Righting Wrongs

Lisa Weiss contributed today's post.

Last year I blogged about the transition of changing our 6-12 district goals to writing goals. I shared the process, the successes, and challenges of the plan, and that is where I want to begin this year: writing about how I intend to address the fatal flaw I made last year--ignoring the importance of the culture that teachers build in their classrooms.

Last December I had Fox Valley Writing Project teacher leaders from most content areas come into the district  to model how the gradual release of responsibility looks when you model writing. I needed the 6-12 teachers to be engaged in the process, like students would be, in order to see first hand what the teacher role looks like, as well as to feel how the natural scaffolding of the GRR worked for students; I wanted teachers to experience the GRR. After teachers saw and felt the power of the GRR in their individual disciplines, I walked them through some simple steps for planning their own model of writing, using GRR, and then set some expectations for teachers  to engage students in the process so we could begin to have some conversations focused on student writing.

My phone was forever ringing, my inbox bursting with emails, the literacy coaches in my ears. The message were all the same: teachers were uncomfortable modeling writing in front of their students. Teachers did not see themselves as a writers, and modeling the messy work of thinking and writing (live) was pushing teachers into disequilibrium, and not the good kind where one can be reflective on a messy process, and walk away with new understandings. This disequilibrium was on that was causing two responses: refusal to model the writing that was being assigned, and challenging the people who were there to support those efforts.

I did much talking, thinking, and writing about the situation, drawing the conclusion that the fear of modeling a messy process in front of kids is about the culture of the classroom. I also acknowledged that a secondary problem playing into the issue of culture was the thinking that I don’t know how to teach writing. But first things first…

How do I “fix” this? How do I go into fall of 2015, backing up to address culture? How do I teach teachers to build a culture of (literacy) learning? Does it start with principals, and building expectations? I still have many of these questions, but I had to start somewhere. I chose to start this year by sharing the identified problems, as well as some possibilities for moving forward as building leadership teams consider how much time needs to be devoted to building a culture of (literacy) learning in each building, department, and classroom.

I set up building leadership teams including technology, literacy and instructional coaches, along with principals to consider the use of the following resources as they consider how they might approach building a culture of learning:

Our writing data from last year 6-12, to revisit the “why” behind the efforts directed at the purposeful and explicit teaching of writing.

Our OASD belief statements

Student & Teacher surveys (as suggested in Eric Jensen’s Teaching with Poverty in Mind, or any developed one that elicits responses from teachers & students regarding the culture of the school and the culture of learning that exists).

Readings or activities that include information about mindsets, for both teachers and students.

Chapter 7 from Subjects Matter: Exceeding Standards Through Powerful Content-Area Reading, Second Edition, Harvey Daniels & Steven Zemelman

Possibly assessing the school’s capacity to support systematic literacy development by considering the use of one of these tools: http://nationalliteracyproject.org/rubrics/

It has been interesting to learn about the similarities and differences that building teams have taken in order to begin having open discussions about what it means to foster a culture of literacy learning, but more on that next month.

We've Seen the Model - Now What?

Lisa Weiss contributed today's post. For more information, read Lisa's other posts about her district's "laser-like focus on the intentional use of literacy in service of our contents."

My vision of how this would play out changed once we returned from winter break. I thought that once teachers had the look and feel of the gradual release, the next steps would be planning for that same process of modeling and guiding writers. Time was provided each week during January collaboration times for such planning, and I had February 4th set as a time for teachers to come together to look at student writing--to see how their modeling, and use of GRR worked for their students.

By mid-January teachers were asking for more time to prepare. As I had conversations with teachers it was clear that this was an entirely new way of providing instruction, and fear was ruling. It became abundantly clear that we do not have a culture of learning established in our secondary schools. While it was not a shocking revelation, it was an insight that forced me to reflect on how starting with belief statements, or starting to build a culture of learning, would have been wise. Since I missed the boat on that critical aspect of professional development this year, I considered how we might be able to lead teachers into that culture shift next year. Turns out this was a glaring problem to many of the secondary leaders, and we are currently engaged in the messy work of planning how to foster that culture with teachers next year. More on that in the fall...

Back to January: I have the sense about me to listen to what the teachers say, and they were saying, “Slow down!” I knew it was necessary to pull back, and allow more time for teachers to plan for writing models, but applying the brakes was a disappointment because there was a tradeoff of time involved. To provide more time on the GRR, we were not going to be engaged in learning about and practicing close reading with the depth I had envisioned. I also felt, in some ways, that by allowing more time that some teachers might think we were sending the message that we do not need to continue using the GRR when the message was quite contrary. The message was this: We’ve heard you. We’re going to slow down and allow for more time to plan. We will not throw a new strategy at you in April, but….we need to continue practicing the GRR when modeling writing because the GRR is not going away, nor is our focus on writing.

The revised plan created more time in January for learning about the GRR with articles, videos, excerpts from Better Learning, and additional teacher demonstrations of modeling student writing--all dependent upon what teachers needed in each building. February was the new time frame to be engaging students in GRR when teaching writing; reading the writing students completed was also an expectation.

March 11th was the date that was designated for reviewing student writing and having conversations about the writing. I created a student work protocol, and placed teachers in small groups, with an English teacher or a literacy or instructional coach in each discussion group. I felt the English teacher was critical to the success of the conversations because, as teachers of writers, they hold the most insights when analyzing student writing. In the end, feedback was overwhelmingly positive! Many coaches reported that people, again, were saying that this was the best professional development session they had been to--we had similar feedback in December! The literacy coaches who were sharing this feedback, all commented about the depth and quality of conversations that took place. It was a time devoted to thinking about students, their writing, and the feedback that could be offered to students, and teachers appreciated the process.

We spent March engaging students in another round of writing, so the April literacy-focused professional development session was an additional opportunity to read, converse, and analyze student writing. The last (May) collaboration session of the year will focus on our data from English and social studies classes, the data sources for W4 and W9 goals; I am excited to receive all of it, as I have had many conversations with excited literacy coaches--boasting about the writing growth students have made this year. I’m anxious to see what that means as a district, and wondering what that means for professional development next year...

Model, Model, Model

Lisa Weiss contributed today's post. For more information, read Lisa's other posts about her district's "laser-like focus on the intentional use of literacy in service of our contents."

Wanting to play off of the positive energy that our fall professional learning generated, I wanted the next steps of our professional development to show 6-12 teachers what modeling writing looked like in their content areas.

I invited all the stellar 6-12 Fox Valley Writing Project teachers I know to demonstrate the gradual release of responsibility when modeling writing on December 10th. My plan was to have every content teacher view a model, using the gradual release of responsibility, of writing by a Writing Project teacher who teaches that content. For example, I invited my friend David, a biology teacher, to model writing to the high school science teachers.

I plan, and God laughs. Naturally, that was not quite how things worked out. I ended up having to group some of the contents with smaller numbers of teachers together, because I could not get enough teachers to model in the elective classes. The groupings can be found at the bottom of the agenda (link) if you are interested in seeing how I grouped teachers.

Each FVWP demonstrator was partnered with an OASD facilitator, who was either a literacy coach or a principal. The agenda was set so that the OASD facilitator had the responsibility of setting the goal for the afternoon, introducing the demonstrator, leading teachers through the guide for how to prepare for a writing demonstration, and getting feedback on the session. The FVWP demonstrator was responsible for engaging the OASD teachers in writing and the gradual release.

The feedback was overwhelmingly positive. The high school science teachers really appreciated what David had shown them. One of the science teachers told me that this was the best collaboration she had ever been a part of in her 20 years in the district; another went to his principal and showed her how he was going to recreate his lesson plan for the following day, emulating what he saw David model! Impressive. Most people left the professional development session with a clear understanding of what modeling writing looked like in their contents.

Next came the tricky part--consistently building the modeling of writing into practice.

Rocky Start

Lisa Weiss contributed today's post. For more information, read Lisa's other posts about her district's "laser-like focus on the intentional use of literacy in the service of our contents."

After the late August department head retreat, the start of the school year was here in a flash. The understanding was that two weeks into the year, at the first building-focused collaboration (September 10th), the principals, literacy coaches, and department heads would be sharing the district writing goal, and the vision I shared with them at the summer department head retreat. This would give people time to think about the plan, ask questions, and consider using the district goal as their SLO up until SLOs were due, at the end of October.

One thing I appreciated about the professional development plan for the year was the way the two high school principals and I allowed time for many of the new initiatives to be the focus of the professional development times through September and October. With the exception of September 10th, every Wednesday morning was devoted to new initiatives: Framework for Teaching, Infinite Campus, Smart Boards, and ACT Aspire and WKCE teacher preparation. We thought it would be wise to devote time to the initiatives that would be on teachers’ minds early in the year, so that teachers would be ready to think about instruction and literacy by the time we kicked off on November 5th. In retrospect, that was a great idea, one that I hope we will hang onto next year, but what made the road a rocky one was that the teachers were on initiative overload. We were not all in a place where we could focus on literacy by the time November 5th rolled around.

I pulled the department heads together on October 22nd for two purposes:

• To get specific about SLOs, and how your department can engage kids in writing
• To prepare for November 5th’s disciplinary literacy kickoff

We spent most of our time talking about SLOs and looking at examples from each content area, of how we could begin to purposefully and consistently build in writing. We talked about the questions department heads brought forward from their colleagues, we talked about the data coming from English and Social Studies, we talked about teachers from each department creating their own baseline assessments, we talked and talked and talked, until every last question was discussed, and department heads had the ability to back to their colleagues and share the discussion points. It was time well-spent, but truthfully, a concern of mine was how those messages would be shared with teachers.

We also  revisited the disciplinary literacy activity I engaged them in in August, and I clarified questions, and offered troubleshooting as I modeled the roles the department heads would have facilitating on November 5th. The week of November 3rd, I went to each building, to address any last minute November 5th kickoff preparation concerns, questions, and/or anxiety of department heads. At the middle schools, the literacy coaches were facilitating this professional learning, so I felt confident that they were ready, and, therefore, did not go to each middle school for a check-in.

The kickoff went well, perhaps better than I could have imagined! The literacy coaches were excited, the teachers were seeing how they use literacy, but more importantly, recognizing that assigning it is different from engaging our students in the six literacy processes; principals were pleased with the discussions that came as a result of this activity/kickoff. One of the middle school literacy coaches wrote to me, “You made me look like brilliant today!”

Although the road along the first two months of the year were bumpy, the disciplinary literacy kickoff went well, and I was even more excited about what was to come in December: Modeling writing, using the gradual release of responsibility, by content teachers who really model writing!

Sharing with Department Heads (continued from December)

Lisa Weiss contributed today's post. For more information, read Lisa's other posts about her district's "laser-like focus on the intentional use of literacy in the service of our contents." This post is a continuation of "Sharing with Department Heads."

The discussion of the bulleted items from November, with the department heads was fascinating, and after we defined what we meant by disciplinary literacy, I transitioned into the why behind the focus of writing as a 6-12 school improvement goal, and what it meant for all departments/teachers as we considered writing SLO’s.

I “sold” this 15 minute time to the department heads as a mini-keynote. I talked through how, by focusing on writing, and specifically writing standard 9, we are all pulling in the same direction. I suggested that they consider using writing as an SLO for two reasons: we have data from social studies and English as established data points, and all the 6-12 professional development this year is focused on writing. An SLO, quite naturally, is determined by a teacher, and while we want them to write an SLO that makes sense to them, we wanted to encourage them to write one based on the professional learning that was to take place.

After sharing this information, I had the department heads talk to a partner, reconstructing my messages about why we were moving to a writing goal, how W9 was chosen, how W9 still relates to our reading goals from last year, how the professional development calendar focuses on writing, and how all of this ties to SLO’s. As pairs of department heads verbally processed the information, I walked around, clarifying questions. I did this for two reasons. I needed them to understand all of this information so they could articulate it to their colleagues in their departments, and I needed the opportunity to address any misunderstandings.

Although people were kind, I knew this was unexpected information, and it was clear that  they were considering the ideas, as well as anticipating the outcomes. I wanted to share some examples of high schools where teachers pulled in the same direction and saw astonishing results. I went to an old favorite, Mike Schmoker. In Focus: Elevating the Essentials to Radically Improve Student Learning, Schmoker gives examples of high schools where teachers systematically and consistently engaged kids in close reading, and/or monthly formal writing assignments, and/or Socratic discussions, for example, and then reported what that did for student learning--at Tempe Preparatory Academy, 100% of students passed their state examinations in reading, writing, and math! I wanted to show the department heads the results of all of us speaking the same language, and pulling in the same direction!

I pulled an excerpt from the text, “Simple, Redundant Literacy,” for the group to read and discuss, and I ended by sharing my simple, redundant literacy professional development plan for the district. Here’s the gist of what I shared:

• I promise to keep it simple!
• I promise to share one, maybe two reading strategies.
• I promise to model how to model the writing you require of your students.
• I promise to teach you how to assess the writing as a content teacher. I promise to keep it simple!
• I promise that we will follow a learning progression like this: learn a new strategy, then have time to plan for the use of it, implement it, and then return to the student work to analyze. Whenever we learn something new, we are going to take the time each week at collaboration to think more and plan for the intentional use of it!
• I promise to slow down if you’re not ready to move on, and I promise to differentiate for those buildings that need something different.

It was a great day, and I think the words of one teacher sums up how the day went for most of the department heads. Afterward, a teacher I met for the first time that day, one who taught a content where the idea of writing could be tricky, approached me to say: Nobody, absolutely nobody, was excited about coming here today to hear about literacy, but you made it okay, and I think I can do this because I think your plan is simple, makes sense, and I feel like you are going to support us.

Not a bad first impression!

Sharing with Department Heads

Lisa Weiss contributed today's post. For more information, read Lisa's first post about her district's "laser-like focus on the intentional use of literacy in the service of our contents."

How does one go about sharing such a vision with high school department heads? Like all teaching: thoughtfully and intentionally. It is a common practice for department head retreat to be held each summer. This year I was given the better part of a day to share the thinking behind a number of literacy-related items.

A number of years ago I was a literacy coach at one of the high schools, so I feel as though, because I had relationships with many of the department heads at that school, and some successful coaching and professional development experiences behind me there, I’d have a somewhat receptive audience. On the flip side of that sun-shiny thinking is the realist in me--the part of me that fully understands that the topic of literacy is not one that all will embrace--even if they respect or like me, and...I had another set of department heads who never heard my name, didn’t know my agenda, how I operate as a literacy coach, nor as a literacy coordinator!

I admit, I was nervous, because I had all kinds of information that was going to be new thinking for the group, and the level of receptivity was going to vary, but I also felt confident because my plan was solid, simple, and one that I thought would be appealing to most teachers. The agenda for the day included starting with a self-reflective set of questions that had the department heads thinking about how often they want and/or require their students to be engaged in literacy processes.

After that short, but powerful activity, I got the group moving and thinking more about the kinds of literacy that are used in their individual content courses by engaging them in a carousel brainstorm. I split the group of 40-45 teachers and administrators into six different groups, each group representing one of the six literacy processes: reading, writing, listening, speaking, viewing, and graphically representing. Each group had an opportunity to think and write, for approximately 5 minutes, about how they engaged kids in each one of the literacy processes, and then, with the walls full of ideas surrounding us,  we debriefed the process, which led to a working definition of what is meant by disciplinary literacy--what it is, and what it is not.

Here are some of the disciplinary literacy talking points we discussed:

• Something you already are doing--it was important to the administrators for me to continually show the department heads, throughout the day, how they are already engaging kids in literacy processes, so it did not feel as this is, yet another, entirely new initiative.
• Something we will work to do systematically, consistently, and with intentionality. It was clear from the carousel brainstorm that our students are using literacy processes in content courses, but now, as teachers, we are going to think about engaging students in these processes frequently, with purpose, and supporting students with this work.
• Something we require of students because “using literacy in the service of your content” is how we help students to process your content goals. (Doug Buehl)
• You are not being asked to teach English for the ELA teachers, or to “help out” the ELA teachers. We discussed how the writing of a lab conclusion differs from writing a character analysis, and how that differs from a cause and effect paper, and how that differs from a reflection on a performance, so that the point was that you model and teach students how to write in your class so your expectations are made visible, so that kids see you muddle through the messy work of modeling writing, and so that students see how the kind of writing you are asking for is different and similar to what they write in ELA. It’s about effective communication of your course content via literacy processes!
• You are not being asked to ditch your content so that kids can start reading novels or writing essays in place of your content. An example was that if you teach physical education, you are still going to require students to participate in the physical activity your content standards require, however, the writing you could engage kids in is of a reflective nature, using the data from food and exercise logs to reflect upon goals being met (or not), and setting new goals. We are not asking for radical changes in your curriculum, just thoughtful ones that require your students to make sense of content while using literacy as the processing tool!

Next post: Other highlights from the department head retreat, and the rest of the agenda

A Bit Like Bungee Jumping

Today's post was contributed by Lisa Weiss.

I am excited and terrified about this year! I have a literacy-focused professional development plan in place for all 6-12 teachers, which I am certain, explains the previous sentence. I’m anxious, in a good way, to see what results from everybody pulling in the same direction, but I am also biting my nails, anticipating what will be challenging for teachers! My blogging plan for the year is to document the good, the bad, and perhaps a few happy accidents, of our laser-like focus on the intentional use of literacy in the service of our contents. Love that phrase...thanks Doug Buehl!

First things first. For a variety of reasons, I wanted to move away from focusing our school improvement goals on reading. The assessment we use as a screening tool is not sensitive enough to measure the incremental growth we are looking for, and at times I think we oversimplify what it means to have a reading focus. In worst-case scenarios we hear things like, It’s not my job to teach them to read, or I assign reading, so I’ve done my part for the school improvement goal. If only it were that easy!

In moving toward a focus on writing, I can:

• set teachers up to elicit meaningful writing from students in their contents
• model how to model the writing we hope for in our content areas, using the gradual release of responsibility
• facilitate sessions where our purpose is to study student writing
• show teachers how to identify strengths in writing, and give feedback that continues to challenge our proficient writers
• demonstrate how to coach students through the areas of writing that are not yet meeting the standards, and
• show the connection between the reciprocal processes of reading and writing, and how we can assess reading through writing!

The original plan was to make sure that each 6-12 building had a minimum of one  literacy-focused professional development session each month, and that is how the plan worked out at the middle schools. The high schools are a different story; the principals had an even more ambitious vision for the frequency of literacy-focused learning sessions! There are  three literacy-focused professional development sessions each month, beginning in November. With dates identified, I was ready to move to the next step: sharing the thinking and the year-long plan (and how this professional development ties to the school improvement goals, and could tie to SLO’s), with the department heads.