Re:Learning, 5 Mayo 1994 Notes by Roy E. Howard

Jean Stratton, Sheryl White, Steve Dilg

The Principles that effective schools have in common:
Schools should discover the principles which have become the "Nine Common Principles of the Coalition of Essential Schools", Director, Ted Sizer. Adopted in New Mexico in grades K-16. The State funds this for the schools, as well as the Noyse Foundation that supports NSF. The ultimate purpose is to promote systemic change based on all stake holders communicating. We are looking at all the promising practices and tying them together in dialog among the individuals within a system.

1. Intellectual Focus
2. Simple Goals
3. All Children can Learn
4. Personalization
5. Student as Active Learner
6. Authentic Assessment
7. Tone
8. Staff as Generalists
9. Time and Budget

RE:Learning
E - expectations are high for all
G - goals of a school should apply to all students
A - all can learn and use their minds well
R - recognize diversity in teaching and learning styles and the personal needs of individual schools
D - designing strategic plans for change
I - involves all stake holders
N - Nine Common Principles
G - gives staff opportunites for professional growth

Regarding:Learning for student success


Steve Dilg

How do we develop true interdependency based on the individual needs of each institution?

Shades of Change

We do some things the old way and some things the new way in terms of attitudes, beliefs, and practices. How to involve the whole community, including the school (the whole, K-16 school community)? Identifying the key players is essential. The school needs to identify the action plan for themselves. They need to self evaluate and come up with an action plan that involves the whole community, and ownership in where you are going as a school system. Take advantage of one another and things that work, to develop an attainable action plan that makes the stake holders feel ownership and hope that it can be done.

Indicators of School Change
Where are you now in terms of these indicators? Are you working with the right group of individuals? Are you revisiting and reflecting upon the changes in the world and the realities of the system? Is the whole system involved in needs assessment and planning what we can do?

•Communication - we have to bring back to the rest of the school what we have learned. Teachers don’t have time to talk to each other. We need to bring in the stake holders when the students are not there.
•Leadership
•Teaching & Learning
•School Community Partnerships/Networking -
.>Systems Accountability

Shared Decision making: Faculty need to feel that they have had opportunity for appropriate input. They know that accountability lies with individuals assigned to make decisions. Their comfort and support for decisions is not based on a sense of consensus, but of respect and ownership in the system.

Rubrics: Let the students develop the methods and assessments for attaining the competencies.


Desired Outcomes for First year teachers, group discussion:

>Classroom management is key to survival for new teachers.
>Cultural Awareness: First year teachers do not know how to act differently and what to expect of students of differing backgrounds.
>Innovative Pedagogies
>Varying philosophies/theories - they may end up in a school with a different philosophy
>Counseling/facilitation
>Need for training in bilingual, SPED, etc, vs. limitations in numbers of courses
>Realism vs idealism about what schools are really like.
>Stress management

If you continue to do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got.

Indicators: Systemic Development of Professional Educators

Facets: Collaborative Field Experience

Bi-Directional Admnistrative Support

Interagency Relationships

Undergraduate Ed Preparation

Sustained Professional Development for all Educators

Involvement of partners, organizations, and communities in the dialogue about systemic reform in education

Backward Planning

Outcomes desired (attributes): Students who have the following attibutes - enthusiastic, confident, curious, motivated, critical thinkers, decision makers, problem solvers, tolerant of differences, life long learners, creative, original, rigorous, cooperative, adaptable. But according to whom are these desirable? Many jobs in society do not appreciate these attributes, so we are creating a revolutionary movement towards a democratic society.


Relevant Issues

Maintain Job, scarcity of resources, ecology, population, health, violence, policy, aging, attitudes, global economic, immigration, intercultural communication

Concept Defined

The attributes of a concept are - abstract, broad, universal, timelss, represented through differnct examples, but all examples hav the same atributes. The concept that some of the above issues have in common may be change or social challenges, or competition, cooperation, equity, global stewardship,

A team works together to find issues, attributes, concepts and skills.

Skills that exist across the disciplines in this integrated curriculum that will be demonstrated in the final exibition

analyze, compare, contrast, apply, evaluate, research, observe, etc.

Essential questions

>Should shape the way students learn to think critically for themselves
>Does it go to the heart of the matter?
>Can I address the question in many subjects?
>Is it open ended?
>Does it promote thoughtful habits of mind?
>Is the question too broad or too narrow?
>Can it reflect real world applications?

How could global resources be more equitably shared?
Describe the world you want to leave for your grandchildren.

Checklist for Authentic Assessment

>Is it task oriented?
>Does it parallel real life?
>Is it performance based?
>Does it exhibit clear evidence of skills and knowledge?
>Is it integrated?
>Does it encourage higher order thinking skills?

Not, "cover the book", rather, focus on the purpose

Outcome: Acknowledgement of a common core of expectations from both districts and universities in their committment toward professional growth.

Undergraduate Preparation -

Modeling teaching expertise outside department: Students get content ideas from their major courses.
Are those professors modeling appropriate teaching behaviors?
How do we create a comfort zone in which we can have a conversation about how we teach when we know there will be disagreement?
What is the model that the college professors should follow?
How do we select and train the cooperating teachers and clinical faculty? How can they become coteachers (collegial) rather than supervising teachers? We should not leave the student teachers alone, but work with them. How can we be certain that the teacher is collegial, not just says they subscribe to the philosophy.

Common Characteristics of Master Teacher and Student Teacher

Nine Common Principles
high expectations for students
flexible, good planner
Questioning
Strategies to become good learners so they can deal with daily situations outside of the classroom
Applies knowledge to solve problems in real life
We do not want to just sit and find out what someone else knows, and then spit it back out to them in the final exam, and then forget it. I can't cover it all.
Give them experiences that will help them deal with the body of knowledge in solving current problems.
How to utilize the teaching support system to get feedback on how to react to successes and failures in implementing teaching strategies
Preteachers need many experiences with a variety of styles of teachers. We should not rely upon one experience with one teacher as now. Assign a student teacher to a school rather than to a teacher. The student teacher must be respected as one who can and will do it.
Student teachers should experience middle school as well as their level of choice, since they are certified K-8 or 7-12.

Evaluation and Refinement: the courses must match the needs of the teachers by going past theory into practice. It will make sense for the students if they see how it applies to their teaching.

Expectations for Student Teachers
by the faculty

Positive Professional Attitudes
toward students, community, parents, colleagues
toward life long learning
independent learners
works collaboratively
balances advocacy and inquiry
values diversity
all children can learn

Skills
schools safe for differences
communication
interpersonal, understanding, self awareness, nonverbal, verbal, intercultural
TESA
reacts appropriately to cultural behaviors
varies teaching style
don't exclude any student
questioning skills
Teaching to varied learning styles
evaluation, adjustment of teaching
illiciting participation and interaction

Knowledge
Current Content knowledge of their discipline
Interrelationships to other knowledge
Applications of knowledge to problem solving
Learning in context
Creating new knowledge by doing research
Use of latest technology to promote learning, thinking and problem solving

Responsibilities of Teacher Trainers
convert the students
model the desired outcomes
participate in the schools
observe the master teachers
be involved in the schools
networking
team teach in classrooms
invite teachers to demonstrate in our class
talk to teachers


Expectations for Student Teachers
by the Administrators

Active life long learners
Security in knowledge and ability to try different methods, based on being exposed to different current methods and assessments
Commitment to the 9 Common Principles or other valued philosophies of education
Belief that all children can learn and demonstration of that belief
Flexibility in teaching
Organiztion, management skills
Reflective practice - thinking about what you did, how it worked and how it can be better
Acceptance, liking children
Working with others, teaming

Responsibilities of Administrators

Facilitate learning from all perspectives
Create a supportive atmosphere
Actively model behaviors and expectations
Nurture diversity
instruct
Be available
Give clear expectations
Be a good listener

Expectations for Student Teachers
by the Teachers

Professionalism
Definition of roles in relationships, especially in multiple placement
Develop and complete a unit
Classroom management plan
Active listening skills

Responsibilities of Teachers
Professionalism
Expect student teacher to take responsibility in developing a unit
Multiple placement should be coordinated by the clinical teacher
Process for dialoguing and feedback and evaluation
Open mindedness by cooperating teacher of innovations by student teachers
Clear expectations of clinical faculty/student teacher role by district policy
Field experience - don't use them as and aide or sub, but to practice supervised teaching

To do: "What Benchmarks will screen students in advance for interest and potential to be a teacher?"
>Assessment rubrics based on State competencies
>Annual review boards for consideration of a student's continuation in teacher education
>Self Evaluation - teach them how to make decisions about their career
>Don't think of it as weeding out, but as an assessment for advocacy: what do they need to learn?
>Which students should be redirected to different majors into or out of education?
>How can we identify potential teachers among freshmen and sophmores?
>What can we do with early identified college students to encourage their development or redirect their interests?
.>How can we recruit and encourage high achieving high school students to investigate education careers?
>Philosophy statements
>Housekeeping items
>Expectations for student teachers from university and teachers
>How are cooperating teachers selected and matched with student teachers?

NEXT MEETING:

October 27 9-3:00

1. Outcome: Define purpose and objectives

If we replace the static old dinosaur of the old system with a static new system, we have not gained much. We need to create a philosophy statement that mediates the problems caused by systems that are slow to change.

The statement needs to be inclusive of all services and agencies that work with children and youth if it is to be true systemic reform, that is dynamic and responsive. We need to seek "promising practices in education", not "best practices", because schools are like people, they are infinitely improvable.

The scope of the statement needs to include the entire cycle of life, including prebirth and birth through the continuing levelsof life-long education.

Terms:

Early Childhood: Prenatal to age 8

Stakeholders: families, communities, agencies, Educational entities, Legislative bodies, business

Transformational Leadership: educators need to know how to collaborate with stakeholders to bring about change and help the organization become self directed in the process. This implies the transcending philosophy of attention to the need for changing organizations to address new challenges and new information. This allows a metamorphosis of change from within that involves the entire system from the deepest levels, from bottom to top.

Statement of Philosophy, October 1994

The SW Alliance for Learning is a coalition of concerned community members from Southwestern New Mexico. The Alliance recognizes the need for leadership in the development of systemic professional growth for all human service providers. The Alliance believes in leadership which is collaborative, transformational and inclusive of all stakeholders. Its membership includes educators, agency representatives and other community members. The Alliance is committed to continually seeking the most promising practices to address the comprehensive needs of our communites (children, youth, adults). In accepting this mission, The Alliance recognizes that this will be a never ending endeavor in that all persons and institutions that serve them are always simply in a stage of development leading to continuous self improvement. As the most promising practices are identified, The Alliance is committed to improving education and practice for all stakeholders.

Goals and activities (Examples)

Identify Current Needs

Gangs and school /community violence
Arts not addressed sufficiently in schools
Artistically gifted students not recognized
Language gifted students not recognized

Identify Promising Practices

Forum for sharing ideas in order to identify them

What are the Promising Practices
Control Theory
TESA
Common Principles
Re:Learning
Moms for Fun (Arts Education)

Dissemination of Promising Practices

Conferences
Meetings
Newsletters
Journal of NMDOE: "Best Practices"
Contribute, encourage subscriptions
Town Meetings

Involving stakeholders

Encouragement to institutionalize Promising Practices
Voice for developing and encouraging programs in among the stakeholders
Catalyst
Support Group
Bring groups in, empower them
Formation of Task Forces to address issues

2. Work Out Housekeeping Items

There was a lengthy discussion on student teacher policies, and a satisfactory conclusion, because this event provided an excellent forum.

3. Specify Expectations for Student Teachers from the University and the Teachers -

The Gallery walk process in August resulted in a list as follows that was approved by today's group:

>Expectations for Student Teachers by the faculty

Positive Professional Attitudes
toward students, community, parents, colleagues
toward life long learning
independent learners
works collaboratively
balances advocacy and inquiry
values diversity
all children can learn

Skills
schools safe for differences
communication
interpersonal, understanding, self awareness, nonverbal, verbal, intercultural
TESA
reacts appropriately to cultural behaviors
varies teaching style
don't exclude any student
questioning skills
Teaching to varied learning styles
evaluation, adjustment of teaching
illiciting participation and interaction

Knowledge

Current Content knowledge of their discipline
Interrelationships to other knowledge
Applications of knowledge to problem solving
Learning in context
Creating new knowledge by doing research
Use of latest technology to promote learning, thinking and problem solving

Responsibilities of Teacher Trainers

"convert" the students
model the desired outcomes
participate in the schools
observe the master teachers
be involved in the schools
networking
team teach in classrooms
invite teachers to demonstrate in our class
talk to teachers

>Expectations for Student Teachers by the Administrators

Active life long learners
Security in knowledge and ability to try different methods, based on being exposed to different current methods and assessments
Commitment to the 9 Common Principles or other valued philosophies of education
Belief that all children can learn and demonstration of that belief
Flexibility in teaching
Organiztion, management skills
Reflective practice - thinking about what you did, how it worked and how it can be better
Acceptance, liking children
Working with others, teaming

Responsibilities of Administrators

Facilitate learning from all perspectives
Create a supportive atmosphere
Actively model behaviors and expectations
Nurture diversity
instruct
Be available
Give clear expectations
Be a good listener


>Expectations for Student Teachers by the Teachers

Professionalism
Definition of roles in relationships, especially in multiple placement
Develop and complete a unit
Classroom management plan
Active listening skills

Responsibilities of Teachers

Professionalism
Expect student teacher to take responsibility in developing a unit
Multiple placement should be coordinated by the clinical teacher
Process for dialoguing and feedback and evaluation
Open mindedness by cooperating teacher of innovations by student teachers
Clear expectations of clinical faculty/student teacher role by district policy
Field experience - don't use them as an aide or sub, but to practice supervised teaching

4. What/Who is a Master Teacher - How do we decide/define clinical faculty?

>Master Teacher - desired characteristics

>Scholarship, Knowledge
Learner
Learn from OT/PT, Special Ed, Communities in Schools, Bil Ed, Central Abuse, Hazardous Waste Act, Curriculum...
Attend inservice, contribute to preservice
Be up to date on technology in teaching and connecting to the world knowledge
Advanced degree, excellence in teaching

>Education Platform
Practices Reflective Thinking
Key areas and Education models

>Innovative Pedagogy
Classroom Management Skills
Ability to integrate across the curriculum such as math plus science, arts in education
Learner centered, cooperative learning
Whole language education and eclectic teaching
Adjust teaching style to learning styles
Sensitive to individual differences

>Interpersonal skills
Risk Taker
Collaborator
Professionalism, collegiality
Cares about children, empathetic
Values diversity
Parent interactions

>Leadership
Find out, talk with others, intervene, collaborate

What we need to do next:

Each agency needs to decide in advance for a way to act upon the concerns, recommendations, and decisions of this body.
Meetings: this body will meet one Thursday in September, November, February and April. Please respond to the survey by prioritizing your best Thursdays.
We need to invite the WNMU President and VPAA to strengthen the power of The Alliance to act upon decisions.
We need to design bylaws that specify how the organization comes to decisions.