DATE CHANGE: Broad Based Planning Meeting: February 6th, 4:15-5:15 p.m. PTEC 210

NAGC Teachers Summit: February 25-26th 11-4:30 p.m.

Just a little food for thought–recently, gifted educator Andi McNair did a series she called “IT’S THE WRONG WORD” to challenge us to think about 5 terms or phrases we use that we can update to be more accurate or positive in nature.

1. Out with the word FAILURE–instead of using the word failure which implies an end game, try using the word STRUGGLE. Continue to struggle until you find success!

2. Out with the words MY CLASSROOM–let’s refer to the classroom as YOUR LEARNING SPACE. Ownership is a powerful tool!

3. Out with the words PEER TUTORING–our gifted kids aren’t built in tutors, nor do our struggling students want to be carried by others. Instead, let’s build up all kids and call them THOUGHT PARTNERSHIPS. Everyone is required to participate in the thinking!

4. Out with the words REAL WORLD–what is happening in our classroom is the real world for our students for the foreseeable future. Let's refer to learning as INSIDE THE CLASSROOM versus OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM. What we are doing right now is important and applies today as well as life in the future!

5. Out with the word ACTIVITY–An activity is something to do, however an EXPERIENCE is something that leaves an impression. What experiences are you creating for your students?

To learn more from Andi, click here to follow her on Instagram!

This is a quick read that talks about how perfectionism, anxiety, and competition (traits common with HA students) affect how students interact with differing views and opinions from others and how validating their feelings is a useful strategy to help them cope.

As we are learning our new CKLA curriculum, sometimes a topic appears that you may not know exactly how to confront. For example, in the third grade curriculum, there is a Norse Myth that includes Thor using his hammer to kill an entire group of people and then going home to be a celebrated hero. My students were quite startled! “Is this school appropriate?” one asked. This was the perfect opportunity for me to use our Ethics Depth and Complexity icon to dig a little deeper with these young minds.

So I asked for help from my somewhat trusty partner, ChatGPT. Below are the list of provided questions that helped me to tailor a powerful conversation rich with deep thinking:

Fairness and Justice

• Was this event fair to everyone involved? Why or why not?

• How would you feel if you were treated this way?

• What could have been done to make this situation more fair?

Right vs. Wrong

• Why do you think people made the choices they did?

• How do we know if a decision was right or wrong?

• Were the rules or laws at the time fair to everyone?

Impact of Decisions

• How did the choices made during this event affect people’s lives?

• Did people have a choice in what happened to them?

• How might things have been different if people made other choices?

Responsibility and Consequences

• Who was responsible for what happened?

• What were the short-term and long-term effects of this event?

• How did this event shape the future?

Empathy and Perspective-Taking

• How do you think people felt during this time?

• If you could talk to someone from this event, what would you ask them?

• How would you explain this event to someone who wasn’t there?

In December, a team from our district attended an ILEARN Summit with the DOE. They shared resources and information on how to use ILEARN results. When we think of the ILEARN Checkpoint data, it is important to remember that the checkpoints are meant to be that, a pulse point on achievement and are meant to be used with the other data that we have: classroom assessments, mCLASS, Star, Aleks, to help make intervention decisions. When you click on the link below, it will take you to a folder with all Checkpoint Resources and links that I reference in this article.

I want to point out the stimulus specifications. This document will be for the 25-26 school year, but I wanted you to know about this resource. Stimulus specifications reference the media and complexity of text students are engaging with for each type. The left hand side of the screen is what is addressed in the stimulus. Item specifications address what is on the right hand side. This year 24-25 the PT changes are in Stimulus specifications. For example, the max level of passages for 5th-8th is two. Additionally there is one possible stem but it is a graphic or table that they can engage with. Middle level grade 4 is the lexile of writing tasks. Part 1 is the research question. There is only one question, a short constructed response item. It will ask students to provide evidence. It sets students up for whatever genre writing they have for part 2. Then they go to the essay and use the evidence in Part 1. Students will pull evidence in Part 1, then they are asked to apply why they pulled the evidence in Part 2. Conventions are not scored with constructed response items, they just want them to get the idea correct.

The next resource that I want to point out is the PLD Guide. As you are looking through your data, you see that you get a performance level descriptor and you may not know what to do with that! This PLD Guide shows that students may go through different learning progressions for each concept and across grades. This document was meant to be used to cross reference with classroom assessment to see where students are with each continuum. The goal is to support the student’s growth to the next proficiency level and then monitor the progress toward that goal. Students identified at Below proficiency may need scaffolding or intervention from prior grade levels in order to access grade level content and provide additional support. Students identified Above may have mastered all of the grade level standards. These students may be provided enrichment activities that explore the standard at a deeper level.

The first steps in looking at the ILEARN resources and assessment is to reference the instructional frameworks to identify what mastery of the standard looks like and what essential standards are identified (#1). This is what we used to call our Power Standards document that tells us essential standards assessed by ILEARN. Then, login to the CRS and look at the student overall domains. Students at or above grade level on the overall domain would continue to receive grade level instruction or enrichment as appropriate. Those that are approaching or below, consult the Assessment Frameworks (previously known as Blueprints). As you know, there are 2-4 standard assessed for each domain category (#2). Look at the PLD for each overall category for those that are at or below. Look at the PLD documents to see what they can do and the one above is what they can work on (#3). Then, consult the Item Specifications link (#4). This document tells you what the item types, rigor, and DOK is like at each level. Intervention can be focused on the level above to help the student reach the next proficiency level. Step #5, what do the subdomains tell us? First, think about the subdomain within the overall domain. Students with similar subdomain categories but different overall categories are different. You reference these domains with other data to see if foundational skills are being missed.

Let me know if you have questions or want to learn more about the ILEARN Checkpoint results. We are learning together how to use this information!

I have 130 students in the 8th grade. Out of my 130 students, I have chosen 24 “focus kids.” These are kids that I have identified using ILEARN data, CogAT data, school-wide common assessments, and my own classroom assessments. When looking at this data, I noticed these 25 are not performing to their potential and I see a significant potential to help them bump up to the next level on ILEARN. Some are “at proficiency” that should be “above” proficiency based on their CogAT scores and high ability label. Some are “approaching proficiency” on ILEARN and should be passing or above. After I used this data to identify them, I am continually looking for ways to intervene and help push them to the next level. Applying these actions to the MTSS framework means I have used data that all students have taken at the tier 1 level and have determined this group needs to have tier 2 support in place.

Below is an example of the data sheet I used to identify my 24 focus students. I have this same data set for all 130 students. I identified these 24 based on their potential to perform to a higher level. Some of the students on this list passed ILEARN last year. However, they are labeled as high ability which means at some point they were identified in the 96th percentile of all students in their grade level for the potential to perform at that high level. In order to serve my high ability students, that is what we are trying to achieve. Other students on this list are labeled by my school as advanced and in regular English classes. Some of those students are trying to reach proficiency and some of them are trying to reach above proficiency. Of all these levels, we all have goals to improve.

Labeling them and setting goals to improve isn’t enough. We have to put targeted interventions in place for them and the students have to own their goals. In our building, we give common assessments. Those common assessments are created by our departments with a direct correlation to the state’s blueprints for English language arts. These assessments are an integral part of my targeted interventions.

Below are two charts of my own analysis from two common assessments we have given this year to all 8th graders in our building. Both assessments contained questions relating to the same argument standard. I closely monitor the progress of these 24 students, after I have done all tier 1 instruction, feedback, and reteaching. When looking closer at the 24, I am looking for patterns. I ask myself, is there a student who is consistently struggling? Is there a student who could benefit from more individualized instruction, more specific feedback or additional instruction? We meet as a grade level team to discuss these questions and the progress of our focus groups. In this data, there is a pattern noticeable for student H and student L. There is also a clear pattern in the questions that were missed overall by the group. In class I will use the most missed questions as a bell ringer for all students to consider again and I will reteach strategies for that skill. Following the reteaching with bell ringers, I invited students H and L to come into my room during our flexible homeroom advisory time to try new questions and teach direct metacognition strategies for this skill. I also provided an open invitation to the 24 students on the list to come in and practice again if they feel they need extra practice. This allows me to hold students H and L accountable while also providing the option for others to own their education and receive extra help, too.

These supports I have put in place for this focus group help me feel less overwhelmed. Of course I give tier 1 instruction to all students and help all students as the need arises but when I know I have 24 kids to give my intentional best, it certainly feels less overwhelming than 130. It is also clear from the tier 1 assessments I give in my classroom, not all 130 need further, focused instruction. However, the data shows that some students do need tier 2 and tier 3 support and that is what I am striving to provide daily through this process. We will measure if it is working by keeping track of patterns on the large data sheet. The more students receive GREEN scores that indicate improvement or passing scores, the more I can visually see patterns of the students who are growing and the students who are not and make the adjustments I need.

If you would like help creating a spreadsheet for your own students, discussing how to provide targeted interventions, or monitoring the data to find patterns and identify their needs, please reach out. We are happy to support you. Any step you can take to help a student improve is a step in the right direction!

Teacher rating scales went out for students in Grades 2 & 5 who are on the bubble of qualifying in Math or ELA. If you have a student in this category, you should have received an email from SIGS-2 when we returned from break on 1/8/25. Those scales are due on 1/31/25. They help our identification committee make decisions. K CogAT scores will be inputted into Skyward under Test Scores shortly. All of the CogAT profile reports will be shared electronically with building administrators and printed for student files. Each student profile has an Ability Profile in the lower left hand corner if they took all subtests. You can go to www.cogat.com to use the Ability Profile to get a view of the student's strengths, challenges, and strategies to support. Students who scored an 80th-95th percentile on one of the CogAT batteries will take the NWEA in March before Spring Break.

The HA Licensure program is a 4-course program that focuses on the needs for high ability learners, curriculum, and programming support. Ball State University, IU Southeast, and Purdue have programs. Reach out to Kim Jovic if you are interested. We have a district agreement to review with details on the reimbursement.