Integrating 21st Century Learning Into A Danielson Modeled Classroom

The central idea of this book are the seven principles or levers that leads to continuous and transformational greatness. These seven principles or levers are divided into two categories Instruction and culture. According to Bambrick without great instructions, there is no student achievement thus no greatness for schools. Instructions include data driven instructions, observations and feedback, planning, and professional development. The book explains that data driven instruction is the instructional manual for rigor, because to be great one cannot know if students are making or not making achievement without data. Instructional practices driven by data yields significant student achievement gains (Bambrick, 2012).

As a teacher I use formative and summative data to drive my instruction. As I start with the state standard for the lesson and plan a formative assessment on that skill before a summative assessment. In years prior our school district used the platform of Performance Matter to collect data of that grade level standards three times a year. This type of information set in with Dr. Scott McLeod (20??) essential concepts. “The five major elements of data-driven instruction are: good baseline, measurable instructional goals, frequent formative assessment, professional learning communities, and focused instructional interventions (pp. 1-2, 20??). The assessment gave teachers a baseline, mid-year, and end year focus. When the teacher delved into the platform each question was broken down each standard and concept, thus allowing teacher to provide adequate instructional goal to meet the students’ needs. Teachers would also look at past state standardized testing to determine what if any remediation is needed. As a principal, he/she/I needs to understand the data elements to schedule necessary people and aid for the professional development communities.

The entire Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium Standards focus on actions/ skills that leaders should be modeling in their schools, and there is not one standard that is more important than another. Leaders should be concentrating on how to make the learning environment more effective for student learning. In this essay I will give the challenges faced in that standard and the purpose of the standards and how do they impact that educational community.

The major emphasis in education for the 21st century is on data driven accountability measured by student performance on standardized testing. National and state expectations require students to demonstrate mastery of curriculum objectives. Instructional objectives are the focus of the building principals to show measurable student progress. The improvements are evaluated based on data and monitoring of the curriculum.

Today, many states and schools systems are adopting a standards based education system. In fact, according to Common Core Standards Initiative (2014), forty-three states, the District of Columbia, four territories, and the Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) have adopted the Common Core State Standards. The premise is that if all critical subject areas follow a standard from state to state, that all students will receive the same and fair education. The Vermont State Board of Education saw a need and a value in implementing such a system. As such, the Board created a strategic plan to implement a framework of standards that would eventually adopt the common core standards. This paper will discuss the strategic plan created by the Vermont Board of Education and evaluate whether or not the goals of the plan were met through the Framework of Standards.

While standards and assessments tell us whether students are gaining the skills and knowledge they need, accountability systems say that if they aren’t, schools and districts have to take steps to improve. This expectation of action is critical if we want all students to graduate high school ready for whatever they wish to do next – be it attend college, train for a job that will allow them to support a

The No Child Left Behind act emerged as a result of a massive increase in the costs of schools, while failing to show an improvement in their students performances. (Paterson 32) Since these standardized test have been in effect teachers have been judged off them. The problem is that

Our parish has seen a drop in the math scores with the new PARCC test. With this weakness being of the utmost importance, a responsible district leader, should engage in professional practice by ensuring that their administrators and teachers are working as a team to improve student achievement. Everyone should work together in order to promote positive change concerning this districts math scores. Observations should be conducted by the administrators and by district level supervisors in order to find any strength and weaknesses that may need to be addressed. ISLLC standard 2, states that the school administrator should sustain an instructional program conducive to student learning and staff professional growth. In order to do this, everyone on the team must be open to diversity and innovation, which includes the constructive criticism from the Danielson Rubric used during observations, and adoption of new curriculums. The district level supervisors have to provide professional development for all teachers in order to implement a new curriculum

This is putting a lot pressure on teachers and is resulting in “Teaching to the Test”, which means they are spending a great amount of time teaching students only the objectives that they know will be on the test. This is only a small sample of what students should be taught throughout the school year. Another effect of these evaluations is the loss of effective teachers. A survey by NEA Today showed that nearly forty-five percent of teachers have or have contemplated leaving their profession. It is clear to see teachers’ evaluations need less emphasis on their students’ standardized test scores and more on their ability to teach. This would allow teachers to teach a wider range of objectives and be evaluated on their ability to teach and not their students

By believing that instructors are the most important influence in a child’s education, teachers are given an unrealistic responsibility. Many policymakers believe that holding educators accountable for student success is the best way to improve public education. This asks educators to overcome these outside variables that are far outside of teachers’ control. Policymakers suggested linking teacher evaluations to student achievement, measured by standardized tests. This is not a beneficial way to hold teachers accountable because of the many outside factors that affect student achievement. A better way to hold teachers accountable is to stem out of a realistic perspective on what teachers can and should do for their students. Each part of society holds an important responsibility in increasing student achievement. Teachers should not be asked to be responsible for more than they can handle.

Before the birth of Common Core, Illinois like many other states had its learning standards to identify what students should know and be able to do pertinent to their grade levels. Implementing such standards caused many Chicago Public Schools (CPS) to end up on academic probation, due to low test scores and failure to progress students to proficiency levels in core subjects like reading and math. In fact, Chicago Tonight reports that only 35 percent of eighth graders across the country meet proficiency standards in reading while only 25 percent of high school seniors that took the SAT examination showed college readiness through their test scores.

Introduction: Mr. Nichols thanked everyone for attending. He explained why the subcommittee was developed; the goal is to have a workable plan ready for the fall. Mrs. Everly thanked Mr. Nichols for his leadership on the Board, and by bringing this conversation to the table, we can only get better. At the administrator meeting last week with Mrs. Joseph, administrators talked about the communication issues within the discipline process that need to be worked out; there is a need to tighten up communication between the office and teacher. Mr. Nichols noted that central office administrators have already been working very hard on this subject, but he thinks it is important for administrators to receive input from teachers and parents.

School reform pushes school systems to evaluate their current teaching practices. Policies and teaching mandates are making hefty demands on teachers and students, as we increase rigor and complexity of tasks. The scope of the content covered in our classrooms has been narrowed, but deepened. Students are being asked to master critical concepts to be able to hypothesize, analyze, and apply their learning to real world problems. Teachers are being asked to become masters of their content, skillfully identifying instructional moves that help students gain new understandings. This shift in pedagogy has educators moving away from traditional teacher centered instruction and move toward student-oriented learning activities. Teaching decisions are anchored to state standards, updated curricula,

Change is inevitable. When the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) initiative finally became defunct, a new accountability system emerged. In San Francisco Unified School District, central administrative teams began a transition phase starting as early as four to five years ago when Common Core State Standards were introduced to low performing schools. As the Instructional Reform Facilitator during that time, it was exciting because new and more robust learning/content standards also required a change in our approach to instruction and assessment. This was the lever in my mind that this could help close the achievement gap. However this new initiative also brings uncertainty and apprehension for many teachers.

by Karen Dorgan — 2004 This qualitative research project studied the efforts of a small public elementary school over the course of 1 academic year to meet higher standards imposed by the state. The state's department of education defined school success in terms of the percentage of students passing a set of multiple-choice, standardized tests in four core areas of the curriculum. The study looked particularly at strategies the school applied in an attempt to raise students' mathematics test scores. Interviews, classroom observations, and document analysis were used to analyze the effects of new