School: Auer
Teacher: Joanie Marchillo
Title: Building the Bridges toward Cohesiveness
Summary:
Introduction: Our school was at the beginning stages of working collaboratively. We
weren’t really working as a team. Everyone was doing their own thing.
The assessments weren’t necessarily aligned with the targets or each
other. Before we could go any further to improve our math scores, we
had to develop a plan and work together to achieve it.
Description: Auer Avenue’s two main goals were to develop more collaboration among
its teachers through biweekly team meetings, and to use the curriculum the
teachers were familiar with, the Investigation series, and discuss the
learning targets, develop an assessment based on the learning targets for
that unit, and choose activities to help the students achieve their goals.
Grades 3, 4, and 5 met twice a month for two hours at a time. We started
using the Backward Design with each Investigations book. The teachers
made a folder for each unit to keep the work intact for next year.
Implementation: Teachers chose the days they wanted to stay after school with their
team member. We stayed after two days a month for three months for
two hours each time. We met in grade level teams. The teachers brought
the mathematics book they were working on at the time. We began with
a discussion of the learning targets that aligned with the unit. We
unpacked them and began looking at end of chapter assessments. Some
of the assessments were kept, and others were not used or tweaked to
align with the targets. Then they studied the assessment together and
designed 10 – 14 activities that helped their children do well on the
assessment. The teachers taught the unit and discussed what went well
and what didn’t at the next meeting.
How were the teachers affected? The teachers were excited for the chance to work
together. They felt it was very worthwhile and are going to continue
their work together next year. They feel they have grown a great
deal this year.
Implications: We are going to continue our work next year. Fifth grade is going to meet
to plan for every subject next year, third and fourth grade are going to
continue their work in math together next year. They enjoy collaborating
and don’t want to plan without the other person. The first and second
grade teachers just began in May and want to continue their work together
as well.