and is not a one or the other approach to planning.

David Weir: Teach for Success Task

David A . Weir Staff reviewed the results of the Fall WestEd Teach for Success “Sweeps” data and were content with what they viewed. The majority of the teachers understood that this was a “snippet” of time however, agreed that we should implement a school wide focus on Depth of Knowledge, specifically designing lesson plans and learning objectives with a DOK Level 2-3 and/or higher. 

Tolenas T4S Task

Tolenas T4S  Task

Principal Soler shared the T4S data with grade levels on Tuesday, February 16th, Each grade level completed a Collaborative Summary Sheet and articulate ways they could improve the outcome of the sweeps for the Spring.

Rolling Hills is Teaching for Success!

Rolling Hills teachers reviewed the results of the fall WestEd T4S "Sweeps" data during the February staff meeting.  The teachers understood that this was a "snippet" of time and that the data was limited.  As a faculty, they agreed to continue to pursue professional development on: Academic Conversations, Depth of Knowledge, Student Engagement, and Learning Objectives.  Based on the data collected so far this year, the staff, the principal, and the campus WestEd consultant have decided to put an emphasis on Depth of Knowledge as an area for focus and for professional development in the future.

T4S...baseline and beyond!

The staff at Cleo Gordon has been working this year on becoming more familiar with the new observation tool, as well as, the Academic Conversation Planning Tool. We have spent several Profession Development sessions unpacking the standards, discussing DOK, and how to write grade level objectives that bring all of this together. At the fall weep, nine classrooms were swept and as a staff we looked at the data at both the IPR and at staff meetings.
We have several areas to improve upon, but we are determined to be successful. At our staff meeting on January 5th, teams compared the old observation tool with the new one. Each team noticed immediately that the new tool is focused on student engagement and learning. Spring sweeps are coming and we anticipate growth from the first visit this year.

Anna Kyle Teach For Success

Teach For Success:
Completed sharing of Fall T4S data on Tuesday, February 2nd at our staff meeting.  Comments from the discussions regarding the data were as follows:

• Teachers have a concern with the number of classrooms that were visited to represent our site.
• Areas of strength:  engagement, responding overtly to teacher direction
• Areas of improvement:  building on others statements, higher Depth Of Knowledge areas, academic conversations

Sweep Data

At CMS we have shared the sweep data with our staff at a faculty meeting and department chair meeting. Our Department Chairs have participated in 4 sessions of C4S walkthroughs and training with our coach Angie. 

T4S Fall Sweeps Data at Laurel Creek

We have shared the Fall Sweeps Data at Laurel Creek with all of our teachers.  T4S has been a focus this year of our on-site professional development.  We have a Coach for Success Team, made up of volunteer teachers.  Our focus this year has been on writing effective objectives, facilitating academic discourse, and increase the Depth of Knowledge in our daily lessons and activities.

T4S Data

On February 2nd, our T4S data from fall sweeps was shared at a full staff meeting.  In addition, we hosted a professional development session on the new observation protocol, presented by Patricia Dienz from West Ed. February 4, 2016.

Suisun Valley shares T4S

Shared in weekly newsletter on 1.15.16

DATA analysis of our results:

Kuddos: We did a great job getting 40% with academic conversations with only have one Pd on this in October.!!! We will be getting another one in Eeb. during our staff meeting. In DOK levels, which is one of our goals this year, most of our DOK levels fell in DOK 1 and 2. we just had a dok pd on Jan. 13. Our goal will be to have a larger percentage in DOK 2 and 3 for our next sweep. I know we can do a better job with learning objectives we received a 92% on our sweep in March 2015 and for this sweep we received a 25%.