Student Achievement Goal

Team Goal

Focus Area 2:

Curriculum and Assessment

Concern: In order to meet the expectations of the CCS for Literacy, and “on demand” writing assessments on PARCC, SAT, and AP types of assessments, teachers must adjust their instructional practices to ensure that all students have adequate practice in evidence-based argument skills in oral and written response.

Goal 2: By the end of June 2014 all students will have demonstrated growth in their ability to utilize evidence based thinking skills in oral and written responses to texts.

Action Steps: Proposes Professional Development Activities with Tentative Timeline:

(September – December)

  • Curriculum Directors will identify key evidence based thinking strategies and tools for content areas
  • Introduction of Evidence-Based Thinking Strategies for oral and written response including current rubrics utilized to assess degree of student progress
  • Examples include content-response notes, dialectical journals, Claims-Evidence-Reasoning (CER) , student-run discussions, Socratic seminars, document analysis, APPARTS for Primary Source analysis
  • Initial looking at student work sessions to review data from common assessments that show degree of students’ ability to utilize relevant evidence in their (oral and written) argument
  • Identify common assessments/benchmarks to create anchor papers/projects for teachers to establish common criteria/norms
  • Possible examples include Notebook rubric, student-run discussion rubric, persuasive writing rubric, document-based questions (DBQs), AP and MCAS rubrics for DBQs (evidence-based, vs. writing conventions)
  • Teachers will work collaboratively to identify the most effective strategies for developing evidence-based thinking that result in student growth in oral and written responses.
  • Review, and where appropriate, revise midterm assessments to include items that assess students’ evidence-based thinking skills.

(January – June)

  • Administration and review of midterm exam and review of data during departmental meetings, looking at student work.
  • Teachers will share analysis of exams
  • Use district content meetings (early-release or late-entry) to adjust instructional and assessment practices based on midterm data analysis.
  • Review, and where appropriate, revise final assessments to include items that assess students’ evidence-based thinking skills.
  • Directors will share observations and teacher feedback of student’s use of evidence-based thinking during whole and small group presentations/discussions.
  • Directors will meet to review final exam data to analyze student growth with regard to evidence-based thinking and writing skills.

Benchmarks

  • Teachers UbD units reflect planning of evidence-based thinking (Stages 2 and 3).
  • Formative and Summative Evaluations reflect evidence of visits, observations and feedback on classroom practice that have engendered the increased use of teachers modeling and integration of evidence-based thinking strategies.
  • Evidence based strategies will be posted on departmental webpage or wiki.
  • Samples of student notebooks will show how students meet criteria for high level evidence-based thinking in their response to texts.
  • Sample of student work from common assessments demonstrate growth in their use of evidence-based thinking skills argumentative writing.