Teaching and Learning – Reflections from a new NBCT

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Olmsted
NBCT Spencer Olmsted is a new NBCT in Early Adolescent Mathematics and has been teaching 5th grade in Olympia, WA since 2006. He recently attended NBPTS Teaching and Learning Conference in Washington, DC.

I’m a fifth grade math and science teacher. I spend most of my work day in the company of 10 and 11 year-olds, helping them develop critical thinking skills so they can learn how to read the world. We work on getting better at collaborating, accessing and analyzing information, and communicating our findings and questions to others. It’s good work, but all too often I work in isolation of other adults.

When I became a new NBCT this past year the thing that surprised me most was my sudden connection to new network of teachers and education advocates. I began to receive regular communication from people looking to engage and empower teacher-leaders. One of the emails that caught my attention was an invitation to attend the Teaching & Learning Conference in Washington D.C. I was instantly excited by the expanding line-up of impressive speakers, but as I live in the other Washington, on the other side of the country, and would need to pay for airfare, hotel, and arrange for a substitute to teach my classes (I had never considered the possibility of doing this during a school day!) I struggled with the decision. Around this time the Seahawks were imagining a Super Bowl win, and Russell Wilson was famously asking “Why not us?” I asked myself the same question, why not me, and decided to go.

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New Study: Teachers Who Pass ProTeach are better than Those Who Don’t

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Assessment, Education Policy

Cedar leavesBy Tom

A new study commissioned by Washington’s Professional Educator Standards Board shows that ProTeach – our teacher licensing assessment – seems to contribute to an increase in student learning. The study was conducted by UW Bothell’s Center for Education Data and Research (CEDR). It was a complicated study, but essentially they compared teachers who passed ProTeach with those who didn’t by looking at their students’ test scores using Value Added Models (VAM).

The main conclusion reached by CEDR is that teachers who passed ProTeach correlate to higher student test scores, especially in reading. Not so much in math. It's worth noting that this is essentially the same conclusion they drew conducting a similar study on teachers who earned National Board Certification. The study also found the effect was greatest for those teachers who scored high on Entry 2; the one that concerns classroom management and family communication. I found that interesting; it seems more likely that Entry 3 – which is all about teaching and assessment – would be the one more closes associated with higher test scores. I guess that goes to show how important classroom management is. Overall, the results seem to indicate that ProTeach is an effective measurement of teacher quality, which must make the PESB feel relieved.

Of course, we can also look at these results from another direction. Maybe they indicate that VAM is a valid measurement, at least for reading instruction. Personally I found the entire report a little presumptuous; strongly implying that VAM is the gold standard and that teacher performance assessments like ProTeach are valid to the extent they correlate with student performance assessments like VAM. I may be biased (I’ve never been a big fan of VAM), but I place a lot more credence on an evaluation that focuses on what teachers are actually doing when they teach than an evaluation that looks at student performance, which is effected by a myriad of factors that include teacher quality. So perhaps the fact that VAM results and ProTeach results are correlated might show that VAM is legitimate. At least in reading instruction.

In a larger context, it seems to me that if there’s a place for VAM, then this is surely it; used on aggregated data like in this study. Where VAM is not appropriate is when it’s used on individual classrooms and individual teachers. That’s a complete travesty. It’s also a shame, because advanced statistical analyses – like VAM – can be invaluable when it comes to showing which instructional practices are effective and which aren’t. And I’m here to tell you: teachers across the country who are evaluated using VAM hate it with a passion you don’t often see in education. If we manage to steer clear from that mistake in Washington, I can see the day when TPEP reaches maturity and we have a large database of teacher evaluations and researchers like the folks over at CEDR can use metrics like VAM to help us understand which teacher practices are most effective.

But for now, we’ll have to settle for what we have: a somewhat obvious conclusion that tells us that good teachers produce good students. 

Reflections on Teacher Leadership

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123280454227616203596_washmonBy Tom

I spent last week in Washington DC. For three days I worked with an amazing group of teachers redesigning Jump Start, the WEA’s National Board Certification candidate training program. We were holed up in a conference room at NEA headquarters working with their staff along with staff from the National Board. And we ended up with a product that will definitely help National Board candidates understand the new assessment process and make their way through certification.

I also spent two days at the National Board conference. Between breakout sessions and keynote addresses, I heard a lot about teacher leadership. Two speakers in particular seemed to epitomize the opposite poles of what that concept actually means. Arne Duncan spoke about teacher leadership and the subtext seemed to be that teacher leaders are those who help administrators execute their decisions. They’re the ones who lead the workshops on the Common Core and the new evaluation systems. Tony Wagner also spoke about teacher leadership. But his definition seemed to give teachers authority over actual education policy. Teachers should be involved in continual reexamination of what we teach, how we teach it and how we should be assessed.

Personally I think they’re both right. Teacher leaders should have a voice in policy decision and have a hand in executing those decisions. Unfortunately, however, I think our voices have been stifled and our hands held back. Why?

Three reasons:

One of the ironies of teacher leadership is the fact that teaching itself gets in the way. First of all, most of us are too exhausted at the end of the day to do much more than eat dinner and plan the next day’s lessons. Being a leader takes energy. Energy and time. Teaching uses up both of those things. Besides that, teaching is generally more fun than leadership. Given the choice, I would much rather spend a day working with my fourth graders than working with colleagues. It’s not that I don’t like working with adults; I just like working with kids better. They’re more fun. When I get opportunities to take on leadership roles, I frequently turn them down if they conflict with my teaching schedule simply because I would rather be teaching.

Another barrier to teacher leadership is that many teachers have a lack of confidence in their ability to lead. Of course, sometimes a lack of confidence is justified. I have no confidence, for example, in my ability to pole vault because I’ve never done it before and it looks complicated. Teaching and leading require two fairly distinct skill sets. That’s not to say that a person couldn’t do both; but being a good teacher doesn’t necessarily make you a good leader. But a person who has learned to be a good teacher can certainly learn to be a good leader.

And finally, there’s failure. Sooner or later, a teacher leader will encounter it. It’s certainly happened to me. I’ve fought hard to get my district to adopt a particular policy only to have them turn it down. The natural impulse is always to throw in the towel, go back to my classroom where I know I can find success and forget about trying to change anything. Forget about trying to lead.

That attitude, of course, is exactly what we need to reject. We also need to get over our lack of confidence in our capacity to lead, either by learning the necessary skills or by finding a leadership niche that fits with the skills we already have. The hardest barrier, at least for me, is finding the time and energy to lead. But it can be done. It has to be done. Because if thirty years in the classroom has taught me anything, it’s that teachers need to be both in and out of the classroom in order for anyone to be successful in the classroom.

Want innovation in the classroom? Get teachers involved in Policy

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Assessment, Education Policy, National Board Certification, Science, Teacher Leadership
image from http://aviary.blob.core.windows.net/k-mr6i2hifk4wxt1dp-14031620/71248eaf-3628-450a-8a5b-67a49178f444.png

 

by Maren Johnson

I spent the weekend in Washington DC at the Teaching and Learning 2014 Conference. It was dazzling. Famous and thought provoking speakers, incorporation of art and music, huge diversity in education viewpoints and experience.

With all the hubbub over the big names at the conference, what I'm heading home thinking about is a session led by a middle school science teacher from Washington state. From the small town of Cheney, no less.

Teacher Tammie Schrader's session was titled, "Coding in the Classroom." I went into the session expecting to learn a bit about coding itself, and perhaps a bit about how to use coding to teach concepts in life science. I came out of the session thinking about innovation and education policy.

Tammie started out the session by introducing herself and her classroom programs. She has been facilitating student coding in her science classes for several years now. That, itself, is innovative, but not extraordinarily unusual.

Then Tammie started talking about education policy. My ears perked up. What was going to be the tie-in here? I've been to sessions on innnovative instructional methods. I've been to sessions on education policy. I have rarely been to a session incorporating both.

Tammie's point? She wanted to do cutting edge things in her classroom. In order to be free to do these things, she needed to be released from some of the usual considerations of what might be expected in a classroom. There were a few non-negotiables, however. She would still need to assess; she would still need to show student growth. She wanted to assess and show student growth in a way that would fit her classroom. The solution? Get involved in policy. Tammie has done this, in a big way, at state and national levels.

I thought to myself, "This woman's message needs to get out there." So there I was, like the paparazzi, taking photos and tweeting. Not that Tammie isn't already well known in many education circles, but I wanted to do my part!

image from http://aviary.blob.core.windows.net/k-mr6i2hifk4wxt1dp-14031621/8e1854ea-84f9-461c-90bc-4e482f91c4cc.png

The policy involvment has allowed Tammie's innovative classroom work to become systemic. Tammie has worked on state assessment committees and on designing frameworks for Career and Technical Education. She helped write the state science test. Because she knows what students are expected to do, she's not ignoring the state science standards or the Next Generation Science Standards. She's not letting all of that go. She's just helping to shape policy and then use it in a way that helps herself and other teachers be innovative in their classrooms.

Tammie has spent time talking to policy makers at all levels. Having a teacher involved in these areas allows education policy to encourage innovation as opposed to stifling it. Want innovation in the classroom? Get teachers involved in policy.

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What do Teacher Leaders Need?

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Teacher Leadership

Tl cstpBy Mark

From the BadassTeacher Association to WEA to CSTP and everywhere between, regardless of positions on the "big issues," many organizations recognize that teachers are the change-makers in our system and thus should have their voices amplified and listened to.

The tougher question is how teachers do this. Many approaches are in the toolbox, from painting signs and marching to harnessing social media. 

A while back, CSTP convened teachers to develop a Teacher Leadership Skills Framework that outlined the need for teacher leaders to have knowledge and skills, opportunities and roles, and mindful dispositions that triangulate to foster authentic leadership.

I'm brainstorming a project–hopefully in conjunction with CSTP and modeled to an extent from the original Auburn Teacher Leadership Academy–for my own district.

Therefore, I'm shopping for ideas: What do teacher leaders need? (Not just in terms of tangibles or trainings, but I'll take suggestions for those as well.) What books or articles are good resources to get us off to a good start? What has helped you along your path in teacher leadership?

Deacronymization of Education

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51Fr24ZYv9L._SS400_By Mark

One education reform movement I can get on board with is DEM: The Deacronymization of Education Movement. This is a small, grassroots movement located primarily in my house and in room 116 of my school building.

It is not that I seek to eliminate the programs or initiatives for which acronyms stand. Far from it. The point of deacronymization is about recognizing the inherent merit and value that may (may) be present in those very programs and acronyms. 

For example: this year, I've been deliberately avoiding talk of "TPEP" in favor of either "teacher evaluation" or better yet, "effective teaching." To me, the essence of TPEP is the promotion and development of effective teaching. The acronym "TPEP," while convenient, enables a teacher to slip into an affliction called TIJOMT, pronounced "TIE-jomt," which stands for This-Is-Just-One-More-Thing, and often precipitates the classic TTSP (TIT-spee), or This-Too-Shall-Pass, which is a widely acknowledged excuse for polite disengagement from what is perceived as the next BTIE (BEE-tie), or "Big-Thing-in-Education" to ride the EP (Education Pendulum).

Think of it this way: If I am making a list of tasks to do today, "TPEP" is a convenient little term that could be listed there, as if it were something I could finish and cross off and be done with. That's easy to do when the OMT is added to an already full plate: we naturally want to find a way to cross the OMT (One-More-Thing) off our list. If I were to write "be an effective teacher" on that list, I would not cross that off and say "Phew! Thank goodness I'm finished being an effective teacher!"

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HB 2800

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Assessment, Current Affairs, Education, Education Policy, Games, Life in the Classroom, Literacy, Social Issues

boxesBy Mark

I strongly believe that civil consideration of all sides of an issue are important for a literate society.

So let's take the Inslee/Dorn joint venture, House Bill 2800, which adds to RCW 28A.405.100 at section 2(f) a passage that begins on line 31 of page 3:

"Beginning with the 2017-18 school year, when relevant to the teacher and subject matter, student growth data elements must include results from federally mandated statewide student assessments."

This language is also inserted elsewhere in the document where it is relevant to define student growth.

Based on what I am reading, I hesitate to boil this issue down to a simple pro v. con. This issue, as are most, is more complicated that our society's convenient dualistic reduction.

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Inslee Fought The Law and The Law Won

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DownloadBy Tom

I was at a staff meeting once in which a colleague made a presentation. She wanted us to take on some new initiative. I can’t remember what it was, since we voted not to do it. She came to me afterwards and asked what she did wrong. “You didn’t do anything wrong,” I said. “You were clear and articulate. You explained what the program was about and told us why it was a good idea. Then we thought about it and decided not to do it. That happens sometimes.”

I tell this dull story because it sounds like what happened in Washington D.C. last weekend. Governor Inslee went out there and explained to Education Secretary Arne Duncan why our teacher evaluation system should be good enough to obtain the NCLB waiver, even though it clearly doesn’t require the use of state tests like the feds want. Governor Inslee, I’m sure, was every bit as clear and articulate as my colleague, yet in the end Duncan said no.

That happens sometimes.

So now what? So now Inslee is going to help the legislature pass a bill that will change TPEP in a way that the feds like. And then we’ll get our waiver, which will allow the state more freedom to spend $40 or so million dollars. And we also won’t have to send home letters to our parents telling them that our schools are bad.

And as for us? The teachers in the classroom? We get to use state tests to measure student growth. Of course by “we” I mean the 16% of us who actually teach in state tested grades and subjects. Everyone else gets to use meaningful assessments that reflect what they actually teach every day.

Personally, I’m trying really hard to get upset about this. Really hard. But all I can muster is a sense of disappointed resignation. Sure, our new evaluation system is damaged, but the damage is only to those of us who teach state-tested students, and since the student growth part of our evaluations are supposed to use “multiple measures,” state assessments will only matter to a slight degree to a small number of teachers. And there’s yet another caveat: we’re switching to a new student assessment system. This year is the field test. Next year is the first year; the year we gather base-line data. The year after that is the first year in which we could actually misuse the assessment for teacher evaluations, and since CCSS promises to be the essence of professional development for the foreseeable future, there’s every reason to expect student test scores to rise, at least in the short-term.

While I would like to see a way around using student test scores for teacher evaluation, what I would love to see is a reasonable, rational US Congress completely rewrite ESEA, better known as NCLB. Remember, all the nonsense we’re going through right now is an effort to secure a waiver from the onerous sanctions of that ridiculous law. ESEA, as it was originally conceived decades ago, was designed to provide support for our country’s high-needs students. If Congress could set aside their bickering long enough to write a law that actually did that, we wouldn’t have to worry about all this crap.

Dream on, Tom.

Inslee and Dorn: “Can,” “Must,” and “Will Not.”

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Assessment, Current Affairs, Education, Education Policy, Games, Social Issues

George is watchingBy Mark

I'm not sure I understand. 

Did Jay Inslee travel to Washington, D.C., solely to tell Arne Duncan that our Washington will do whatever the USDE wants? And this was initially heralded as "progress"?

The Governor's office has issued this press release, which is thin on details and basically says a bill will be proposed soon by Dorn and Inslee that will include requirements for statewide assessments in 2017-18 (which I thought was already the works) and a recommendation from the TPEP steering committee (about what, it is unclear) by 2016-17. The media seems to interpret this is as a victory for "must" over "can" which, as I've already pointed out, does NOTHING to actually make our teacher evaluation system better for kids, nor does it make teachers more accountable."Must" over "can" only means we have to budget to spend more money on standardized testing instead of more money on making student learning happen. My weak metaphor, considering my goals to get healthy this year: we're buying a very, very expensive scale (and an invalid and inaccurate one at that) instead of investing in healthier lifestyle.

As of my groggy pre-workout-and-coffee reading this morning, the Dorn-Inslee bill doesn't appear to have been released for me to examine the text. If the bill holds back on changing the law, and the waiver is granted pending the TPEP steering committee recommendations in 2016-17 (a.k.a. kicking the can down the road), then I suppose I'm satisfied–I just hope the steering committee has the guts to do and say what Inslee apparently didn't. If the bill proposes the same word change as the bills that already died in the legislature, then the fight picks up again. But seriously, everyone: Stop playing games and give us the waiver. We're doing the right thing. 

With renewed focus on "can" and "must," I guess I'll repeat: Our teacher evaluation system may not be perfect (though I think the strengths far outweigh the weaknesses), but including a "must" around test scores will not hold more teachers accountable, will not impact student learning, and will not improve the profession.

NEA President is Concerned about Common Core Implementation

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070309 Petco 2By Tom

As you may have heard, NEA President Dennis Van Roekel had some sharp words to say about the rollout of the CCSS. He called the implementation “completely botched.” His assessment is apparently based on feedback he’s received from NEA members over the past year. There’s no way to interpret this as anything other than a major blow to proponents of the Common Core. The NEA – our nation’s biggest teacher organization – has been one of the strongest supporters of nation-wide standards and has consistently pledged to use classroom teachers as “ambassadors” to spread support for CCSS.

I certainly can’t speak for all NEA members, but I can speak for myself. When I first started teaching, thirty years ago, standards were effectively hidden; curriculum companies seemed to know what students should know and be able to do at each grade level and they used that information to write and publish textbooks. Teachers were simply consumers; we used what they wrote and didn’t ask too many questions.

There was an attempt in the early 90s to create a common national set of standards, but it was defeated by conservatives who argued for local control over education. Each state subsequently began to write and implement its own educational standards.

Then came 2001. With NCLB, our lawmakers decided that every school had to get every kid “up to standard” within twelve years, something not even Finland could ever achieve. Making it even more ridiculous was the fact that by that time every state had its own standards and assessments. Actually, some states didn’t even have standardized assessments.  

As the sanctions required by NCLB began to loom large, Obama became president. He decided to use the threat of those sanctions as leverage for his own reform agenda, which included the Common Core. Not surprisingly, 45 states and DC signed on, partly because they liked the standards, but partly because they wanted a waiver from NCLB sanctions.

As a teacher, I embrace the standards from an instructional perspective. The standards themselves make sense; they’re narrower and deeper and for the most part seem developmentally appropriate, at least from my perspective. But what really appeals to me is the fact that they’re (mostly) national standards. Not only will curriculum publishers have more consistent targets, but it opens the door for collaborating at a scale never imagined before.  

But with the standards came the assessments. When I first started scrolling through the fourth grade SBAC language arts assessment, I remember thinking, “Wow, this will be challenging for my students. But I’m sure there will be support and with that support I’ll be able to get my kids to achieve something remarkable.” And in my state and my district, that support has started to materialize. We’re focusing on CCSS-related instruction in district professional development time, and I hooked up with an awesome training in an instructional model called Literacy Design Collaborative.

But there’s a problem. The implementation of Common Core and its attendant assessments are unfortunately occurring while teacher evaluation is undergoing a major shift. Teachers are, for the first time, being assessed in part on the basis of student growth; student growth which is – or soon will be – measured by brand-new assessments based on a brand-new set of standards.

Teachers are, quite predictably, freaking out over all this. It’s one thing to change the standards and the tests used to measure those standards. It’s another thing altogether to use those tests for teacher evaluations before teachers have a chance to fully delve into those standards and understand what the assessments are actually demanding from our students.

That’s exactly why Dennis Van Roekel is calling for a “course correction.” It’s a simple request to slow things down to a manageable pace. Let us get to know the standards. Let us understand the tests. And then, down the road, maybe we can use those tests as part of teacher evaluation. Or maybe not. But to press on both fronts right now is counter-productive. The only way to ever successfully implement the Common Core is to get teacher buy-in.

And the only way to insure that the Common Core is not successfully implemented is to alienate those same teachers. And that seems to be what’s happening.