Week 14 Policy Implementing and Proposal Writing

Hello girls!

Hopefully all of you are adjusting to your new schedules, personally mine is giving me a run for my money! This week was all about policy implementation and writing grants, which should be helpful for Tasks 3 & 4! Keep in mind how policies are implemented at your school while answering the blog, and make sure to make connections with the reading and each other.

B&D Chapter 17: Policy Implementation

This chapter starts with a discussion on how NCLB has changed the stakes for teachers and has added a lot of pressure for students to do well on state testing, something all of us are a little too familiar with! The case example about Sharon and her coworker Evie trying to adapt a core-reading program to meet their needs is something I think all of us can connect with. Bean and Dagen posit the idea that the way teachers’ respond to policy is a combination of three things: their personal beliefs, attitudes, and knowledge, the school and district context, and what makes up the policy itself. A teacher’s personal beliefs can play a huge factor in the way they interpret instructional policy. If the policy aligns with their beliefs, they will be more likely to adapt classroom practices to the new policy. On the other hand, if it does not align, they are much less likely to change their practice. The knowledge a teacher has about their practice plays a major role in how policy shapes instruction. The study conducted provided evidence that it helped a teacher with weak content knowledge.

There are two components of social context that have an impact on how teachers’ incorporate new reading policies: social interaction and leadership. A teacher’s social network can impact what they find out about a new reading policy. Those that are not a part of certain social networks or professional organizations may learn about these things much later. Through interactions with the literacy leaders, teachers make decisions about their thoughts on the new policy, as we saw in the example with Sharon and Evie. School leadership also shapes the way a teacher thinks and how they feel about policy changes. Principals can insist that you utilize the entire new core-reading program, or may just ask for you to address the standards. This influences how we as teachers feel about the new initiatives.

Teachers need to feel that a new policy aligns with their current teaching practice and beliefs. In the climate surrounding education, multiple initiatives are being mandated all at the same time. Teachers are more likely to start using those that align with their beliefs and ignore those that do not. They also are more likely to use them if they are trained how to use them properly. Finally, teachers are more likely to utilize new instructional policies if they feel they have a choice in the matter. By this, I mean, that teachers are more likely to incorporate it if they have some choice in how they implement. If they are forced to change their style to a new teaching practice entirely, it is unlikely to happen. If they are allowed to adapt parts to work with how they already teach, they are more likely to try it.

Questions:

1. How have your beliefs about reading instruction affected your responses to reading policy?

2. At your school site, how has teacher collaboration influenced the adoption of reading practices, methods, or materials?

3. What kinds of policy have been implemented and how were they implemented? How does Figure 17.1 align with your own policy implementation?

Bean Chapter 11:

The chapter begins by discussing the opportunities for grant writing, and the requirements that each grant may have. It uses the reduction in funds as a potential reason for writing grants, which is something we all know too well. It then provides us with some general guidelines for writing.

1. Develop a great idea!

• The person reviewing your grant is going to want something creative and well developed that remedies a specific issue. Find a target group or area that you would like to focus on, and write for that.

2. Work with others to develop the idea.

• Most grants require that a grade level or whole school implement it. Because of this, it’s important to work with others to come up with the idea for the grant, so that it encompasses what all of you feel the school (or your grade level) needs.

3. Address your needs and locate a good match.

• Find a funder that matches with your proposed activity.

4. Proposal should be well written.

• Use the terminology and organization that is used in the grant application.
• Avoid using teacher jargon and acronyms. It should be written as if the person is unfamiliar with these terms.
• All of the questions should be answered and all of the requirements fulfilled.

5. Talk to funders.

6. Solicit feedback.

7. Use effective formatting.

8. Become familiar with the review criteria.

Not all grants are the same, but most contain these elements:

• A statement of goals or objectives.
• A review of the literature that applies to your grant. It should be relevant and current, support the need you have identified, and summarize what is known about this issue.
• A design plan for what you are planning to do. Providing graphics or visual aids is helpful. Using a timeline can help the reader of the grant really see your vision for when things will be implemented.
• Background information on who will be working on the project, and what skills they have that will be useful for the project. Listing the qualifications helps make the funder more comfortable.
• A plan for evaluation. Some may require formative evaluations, such as documentation of when meetings occurred and who attended; others may require a summative evaluation to see the results of the project.
• A budget of how you plan to use the funds should be included.
• A plan for how you will share this information with your colleagues.
• A plan for continued use after the funding runs out.
• After all of this, the writer needs to provide an abstract. This summarizes everything that was written in the proposal and serves as the attention getter that makes funders want to read your grant.

Questions:

1. What was in the chapter that was new or surprising to your?

2. How will the hints help you write your own proposal?

Week 13 Communication and Collaboration with Multiple Stakeholders

Hello Lit Ladies!

Bean and Dagen Chapter 6 Principals as Literacy Leaders

“The work that principals do, although it has some direct effect on student achievement, has larger indirect influences through the ways that their leadership influences teachers.” (104) Although the role of the principal is more organizational than simply in a school, this role  indirectly influences student achievement and directly influences school and community relationships and individual teacher instruction. All of these relationships help mold the role of the principal as an instructional leader.

                Responsibilities and roles of the principal include setting the mission and goals of the school, developing a culture of trust and collaboration, and actively focusing on instruction. These roles and responsibilities indirectly influence teacher to teacher relationships and student achievement.

                “James”, in his assistant principal role, paints a picture of this journey by modeling the process of principals striving to become more of an instructional literacy leader. He began by listening to teachers to gain understanding as to what was occurring at school with the students and staff. He then wanted to set direction for the staff, therefore developing a mission and goal that the staff would share together. In order to build support though faculty involvement he decided to utilize distributed leadership using PLCs and ILTs (instructional leadership teams). He then focused on managing the instructional program through planning effective professional development and including experts outside the building. Finally, James utilized formative and summative observations to show that teachers continued to strive for shared mission of the school and he used data to guide instruction and diagnostic data to key in on helping struggling students. “His effectiveness as a leader, like that of a principal, is multidimensional. We believe that the most important step he took was to become aware of what those dimensions are.” (120)

Think about your situation and discuss:

What does distributed leadership look like at your school?

How does your principal fit in with the characteristics of an instructional leader?

How could you, as a reading specialist, support him/her?

WSQ 16 Working with Parents and the Community

“Parents don’t care about their children’s education or lack the ability or knowledge to support their children’s learning.” (216). I know I personally have stated this time and time again. But as this chapter points out, “...[Parents] situations, perspectives, and abilities may affect their capacity to support their children in particular ways.” (217) This statement helps me focus on the fact that no matter a parent’s background or situation, they want to see their children succeed in school.

The expectation of parents to be involved in their child/children’s education is at an all time high due to majority of states adopting the CCSS in which involved parents are better able to comprehend what is being taught. However, there is a line between involved and uninvolved parents. Many uninvolved parents of our nation’s children have cultural, linguistic, and economic differences. These differences include children of poverty from a variety of ethnic backgrounds, children of immigrants who may or may not be undocumented, parents who did not graduate from high school and diverse home languages. Other challenges include teachers who may not understand or have misconceptions about the families they serve. Teachers must “explore their own beliefs and attitudes about non-white and non-middle-class people.” (216).

Administrators and teachers must recognize that “one-size-fits-all” does not fit all families. Differentiated parenting states that teachers have to get to know parents and collaborate with them to learn their individual and family needs. This will be easier to create a plan for parental appropriateness - a plan for parent involvement that realistically can be attended to, given the family’s daily routines. Parental self-efficacy is in which “parents who are capable of reading may lack the requisite knowledge and experiences to effectively engage in shared reading.” Parents believe they know how to read, but feel self-conscious because they feel they are not “reading” the proper way and may feel that they don’t know what teachers practice every day - appropriate reading materials/levels, modeling how to read, talking with children as they read, etc. Parents fear they may, “get it wrong.”

Outreach strategies to communicate with parents are some ways we may already be familiar with such as: encouraging an open door policy for family to visit at any time, offering a range of times for families to attend school functions, including parents’ home language on material that goes home, and developing a school Family Resource Center. Funds of knowledge is the school taking effective outreach to the next level. This is done by positioning parents as rich and valuable resources. Ways to achieve this outreach would be by making home visits and talking with parents and children about family routines and events outside of school.

Finally, home-school collaboration includes connecting parents to services that may be before or after school. Such services may be that the school offers before and/or after school care, which could include tutoring. External agencies that schools could refer parents to for continued home-school support could be community stakeholders such as the local library or the YMCA.

In this chapter, I have highlighted in bold print, some terms to discuss/compare in your blog discussions: differentiated parenting, parental appropriateness, funds of knowledge, parental self-efficacy, parental involvement, outreach, external agencies. What do some of these look like at your school?

Please look at the reflection questions in WSQ page 221 and Bean page 257 for those that have each chapter and choose one that strikes a chord with you that we can discuss in our blog on Thursday. Any questions, 1-3, would make good questions to discuss as you share what your chapter says.

Also, be sure to make connections across the chapters.                Happy Blogging!

Week 13 Communication and Collaboration with Multiple Stakeholders

Hello Lit Ladies!

Bean and Dagen Chapter 6 Principals as Literacy Leaders

“The work that principals do, although it has some direct effect on student achievement, has larger indirect influences through the ways that their leadership influences teachers.” (104) Although the role of the principal is more organizational than simply in a school, this role  indirectly influences student achievement and directly influences school and community relationships and individual teacher instruction. All of these relationships help mold the role of the principal as an instructional leader.

  Responsibilities and roles of the principal include setting the mission and goals of the school, developing a culture of trust and collaboration, and actively focusing on instruction. These roles and responsibilities indirectly influence teacher to teacher relationships and student achievement.

“James”, in his assistant principal role, paints a picture of this journey by modeling the process of principals striving to become more of an instructional literacy leader. He began by listening to teachers to gain understanding as to what was occuring at school with the students and staff. He then wanted to set direction for the staff, therefore developing a mission and goal that the staff would share together. In order to build support though faculty involvement he decided to utilize distributed leadership using PLCs and ILTs (instructional leadership teams). He then focused on managing the instructional program through planning effective professional development and including experts outside the building. Finally, James utilized formative and summative observations to show that teachers continued to strive for shared mission of the school and he used data to guide instruction and diagnostic data to key in on helping struggling students. “His effectiveness as a leader, like that of a principal, is multidimensional. We believe that the most important step he took was to become aware of what those dimensions are.” (120)

Think about your situation and discuss:

What does distributed leadership look like at your school?

How does your principal fit in with the characteristics of an instructional leader?

How could you, as a reading specialist, support him/her?

WSQ 16 Working with Parents and the Community

“Parents don’t care about their children’s education or lack the ability or knowledge to support their children’s learning.” (216). I know I personally have stated this time and time again. But as this chapter points out, “...[Parents] situations, perspectives, and abilities may affect their capacity to support their children in particular ways.” (217) This statement helps me focus on the fact that no matter a parent’s background or situation, they want to see their children succeed in school.

The expectation of parents to be involved in their child/children’s education is at an all time high due to majority of states adopting the CCSS in which involved parents are better able to comprehend what is being taught. However, there is a line between involved and uninvolved parents. Many uninvolved parents of our nation’s children have cultural, linguistic, and economic differences. These differences include children of poverty from a variety of ethnic backgrounds, children of immigrants who may or may not be undocumented, parents who did not graduate from high school and diverse home languages. Other challenges include teachers who may not understand or have misconceptions about the families they serve. Teachers must “explore their own beliefs and attitudes about non-white and non-middle-class people.” (216).

Administrators and teachers must recognize that “one-size-fits-all” does not fit all families. Differentiated parenting states that teachers have to get to know parents and collaborate with them to learn their individual and family needs. This will be easier to create a plan for parental appropriateness - a plan for parent involvement that realistically can be attended to, given the family’s daily routines. Parental self-efficacy is in which “parents who are capable of reading, may lack the requisite knowledge and experiences to effectively engage in shared reading.” Parents believe they know how to read, but feel self conscious because they feel they are not “reading” the proper way and may feel that they don’t know what teachers practice everyday - appropriate reading materials/levels, modeling how to read, talking with children as they read, etc. Parents fear they may, “get it wrong.”

Outreach strategies to communicate with parents are some ways we may already be familiar with such as: encouraging an open door policy for family to visit at any time, offering a range of times for families to attend school functions, including parents’ home language on material that goes home, and developing a school Family Resource Center. Funds of knowledge is the school taking effective outreach to the next level. This is done by positioning parents as rich and valuable resources. Ways to achieve this outreach would be by making home visits and talking with parents and children about family routines and events outside of school.

Finally, home-school collaboration includes connecting parents to services that may be before or after school. Such services may be that the school offers before and/or after school care, which could include tutoring. External agencies that schools could refer parents to for continued home-school support could be community stakeholders such as the local library or the YMCA.

In this chapter, I have highlighted in bold print, some terms to discuss/compare in your blog discussions: differentiated parenting, parental appropriateness, funds of knowledge, parental self-efficacy, parental involvement, outreach, external agencies. What do some of these look like at your school?

Please look at the reflection questions in WSQ page 221 and Bean page 257 for those that have each chapter and choose one that strikes a chord with you that we can discuss in our blog on Thursday. Any questions, 1-3, would make good questions to discuss as you share what your chapter says.

Also, be sure to make connections across the chapters.   Happy Blogging!

Week 12: Meeting the needs of diverse learners as a reading specialist

Happy Tuesday Everybody!

Oh my goodness, I think I can speak for everyone here when I say, I’M POOPED!  Nevertheless, here’s to another great week fighting the good fight for our schools and our kiddos!

This week we all need to read WSQ chapter 14: Response to Intervention.  Do you have RTI in your setting? How is what you have similar to or different from the information in the chapter?

WSQ 14: Response to Intervention

What is RTI?

·      Multi-tiered student intervention system

·      Insures the implementation of high quality researched based instruction in the general education classroom

·      Supplements instruction by outside resources such as a reading specialist or tutor

·      Interventions for students who are on any level of the “at risk” continuum are provided interventions which occur at various times, durations, and frequencies

·      Require regular screenings of all students in order to identify those who are “at-risk” and monitor each child’s academic progress

·      Interventions and monitoring can be utilized for both academic and behavior struggles

One aspect of RTI, which seems to be advantageous, is that a student can be placed almost immediately after there has been an indication the child is not responding to what is being taught in the general education classroom.  This is very different from being placed in the special education program which can take months, or even years.  Additionally, special education does not serve English language learners.  These students are often assessed and score “at-risk” but have no learning disability and never receive the services they need.

Tier 1:

·      Insures high quality, core instruction for all students

·      Requires that each classroom spend 90-120 minutes of uninturupted time on reading instruction

·      Regular assesses all learners (usually once each quarter)

·      Requires teachers to collaborate during PLC meetings.  This time can be spent assessing data, solving problems, identifying successful teaching strategies, etc.

Tier 2:

·      For students who are identified as “at-risk”

·      Allowed time for supplemental tutoring 3-5 times each week for 20-30 minutes at a time

o   Continue focus on phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension for 8-12 weeks before reassessment

·      Small student groups are best served if they are paired with “like” struggles; ex: students who struggle with long and short vowels would see the specialist at the same time.

·      Students are assessed weekly

Tier 3:

·      Increased intervention intensity

·      Smaller student groups and longer duration on intervention (60 minutes)

·      Addresses students social and emotional struggles

o   Attention, on task behavior

*If tier 1 and 2 are followed properly, tier 3 may begin to address the possibility of administering an educational evaluation.

* The RTI process is a shared responsibility.  Teachers, tutors, specialist, administration, and team collaborative groups are all working together to best serve the needs of the students.

We do have RTI at my school, and we follow it to the letter.  We work really hard each year insure that our class schedules allow for a full 120 minutes of reading instruction.  Even though some children are not testing “at-risk”, we still service students who concern us in specific areas of reading instruction.  Also, we service children as early as kindergarten in hope to catch the problems early and begin intervention strategies at the first sign of struggle.  I only wish we had more resources to serve students who are ELL.  We are only able to serve these children as we do our struggling English speaking students.  This is, more times than not, ineffective.

WSQ 13: Reaching Linguistically Diverse Students

Between 1980 and 2009, children ages 5-17 whose home language is something other than English has increased 10-21%

·      Demographics, including race, ethnicity, poverty status, citizenship, and age differ between each English learning student.  Thus, the needs of these students can be equally diverse

·      24% of 4^th grade ELL students scored below the 25^th percentile on state testing

Elements contributing to English Learner diversity are:

·      Knowledge of English

·      Educational background,

·      Sociocultural, emotional, and economic factors

·      Special service needs

The role of reading personnel who are supporting ELL students are

·      To use data to determine how well a student knows English

·      Create an intervention plan

o   This may include professional development, coaching, on-going assistance for supporting teachers and support personnel

Effective Programs used for supporting ELL students mish include:

·      Teacher buy-in (commitment from the teacher stick to the best laid plan for the student)

·      Book study groups

·      Team planning and collaboration

·      Peer observation

·      Utilizing newsletters to build ideas on how to support ELL students

·      Utilizing PLC meetings to collaborate with other teachers on how to best serve these children.

** A point that stood out to me:

“Obviously, funding sources must be identified as a part of any plan for professional development. Also, remember that new sheltered instruction classes may be needed as students transition from a newcomer program into content classrooms. This may necessitate additional training for new sheltered teachers.”

The role of culture and language is powerful as children and adolescents develop their sense of who they are. Some teachers believe that they should connect new information to English learners’ own cultural backgrounds in order to make concepts meaningful. Others disagree, believing that students relate more to popular culture and American influences, and that those should be used when helping students make connections. What are some advantages and disadvantages with both perspectives? What are the instructional implications of each? And what would you suggest for English learners born in the United States but who have never lived in their native cultures?