Getting Results

Let's face it - in the world of school turnaround, the bottom line is results in student achievement. I can tell you that I have led my school to a complete turnaround in the areas of culture and climate and that we are a radically different learning environment than we were when I first started and I can even show you data that supports all of that. But - and it is a big but - according to state assessment scores, we are still performing with single digits. We collect a great deal of data that indicates student growth and student progress, but even our common core aligned interim assessments (we use Achievement Network) make a disclaimer that they are not predictive. And the short version of this story is that we need a win.

Unraveling the story of what your data is telling you is akin to Alice going down the rabbit hole. As a leader, you have to ultimately make a decision about what needs to happen first in order to get results. Here is a real life scenario. According to our receivership metrics, our baseline for students scoring a level 2 or above on the NYS ELA assessment is 21%. Our target set by the state is 43% and the very least that we can do in order to receive any credit for that indicator is to improve by 1% - so 22%. As we analyze the closest thing that we have to an aligned state assessment (our Achievement Network Interim Assessments), one of my grade levels has only 17% of students scoring a level 2 or above and the proficiency rate is single digits. Unraveling what is the root cause of under-performance is what getting results is all about.

Everyone seems to have a proposed solution for getting results; replace the principal, replace the teachers, change the curriculum, become a charter school, bring in outside consultants, provide more interventions, increase community involvement. If you google "getting results in failing schools," you will end up with link after link of schools, districts, outside consultants, and independent receivers that propose the answer for getting results. As I think about the situation with my under performing grade level (to be honest, I am perseverating on it), I am reminded of the underpinnings of Patrick Lencioni's Five Dysfunctions of a Team. I know that we have a clear vision, I have the best teachers, and we have students who are willing and eager to learn - so what is preventing us from getting results? As I think this through, I can see how gaps in both our curriculum and instructional delivery are impacting our ability to achieve the results we want and need. When 83% of your grade level is not proficient, it is an issue of core instruction and cannot be addressed through intervention. So, as the school leader, I have to make decisions that will lead to us getting results because we cannot continue this level of under-performance.

As we peel back the layers of this issue, I have to go back to my fundamental beliefs about high quality reading instruction - whether we are talking about common core or not - and I need to dig deep with my team to see what their fundamental beliefs are as well. Students become better readers by reading. Our classrooms must be spaces that inspire and encourage children to love reading. This is the underpinning of high quality reading instruction. When I think about what our instruction actually looks like in comparison to this, I know that I am seeing more teaching of discreet skills than I am seeing students deep in text that they love and responding to that text in a meaningful and purposeful way. This is likely the result of the very thing that we think is helping - reteaching plans that are based on improving specific skills, disaggregated data that identifies student gaps, and an unending pressure to make gains. It is more difficult to see how students are growing on specific skills when they are deep in a great book. It requires a different approach to teaching that is based on the passionate belief that our kids can achieve at high levels if they are given the right environment and encouragement.

Good teaching should result in results. Curriculum may change. Initiatives may change. Leadership may change. Good teaching should be the stuff that results are made of.

Going Deeper with Data

We have been using data more than ever to understand our student's progress and reflect on our teaching. Benchmark assessments, formative assessments, mid-module assessments, progress monitoring, and unit assessments all tell a story about the gaps in student learning. Teaching to fill the gaps - teaching to mastery - is still a mystery to many of us. Digging deep enough to use that data to see a clearer picture into children's understanding and misconceptions is powerful. Planning proactively - saying "because I know this about this student, I will be prepared with this strategy" - is so different than reacting to what a child's gaps in understanding may be and re-stating or re-explaining. Really teaching to mastery is about student understanding and having students prove how they understand a concept or skill in many different ways. Simply put - it is deeper, not wider.

Going deeper to fill gaps in student learning requires a deep understanding of the standards, our students, and the specific competencies and foundational skills that our students must have to achieve mastery. This is very different than re-teaching by providing students with similar questions or problems (or parallel tasks) in order to achieve mastery because it involves a deeper analysis to determine what is missing in the students' understanding of the standard. If we take standard, for example RL 5.3 which states "Compare and contrast two or more characters, settings, or events in a story or drama, drawing on specific details in the text (e.g., how characters interact)," In order to teach to mastery of this standard, we must know what the competencies and skills are that make up this standard. There is no process or short cut that we can give students to master this kind of deep thinking. Students must be able to identify character traits, determine text details that identify the setting, make inferences, identify cause and effect, understand rich vocabulary, identify similarities and differences, and use details to understand the context of dialogue and narration. This takes practice and classroom structures that support this type of thought and analysis.

 In a Reader's Workshop model, teachers model metacognition and text analysis in order to build the capacity for students to think deeply and carry on their own dialogue. In the video clip below, you see how the teacher models both the kind of thinking he expects around the standards and his expectations for students to carry on this kind of dialogue on their own.

 

Click here to view video directly.

Our expectations as teachers and the structures that we implement to support student learning will lead to the type of learners we produce. Our understanding of the standards and the competencies and skills that our students must have in order to achieve mastery will impact the way we plan and the way we use data to teach for mastery. If we understand our students, our data, and the standards, we can produce amazing results in student achievement that will have a lasting impact on our students' lives.