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=AGenda: January 26, 2011=

I. New business (10:45 – 11:45)

a. Summarizing and Note Taking - Marzano i. Article - discussion ii. How does the instruction of this skill (these skills) look and sound across the grade levels? iii. What resources/training would be helpful? b. Study Island i. Usefulness? Use? Results? c. AR i. Same questions d. What resources/continued training would be most appropriate for all staff regarding LA instruction? How would we track effective implementation   II. Follow up items from October a. Vocabulary b. Assessments - your task from the last meeting was to discuss with your grade level and be ready to give recommendations for the structure of how these assessments can be given and scored most effectively (including time as a variable). This is to include all of the district assessments, but you can also include requests/recommendations for how any other assessments you use are administered/scored. We’re talking about timing, personnel, resources…… Thinking of what you gave this year….. if those same assessments are required next year….. what would work best?

2nd grade - used paras to give sight words, before school starts for the DRA Kdg - phase in days worked well for doing the assessments, need extra personnel for this. DRA required at end of year. 1st grade - before school starts for DRA, included dictated sentences and other at the same time. Need to get all the kids in for that. Teachers and volunteers are doing sight words. This works well. Diagnostic remains difficult, especially scoring thereof. Having paras and others help input data was good. 3rd grade - Writing diagnostic being reduced/removed (still being decided), anchor papers are being considered, no consensus across district on the Scott Foresman benchmark test. Needed more summative assessments to use for Words Their Way groups (Tier II) 5th grade - Scott Foresman to be done using scantron,. Words Their Way gave good information - scoring and recording was difficult. Also need training on scoring. 6th grade - flex time helped, paras and others helped to give the assessments. Study Island testing is split up - math and reading. Paras and volunteers helped to put in the data. STAR gives an opportunity to conference with students individually. Google Docs is frustrating - some teachers have had their accounts disabled.

Proposal: have grade levels give end of year SCott Foresman and Words Their Way. Correlate to OAA results AND to beginning of year SF test. STart with one class in a grade level.

c. School Wide Theme - any follow up? for the cut outs - 3rd grade is having kids actually write something on each one (the character I most admired was and why, for instance) Kids shared with each other. d. After school intervention - grades 3-6 - questions/needs - what will we use to track student progress? How much emphasis will be given to test taking strategies? e. Interim reports - suggestions/recommendations for revising based on new assessments, etc.

Break (10:30 – 10:45)

III. Other

=Meeting Notes : October 27, 2010= Igniting a Passion for Reading Steven Layne Buy some copies - Writing Circle Jim Vopat On Solid Ground Sharon Taberski Debbie Miller Daily 5 and Café the more they read the better readers they become; independent reading; set appts; fits well with RC; need to be independent learners; books are easy to read, they have a great web site; there is more reading going on; Words Their Way
 * Recommended books (Please add to this list from your own personal favorites):**

When Kids Can't Read For Teachers 6-12 (although it is applicable for 4th and 5th as well) Kylene Beers

The Reading Zone by Nancie Atwell

Mini-Lessons for Literature Circles by Harvey Daniels

In the Middle by Nancie Atwell (an oldie but a goodie)

2) Spelling assessments - can we get consensus across the building about whether we do high frequency words, do spelling patterns? REcommendation is to do both and to link word work to spelling instruction. 3) Assessments and data: 1st grade: DRAs were helpful, also sight words, NOT dibels (phoneme segmentation) Could we give it to just the level 1-4 DRA kids? Upper Grades: Scott Foresman assessment was good. Can we split out the vocab and comprehension scores? Bottom line is that the information is good from these assessments (in general). May need to restructure how we give them. Would also like to revise google docs page to include other information. Each grade level needs to give Kathy a recommendation about how to structure the administration of assessments (i.e. having an aide in the room all day for a day or two, allowing the teacher to get through all assessments quickly). This needs to be discussed in grade levels and back to Kathy soon, so she can set up the appropriate plan now (while the info is fresh in our minds) and make the beginning of next year go more smoothly.

4) Topic for ALT: interim reports revised to reflect baseline data rather than grades  ﻿ 5) After School Intervention: Generally seen as effective. Experience appears to show that test taking strategies and skills are more important in these venues than content specific remediation. A presenter will be here at the end of November to work with parents on helping kids become more effective learners, and will be able to work with teachers about her own research and work with after school groups.

6) SChoolwide theme: Loving to Read - shared literacy…. will discuss at Inservice Day.

7) Vocabulary - pare down the word list and review how to use the 6 step process.

=Welcome, everyone! We will use this space to share ideas and keep our work updated as a team.= AGenda: March 18, 2009

1) Sharing vocabulary binders. Input and questions.

A __x_ alphabetical__ 25___
 * nonexamples - How do we teach this to kids? 1) teach that separately, lots of modeling, break it out and directly instructed 2) have them give a reason why it's not...... 3) make sure they know that it must be similar but not the same (ice cream)
 * kdg needs to use a different system - something other than individual binders
 * each grade level can use the format from the grade below at the beginning of the year - renew and review - then at some point in the year that grade level can begin using a different, possibly more complex, format
 * Binders: organizing the pages - - Also have a glossary at the beginning of each student's binder alphabetical - student can check them off as they're added and put the page number Some grade levels may choose to use an index as well (especially if one of their concepts is index)

2) Assessment folders: Reviewing what your team chose to use as your baseline assessments this year, and looking at whether we can pare those down, simplify, or if they are just about right as is. We will look at the Scott Foresman beginning of the year assessment to see if those might be a good choice so that there is continuity across the grades and might simplify the assessment folders for you. 4th grade liked using it, but we don’t know whether each grade level’s SF assessments are as good as the 4th grade one is. So, I’d like to look at them to see if that would be a good option. If not, that’s fine. For instance, 1st and 2nd grade use DRA now, and that may be what they will use as the base of their fall assessments. Anyway, let’s look at it.

Need to order QRI reading probes for all grade levels. SF : check readability on all of the baseline tests Primary

K

!st: DRA, sight words

For all grade levels (except K-1): assessment plan in reading 1) QRI reading probes 2) SF baseline assessments 3) STAR used only for specific kids (maybe prior to IAT)

For primary grades: add a phonics assessment for 1-3 - screener?

3 ) SOC: Input on revising the SOC database. Taking some columns out? Adjusting others? We will use SOC next year and from there on, but obviously we want to revise it to make it teacher friendly. The point is to have information about students that we can track over time. Need your input about what info and how we do it in a way that makes sense.

4) Testing updates. Preparation for success! Pro Ohio questions, etc.

AGenda: February 9, 2009

I. Vocab final review - unless someone has a change that needs to be made, it goes to the web. What resources are needed? II. Preassessment review - sharing out and article III. Vertical articulation - Acquisition of Vocabulary

Notes from December 3, 2008

Vocabulary update: Team worked on paring down essential vocabulary lists. 1) Note that the Marzano 6 step process is expected to be used only with the essential vocab words, and for this year, not even for all of those (because we weren't able to start with it at the beginning of the year). 2) This year is a pilot year, a time to begin the vocab notebooks/binders, begin teaching kids the 6 step process, build our toolbox of strategies, games and activities. At the end of the year, everyone will get together to adjust/revise the process, as needed. All grade levels need to be doing a binder, but know that the process used this year may adjust some for next year as we see what works and what doesn't. 3) Please be sure to let Kathy know if your grade level needs binders or folders, or......? 4) Vocab lists are edited and will be posted to our school web site as soon as you have one final chance to review them.

Preassessment: Team shared out about their experiences with preassessment strategies. 1) Noted that preassessment does allow the teacher to be more targeted in his or her approach to a topic/standard 2) Some tools are better than others and many can be very simple (i.e. individual whiteboards, exit slips, etc) KWL charts have limitations. It can be good to write down what kids already know (as a preassessment) but if we write everything down that they say, some things may be erroneous. Having kids see that written up there can plant that inaccurate information in their brains. KWL can work if adjusted to the purpose at hand.

Scott Foresman review: Team members shared about parts of the new program they are finding useful. 4th grade has used the assessment material as their baseline and will monitor that over the year to see if they find it valuable enough to recommend to other grades. Leveled readers seem to be popular with many grades, also.

Notes from May 8th....
 * Meeting with Connie West (powerpoint about language arts balanced literacy program)
 * Sharing on May 22nd... 1) slide about balanced literacy program - what it includes 2) genre chart 3) writing chart 4) keyboarding - ideas for building skills with this at earlier ages (do response journals - 3rd grade - 30 minutes a week, centers, look at earlier introduction through software program) 5) explicit teaching of writing (writers' workshop) with student choice - may give a vague topic that relates to an EU or EQ that can last through weeks 6) monitored independent reading, 7) writing assessment types (3 from slide)


 * Agenda: May 8, 2008**


 * This is our last formal meeting for the school year. Some members of this team will be going to the Nashville conference and will continue the team's work by developing vocabulary plans for next year.**


 * Connie West has agreed to come to this meeting and review the district's new Balanced Literacy approach for language arts. In this, they are working to ensure that the language arts program is NOT "the anthology", but rather that there is a full spectrum of good la instruction (including things like the guided reading approach, writing workshop and/or 6+1, etc as well as the Scott Foresman anthology being the adopted core text). Anyway, she's going to be at our meeting on Thursday at 1:45 (we'll be starting a bit earlier as she has to go to another meeting elsewhere) to share these ideas with you and discuss them. One piece she'll be interested in developing is how to ensure that LA instruction (counting any reading but also writing or spelling that may be split out at the upper grades) equals around 1.5 hours daily (average). Please be ready to offer ideas on that.**


 * So:**
 * 1:45 - 2:45 (approx.) Connie West discussing overall LA program**
 * 2:45-2:55 break**
 * 2:55 - 3:40 continue the unpacking of the research standard and compare across grade levels (looking for gaps/overlaps). Goal will be to complete Stage I and II. Remember that this standard is not typically one that is taught as a "stand alone" but rather incorporated into other work through the year. We are pulling it out to ensure that we are supporting each grade's indicators and building on skills appropriately. Also, to see if we need to pull in other resources (ordering is coming up!).**


 * Please note: If the conversation with Connie sparks a lot of interest and discussion, and you wish that to continue past the time frame above, I"m open to that. However, I do want to get the research piece done before we leave for the year, so I will do what I can to expedite that (maybe I can get some pre-work done on them to facilitate it moving quickly).**


 * Please let me know if there are other topics you wish to pursue on Thursday.**