Quality Teacher & Education Act Impact & Innovation Awards 2013

IMPACT STRATEGY #1
Goal: Access and Equity The gap between ELs and non- ELs is significant at our site. In 2012 the gap between our school wide and ELs proficiency levels was 18%. In terms of language proficiency, we had 109 EL students. 47 Developing, 54 Newcomers, 8 Long Term ELs. In 2012, 40% of our ELs gained at least 1 level of language proficiency. Strategy: Strengthening the English Instruction time in DLI Program and ELD Last school year, we focused on strengthening the English Instruction time for our ELs in Dual Language programs and in ELD professional development for teachers. We noticed that the English instruction for our ELs in Dual Language pathways was missing a systematic direct instruction of how English language works/ the foundational skills phonics. As a result, we focused on providing professional development for teachers to deepen their understanding of how to incorporate this component during their Spanish/ English Biliteracy Transfer (SEBT) time as well as Essential Elements of ELD. We also noticed that during ELD instruction, students were not asked to read. We decided to incorporate the reading and writing component during ELD. Since 14 out of 15 teachers had just participated in the Readers Workshop PD presented by Teachers College staff, we decided to implement Interactive Read Aloud during ELD instruction using Fiction and Non Fiction Texts. We provided guided reading instruction in English starting in second grade for ELs students in the dual language pathways and extended time to read non- fiction texts during ELD. We also partnered with our afterschool programs, EXCEL and EED and created monthly collaboration meetings with on site afterschool programs. This strategy aimed to support the implementation of daily, leveled reading time. Our EXCEL teacher leader and our EED teacher leader collaborated to create a leveled books lender library. Our Literacy specialist trained afterschool teachers on the leveled books system and how to support students to select books during afterschool reading time. We monitored this effort using classroom visits and feedback to afterschool teachers. The students reading stamina increased as a result of this effort. Our overall Spring CLAs ELA #3 shows that 60% of our ELs were at Benchmark and Challenge proficient levels. Our CST ELA Spring 2013 results showed that students at Daniel Webster are at 42% proficient. This is a +10% growth from the previous year. Our achievement change data in ELA showed a 17.1 % positive growth on the number of English Learners at the proficient level.

IMPACT STRATEGY #2
Goal: Academic Achievement Strategy: Deepening understanding of math CCSS through the use of MARS and performance tasks assessments. Last year in August we created math units under the following guiding principles: The Unit plans are organized around the Common Core State Standards (CCSS).
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Quality Teacher & Education Act Impact & Innovation Awards 2013 Everyday Math is the core instructional resource for unit plans. MARS benchmark assessments guide planning and are used to monitor progress.

Teachers will organize daily, weekly, and unit plans based on their grade level experience and knowledge of the students. During grade level meetings, teachers reviewed math student performance data. At these meetings, we implemented collaborative Mars benchmark assessments where teachers collaborated to analyze student work, using the Mars rubrics. At the math data meetings, teachers received support to use the data to plan for instruction. Lesson Study Group: 4 classroom teachers and the IRF engaged in a lesson study group with the SVIM. Through this group, teachers co-planed math lessons, observed each other teaching and then met to analyze students responses during the lesson. Teachers reported that as a result of their participation on these groups they grew as educators in the following ways: 1) increased their abilities to support students to engaged in math conversations in their classrooms; 2) awareness of the shift / rigor that the new CCSS for mathematics are asking students to perform. Math Interventions: We also implemented math intervention groups using EPGY. In January, a paraprofessional was hired to support the implementation of an EPGY math intervention program. Small group intervention groups meet in the computer lab for their EPGY intervention time. Partnership with The Afterschool Programs: Afterschool teachers received training on implementing EPGY during afterschool hours by facilitators from Stanford University. Monthly meetings between the principal and the afterschool supervisors (EED & EXCEL-ASEP) occurred to monitor the implementation of this intervention. As a result of this work, our overall CST- Math Spring results showed an 11% improvement from the previous year.