PLCs and Moving Instruction Forward

Team,

This week, please continue to discuss norms for your PLCs and review the four questions that must drive every PLC:

1. What do we expect students to learn (goals and expectations)?
2. How will we know when they've learned it (assessment)?
3. How will we respond when they don't learn it (intervention)?
4. How will we respond if they already know it (advanced/gifted)?

Everything we do fits along a continuum of teaching and learning.  Think about this as you plan for instruction, measure student progress, and plan next steps with your PLC.

• Planning for instruction:  Preparation is key - we start with the end in mind -- (PLC questions 1 & 2).  Plan instruction to engage students geared towards the end goal -- how will they be assessed, meaning how will you know they have learned the information/skills/concepts.
• Preparation means minimal downtime -- students should be able to move from one activity to the next -- implement a timer to stay on track.
• Teacher Clarity:  How will you scaffold the steps for students?  This creates a check list for you and students as they move towards meeting or exceeding the learning standard.  This easily lends itself to goal setting and student self-assessment, which promotes engagement and motivation.
• Response and Intervention:  Daily formative assessment allows us to better respond to student needs.  These daily checks measure if students understood the learning target and can perform the skill or apply the concept immediately following the lesson.
• If students are not able to apply the skill or concept (question 3), you can make an adjustment for the next day's instruction for students who fit this criteria.
• If students are able to easily meet the expectation (question 4), how can you differentiate for students to push/elevate their learning and application.

This is all part of teaching -- the daily expectation for our profession of education.  We are not hoping students master material, we are purposefully planning and setting up the environment so that students are successful.

Thanks for your professionalism each day, have a great week!

We do have a KDE training for KPREP this Thursday from 4:15-7:15 for all who participate with KPREP.