Jim Knight Training

Whew! Why is it that meetings seem to take SO much brain power - even though all you do is sit through them and try to later regurgitate the info?!?

Today was my first day away from my new home (Chicot!) to attend a training. Today's training was "Jim Knight Training" for instructional facilitators. BTW- I learned today that the Arkansas legislature wants all instructional "coaches" to be called instructional facilitators because they had a hard time distinguishing the difference between the two. Hmm... very interesting!

My training today was NOT by Jim Knight, rather it was delivered by a very nice lady that works for the State Department and then a man that is good at Math, but I don't remember his job title!

The BIG ideas from today's training- focus on the BIG four (content, instruction, assessment, and behavior management) and help teachers through the continuum of the 7 principles (enroll, plan, model, observe, etc...)

If you are interested in learning more about Jim Knight training his website is: http://www.instructionalcoach.org/

I did a little bit of networking- I talked to Watson's new coach, Morgan Ealy, I sat next to Mrs. Michelle over at Hall... they were all doing fine- everyone is still loving their jobs and at the same time learning how to work with the pressures of being a coach!

Well, that's all I have for today! -Ash

Why Pre-K and 1st Grade teachers ROCK!

Wow! My teachers were awesome today! Today was so much fun because today was SMARTboard day! I taught two sessions to teachers today about SMARTboards. I hope they remember two key things: (1) They can find all kinds of lessons on the web (specifically at http://exchange.smarttech.com/index.html#tab=0) and (2) they can find troubleshooting at http://education.smarttech.com/ste/en-US/Ed+Resource/Teachers+Hub/Getting+started/.

Tomorrow is our Math training day at Booker. I am working with 1st grade again- yay! I just can't wait to see them and talk to them again- this is going to be SUCH a great year!

A thought about "Math Land"

Okay- so I KNOW that naming our newly improved trailer "Mathland" is SUPER corny- BUT it does make things sound a little bit more classy!

Who is Danielle you ask?!? Well... she is a WONDER! She will be the new Math interventionist and she is my roomie in Mathland! She brings ALL the passion, excitement, and joy that comes with a new teacher AND all the wisdom and foresight that the best nontraditional teachers inherently have. I am SUPER excited to be sharing my new space with her and CANNOT wait until the two of us really work our magic on our little space.

Other exciting news I have to share tonight, I am beginning to post some Partner Games onto http://lrsdmath.proboard.com/ I have begun first on 1st Grade, because 1st is what I know, but I anticipate this process going quicker and quicker the more I build. If you want to download these go check the proboard and let me know what you like and what I could make better!

I have vision...

Well, I am completely covered in fire hydrant dust! Apparently this summer this was a little incident with a fire hydrant being sprayed by some youngsters ALL over "Mathland" (yes, this is my new nickname for our lovely, dusty trailer) So today consisted of opening a MILLION boxes, and dusting everything. (And trying to not sit down on dust covered chairs.) I learned where the bathrooms, library, book room, office, cafeteria, and gym are located today. All thanks goes to Mrs. Chambers for my awesome tour! I also got to meet the new 2nd grade literacy coach, I think she is AWESOME! I feel a little exhausted, and a lot excited... I can't wait for teachers to come back!

Oh and let me impart this tiny bit of wisdom- if you want to know who the BEST welcoming crew at Chicot is... it is the custodians! They were so helpful today! I had a ton of boxes to throw away, and tons of things to be moved inside to literacy areas, and just generally a few thousand  favors and they were so gracious about everything I needed- EVERYtime! Mr. Lyle (I think that was his name!) even found something to help dry my feet from walking in the rain so I wouldn't slip on the newly waxed floors! 

Ok- onwards to tomorrow!

Registration - Day 1

Well today was a completely and totally exhausting and exciting day!

I spent all day helping in the cafeteria and registered SO MANY families!

Today I met our new counselor, the security guard, the Principal's bookkeeper, the secretary, the new VP, a new 2nd grade teacher, the two nurses, the nutritionist, and oh so many students!

Another exciting detail to add to my day was my first glimpse into my new Math area! It will take a lot of work to organize those boxes... but so many boxes means SO MANY new Math tools- yay! I can't wait to get my Lysol wipes and some soap and water and get the grime out!

I can just imagine an area where:

1. teachers can meet and commune about Math
2. teachers can check out Math manipulatives
3. we can all discuss the Math assessment wall
4. AND still have an area inviting to small groups of children ready for interventions!

Overzealous? Maybe... but I prefer the term SUPERDETERMINED!

Planning for Pre-School PD 2010

Oh man am I excited! Today Patricia, Jennifer, Myrna, Beth, and I met to dicuss our plan for the pre-school pd session. We have decided that teachers need to walk away with "stuff"! We want the first 9 weeks planned, assessments thought through, new rubrucs/report cards understood, all the different lessons understood and planned out... whew!

What DO YOU like to leave a pd session with?

Coach's Retreat Day 2!

8:30 – 9:00 Icebreaker

• Human Scavenger hunt
• Qualities of a favorite teacher 
• Compassionate, energetic, creative, encouraging, interesting, facilitator, positive, fun, challenging, engaging, prepared, share personal strories, high expectations, fair, passionate, knowledgeable, humourous, genuine, caring, nice, motivating, hands-on, intelligent, approachable, clarity, authoritative, not a traditionalist, consistent, enthusiastic, quality

 

9:00 – 10:20 Classroom scenarios

• Building rapport between and with teachers
• Helping a teacher feel empowered when she/he is close to retirement
• Helping a new teacher through her/his first year 
• Karen Rivers is setting up a mentorship program for new teachers through UALR
•  kyrivers@ualr.edu 
• Helping a teacher work through a teaching rut

 

10:20 – 10:25 Math classroom observation protocol

 

10:25 - 11:20 Using teacher data: questions, answers, next steps…

 

• Looking at data and determining “did they grow?” 
• Student CAN gain and meet growth goals, AND STILL can negatively grow 
• We need to show students their scores
• Even if they do not meet growth goal for the year, they can still have a LARGE amount of growth
• Manipulating data is a powerful tool for beginning conversations
• Tinkerplots

 

12:20 – 3:00 Breakout Session with Beth

• Analyzed item by item data
• Designing PD
• Bring in specialists to correlate standards
• Sometimes this can go awry
• Renew everyone/ be positive
• Problem solve- let teachers solve the problem
• Find the things that are common
• Teachers and Coach can pull stuff for specialist
• Think about curriculums for after school tutoring
• Think about getting teachers to choose to do things they like
• Cooking, art, chess, etc…
• Take the data and look at the items that are best/worst
• PD plan for 2010 – 2011
• June 7, 2010 – Report cards, rubrics
• August 13 - backward design for rituals routines and classroom environments
• K – 2 Booker
• 3 -5 Romine
• Feb. 14 – How to move a student to proficiency
• Regional PD 
• AEA Days – Lesson study
• Lesson Study clinics
• Problem types
• Tech
• Set up a leadership team that will be the go to people to help the communication about standards based report cards
• This team will also share at open house
• THEN after parent conferences rubrics will be posted online for parents
• Need to have family Math night
• 50’s night
• Carnival night
• Tickets
• Stickers
• Bank
• Buying/selling
• Sell things kids make 
• Regional meetings
• AEA Days
• Lesson Study
• Proboards/Live Chats – every 2 and 4

Coach's Retreat

So... I have decided I want to do everything possible to keep my teachers UP TO DATE with what is going on in the district! I know how nosy I am- so I want to help others feel like they are "in the loop." That being said, here are my first notes from my first coach's meeting!

8:30 – 9:15 – Opening, ice breaker

9:15 – 10:40 – Defining Mathematics Coaching

• Chapter 1 Mathematics Coaching
• Stage I- Defining Math Coaching
• Responsibilities
• 6 Characteristics
• Dispelling Negative Images

 10:40 – 11:10 - Google Calendar

• Coaches all set up a google calendar
• Link their calendars with Beth Clifford and Vanessa Cleaver
• offer the link to teachers and principal
• Coaches send log of what you did with your time to Vanessa and Beth each Monday

 11:10 – 11:45 - District Data

•  Trends in 6th – 8th
•  6th dipped, 7th increased, 8th increased
•  Algebra and Geometry
•  Geometry increased
•  Algebra increased
•  LRSD Cohort Data
•  Raw vs. Scaled score
•  Scaled 0 – 1000 weight on open responses
•  Raw score number of correct items they got out of total

 12:45 – 1:45 - TinkerPlots

•  Learning the software
•  Importing data
•  Creating a plot

 1:45 – 2:20 - Discussion Panel of Data

•  Connie - Wakefield
• Organizing the Coaches notebook
• Notebook 1 - Planning pd by grade level
• Sign up sheet
• Minutes
• Agenda
• Notebook 2 – Coaches Items
• PGP sections
• Some sectiones might reference a different binder
• Notebook 3 – Data
• Must have all hard copies for Audit
• Asking Teachers to analyze their own data to bring back to common meeting
• Survey
• Things you need help in with a possible checklist
• PDs you would like
• Something they felt like they were strong in that the coach could send someone to them
• Folder for “observations”
• Schedule
• Feedback
• Terrie – Pulaski Heights
• Becoming data driven- making it a part of the work day
• Data Notebooks
• 4 hours first work day – to get EVERYone to buy in to data
• Initial challenge 10 kids per grade level
• Every teacher gets their own data notebook
• Scores of previous year’s kids
• Scores for current roster kids
• Item by item analysis by school, district, state
• Student’s competing against themselves for better data
• Copy of student report of tli
• Creating a file for the leadership teams to track students
• Started off with the norms files from ‘09
• Sub population
• Race
• special ed
• economic disadvantage
• LEP
• Started highlighting “triple threats” kids that fit more than 2 subpopulations
• Cannot let out ED, but CAN say “triple threat”
• Double blocking them in core subjects or giving them extra time in the needed subjects for basic skills
• Use america’s choice navigator series for basic skills
• Presenting info in a different way
• Pull out programs – 45 extra minutes a week
• Open-response

 2:35 – 4:00 Breakout with Beth

•  Next time coaches need to bring 3 ring binder
• Bring long term roll out goals
• PD plan for k – 2 report card
• Common Core standards
• Data
• Rubrics
• Growth data - Finding profiecieny
• Get all students either proficient or having made the gain then put proficiency / total
• 4th- (89/130)68.4%
• 5th – (67/121) 55.3%
• Next years AYP – 77.5%

 

SMARTboard training!

Oh man!! I finished the lrsd SMARTboard "train the trainer" sessions today- and I am SO excited! A BIG shoutout goes to Ms. Stephanie Jones over at Mann Magnet East lab for being an awesome instructor! Here is a picture that I found roaming around on the internet that makes me think of all the wonderful learning CHILDREN will be doing come this school year!

I am now inspired to add more work *sigh* to my summer "must do" list! Speaking of which, why don't I outline that for you right now...

1. Reread Van de Walle's book
2. Reread Classroom Discussions book
3. Read CGI Math book
4. Make sure I have hammered out end of 9 weeks assessments for k - 2 (at least the 1st 9 weeks!) ~ Luckily, I found out tonight that K already had theirs posted on their curriculum map!
5. Work on assessments for the assessment wall (I need faster snapshots of the kids work...)
6. **NEW** Create a partner games intro for each partner game
7. **NEW** Create possible SMART lessons for the first week of each grade k - 2
8. Keep up with my new blog
9. Make an A in my Theories of Instruction Class
10. Collect tons and tons of pictures of classrooms (that focus on the Math) from online
11. Keep up with LRSDmathproboard

Ok- that's all for now I think! :) Sometimes I feel very ADD. I like to have multiple projects going at once because I get bored if I stay working on one of them for too much time!

-<3->

Ash

The beginning...

“Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end.”

~Seneca (Roman philosopher, mid-1st century AD)