In a Standards-Based World Everyone Can Be a Winner! Summit on Urban Education in Ohio Thursday, May 5, 2005

1
In a Standards-Based World Everyone Can Be a
Winner!Summit on Urban Education in
OhioThursday, May 5, 2005

• Cleveland Municipal School District
• Donna Snodgrass
• Cleveland Teachers Union
• Maryann Fredrick

2
Barbara Byrd-Bennett, CEO, Cleveland Municipal
School DistrictJoanne DeMarco, President ,
Cleveland Teachers Union

• Board of Education
• Dr. Margaret M. Hopkins, Chair
• Grady P. Burrows, Vice Chair
• Rashidah Abdulhaqq
• Lawrence W. Davis
• Louise P. Dempsey
• Magda Gomez
• Robert M. Heard, Sr.
• Willetta A. Milam
• Gladys Santiago
• Dr. Michael Schwarz, ex officio member
• Dr. Jerry Sue Thornton, ex officio member

3
Educators all over Ohio are attempting to build
unified standards-based curricular systems.
4
Clevelands unified ELA system includes
Standards Matrix Standards at a Glance
Pacing Guides Instructional Guides Model
Lessons Benchmark and Dipstick Assessments
Intervention Materials Standards-based report
card
5
In a standards-based world

• First, educators Assess to understand a
  students current knowledge of the standards,
• Then, they Plan to connect the assessment
  results to instruction,
• Then, they Teach to the standards, beginning
  where the student is ready to learn.

Assess

Plan
Teach
6
But in order to to assess, plan and teach, to the
standards, first educators must . . . .
UNPACK the Standards!
7
Unpacking the standards is a process districts
employ to breathe life into the standards in a
way that gives educators, students and parents
specific and clear directions about what to
assess, plan and teach.The First Step in
Unpacking the Standards is to organize the
standards in a way that reveals hidden patterns
within and among the standards.
8
. Reading (5) Writing (3) Research
(1) Communication (1)
Cleveland educators have organized the Ohio
standards in a way that reveals how
standards-based skills should develop from Pre-K
through 12, well as what students should know and
do at specific points in time to be on-track for
graduation.
9
(No Transcript)
10
(No Transcript)
11
Standards at a Glance

• Provides a condensed view of all the English
  Language Arts standards and indicators for a
  particular grade
• Includes all ELA standards five standards for
  reading, three standards for writing, one
  standard for research, and one standard for
  communication
• Distributed to all teachers at the beginning of
  the school year

12
(No Transcript)
13
Pacing Charts

• Lay out the grade level indicators by quarters
  and provide a research-based framework for
  determining the appropriate timing of instruction
• Identifies the most critical skills
• Developed in reading and writing for grades
  Pre-K through 12

14
(No Transcript)
15
The second next step in unpacking the standards
is to unpack the benchmarks and grade level
indicators into their implied assessment items
and lessons.
16
Standards, benchmarks and grade level indicators
are theoretical statements in which assessments
and lessons are merely implied. There are no
explicit assessments or lessons in any standard,
any benchmark or any grade level indicator. One
hundred experienced teachers might read a
standard, benchmark or grade level indicators and
each visualize a different assessment or lesson.
17
The need for common assessments and lessons

• If our assessments and lessons are not common,
  our 100 teachers might all be teaching to the
  same standards, but all be measuring and working
  toward different learning targets.
• Each test and lesson is a concrete example of
  what a child must do to demonstrate mastery of a
  standard.
• Common assessments and common lessons mean common
  learning targets.

18
Common assessment and common lessons are vital in
a district where it is common for children to
transfer from school to school. Common
assessments and lessons mean

• Children are less likely to miss content, when
  they transfer.
• The setting may be different when children
  transfer, but the work is familiar.
• Upon transfer, teacher can more readily engage
  children in appropriate class work.
• All of the students records move with children
  to their new District school through SchoolNet, a
  managed learning system.

19
Assessment

• Historically, assessment has focused on
  norm-referenced tests, which rank students in
  order of their performance.
• Even if 100 students do relatively well on a
  norm-referenced test, they are rank-ordered by
  their scores.
• Thus, by their very nature, norm-referenced tests
  create winners and losers.

20
In a standards-based assessment environment
everyone can be a winner! On a standards-based
test, students are not compared to each other,
rather, their performance is compared to the
mastery of a specific set of skills or concepts.
If everyone masters the targeted standards at a
high enough level, everyone is a winner!
21

• Cleveland has unpacked the ELA standards into a
  variety of common assessments. Each of these
  assessments serve different useful purposes.
• Benchmark Tests
• Dipstick Tests

22
Benchmark Tests

• District teachers created a series of benchmark
  tests that are equated to each other and the Ohio
  Third Grade Reading Test.
• Three of these District benchmark tests are being
  administered to third grade students during the
  2004/2005 school year. September test is NOT
  a secure test December test is a secure test
  May test is a secure test

23

• In 2005/2006 three versions of third, fourth and
  fifth grade Benchmark tests will be fully
  operational.
• Statistically equated versions of the tests at
  each grade level will be administered in
  September, December and May. The Benchmark tests
  are aligned to their grade level counterpart Ohio
  Achievement Tests.
• Benchmark tests will be vertically scaled across
  grade levels to allow for the tracking of growth
  over time.
• Sixth and seventh grade Benchmark tests will
  become operational in 2006/2007.

24
We have studied hard. We have all become good
at the data part ofDATA DRIVEN INSTRUCTION.

25
Now, we must make the jump from data to ..

• . ACTION ?

26
Examples of Action orINSTRUCTION DRIVEN BY DATA

• Scoring Camp for Kids (grades 3-7)
• Learning to Answer and Score Open-ended Test
  Items on the Ohio Graduation Test (Reading,
  Science, Social Studies and Mathematics)
• Intervention Activities Teachers Can Do When Kids
  Cant (grades 3-7)

27
Scoring Camp for Kids helps students learn to
write high quality responses to open-ended test
items. The materials and activities in the
Scoring Camp for Kids manual are based on the
premise that providing students with exemplars of
what constitutes high quality work facilitates
the students ability to produce high quality
work.
28
Intervention Activities Teachers Can Do When Kids
Cant Answer Multiple-Choice Items on Cleveland
Third Grade Reading Benchmark Test.
29
Provides Cleveland teachers with an array of
hands-on and concrete intervention ideas for
helping students who are having difficulty with
multiple-choice items on the Cleveland Third
Grade Reading Benchmark Test
30
The Cleveland Literacy System URLhttp//www.cm
sdnet.net/opd/CLS/index.htm
31
Dipstick Tests are short periodic tests that
measure skills that are markers of good progress.
These markers are identified on the Pacing
Charters. For example in grade three there are
common dipstick, based on common lists provided
to teachers, for example

• Sight word tests
• Prefix and suffix tests
• Contractions tests
• Antonym and synonym tests

32
An Aligned System CLS Tools
State Assessments -District Benchmark and
Dipstick -Classroom Assessments

• Instructional Guides/
• Lesson Plans
• -Ongoing Assessments
• -Intervention Activities

Standards Matrix -Pacing Charts -Literacy Block
Structures -Instructional Guides
Assess

Plan
Teach
33
90 Minute Literacy Block Template
34
90 Minute Literacy Block Components

• Whole group mini-lessons
• Guided Reading
• Independent and partner reading
• Vocabulary development
• Spelling
• Fluency practice
• Writing
• Teacher read aloud

35
(No Transcript)
36
Teachers are not the only individuals in
classrooms who need to understand the standards!

Standards must be unpacked for students too!
37
Rewriting standards into student-friendly
language is a positive step in ensuring that
studentsunderstand what they are to learn!
38
Consider a standard that requires that a student
summarize a story

• how might the concept summarize be put into
  student-friendly language?
• perhaps as, the Big Idea of the Story.

39
Once teachers have rewritten standards into
student-friendly language, students can turn the
standards into I can statements!

• For example, a student might say I can
  summarize or tell the big idea of a story and let
  me show you my evidence.

40
Students should keep evidence of their own work,
as it relates to the standards. Some examples
are

• Student portfolios
• Graphs and charts
• Checklists
• Record sheets
• Learning chains
• Quality control sheets

41
A Standards-Based World Includes Everyone

• Teachers
• Students
• Administrators
• Parents
• Community Members

42

• Students need to be actively engaged in their
  personal progress.
• Here are some samples of how students can
  record and celebrate their personal progress.

43
Look What I Accomplished This Week Student
Week
Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday
? I can read I can read I can read I can read I can read
? I can write I can write I can write I can write I can write
- I can add and subtract I can add and subtract I can add and subtract I can add and subtract I can add and subtract
? I can tell time I can tell time I can tell time I can tell time I can tell time

44
Learning ChainsLearning chains are one
way to help students measure and celebrate
individual, classroom or building progress.
Links in the chain represent skills and concepts
that students have mastered. Each link makes an
equal contribution to the total length of the
chain no matter whether the links represent the
work of the most advanced student or the work of
a student who is just starting to make progress.
The links of an individual child represent the
measured progress of that child. Combining the
links of all the students in the class (or
building) represents the measured progress of the
entire class (or building) over a specified
period of time. Step 1 Create colored strips
as shown below.Reserve for taping
Reserve for taping ?
? 11 long and 1 ½ wide
¾ Students Name _________________________ Class ______________ What I accomplished ____________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________ ¾
45
Step 2 Allow each child to pick the color he or
she will use for all of his or her links. Give
each child an envelope or bag in which to keep
untaped paper links he or she has earned.Step
3 Each time a child has completed an assigned or
agreed upon task he or she is given a strip as
shown above. The child immediately writes the
appropriate information on his or her strip and
puts it in his or her envelope.Step 4 At an
agreed upon time, each child chains together his
or her links and measures the length of his or
her chain in order to determine his or her
measured progress. Students can graph the length
of their chains on a time series chart at regular
time intervals. The time intervals are graphed
on the x-axis, and the length of the chain is
graphed on the y-axis. The entire class can link
its chains together. Classroom chains can reach
around the room more than once. (Measured
progress for a building can reach around the
block.) This activity is a good opportunity in
elementary or middle schools for older students
to apply what they have learned about measuring
the perimeter of a figure.Step 5 Each child
should be able to tell which link he or she is
most proud of and why.
46
Percentage 100 - Quality Control Sheets or Student Performance Over Time - Quality Control Sheets or Student Performance Over Time - Quality Control Sheets or Student Performance Over Time - Quality Control Sheets or Student Performance Over Time - Quality Control Sheets or Student Performance Over Time - Quality Control Sheets or Student Performance Over Time - Quality Control Sheets or Student Performance Over Time - Quality Control Sheets or Student Performance Over Time - Quality Control Sheets or Student Performance Over Time - Quality Control Sheets or Student Performance Over Time
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Date
Assessment Number 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

47
Assessment How I prepared for each assessment.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10