Brevard Public Schools

School Improvement Plan

2015 – 2016

Name of School: Area:

Principal: Area Superintendent:

SAC Chairperson:

Superintendent: Dr. Desmond Blackburn

Mission Statement:

Our mission is to set high expectations and create a rigorous learning environment that cultivates collaboration throughout our school community to help our students reach their full potential. Revised 8/12

Vision Statement:

Roosevelt is an enriching environment where our community encourages life-long learning to reach our full potential. Reviewed 8/12

Stakeholder Involvement in School Improvement Planning:

Briefly explain how stakeholders are involved in the development, review, and communication of the SIP.

During preplanning, teachers were asked to reflect on the 2014-2015 school year’s success and areas in need of improvement. Administration shared with staff we saw everyone implemented last year’s writing initiative according to guidelines given. Staff agreed that we need to work on writing across content areas and to start use writing as formative assessments within the district initiative process, Understanding by Design planning. After gaining input from teachers informally through discussion during professional development and grade level meetings, teachers were given a copy of the SIP rough draft and asked to read and give input during an after school professional development meeting. In order to give all stakeholders an opportunity to review the SIP, stakeholders were made aware of the plan by putting a notice in the newsletter and on the website letting stakeholders know where the SIP was posted. They were invited to review and give feedback at PTO/SAC meetings. We advertise the meeting dates and times in the newsletter. As for community stakeholders, business partners, emailed them our school’s website link and invited them to view the SIP there as well.

Brevard Public Schools

School Improvement Plan

2015-2016

Part 1: Planning for Student Achievement

RATIONALE – Continuous Improvement Cycle Process

Data Analysis from multiple data sources:

What are the areas of successful professional practices and what data shows evidence of improvements? What are the concerns with professional practices and how are they revealed with data?
Our focus last year was writing across content areas. We implemented a school wide writing initiative which required teachers to post student writing at least once a month, score papers using a predetermined rubric, post the rubric and standards the writing was addressing. One hundred percent of our teachers did this and they were provided with monthly feedback regarding their scoring of the paper and the standard that was posted and whether the writing was meeting the full intent of the standard. Most writing was summative in nature and that is one reason the full intent would be expected to be seen. We realized that even though teachers were following all required components of the school wide writing plan, since their writing was summative in nature, they hadn’t used writing as a formative means to see what needed to be taught before assessing for the full intent of the standard. Our goal of making certain that students were writing across content areas was met. We met partial success with the writing showing student understanding of the full intent of the standard. In addition, on the EDI survey under instructional planning, only 33% of teachers were satisfied with the support they received at their school for instructional planning compared to 74% of the Brevard Schools within the top quintile. Only 54% felt they met with other teachers throughout their school or district who teach in the same grade or subject area to plan and share resources compared to 75%. When we discussed this finding with our teachers, they shared that they rated this low because of the “other schools” in the statement. With this recognized new knowledge, we will provide professional development and support to help teachers use the UBD design to preplan writing as formative assessment, use the results to drive instruction towards students’ understanding of the full intent of the standard and finally use writing as a summative tool to measure whether the transfer statement is being met therefore the full intent of the standard.
In addition, teachers were given a survey with a rank of 1-5 to measure their knowledge and ability with using writing across content areas consistently and with providing effective feedback to students regarding their writing. Ranks 1-3 indicate that teachers may assign writing across content areas but are not using best practices consistently and pervasively. Ranks 4-5 means they are assigning writing across content areas, using rubrics to score and providing feedback to students with 4 being barely and 6 meaning they could teach others how to do it effectively.
Based on our pre and post qualitative survey, teachers showed growth in their understanding of using writing across content areas, scoring it with a rubric and providing students feedback. However, we weren’t as successful as we would have liked in developing teachers’ confidence with this. Continuing to work on using writing as a formative means of assessment within UBD planning will help teachers to continue to grow in this area.
Last year we administered a student survey regarding their writing knowledge. We can see from this student data that students’ attitudes towards writing improved. This also proves that the focus and professional development provided to teachers last year made a positive difference. It also indicates the need to continue our focus on writing across content areas.
What are the areas of successful student achievements and what data shows evidence of improvements?
What are the concerns with student achievements and how are they revealed to the data?
Since writing across content areas was our big school initiative, we used the writing portion of the BELAA assessment for 2nd through 6th grades to measure whether students made growth. Our students did increase as a whole. Below is the data broken down by grade level and areas within the writing component of BELAA.
2014-2015 BELAA A and BELAA B. comparisons –
A.  51% B. 69.6% Organization 19% growth
B.  62% B. 70.4% Development of Ideas 8% growth
Our overall goal for both organization and development of ideas was 70%. We did meet our goal.
The break up by grade level is below.
2nd grade
A. 61% B. 94% of 2nd =70% and higher for organization
A. 67% B. 87% of 2ndg = 70% or higher for development of ideas
3rd grade
A. 88% B. 62% of 3rd = 70 % and higher for organization
A.67% B. 66% of 3rd =70% or higher for development of ideas
4th grade
A. 51% B. 80% of 4th = 70 and higher for organization
A. 45% B. 84% of 4th = 70 or higher for development of ideas
5th grade
A. 61% B. 75% of 5th = 70 and higher for organization
A. 63% B. 78% of 5th = 70 or higher for development of ideas
6th grade
A.37% B. 37% of 6th = 70 and higher for organization
A. 22% B. 37% of 6th = 70 or higher for development of ideas
Results varied across grade levels with 2nd grade showing the most growth, 6th grade the least and third grade declining. We have determined there is a need to provide more training to teachers on scoring objectively using rubrics.

Analysis of Current Practices:

Describe action steps that have become non-negotiable, things that you will continue doing.
We have been working in PLCs for the past nine years, which mainly consists of grade level specific teams. They look at formative assessments and work as a team to develop strategies to meet the needs of their students.
We schedule monthly data meetings. They are given data profile sheets where they document data and other important information such as retentions etc. The team discusses interventions and monitors the progress the students are making.
Our Non –Negotiables that are part of Roosevelt’s culture include “Do Now” activities, writing across content areas, Essential Questions and Goal Setting. All teachers provide a “Do Now” activity for students to begin working on the minute they walk in the room each morning. Essential Questions are used as an advanced organizer, a tool for teaching vocabulary and for summarizing across the curriculum. Goal setting begins in kindergarten. Students set individual academic or behavioral goals with the help of their teachers. This is the fourth year that we have really stressed goal setting with our students. They monitor how the students are progressing and give them feedback. Each month the teacher recognizes one student in each class who has met their goal or who has worked really hard toward their goal as “Student of the Month”. They are recognized on our morning announcements, at our quarterly Roosevelt Recognition Program as well as on a star in our Commons area and they attend an “Open Gym” celebration with an administrator attending to let them share what their goal was and to congratulate them on their accomplishment. In addition to promoting goal setting as mentioned above, we will also hold teachers and students accountable by looking for the goals posted and recognized during classroom walk- throughs.
Writing across content areas was the basis for our School Improvement Plan for the 2014-2015 school year. Teachers worked hard to meet the expectation of having monthly writing displayed, scoring it using a rubric and providing feedback to students. In addition, they posted the standards used for the lesson taught with which the writing correlated.
Several years ago our school committed to using Thinking Maps across the curriculum. Thinking Maps incorporate several of Marzano’s strategies such as non-linguistic representation, critical thinking, examining similarities and differences, summarizing note taking, etc. Although many of our teachers still use Thinking Maps, we feel that we need to revisit this commitment so that all teachers are using them with fidelity. One of the most important pieces to Roosevelt’s success in implementing our SIP initiatives is monitoring and providing feedback to our teachers.

Best Practice:

Based on research, as it relates to the data analysis above, what should be best practices in the class room?
Teams that focus on results are more effective than those that center their work on activities and tasks (Katzenbach& Smith, 1993). When teams work together to establish measurable goals, collect and analyze data regarding their progress, and monitor and adjust their actions, they produce results that “guide, goad, and motivate groups and individuals” (Schmoker, 1996, p.38) We also know that to create a high performing learning culture with continuous improvement, professional development and reflective practice must be systemic. It is imperative that teachers work in Professional Learning Communities which are defined by Richard Becky DuFour as an ongoing process in which educators work collaboratively in recurring cycles of collective inquiry and action research to achieve better results.
Dr. Max Thompson outlines exemplary practices that are evidence based as well as research-based such as using advance organizers, teaching vocabulary in context and summarizing throughout the lesson as high yielding strategies that maximize learning. In addition, BEST Module 4: Using Assessment to Drive Learning shows that there is a 23% gain for setting objectives and providing feedback as well as a 22% gain in using questions, cues, and advance organizers. As Max Thompson’s research shows, essential questions incorporate three of the five highest yielding thinking strategies: advance organizer, vocabulary in context and summarizing. When beginning with the end in mind by looking at the standards, developing essential questions allow for students to have a reason for learning what is being taught and guide the lesson. In addition, It is critical that teachers engage their students, establish effective relationships with their students while communicating high expectations for all students. Doub Lemov, provides techniques in his book “Teach Like a Champion, for setting high expectations such as “Do Now” activities, “No Opt Out”, “Right is Right”, “Format Matters” and “Without apology.
According to “The Core Six”, there are three reasons for using writing to learn to address the common core (Florida standards). The first is that writing develops higher order thinking. The second is that the common core’s anchor standards for writing have identified three types of text that are particularly important to ensuring students’ readiness for college and careers in the 21st century; arguments, informative/explanatory texts and narratives. Write to learn helps develop students’ skills in these areas by requiring students to develop high-quality written responses on demand and engaging students in the extended writing and revision process. This includes self-assessment and peer revision. The third is that writing anchor standard 10 makes it clear that classrooms must incorporate writing “for a range of tasks, purposes and audiences.”
This year, we will focus on integrating the Understanding by Design process with writing across content areas. As stated in The Understanding by Design Guide to creating High Quality units,” many assessments measure only recently taught knowledge and never ask for authentic performance (conditional knowledge and skill I context)-whether students know when, where, and why to use what they have learned in the past. This approach leads to surprisingly poor test results, because students do not recognize prior learning in unfamiliar-looking test questions. Given that performance is the goal, local assessments typically do not provide a valid measure of student understanding.” Using writing across content areas during the planning process and as a means to assess will help us authentically assess our students. Writing “allows us to see conceptual relationships to acquire insights and to unravel the logic of what was previously murky or confusing” (Schmoker, 2011, p.211). “Writing helps students get their thinking out in the open where it can be assessed and refined”(The Core Six p.50) That’s why it is so important to use writing as formative assessment because it allows us to understand the comprehension the writer has done about their reading. We can provide direct feedback about their understanding of the content read about through their writing.
Douglas Reeves (2002) has similarly found that writing is the “skill most directly related to improved scores in reading, social studies, science and even mathematics.” (p.5). Reeves also reminds us of something that too often gets lost in our concern over test scores: that writing brings engagement, interest and fun to the classroom. Using writing across content areas will be a way to authentically assess standards taught.
Thinking Maps are a researched based strategy to help students organize information based on how the brain processes information. Students should develop mental maps of words, their meanings and their different contexts. In Janet Allen’s, On the Same Page, it states that “graphic organizers help learners break down information they would have overlooked because it seemed too abstract or difficult”. We will use writing to take these maps a step further and students will synthesize what they learned in the different content areas when using the thinking maps as an organization tool for writing across content areas.

School-Based Goal: What can be done to improve instructional effectiveness?