Conference Day 2: Facilitation Skills for Leaders

The second session on the second day of the Maryland College and Career Readiness Conference was targeted to improving the skill of facilitation in leaders. 

Facilitators serve three main roles in their work with groups of professionals. They are designers who develop an agenda and a vision for the group. From designing facilitators then become pilots who lead the course of discussion and brainstorming, as well as landing the productive plane with an action plan that brings everyone to a common purpose. Continuing the group's travels the facilitator becomes a guide if the group through the action plan. As an expert, the facilitator uncorporates the valued opinions of the entire group in the discussion and execution of the process. 

This metaphor was very helpful in connecting the many differ bet hats of the facilitator as a leader of others. The main skills that stuck with me were as follows; listening and responding effectively, guiding others, attending to the conten and process keeping the group focused, being in service of the group, and creating conditions that bring people together. 

When working with a divers group of people towards a common purpose it important for the facilitator to maintain a sense ofcommunity and goal oriented focus. I connected this to how we as teachers organize our students  in the work toward a common goal. 

My goals after attending this session are to engage in facilitation with a group of professionals, and to improve the facilitation of my students in their problem solving. 

Conference Day 2: Integrating STEM

Continuing my reflection from the sessions I attended at the Maryland College and Career Readiness Conference, I am beginning to look back on day two. The first session I attended was about integrating STEM standards into middle school. I was very interested in this session because a major goal of mine is to provide STEM experiences for all students instead if te select few who get those opportunities through the STEM academy. 

The main emphasis of STEM centric teaching is to connect to careers, incorporate STEM standards, connect to the real world, and have the work be a natural fit in the disciplines. Projects and problems shouldn't feel out of place or disconnected, and there should be a connection to at least two of the STEM fields as often as possible. 

The process of designing a STEM centric lesson starts with the content and STEM practices. What is the content being taught? 

From there the task shifts to finding a real world connection to the content. What is a problem or projects that professionals in the field are tackling that connects to the content?

Once the project idea is put together, a connect to at least two of the Science Technology Engineering and Math standards. What science connects, technology uses, engineering opportunities, and mathematical thinking will students be doing? 

An abbreviation to which I was unfamiliar was the "5Es"; engagement, evaluation, exploration, entension, and explanation. The idea is for all five to be incorporated, so that students are working through all five skills throughout the process of the project. 

The connections and the resources presented in the session were very informative, and I left very excited to start preparing lessons through a STEM lenses on a continuous basis for all of my classes. This leads me to the main goals after attendng this session. I want to develop STEM lessons and projects for my 8th grade math class specifically, I want to incorporate hands on projects for students to work on often in all of my classes, and I want to promote the ideal that every student should have the STEM opportunities on a regular basis at the county level. 

Conference Day 2: PLC

Looking back on the Maryland College and Career Readiness Conference, I have been reflecting on the sessions. The third sessions from the second day of the conference was one I was very interested as it pertains to goals that I have for my department, Keeping the Learning in PLC. 

This session focused on keeping PLCs as a tool for ongoing rigorous growth for improving student achievement. The key features of a PLC include research, examining student work, enhance pedagogy, and providing time for reflection. All of there can be present in any Professional Learning Community. 

One of the key components needed for any development to take place is to ask why. Why are we doing research, why are we looking at student work, why are we trying to enhance instruction, why are we reflecting, why are we doing anything to grow professionally? The why is the key, for without a satisfying understanding of the why, we will have trouble defining an action plan or vision forward. 

The session took a step towards distinguishing between dialogue and discussion. Dialogue is meant to provide a means for a group to talk while reserving judgement, promote inquiry and examination, and listening. Discussion is meant to advocate for a position, convince others of an idea, and solutions are not necessary. This was an interesting day crib to make, and we discussed that both forms of communication are appropriate depending on the situation. 

The main goal that I have moving forward frm this session are to effectively organize and participate a PLC in my department. I have noticed that meetings among colleagues tend to be too focused on administrative details and not focused enough on learning and improving practice. I would like for meetings to be regular and to address a goal of the collective department. 

Conference Day 1: Aligning Tasks to Standards

As part of my reflection process from the Maryland College and Career Readiness Conference, I am recording my thoughts and goals following each session. This session focused on using four main protocols meant to aid instructors, publishers, and curriculum specialists in determining how well curriculum materials are aligned to math and language arts common core standards. 

The tool that I worked on dissecting was the EQuIP tool. This process was structured as a rubric meant t measure the enxtent to which lessons and units effectively incorporate appropriate depth, conherence, rigor, differentiation, and assessment. The main goals are to make sure that materials are aligned with an emphasis on performance based assessment as evidence if effective lesson design. 

The five steps of the protocol are to review the materials, analyze the purpose as determined solely by the directions presented, compare the content to the standards, diagnose student work looking for patterns, and making suggestions on how to improve the materials. Through those five steps the EQuIP has a nice overall evaluative tool for units and lessons. 

The other tools discussed were primarily mean for entire assessments, individual assessment items, and supplementary materials. I am very glad that I was given access to the entire toolkit, a hefty phone book sized document. 

My goals after attending this session are to use the tools to evaluate materials that I am using in my own instruction, and I want to make administrators and supervisors aware of the tools  in case they are not already, so that they can a way of making sure materials are appropriately aligned. 

Conference Day 1: Coaching Skills

Following the Maryland College and Career Readiness Conference, and am continuing to try reflect on the eight sessions that I attended. 

Staring the session, there was a distinction established between being a mentor and being a coach. The main separation between the two roles is that an instructional coach primarily asks prompting questions that are meant to empower teachers to solve their own problems, while mentors primarily consult teachers and work to problem solve for a mentee. 

This was an important distinction, as most of the participants serve as coaches meaning to empower teachers. There are three stages of coaching that shift the approach of the coach. The first stage is a standard coaching relationship where the teaching is the main actor in the problem solving process. The second stage, which may be utilized depending on the level of capability of the teacher, is a collaborative relationship where the coach and teacher are working together to get through a problem. The third stage is meant to be a last resort where the coach takes on a consulting relationship with the teacher. This third stage is very similar to serving as a mentor. 

The idea behind the distinction in the three stages of coaching is to provide a structure for coaching that is flexible based on the teacher's needs. 

The most important skill that effective caches possess is being able to listen well. This took the session into a focus on determining what time of listener we are, so that we can better listen to teachers in order to better attend to their concerns. The key focus was to make sure that full attention and effective listening takes place no matter who the speaker is. In order for us to be effective coaches, the teachers need t know that we are listening fully, and devoting undivided attention to their needs in the moment. 

From being an effective listener, the focus went towards being able to paraphrase effectively so that the teacher knows that you have accurately listened and understood their problem. The main ways to paraphrase depend on how well you as the listener understood what was said. The coach can either acknowledge and ask for clarification, summarize and organize the information, or shift the conceptual focus appropriaty to a productive way forward. The important feature of each method is to affirm for the teacher that their concerns have been heard and you are ready to help them work out a solution. 

We had the opportunity to practice our coaching on a hypothetical dramatization of a teacher. This was a great exercise as it put us in the shoes of a coach trying to help possibly difficult clientels.  After engaging in this practice I realized that, just as with students, if teachers do not see the need for change and growth none of your suggestions will really help them. They need to own the process. 

After attending this session, my goals moving forward Into this year are to build trust from my colleagues and to improve my listening skills to better support teachers in ourcollective shift to new curriculum, strategies, and technologies.  

Conference Day 1: Classroom Focused Improvement Process

Continuing my reflection process following the Maryland College and Career Readiness Conference, I am going to focus on the second session I attended about CFIP. This protocol for analyzing data in continuos, timely, collaborative, and productive ways. 

I found this session particularly useful as my school began ongoing data meetings where teams met to discuss student work on PARCC type assessments. I was able to connect the good things that are happening at these data meetings with the areas that the CFIP outlines for improvement. 

Last years data meetings took place about once a month, while the CFIP suggests meeting at least every two weeks. Making the meetings more consistent will help make the shift of analyzing data in focused and collaborative ways more effective. Just as students need more exposure to puzzling and authentic problem solving tasks to get better, teachers need the same continuous process of engaging in meaningful dialogue about student work to better improve practices. 

 My big take aways from the session are as follows. 

-Discussion about data needs to take place with team members on the same page with common understanding and common purpose.

-Discussion needs to stay focused and precise when discussing data and outcomes. 

-It is important for teachers to separate what we do from who we are. It is easy for teachers to fall into taking comments about student work and suggestions for improving instruction personally. 

-Data that does not serve to answer a question is not necessary. 

- Decisions made about interventions and enrichment should be based on patterns in student work as present in the data. 

In general this session was very informative in introducing the CFIP protocol, and it offered a lot of good ideas to take with me to my department and PLC. I look forward to using the common assessments that we are developing this summer with my PLC to improve instruction based on the data. 

My main goals for the coming year are to establish norms regarding regular meetings that utilize the CFIP framework within my department and PLC. 

Conference Day 1: Using Technology for Effective Formative Assessment Feedback

The first day of the Maryland College and Career Readiness Conference, and I have a lot of ideas ad information to take away. I am going to use this as a platform for reflection for each of the eight sessions I attended. The first session focused on using technology to more effectively assess student learning and provide timely and meaningful feedback. 

A major goal of mine has been to find more efficient ways in which I can evaluate student work and provide timely feedback. The first few tools that were presented provided me with a means to accomplish that goal. I was very glad to have attended this session and now my goals have shifted to working on incorporating those tools into my instruction. 

The first tool that caught my attention was Socrative. Very similar to Poll Everywhere, Socrative provides a resource where assessments can be developed and students can respond from any WiFi enabled device. This will be very handy given that I may not have a set of clickers next year, and I can utilize a bring your o an device policy for students in my room with varying devices.

Another tool that I am especially excited to use is Flubaroo. This tool allows me to utilize google forms, and as an add oo in the spreadsheet, Flubaroo will grade student submissions and email individual reports to each student. I have figured out how to have student responses graded automatically, but being able to send student progress in a timely manner is a great way to let students know their strengths and weaknesses. 

I am excited to explore these tools and more like Three Ring and Video Notes along with a host of other tools that can help me gather student work more seamlessly and timely. 

My goal after attending this session is to incorporate these tools into as many lessons so as to enhance instruction in meaningful ways.