Early Learning Conference Where do I focus my teaching? What does the research say? What does this look like in practice?

1. Teaching Makes a
Difference!
Faye Brownlie
Prince George Early Learning Conference
Monday, January 28, 2018
Slideshare.net/fayebrownlie.earlylearning

2. How is this a metaphor for our work together?

3. How is this a metaphor for our work together?
The Timeless Circle Sculpture
by Susan Point

4. Learning Intentions:
• Where best do I focus?
• What does the research say?
• What can this look like in practice?

5. The teeter totter
kids
kids curriculum

6. Universal Design for Learning
Mul$ple means:
-to tap into background knowledge, to ac$vate prior knowledge, to
increase engagement and mo$va$on
-to acquire the informa$on and knowledge to process new ideas and
informa$on
-to express what they know.
Rose & Meyer, 2002

7. Backwards Design
• What important ideas and enduring understandings do you want the
students to know?
• What thinking strategies will students need to demonstrate these
understandings?
McTighe & Wiggins, 2001

8. Class Review - working together
• What are the strengths of your class?
• What areas would you like to strengthen?
• What goals do you have for your class?
• Review ALL the individual learners in the class and share potential
areas of support.
• What decisions can we make with our team and this information?
Make a PLAN!!!

9. Big Ideas
• Teaching counts!
• Our instructional choices impact significantly on student learning
• We teach responsively
• We need a mental model of ‘what works’ to guide our teaching
• All kids can learn and we know enough collectively to teach
all kids!
• An unwavering belief that everyone has the right to be included
socially, emotionally, and intellectually

10. Big Ideas
• Reading and writing
• ‘float on a sea of talk’ – James Bri4on
• Are appren7ceships – Frank Smith
• Engage the learners!
• If you are not engaged, you can’t be learning
• Thinking is the basis of all our learning
• Provide access for all!
• Low floor, high ceiling
• Work 7relessly to keep students within the community of the
classroom

11. The goal of teaching reading is to
create kids who can read and who
choose to read.

12. Story is at the heart of reading and
writing.
Reading and writing grow through
interaction with others.
We are all readers, writers, thinkers,
mathematicians.

13. Gradual Release of Responsibility
• Model
• I do, you watch
• Guided practice
• We do, you do with others
• Independent practice
• You do, I coach as needed
• Independent application
• You do without guidance – or set-up – from me

14. The heart of our teacher
talk…feedback

15. Descriptive Feedback
• What’s working?
• What’s not?
• What’s next?

16. Do your students receive individual
feedback from you in every class?

17. Feedback
• The purpose of feedback is to improve future performance.
• …most of the time the focus of feedback should be on changing the
student rather than changing the work…
• Dylan Wiliam, April 2016

18. What should I notice?

19. Does your assessment – the results of
your conversations with and
observations of your children at work
– inform your teaching?

20. “The most powerful single influence enhancing achievement
is feedback”-Dylan Wiliam
• Quality feedback is needed, not just more feedback
• Students with a Growth Mindset welcome feedback
and are more likely to use it to improve their
performance
• Oral feedback is much more effective than written
• The most powerful feedback is provided from the
student to the teacher

21. Assessment-Capable Learners
‘Developing “Assessment Capable” Learners – Frey, Fisher, Hattie in EL, Feb 2018, Vol 75, No 5
• Motivation
• Relevancy, interest, critical thinking
• Effect size .72
• Goal setting
• From dependence to co-dependence to independent
• Effect size .56
• Self-regulation
• Manage your own learning
• Reflect on progress toward your goals
• Effect size .64
• Feedback
• T to S – specific, understandable, actionable, timely
• Effect size .75
• Report on your own performance
• Effect size 1.44

22. CSL – Non-negotiables
• Strengths first
• Learner specific
• Focus on the learner, this is NOT a time to explain the curriculum to
the parent.
• CSL is a window into the classroom.
• No checklists
• Is different from a report card.

23. A Possible Framework…
“Every Child, Every Day” – Richard Allington and Rachael Gabriel
In Educational Leadership, March 2012
6 elements of instruction for ALL students!

24. Every Child, Every Day –
Allington, Gabriel
1. Every child reads something he or she chooses.

25. • Listening to a child read should give you information to guide your
instruction.
• What patterns do you notice?
• What strengths/strategies does the reader demonstrate?
• Is the reader self-monitoring?
• Is the reader creating meaning?

26. M – meaning
Does this make sense?
S – language structure
Does this sound right?
V – visual information
Does this look right?
How did you figure that out?

27. Every Child, Every Day –
Allington, Gabriel
2. Every child reads accurately.

28. Building Accuracy: Whole Class Lessons
Using Big Books
• Work with one or two pages (5-10 Minutes).
• Cover up one or two words.
• Read the sentence together leaving out the missing
word.
• Ask them for all of the possibilities for the missing word.
• Record their suggestions.
• Try each word they suggested crossing out words that
don’t make sense.

29. The school is so ________.
The hallways are _________ and _________ and filled with _________
kids he doesn’t know.

30. The school is so b________.
The hallways are l_________ and d_________ and filled with
b_________ kids he doesn’t know.

31. • big
• long
• dark
• big

33. The Seven Teaching Stories – Highwater Press

35. Every Child, Every Day –
Allington, Gabriel
3. Every child reads something he or she understands.

37. Every Child, Every Day –
Allington, Gabriel
4. Every child writes about something personally meaningful.

38. Quick Writes – Grade 3
Robin Martens, Altona
• 15 seconds to think about how they would start
• 3-4 minutes to write
• Wrote for an hour with different prompt words
• Pizza, soaring, puddle
• Kids highlighted their gems after each write and shared them with the
class
• Created criteria:
• Using our senses to describe what was happening
• Using descriptive words

39. Robin’s Reflections
• Kids loved this
• Very focused on their writing
• Some of the developing writers listened to what others shared as
their gems, then incorporated these into their own writing
• The next day in Work on Writing time, several asked for a ‘word’

42. Every Child, Every Day –
Allington, Gabriel
5. Every child talks with peers about reading and writing.

43. Every Child, Every Day –
Allington, Gabriel
6. Every child listens to a fluent adult read aloud.

47. Every Child, Every Day –
Allington, Gabriel
1. Every child reads something he or she chooses.
2. Every child reads accurately.
3. Every child reads something he or she understands.
4. Every child writes about something personally meaningful.
5. Every child talks with peers about reading and writing.
6. Every child listens to a fluent adult read aloud.

48. Daily Expectations for All
… Do your students receive feedback from you in each
class?
…Have you an opportunity to listen to each child read
each day?
…Have you an opportunity to talk with each child each
day?

49. • What will you try?
• With whom will you work?
• What student(s) will you keep in mind as you try something new to
gauge the impact of your actions?