Enrichment Cluster Group

1. “When you have confidence, you can have a lot of fun. And when you have fun, you can do amazing things.” -Unknown Author

2. Enrichment Cluster Group Presented by: Kathleen Miller

3. NAGC Gifted Program StandardsProgram Design • Guiding Principle • A continuum of programming services must exist for gifted learners • Guiding Principle • Gifted education programming must evolve from a comprehensive and sound base • Committee process

4. NAGC Gifted Program StandardsProgram Design • Guiding Principle • Gifted learners are not just gifted for a specific time each day or week • Services are a required part of their total educational environment in order for maximum learning to take place • Guiding Principle • Differentiated curriculum for the gifted learner must span across the grade levels

5. NAGC Gifted Program StandardsCurriculum and Instruction • Guiding Principle • Instructional pace must be flexible to allow for the accelerated learning of gifted learners as appropriate • Guiding Principle • Learning opportunities for gifted learners must consist of a continuum of differentiated curricular options, instructional approaches, and resource materials

6. Not Just Gifted Wednesdays • The skills, abilities, strengths and interests of gifted and talented students, just like those of all individuals, are present 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. • Exploring ideas in a resource room, working alongside a mentor, preparing for a competition, or being accelerated for one subject for part of one’s education does not address these ever-presentspecial abilities. (Riley, 2009)

7. Enrichment Cluster Groups • A method for providing full-time gifted education services without major budget implications, and with potential to raise achievement for all students • A group of gifted identified students is clustered into a mixed ability classroom with a teacher who is trained to differentiate instruction for gifted students

8. Why should gifted students be placed in a cluster group instead of being assigned to all classes? Gifted students: • need to spend time learning with others of like ability to experience challenge and make academic progress. • better understand their learning differences when they are with learning peers. • Teachers are more likely to differentiate curriculum when there is a group of gifted students

9. Advantages of Cluster Grouping • Grouping all gifted children in a regular classroom provides social, emotional, and academic advantages to students • Teachers can focus instruction to better meet all students’ academic needs • Schools provide full-time gifted services with few additional costs • Achievement levels increase

10. Benefits of the Cluster Grouping Model • Challenging gifted students, all day, every day • Creating learning and leadership opportunity for all students • Empowering teachers by expanding awareness and providing preparation • Encourages ongoing assessment of students’ strengths and needs • All students having opportunities for extended learning

11. Achievement Implications • Narrowed range of abilities allows for more focused instruction • Teachers learn strategies for advanced ability learners they can use for all students, not just the gifted students • Ongoing assessment of students’ strengths and needs ensures continual progress • Higher expectations for all students

12. Research Shows… Acceleration versus enrichment" is a false dichotomy. Good acceleration contains some enrichment, while good enrichment is accelerative. Proper pacing and the opportunity to study the subject in depth are both needed for the curriculum to be matched to students’ abilities.

13. Entrance Criteria - Intelligence • CogATS (Cognitive Abilities Test) • The CogAT measures students’ learned reasoning abilities in the three areas most linked to academic success in school: Verbal, Quantitative and Nonverbal. Although its primary goal is to assess students’ reasoning abilities • While CogAT is well-suited to help educators make important student placement decisions, such as selecting students for Gifted and Talented programs, exclusive features such as the Ability Profile Score can be used to expand the educational opportunities of all students.

14. Composite Score Verbal Oral Vocabulary and Verbal Reasoning Quantitative Relational Concepts and Quantitative Concepts Nonverbal Pictures and Figures that do not rely on unique oral-language development Cognitive Abilities Test (CogAT)

15. Entrance Criteria - Achievement • NJPASS (New Jersey Proficiency Assessment of State Standards) • Developed specifically for New Jersey • Designed to measure the New Jersey Core Curriculum Content Standards • Based on the state-released test specifications for the NJ ASK • Provides detailed score reports to help target students strengths and weaknesses

16. Entrance Criteria - Surveys • SIGS (Scales for Identifying Gifted Students) • SIGS offers the most comprehensive observational instrument available for identifying gifted students ages 5–18. Used as part of a comprehensive process for identifying gifted children, SIGS offers schools an instrument with extensive statistical and research support. This standardized, norm-referenced instrument is completed by teachers and parents and provides an effective method for identifying gifted children.

17. Differentiated Instruction

18. Differentiated Instruction • Differentiation is the “the process of assessing individual needs and responding with appropriate learning experiences.”(George, 1997) • When differentiating instruction, “teachers begin where students are”(Tomlinson, 1999), meaning that educators must recognize the many variances in students: learning styles, rates of learning, activities, interests, expectations, motivation, outcomes, abilities, resources, skills, tasks and parental or family support. (George, 1997)

19. Pre-Assessments • Assessment is the key to knowing for whom and when differentiating learning experiences are appropriate and necessary. • Prior to teaching a unit, teachers must assess the children to find out who has already mastered objectives or is close to doing so. • Preassessment provides necessary information for teachers to plan challenging learning opportunities for all children who can demonstrate that they already know the core content and are ready to move on to more challenging learning experiences. Methods and Materials for Teaching the Gifted

20. Fountas and Pinnell /SRI Online Assessments for reading When students have reached a proficiency level in a reading strategy/skill in a grade level text, prior to moving on, be sure that the student can apply the same strategy/skill in a higher level text Utilize rubrics for Reader Response Journals and Re-tellings Utilizing the genre specific rubrics for Writing Workshop Utilize continuum of skills checklist that are included in the Lucy Calkins writing units How will the students be assessed for Literacy

21. How will the students be assessed for math, social studies and science? • Utilize pre-assessments • Interest Inventories • Formative assessments

22. Flexible Grouping • In classrooms, grouping is flexible and changes regularly. • The groups change as learning tasks change. • Teachers may form groups for direct instruction or reteaching based on the results of ongoing assessments.

23. Flexible Grouping Using Formative Assessments • In gifted-cluster classes, the grouping is flexible and may change daily, weekly, or monthly. • Students are placed in learning groups according to common interests, achievement levels, need for differentiation, or even personality characteristics. • Students often move between groups

24. Flexible Grouping Using Formative Assessments • During the time students are working toward mastery of new standards, formative assessments are used along the way to guide and direct instruction. • With gifted students, as with all students, teachers are expected to provide ongoing assessments to justify that students are learning • To ensure consistent forward progress in learning, teachers pre-assess, teach, assess, reteach, provided summative assessments-and then repeat the entire process

25. Flexible group based on strategy/assessment Allows the implementation of Freehold Township Curriculum Allows the teacher to differentiate direct instruction according to ability level and student needs Spirals the curriculum Consistent and constant authentic practice All students are actively engaged Flexible Grouping

26. Tic Tac Toe

28. Flexible Grouping • Flexible group based on assessment/interest/ topic • Allows the teacher to differentiate direct instruction according to ability level and student needs • Allows for integration across curriculum areas • Consistent and constant authentic practice • All students are actively engaged

29. What is Tiered Instruction? • Tiered instruction allows the teacher to differentiate by creating several alternative learning tasks at varying degrees of difficulty; so although all students area learning the same standard, they are learning it at a level that is personally challenging. • Tiered lessons can be developed for specific skills as well as for standards from content areas or entire units.

30. Tiered Instruction

31. The Less Complex Energizer

32. The Just Right Energizer

33. The More Complex Energizer

34. What is Tiered Instruction? • Tiered instruction allows the teacher to differentiate by creating several alternative learning tasks at varying degrees of difficulty; so although all students area learning the same standard, they are learning it at a level that is personally challenging. • Tiered lessons can be developed for specific skills as well as for standards from content areas or entire units.

36. Extension Menus

37. Extension Menus(Choice Menus) • Extension menus provide suggested activities from which students can choose to do an in-depth study. • The goal is to learn about one topic in great detail-NOT to work on several topics. • If a student wants to choose his/her own idea, he/she can do that with the approval of a teacher. • Students may work on one extension activity over time, keeping track of the their work using a Daily Log or Choice Activities Log. (pg. 113 in Cluster Handbook)

38. Why is choice important? • Ask adults whether they would prefer to choose what to do or be told what to do, and of course, they are going to say they would prefer to have choice. • Students have the same feelings. Although they may not stand up and demand choice if none is present, they benefit in many ways from having them.

39. How can teachers provide choices? • When people go to a restaurant, the common goal is to find something on the menu to satisfy their hunger. • Students come to into our classrooms having hunger, as well-a hunger for learning. • Choice menus are a way of allowing our students to choose how they would like to satisfy that hunger.

44. Placing high achievers together in one classroom challenges those students, enabling other students to become academic leaders and allowing new talent to emerge. • Cluster grouping makes it easier for teachers to meet the needs of students in their classrooms by reducing the achievement range of students within a classroom. • Cluster grouping used in conjunction with challenging instruction and high teacher expectations may improve how teachers view their students with respect to ability and achievement. • Achievement scores improved over a three-year period for students in a cluster group environment and the number of students identified as high achievers increased. • Flexible grouping within and between classes that reduces the achievement range of each class can provide many benefits to all students and teachers. • The positive effects of cluster grouping result from many changes in the school climate such as: • creating opportunities for staff development, emphasizing a variety of instructional strategies; • raising teacher expectations; • creating a sense of ownership; • reducing the range of achievement levels in classrooms; • creating opportunities for collaboration with colleagues and administration. Gentry, M. L. (1999). Promoting Student Achievement and Exemplary Classroom Practices Through Cluster Grouping: A Research-Based Alternative to Heterogeneous Elementary Classrooms (RM99138). Storrs, CT: The National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented, University of Connecticut.

45. References Bean, S & Karnes, F (2009). Methods and materials for teaching the gifted. Waco, TX: Prufrock Press Inc. Brulles, D (2009). The Schoolwide Cluster Grouping Model [PowerPoint slides]. Brulles, D & Winebrenner, S (2008). The cluster grouping handbook. Minneapolis, MN: Free Spirit Publishing, Inc. Callahan, C, Landrum, Mary & Shaklee, B (2001). Aiming for excellence: gifted program standards. Waco, TX: Prufrock Press Inc. Gentry, M (1999). Promoting Student Achievement and Exemplary Classroom Practices Through Cluster Grouping: A Research-Based Alternative to Heterogeneous Elementary Classrooms. Storrs, CT: The National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented, University of Connecticut. Reis, S & Renzulli, J (2005). Curriculum Compacting. Waco, TX: Prufrock Press Inc. Winebrenner, S (2001). Teaching gifted kids in the regular classroom. Minneapolis, MN: Free Spirit Publishing, Inc.