Imagine a school with a diverse student body where everyone feels safe and valued, and all—regardless of race, culture, home language, sexual orientation, gender identity, academic history, and individual challenges—have the opportunity to succeed with interesting classes, projects, and activities. In this school, teachers notice and meet individual instructional needs and foster a harmonious and supportive environment. All students feel empowered to learn, to grow, and to pursue their dreams. This is the school every student needs and deserves. In Building Equity , Dominique Smith, Nancy Frey, Ian Pumpian, and Douglas Fisher, colleagues at San Diego’s innovative Health Sciences High & Middle College, introduce the Building Equity Taxonomy, a new model to clarify the structural and interpersonal components of an equitable and excellent schooling experience, and the Building Equity Review and Audit, survey-based tools to help school and teacher leaders uncover equity-related issues and organize their efforts to achieve Physical integration Social-emotional engagement Opportunity to learn Instructional excellence Engaged and inspired learners Built on the authors’ own experiences and those of hundreds of educators throughout the United States, this book is filled with examples of policy initiatives and practices that support high-quality, inclusive learning experiences and deliver education that meets critical standards of equality and equity.
Grades are imperfect, shorthand answers to “What did students learn, and how well?” In How to Use Grading to Improve Learning, best-selling author Susan M. Brookhart guides educators at all levels in figuring out how to produce grades—for single assignments and report cards—that accurately communicate students’ achievement of learning goals. Brookhart explores topics that are fundamental to effective grading and learning practices: Acknowledging that all students can learn Supporting and motivating student effort and learning Designing and grading appropriate assessments Creating policies for report card grading Implementing learning-focused grading policies Communicating with students and parents Assessing school or district readiness for grading reform The book is grounded in research and resonates with the real lessons learned in the classroom. Although grading is a necessary part of schooling, Brookhart reminds us that children are sent to school to learn, not to get grades. This highly practical book will help you put grading and learning into proper perspective, offering strategies you can use right away to ensure that your grading practices actually support student learning.
How do you know if students are with you at the beginning, middle, and end of a lesson? Can formative assessment offer a key to better teaching and learning during instruction? What if you could blend different formative assessment moves in your classroom, with intention and care for all students, to help make better instructional decisions on the fly and enjoy more teachable moments? Educators Brent Duckor and Carrie Holmberg invite you on the journey to becoming a formative assessor. They encourage you to focus on these seven research-based, high-leverage formative assessment moves: Priming – building on background knowledge and creating a formative assessment–rich, equitable classroom culture Posing – asking questions in relation to learning targets across the curriculum that elicit Habits of Mind Pausing – waiting after powerful questions and rich tasks to encourage more student responses by supporting them to think aloud and use speaking and listening skills related to academic language Probing – deepening discussions, asking for elaborations, and making connections using sentence frames and starters Bouncing – sampling student responses systematically to broaden participation, manage flow of conversation, and gather more “soft data” for instructional use Tagging – describing and recording student responses without judgment and making public how students with different styles and needs approach learning in real-time Binning – interpreting student responses with a wide range of tools, categorizing misconceptions and “p-prims,” and using classroom generated data to make more valid and reliable instructional decisions on next steps in the lesson and unit Each chapter explores a classroom-tested move, including foundational research, explaining how and when to best use it, and describing what it looks like in practice. Highlights include case studies, try-now tasks and tips, and advice from beginning and seasoned teachers who use these formative assessment moves in their classrooms.
For years, students in the United States have lagged behind students in many other countries on such measures of achievement as the PISA and TIMSS assessments. In an increasingly globalized world, such a gap is worrisome. Armed with statistics, examples, and cautionary tales from Scandinavia to Japan, James H. Stronge and Xianxuan Xu have written a book that can help educators better prepare students and close that gap. In What Makes a World-Class School and How We Can Get There , you will find Careful analysis of recent international assessment results—what they mean and what can be done to improve them. In-depth profiles of high-achieving education systems around the globe—their histories, their lessons learned, and what they can teach educators and policymakers in the United States. Strategies for aligning successful educational approaches from international systems to U.S. schools—which strategies to use, in which subjects, and with which students. Transformative ideas for cultivating a truly world-class system of schooling—both simple and complex ways to raise the bar for all students, no matter what their background. Educators in every country must ensure that their students are as prepared as possible to lead a future generation of citizens. This thought-provoking and copiously researched book provides educators with a blueprint for radical improvement based on the hard-learned experiences of their peers around the world.
While students who enter a new school must learn to adapt to a new situation, multilingual students who enter a new school must often first learn to adapt to a new country and a new language—and they must be assessed along with their peers. In Assessing Multilingual Learners , author Margo Gottlieb presents the story of Ana, a newcomer to the United States and the American school system and, in a month-by-month format, reveals how assessment affects students, teachers, families, and school leaders. This book shows teachers how to collect, analyze, and act upon data about multilingual learners, with the goal of improving instruction for this large and growing population of students.
In The Coach Approach to School Leadership , Jessica Johnson, Shira Leibowitz, and Kathy Perret address a dilemma faced by many principals: how to function as learning leaders while fulfilling their evaluative and management duties. The answer? Incorporating instructional coaching techniques as an integral part of serious school improvement. The authors explain how principals can Master the skill of "switching hats" between the nonjudgmental coach role and the evaluative supervisor role. Expand their classroom visits and combine coaching with evaluation requirements. Nurture relationships with teachers and build a positive school culture. Provide high-quality feedback to support the development of both teachers and students. Empower teachers to lead their own professional learning and work together as a team. Drawing from the authors' work with schools as well as their conversations with educators across the globe, this thought-provoking book speaks to the unique needs of principals as instructional leaders, providing solutions to challenges in every aspect of this complex endeavor. The role of the principal is changing at a rapid pace. Let this resource guide you in improving your own practice while helping teachers master the high-quality instruction that leads to student success.
Unlike “fix-it” strategies that targeted teachers are likely to resist, educator-centered instructional coaching—ECIC—offers respectful coaching for professionals within their schoolwide community. Evidence-based results across all content areas, authentic practices for data collection and analysis, along with nonevaluative, confidential collaboration offer a productive and promising path to teacher development. Coaches and teachers implement ECIC through a before-during-after—BDA—cycle that includes comprehensive planning between coach and teacher; classroom visitation and data collection; and debriefing and reflection. Drawing on their extensive experience with ECIC, authors Ellen B. Eisenberg, Bruce P. Eisenberg, Elliott A. Medrich, and Ivan Charner offer this detailed guidance for coaches and school leaders on how you and your school can create the conditions for an effective ECIC program, get buy-in from teachers, clearly define the role of coach, roll out a coaching initiative, and ensure ongoing success with coaching. Filled with authentic advice from coaches, Instructional Coaching in Action provides valuable insight and demonstrates how educator-centered instructional coaching can make a difference in teacher learning, instructional practice, and student outcomes.
Teachers view homework as an opportunity for students to continue learning after the bell rings. For many students, it’s often just the dreaded “H” word. How can educators change the way students view homework while ensuring that they still benefit from the additional learning it provides? It’s easy. Flip the learning! In Solving the Homework Problem by Flipping the Learning , Jonathan Bergmann, the co-founder of the flipped learning concept, shows you how. The book outlines why traditional homework causes dread and frustration for students, how flipped learning—completing the harder or more analytical aspects of learning in class as opposed to having students do it on their own—improves student learning, and how teachers can create flipped assignments that both engage students and advance student learning. Bergmann introduces the idea of flipped videos, and provides step-by-step guidance to make them effective. The book also includes useful forms, a student survey, and a sample letter to send to parents explaining the flipped learning concept. You want your students to learn, and your students want learning to be accessible. With that in mind, read through these pages, flip the learning in your classroom, and watch students get excited about homework!
Teaching in the Fast Lane offers teachers a way to increase student engagement: an active classroom. The active classroom is about creating learning experiences differently, so that students engage in exploration of the content and take on a good share of the responsibility for their own learning. It's about students reaching explicit targets in different ways, which can result in increased student effort and a higher quality of work. Author Suzy Pepper Rollins details how to design, manage, and maintain an active classroom that balances autonomy and structure. She offers student-centered, practical strategies on sorting, station teaching, and cooperative learning that will help teachers build on students' intellectual curiosity, self-efficacy, and sense of purpose. Using the strategies in this book, teachers can strategically «let go» in ways that enable students to reach their learning targets, achieve more, be motivated to work, learn to collaborate, and experience a real sense of accomplishment.
In Peer Feedback in the Classroom , National Board Certified Teacher Starr Sackstein explores the powerful role peer feedback can play in learning and teaching. Peer feedback gives students control over their learning, increases their engagement and self-awareness as learners, and frees up the teacher to provide targeted support where it's needed. Drawing from the author's successful classroom practices, this compelling book will help you Gain a deeper understanding of what meaningful feedback looks like and how it can be used as a tool for learning. Establish a respectful, student-led learning environment that supports risk taking and honest sharing. Teach students to be adept peer strategists who can pinpoint areas of needed growth and move forward with specific strategies for improvement. Develop cooperative student expert groups to help sustain effective peer feedback throughout the year. Use technology to enhance collaboration, streamline the learning and revision process, and strengthen students' digital citizenship skills. The book also includes extended reflections that express, in students' and teachers' own words, the approach's powerful effect on their practice. Invite students to be your partners in learning, and enrich your collective classroom experience.