Maximizing Instructional Time at Aspire Port City Academy / Stockton, CA

he seventeen items that comprise Principal: Shelby Scheideman Mondays thirdgrade schedule at School schedule: 8:00am3:20pm Aspire Port City Academy Early release: 8:00am12:40pm (Wed.) (PCA), in Stockton, Additional time compared to California, begin at the top of the white board and surrounding district: 60 min/day stretch all the way to the and 3 days/year bottom, like a long grocery Student Population list. 9:009:15: Calendar Math9:159:30: Roll Grades served: K5 and Write and 11:00 Number of students: 405 12:00: Writers Workshop Qualify for free/reduced lunch: 82% are just a few of the items to be covered throughout Students Scoring At or Above Proficient the day. Each activity on the California State Test in 2010 varies in length between 15 (difference compared to surrounding and 90 minutes. Students district) enter into the classroom, ELA: 67% (+33%) take out their homework, and begin to work on a set Math: 84% (+40%) of problems posted on the boardall without any direction from the teacher. Even with an expanded schedule, teachers and administrators intentionally develop and teach protocols to minimize non-instructional time, and they plan for each instructional minute to maximize instructional time. By effectively leveraging instructional time in its expanded day, the school has produced impressive results: In 2010, Port City Academy scored 837 on Californias academic performance index (API), which uses a scale of 200 to 1,000 to measure student growth using various state tests. California considers a score of 800 to indicate high levels of student growth. As one of 30 Aspire schools across California, PCAs curricular and instructional strategies are developed by, and handed down from, the network. The time allotted for each of the subjects comes from research-based instructional guidelines provided by Aspire, says Shelby Scheideman, principal of PCA. The schools instructional guidelines for language arts and math serve as the manuals for teaching short, 15-minute lessons, such as Calendar Math and Roll and Write, which are incorporated into a teachers lessons each day. The Aspire

Aspire Port City Academy

instructional guidelines are a great resource for me to find different ways to teach language arts and math that hit on the different ways my students learn best, says Sokheap Heng, a fifth-grade teacher at PCA. For each strategy, the guidelines outline specific content resources, assessments, and frequency with which they should be taught. When these strategies are implemented in PCA classrooms, the result is a fast-paced, individualized learning environment. During a 90-minute reading lesson, students may receive whole class instruction for only 10 minutes; for the remaining 80 minutes, students are separated into three groups, based on needs, and the teacher spends time working with students in each small group. The instructional guidelines call for a lot of mini-lessons, a lot of moving around in centers and workshops, continues Principal Scheideman. We believe that this enables our teachers to make the most of their time in their class and target students who need the support. To smooth transitions between activities, Aspire teachers explicitly communicate directions, use a stopwatch to time students between activities, and devote time at the beginning of the school year to teach routines and assign student roles aimed to minimize transition time. In addition to arming teachers with effective small group strategies, PCA also gives them time to identify student needs and plan strong lessons. Along with a daily prep period, PCA teachers meet each week with their grade-level peers. During these times, faculty review weekly and benchmark assessment data to identify students who need additional support, along with intervention staff to work further with them, and also to plan small-group lessons or assign after-school supports. Having the time to look at the data and plan instruction that fits each students needs is a big part of what we do, explains Scheideman. It allows for each teachers time with the students to be as meaningful as possible.

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