Best Practices for School Improvement: A Case Study of Gaffney Middle School, Exams of School management&administration

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Best Practices for School Improvement Amy Dherit American College of Education EL5703: School Improvement Dr. Jacqueline O’Mara June 14, 2021

Gaffney Middle School’s SIP showed some areas where there are areas that need to be addressed in order to meet the needs of all the students. The areas of the greatest weakness appeared to affect the students that are associated with being Students of Poverty subgroup, Black or African American subgroup, and the Disabled subgroup. Three of my colleagues, Casey, an 8th grade Pre-Algebra and Algebra I teacher, Karen, a 7th grade Regular Math 7 and Pre-Algebra teacher, and Candace, a 7th grade ELA 7 grade and Honors 7th grade teachers and myself, a 7th grade Science teacher discussed the needs of the current SIP for Gaffney Middle School. We agreed upon the areas that provided opportunities for improvement were using proven strategies across the three grade levels in literacy, math, and using assessments to plan for instructional needs of the students. Due the majority of the school identifying in at least one of the subgroups, all teachers would need to be able to use specific strategies, while continuing to differentiate based on student ability. This would require that all teachers work together to provide the necessary components to build fluency in both reading and writing and higher achievement in problem-solving and reasoning in math. The professional development for teachers will cover the ways in which these strategies will provide the same equitable opportunities for all students while maintaining the necessary rigor to achieve significant student growth. Shared Vision and Mission My colleagues and I worked together to create a shared vision of increasing student achievement across the board, but making sure to provide the subgroups with a method that targeted and supported continual practice and application. We felt this vision is attainable by having all ELA teachers, across the three grades, be trained to use explicit instruction with the same strategies to teach the writing components and integrate reading into the writing instruction. Core teachers would be included in the training and also focus on using the same strategies to integrate content reading and writing. We believe that all math teachers, also

direct their thinking as writers” (Graham, S.et al., 2016 p.8) All three grade levels use the same integrated interventions and explicit strategies for the five components of the Writing Process. Students will complete the reflective piece of the instructional strategy of the Model-Practice Reflect, in the reflected portion of the Cornell notes. Graham et al. also discusses the “positive effects” (Graham, S.et al., 2016 p. 39) that integrated reading and writing instruction have when they are taught in an integrated way. Differentiation will be implemented to provide the equitable adjustment needed to meet the needs of each individual student. This will allow the teacher the flexibility needed to meet with the students identified as students of subgroups that need small group instruction. This small group instruction will continue to follow the I do, We do, You do to promote students the guided instruction they will most likely need. It is important to remember that students should continue to be challenged in regards to the text so that students “come in contact with challenging vocabulary and sentence structures” (Denton et al., 2007 p. 33). The team chose this strategy so that students would have a consistent opportunity to apply these strategies. By eighth grade, students would have achieved proficiency on each of the strategies, therefore be able to write to communicate ideas based on evidence better. Using the same vocabulary and basic rubrics, students will have numerous opportunities to practice and refine their skills. Teachers and interventionists will be able to provide research based interventions for students who are entering the middle of the three year period or students with specific learning disabilities. The discussion centered on how this strategy would positively impact all children to reflect the subgroups identified in the school improvement plan. The group concluded that all students, from intervention to Honors students would benefit from the same direct and explicit instruction and that the text levels would provide the more advanced rigor. This would also enable all regular education teachers the flexibility for differentiation by using texts that are leveled for each tier of students while maintaining rigor in the classroom.

Explicit Problem Solving Strategies in Math In regards to mathematical instruction, two team members who teach both at grade level math classes in addition to Honor’s math classes believe the weakest area in mathematics is students' ability to read and understand basic problem solving and then use the appropriate steps to solve the problem. It was also mentioned that students struggle with vocabulary that represents a quantitative relationship to the problem. Just like in ELA, explicit instruction will be used to provide students with strategies such as common reflective questioning (Star, J. R. et al., 2016) that can be used as anchor charts in all math classrooms, providing students with opportunities to analyze the structure of completed problems and determine whether it is correct or incorrect by using the correct vocabulary to explain their thinking (Star, J. R. et al., 2016). Teachers would need to choose problems that correlated to the unit of study and offer a variety of ways such problems could be solved, therefore, “teacher planning considered students’ mathematical content weaknesses and understanding of language and context” (Woodward, J. et al., 2012 p. 10) would be essential. The last strategy is using an agreed upon mnemonic that students can apply to solving and reasoning through word problems. “The mnemonic helps students remember the steps to solving a word problem” (Powell & Hughes, 2011 p. 1). The strategies mentioned provide the “frequent opportunities for students to reason with and talk about mathematical concepts, procedures, and strategies using precise mathematical language” (Star, J. R. et al., 2016 p. 7). The students ability to use the correct vocabulary to discuss the application of problem solving is the core of their ability to fully understand mathematics. The team chose the above strategies to work together in a classroom that would establish a continuity of the same expectations in each of the math classes over the three year period, and provide enough practice with cognitive reasoning through multiple ways to analyze mathematical problems and communicate effectively their understanding. The combination of strategies, including the common mnemonic device, all foster the development of mathematical thinking and communication.

Conclusion In order to effectively analyze a SIP, it takes multiple persons with different perspectives. It helped having teachers from different content classes to be able to interject their expertise of instruction in the content subject. Although time did not allow for the inclusion of other necessary educators such as guidance counselors , special education teachers, and an English Language learner teacher, our group did try to settle on strategies that could be used in their specialized classes as well. We also felt that professional development would be needed based on the number of Pace Program teachers at our school. The formative assessment being mandatory was also needed for accountability purposes since we anticipate there will be some reluctant teachers when it comes to using the formative assessments to guide instructional planning. Provided that all teachers incorporate the uniform components in ELA, Math and Core Content classes, then student achievement should show a positive increase in scores. By adhering to the mission and everyone be like minded, then all of Gaffney Middle School’s stakeholders will benefit from the implementation of these strategies.

References Black, P., & Wiliam, D. (2005). Changing Teaching through Formative Assessment: Research and Practice .https://www.oecd.org/education/ceri/35337920.pdf. Denton, C., Bryan, D., Wexler, J., Reed, D., & Vaughn, S. (2007). Effective Instruction for Middle School Students with Reading Difficulties: © 2007 University of Texas System/Texas Education Agency The Reading Teacher’s Sourcebook. Texas Education Agency. https:// www.meadowscenter.org/files/resources/ _RTS_Complete.pdf. Graham, S., Fitzgerald, J., Friedrich, L. D., Greene, K., Kim, J. S., Olson, C., Bruch, J., Ferguson, J., Lyskawa, J., & Wulsin, C. S., Teaching Secondary Students to Write Effectively1–97 (2016). Washington, DC; National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance (NCEE), Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved from the NCEE website: http://whatworks.ed.gov. Powell, S., & Hughes, E. M. (2011). Interventio Name: Word-Problem Mnemonics. EBI Network Mathematics (ebi.missouri.edu). https://ebi.missouri.edu/wp-content/uploads/ 2014/02/EBI-Brief- Template- Word-Problem-Mnemonics.pdf. Rumberger, R., Addis, H., Allensworth, E., Balfanz, R., Bruch, J., Dillon, E., Duardo, D., Dynarski, M., Furgeson, J., Jayanthi, M., Newman-Gonchar, R., Place, K., & Tuttle, C., Preventing dropout in secondary schools1-105 (2017). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance (NCEE), Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education. https://whatworks.ed.gov Star, J. R., Caronongan, P., Foegen, A., Furgeson, J., Keating, B., Larson, M. R., Lyskawa, J., McCallum, W. G., Porath, J., & Zbiek, R. M., Teaching strategies for improving algebra knowledge in middle and high school students1-71 (2015). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance (NCEE), Institute of Education