Thoughts on the SBAC Digital Library

I decided to update this blog post after recently exploring the library. Many resources have been added since I attended the training. I do still believe that some educators will be disappointed in the Digital Library if they confuse it for the SBAC interim assessments that have not been released yet. 

I also wanted to share screen casts of what it looks like to search the library for resources. Flash player is required.

Digital Library Resources For Mathematics

Digital Library Resources For English Language Arts 

Original Post

Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium maintains an online bank of resources, the Digital Library, to support teachers as they prepare students for the SBAC exams. Today, June 30th, I attended a workshop on the Digital Library.

A few observations:

1.) The digital library is not an assessment bank. According to our trainer, SBAC interim assessments will be available in December or January.

2.) The resource is primarily designed to model formative assessment practices. Animated vignettes of teaching practices, rubrics, model lesson plans for performance events, and information on techniques such exit slips and quiz, quiz trade are available. General instructional strategies make up more of the library than content specific, grade level resources.

3.) The library is designed for easy use. Users can filter resources by grade level and subject area.

4.) The resources in the library are high quality. An intensive vetting process was used to select resources.

5.) Perhaps, due to intensive vetting the amount of content is limited at this time.

For example:

A filtered search for resources designed to support seventh grade instruction for Reading Informational Texts Standard 4 (vocabulary in context) provided one resource, a video of quiz, quiz trade protocol from a fourth grade classroom.

A filtered search for resources designed to support seventh grade instruction for Mathematics G.B.4 (circumference) returned no results.

It is important to note that content is still being uploaded. Two resources were uploaded during the training.

So how should the Digital Library be used? It depends.

While some model lesson plans include reproducible assessments, teachers looking for digital or reproducible classroom activities for students will most likely be frustrated. However, the more time I spent in the library, the more material I found that would help classroom teachers in lesson design.  For example, a resource titled "Flustered by Fractions," included a clip from American Choppers and instructions on how to use the clip in a lesson.

For administrators the digital library could be a resource to supplement professional development on formative assessment. It could also serve as resource for curriculum writers looking for models endorsed by SBAC.

I would be interested in hearing how others plan to use this tool.

Will Common Core be the end of National Poetry Month?

April is an interesting month in a middle school. Weather and students undergo dramatic changes. Forces of meteorology, biology, and accountability, in the form of state assessments,  all threaten the calm of a building. Fortunately, this month I've watched an equally powerful opposite force push against Spring Fever's inertia: National Poetry Month. The ELA teachers with whom I work dedicated a great deal of class time to poetry writing this April.

Our building is better for it.

Here are three reasons why the practice should continue even as standards change.

1.) The Common Core does not prohibit poetry.
Seventh grade ELA writing standards make no mention of poetry writing, and while there are voices making logical connections between CCSS and poetry, the standards clearly emphasize informational and persuasive writing. There are good reasons for this; however, as the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education  states the standards are not the only concepts that should be taught.

"The aim of the Standards is to articulate the fundamentals, not to set out an exhaustive list or a set of restrictions that limits what can be taught beyond what is specified herein."

Removing poetry writing from ELA curriculum in the name of CCSS is unnecessary.

2.) Poetry writing promotes intellectual development.
Rigor is an impossible word to avoid in conversations regarding CCSS. A clear treatment of rigor can be found in Justin Tarte's blog. Poetry writing, as much as any other classroom activity, addresses qualities of rigorous instruction. Few activities require more complexity and depth.

3.) Poetry writing promotes interpersonal development.
A peer editing session of robust persuasive essays will not cultivate relationships as well as a peer editing session of meager poems. This is true even for poetry written by the uninterested, but as ELA teachers know there are middle school poets who take great interest in their work. Often these are the students who miss deadlines. Some of the best middle school poems written are submitted after the due date. Praise to those who accept this late work! In these poems, students reveal themselves. And their struggles. Poetry writing, as much as any other classroom activity, has the power to close what John Hattie calls the empathy gap.  There is much value in this.

There are good reasons to support the CCSS, but I do not think CCSS should be the limit to what is taught in an ELA classroom. In spite of, or better said because of, CCSS's omission of poetry writing, teachers should be diligent in their efforts to include it in their curriculum.

Troy

Four Reasons Common Core Should Stay

"When I was in kindergarten I ate glue."

Many people in my circle of friends hold a negative view of the Common Core State Standards. While I respect differences of opinion, I feel compelled to offer my thoughts on why I support the Common Core State Standards. As an educator, and as a parent, I have a unique interest in the shift to the new standards. As the Curriculum Director for my school district, the last year of my professional life has been spent wrestling with the standards in fairly intense ways. I believe I know what the standards are, and I believe I know what they are not.

Here are four reasons I support the standards.
1.) Standards vs. Curriculum: The difference between standards and curriculum is important. Standards refer to specific content and skills. A curriculum details how those standards are taught. CCSS does not mandate how the content knowledge and skills should be taught. Such decisions are left to teachers and leaders at the local level. While many criticisms I see focus on perceived weakness of a curriculum from an anonymous or distant school, I see few criticism of specific standards.  Criticizing specific standards amounts to saying students should not be required to memorize multiplication tables, or spell words correctly.

multiplication standard
spelling standard

2.) The Value of Clarity: One value of the Common Core State Standards is that they are clearly written, and compared to other sets of standards I have seen, they are fairly limited in scope. In thirty minutes a person could read all of the standards for their child's grade in mathematics. The language arts standards could be read in an additional thirty.

mathematics standards
English language arts standards

I will be the first to admit that I have reservations about the role of standardized testing in America. Many attempts to hold schools accountable seem misguided to me. However, if we must have tests, it is only fair to our students and teachers to have clear standards for what is to be tested.

3.) Effects of Disruption: The Common Core State Standards have been influencing educators since they were first introduced by Republican governors in 2009. Teachers have expended tremendous amounts of effort aligning curriculum and assessments to the standards. If political leaders were to force an abandonment of the standards now, for reasons having much more to do with political strategy than regard for students, the efforts of those teachers would have been wasted. The disruption would be compounded further because most opponents of the core have no suggestion for replacement standards. The disruption would negatively impact students.

4.) Benefits for Kids: One final reason, perhaps the most important reason, why I support the Common Core State Standards is that I believe the new standards can be good for kids. The new standards are more rigorous, but our kids will benefit from being challenged to engage in a greater complexity of thought. I'll close with examples of two specific students, a kindergartner and a fourth grader.

In a recent professional development session I led, I used a video of a kindergartner reading a paragraph she wrote explaining why she would choose to have Bengal tiger teeth, if she had to have animal teeth. When I was in kindergarten I ate glue and slept on a mat. Now students are writing paragraphs. This is a direct response to this standard.

The fourth grader wrote a multi-page essay about Scott Joplin. The essay was typed and distributed digitally to her father, who was proud. The length of the essay was a response to this standard.

The technological component to the assignment was a response to this standard.

That fourth grader is my daughter, Laney. The Common Core State Standards, taught by a truly talented teacher forced her to stretch and grow.

Before doing anything to disrupt that kind of experience, we should all pause.

Troy