Raising the Bar and Closing the Gap by DuFour Richard;DuFour Rebecca; & Rebecca DuFour & Robert Eaker & Gayle Karhanek

Author:DuFour, Richard;DuFour, Rebecca; & Rebecca DuFour & Robert Eaker & Gayle Karhanek
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Solution Tree
Published: 2010-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

Laying the Groundwork for Intervention

In order to provide teachers with time to collaborate, Principal Brasic and the leadership team created a schedule that gives every department common planning time every day. Wednesdays are considered sacred, the day that every course-specific team designates for collaboration on the critical questions of a PLC. Every teacher is expected to honor that commitment, and the administration protects teams from any intrusions on their Wednesday meeting time. Each administrator serves as a liaison to a particular department and supports the teams of that department.

Katy teachers have addressed the question, what do we want our students to learn, by becoming students of the Katy Management of Automated Curriculum—the district’s online curriculum guide. This tool, created with the input of teachers throughout the district, suggests essential outcomes and recommended pacing for each course. It also includes lesson-planning tools and research-based strategies for differentiating instruction. The mathematics, English, and foreign language departments have also created vertical teams with the middle schools to ensure a strong scope and sequence in their curricula that avoid redundancy and address essential knowledge and skills.

Cinco Ranch uses a variety of tools to monitor student learning. Teachers are provided with a comprehensive overview of the assessment results for each of their students at the start of each school year. The district’s science and mathematics teachers have created common core objectives tests and administer common district assessments in mathematics every nine weeks and in science every six weeks. The school also administers released sets of the state examination once each year to monitor the potential success of each student on this high-stakes test. Although the state sets the proficiency score at 2100, any Cinco Ranch student who scores below 2300 on the practice test is identified for intervention. Finally, each course-specific team at the school has developed a series of common formative assessments that it uses throughout the year to monitor each student’s learning on an ongoing basis.

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