Quality Teaching for Those Who Need It the Most

1. Quality Teaching for Those Who Need It the Most Harrie L. Buecker Assistant Superintendent Oldham County Schools CREATE – National Evaluation Institute Hyatt Regency – Louisville, Kentucky July 24-26, 2003 Harrie L. Buecker

2. Quality Teaching for Those Who Need It the Most Research Question: What are the observable qualities of teachers who positively impact the academic performance of low-achieving and at-risk students? Harrie L. Buecker

3. Introduction • Emerging research links capable teaching practices and student achievement • Low-achieving students require the most effective teachers • Traditionally, the “best” teachers are assigned to teach the highest achievers Harrie L. Buecker

4. No Child Left Behind (NCLB) FEDERAL When a Title I school fails to meet Adequate Yearly Progress for two consecutive years, the district must identify that school for improvement. A school’s plan for improvement must include ways to strengthen instruction and address the causes of failure. Parents of students in Title I schools in need of improvement will have the option to transfer to another public school in the district not in school improvement. Parents of students in Title I schools identified for their 2nd year of school improvement will be eligible to receive supplemental services for their children. 2002 Senate Bill 168 – Achievement Gap STATE Creates a new section of KRS Chapter 158. Amends KRS 156.095, 158.805, 160.340, 160.345 1. “Achievement gap” defined to mean: “… a substantive performance difference on each of the tested areas by grade level on the C A T S assessments between the various groups of students (male and female students, students with and without disabilities, students with and without English proficiency, minority and non-minority students, and students who are eligible for free and reduced lunch and those who are not eligible for free and reduced lunch).” 2. Schools must set targets and report out to local school boards and KDE on results 2002 Recent Legislative Mandates Harrie L. Buecker

5. Organizing Questions • What Makes a Good Teacher?

6. What Makes a Good Teacher? • Knowing the Subject Matters • Mastering Teaching Skills • Can Good Teaching Be Taught? • The Intentional Teacher

7. Knowing the Subject Matters Good teachers know subject matter well and are prepared with a variety of examples that bring lessons to life.

8. Mastering Teaching Skills • Managing the Classroom • Assessing Prior Knowledge • Motivating Students • Accounting for Learner Characteristics

9. Mastering Teaching Skills • Assessing Learning Outcomes • Reviewing Information • Communicating Ideas Effectively

10. Can Good Teaching Be Taught? “An outstanding teacher does nothing that any other teacher cannot also do—it is just a question of knowing the principles of effective teaching and how to apply them.” Slavin 2003

11. Determinants of good teaching • Self-Knowledge and Self- Regulation • Decision Making • Reflection • Application of Education Research

12. Components of Good Teaching • Knowledge of the Subject and Teaching Resources • Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving Skills • Knowledge of Students and their Learning • Teaching and Communication Skills

13. The Intentional Teacher “Intentional teachers are those who are constantly thinking about the outcomes they want for their students and about how each decision they make moves children toward those outcomes.”

14. Characteristics of the Intentional Teacher • Purposeful Lesson Plans • Experiments with Novel Techniques that Arouse Student Curiosity • Accounts for Multiple Ability Levels • Uses Class Time Wisely

15. Characteristics of the Intentional Teacher • Teacher Efficacy • Open to Feedback • Reflective

16. Teacher Quality • “Professionalizing our Profession” • Establish standards for quality teaching practice • Review those standards with experts • Gear professional development toward the highest level of practice • Create a seamless web of ongoing knowledge/skills throughout the teacher’s career (from beginning to accomplished status) • Link pay to the teacher’s continued enhancement of knowledge and skills • Odden 1997 Harrie L. Buecker

17. “Professionalizing our Profession” • Develop a framework based on the highest standards • Identify points of high leverage in the system to generate change in our teaching force • Create conditions where the desired events become likely • Create an interconnected infrastructure for organizational change • Senge 1990 Harrie L. Buecker

18. Quality Teachers for the 21st Century • In 1986, the Carnegie Task Force on Teaching as a Profession issued A Nation Prepared: Teachers for the 21st Century • Recommended the establishment of a National Board for Professional Teaching Standards Harrie L. Buecker

19. National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) • Five Core Propositions • Teachers are committed to students and their learning • Teachers know the subjects they teach and how to teach those subjects to students • Teachers are responsible for managing and monitoring student learning • Teachers think systemically about their practice and learn from experience • Teachers are members of learning communities • NBPTS 1991 Harrie L. Buecker

20. High Quality Teaching in Every Classroom in Every Community! • The National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future (1997) examined the nation’s progress toward this and recommends: • A systemic approach to addressing teacher quality • More parents should demand that their children be taught by well-prepared and qualified teachers • Linking standards for teachers to standards for students • Reinventing teacher preparation and professional development • Reallocating resources to invest more in teachers and technology • That teachers insist that their occupation evolves into a true profession Harrie L. Buecker

21. Quality Teaching for Quality Learning To clearly focus on linking teaching and learning, “teachers must be equipped with the knowledge and skills they need to enable all children to learn.” But we must ultimately examine student outputs along with teacher inputs if student performance is to improve. Darling-Hammond, 1996 Harrie L. Buecker

22. Quality Teaching for Quality Learning • Value-added Instruction • Dr. William Sanders defined teacher effectiveness by comparisons of students’ test results each school year with those from the previous grade who had similar backgrounds and abilities (most effective teachers were those whose students made the most gains on the state assessments • Findings • Students assigned to the most effective teachers made far greater gains on the state assessments • The results for students assigned to the least effective teachers over a period of two or more consecutive years was additive and cumulative. • Sanders 1997 Harrie L. Buecker

23. Quality Learning Theoretical Perspective • Vygotsky – focuses on how cultural and social contexts influence learning and favors utilizing a discovery approach to learning • Vygotsky’s 3 Principal Assumptions: • Making Meaning • Importance of the community and people around the student • Tools for cognitive development • Important adults to the student, culture, language • Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) • Problem solving skills of tasks (3 categories) • Those performed independently • Those that cannot be performed at all • Those that fall between these two extremes – could be performed with assistance Harrie L. Buecker

24. Quality Learning Theoretical Perspective • Ogbu, an anthropologist, focuses on minority and class status in education particularly emphasizing the differences between immigrant (voluntary) minorities and nonimmigrant (involuntary) minorities • Ogbu’s key concepts related to community factors that impact the school performance of minority students: • Cultural models - People’s understandings of their world • Cultural and language frame of reference of a minority group - Ambivalent or non-oppositional • Degree of trust or acquiescence the minorities have for White Americans and the societal institutions they control • Educational strategies that result from the above elements Harrie L. Buecker

25. Quality Learning: What do we know about how low-achieving students learn? • Address classroom cultural ecology (see classrooms as another cultural activity – similarly to socialization in the family and the community) • Lee, Bryk, and Smith 1993 • Tharp and Gallimore 1988 • Pay attention to routines, practices, and frames of reference • Tharp, Estrada, Dalton, and Yamauchi 2002 • Social interactions between students and teachers are at the heart of learning • Lee, Bryk, and Smith 1993 Harrie L. Buecker

26. Quality Learning: What do we know about how low-achieving students learn? • Tharp, Estrada, Dalton, and Yamauchi (2000) recommend their Five Standards for Effective Pedagogy in improving the performance of diverse ethnic, cultural, economic, and linguistic backgrounds: • Standard 1 – Teachers and students together • Standard 2 – Language and literacy across the curriculum • Standard 3 – Making meaning • Standard 4 – Teaching complex thinking • Standard 5 – Teaching through conversation Harrie L. Buecker

27. Quality Learning: What do we know about how low-achieving students learn? Harrie L. Buecker

28. Quality Learning: What do we know about barriers to learning for low-achieving students? • These students often lack “social capital” • Defined as social relationships from which an individual is potentially able to derive various types of institutional resources and support • Stanton-Salazar and Dornusch 1994 • Minority and low-income students are disproportionately assigned to lower tracks (tracking in this case means assigning students to groupings based on ability) • Instructional inadequacies in lower tracks results in slower achievement growth • Instruction in the lower tracks is often categorized by boring lessons and lower teacher expectations • Hallinan 1994 Harrie L. Buecker

29. Organizing Questions • What Is the Impact of Culture on Teaching and Learning? • How Does Socioeconomic Status Affect Student Achievement? • How Do Ethnicity and Race Affect Students’ School Experiences?

30. Impact of Culture on Teaching and Learning • What is Culture? • Factors Influencing Cultural Background • Tendency to Reflect Mainstream Middle-Class Values • Disadvantages for Children from Other Cultures

31. Socioeconomic Status • What is Socioeconomic Status? • Levine and Levine’s (1996) Taxonomy • Upper Class (3 percent) • Upper Middle Class (22 percent) • Lower Middle Class (34 percent) • Upper Working Class (28 percent) • Lower Working Class (13 percent) • The Urban Underclass

32. Role of Child-Rearing Practices • Differences between Middle-Class and Working and Lower-Class Families • Kinds of Parent-Child Activities • Parental Expectations • Link between Income and Summer Learning

33. Role of Schools as Middle-Class Institutions • Competitive versus Cooperative Classroom and School Structure

34. School and Community Factors • Funding and Social Class • Differences between Schools Serving Lower- and Middle-Class Students

35. School and Community Factors • Factors Influencing Motivation, Achievement, and Mental Health in Very Impoverished Neighborhoods • Crime • Lack of Positive Role Models • Inadequate Social and Health Services

36. Is the Low Achievement of Children from Low-Income Groups Inevitable? • Intensive Interventions • Reductions in Class Size within Elementary Schools • Maximum of 15 to 1 Ratio • Reduction in School Size for Middle and High Schools

37. Implications for Teachers • Recognize Varying Degrees of Preparation. • Avoid Stereotypes, Low Expectations, and Self-Fulfilling Prophecies.

38. Racial and Ethnic Composition of the United States • Minority Group • Increasing Proportion of Nonwhites and Latinos • Implications for U.S. Education - NCLB

39. Academic Achievement of Minority-Group Students • Gap in Academic Achievement • Correspondence between Achievement Gaps and Differences in SES

40. Why Have Minority-Group Students Lagged in Achievement? • Socioeconomic Status • Unintentional and Under Qualified Teachers • Instruction Inconsistent with Culture • Low Expectations

41. Language Differences and Bilingual Programs • Language Minority • Limited English Proficiency (LEP) • English as a Second Language (ESL)

42. Quality Teaching and Quality Learning – Recommendations • Identify schools and teachers whose at-risk students are performing well on assessments • Interview these teachers about knowledge, skills, professional development, and conditions impacting their students’ performance • Observe in these classrooms utilizing framework checklist • Compile identified elements of the School Culture • In the future – videotape lessons for replication and training purposes Harrie L. Buecker

43. Harrie L. Buecker Assistant Superintendent Oldham County Schools Phone - (502) 222-8880 FAX – (502) 222-8885 E-mail hbuecker@oldham.k12.ky.us Harrie L. Buecker