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August 28, 2020
The dual pandemics of COVID-19 and systemic racism have strengthened calls for a national gut check. Recognizing the disproportional impact of… Read More »
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When dealing with technology, things go wrong. The wifi doesn’t work. Kids forget their devices. Teachers become discouraged. But that’s okay because positivity spreads. “What can we do to make this work in the future?” should be a constant refrain. Remind your teachers that there is always a solution and that failure is part of the road to success. The coach’s job is to stay positive and inspire teachers and students to do the same.
Teachers are responsible for so many things. I don’t believe that technology should be another worry for them. Technology integration coaches should work for the teachers by acting as a positive support system. Part of the reason that I love my position is because I can take some of the burden off of the teachers’ backs. Technology integration coaches should be empathetic to teachers’ reservations about technology and remember how difficult it can be for some people to shift perceptions and practices.
Your passion for teaching, technology, and student success should be visible to the people around you. Like positivity, enthusiasm spreads. Teachers who have been apprehensive about using technology are more likely to experiment with new teaching approaches when they know the possibilities and they’re communicated with enthusiasm. So freely share your knowledge, skills and excitement with them.
Pre-K-4 has been doing a version of proficiency-based and student-centered learning work for awhile, and our 9-12 team has been leading the charge in transitioning our district to be ready for the proficiency-based diploma law, enacted in 2012. Grades 5-8, however, have lagged behind a bit. So to provide a full look at our needs (and similarities of needs regardless of grade span) we compared varying grade span’s needs. This was to see if there were any commonalities in needs from our two strongest grade spans in terms of proficiency-based learning design. The data showed us and our staff that the needs of K-4 teachers are similar to 9-12 teachers, however, implementation of those needs will vary based on the students.
Vyew allows meetings and sharing content in real-time and anytime. Multiple users can upload images, files, documents, and videos in any room, anytime.
“When we use Vyew well, we can observe, debrief and change practice very easily. It gives counselors access [to the school community] they don’t normally have.”
– Counselor, Wayland District, MA
Formative is a feedback tool that can be used to gauge learning for individuals and whole groups through formal or informal check-ins. In a professional development setting, this tool can be used to model different ways of virtually gauging student progress.
“I find that professional development opportunities are few and far between—and sometimes [tools like Formative] would be nice to have a quick assessment, to be sure I retained the information and am working towards mastery.”
– Counselor, Wayland District, MA
ClassPager is a platform that educators can use to run classroom polls and instantly message students’ phones (while protecting privacy). According to ClassPager, 98 percent of text messages are read within 15 minutes, so utilizing SMS in this way is a powerful way to communicate with students.
“I can contact a whole group or one student – right to their phone. It helps in a lot of ways, but mostly it makes it so I can have contact and a relationship with some of the students I might not meet with frequently and make sure they understand the options available to them.” – Counselor, Newton District, MA
Remind.com is an SMS-based communication tool for teachers and school community members. Staff can send one-way text message reminders, attach documents, and more to an entire class or select group of students at no cost. They also offer a blog that highlights features and best practices for tool implementation for a range of users, including support staff.
“I can send a text to the whole sophomore class reminding them of an upcoming PSAT deadline, or send to a group of students to remind them to set up a meeting with me. It takes all of the back and forth out of scheduling and really frees up my time and theirs.” –Counselor, Pittsfield District, NH
PowerSchool provides a central data hub for schools and districts to improve cross-role knowledge-sharing and collaboration efforts. Educators and support staff can capture academic, social, and emotional progress with ease and communicate needs and opportunities with their colleagues. Administrators can easily view activity, reports, and progress for both students and staff.
“I love that all of the information and data is in one place and shareable. It allows me to focus on the students as opposed to collecting data from a lot of different sources. ” –Counselor, Pittsfield District, NH
Naviance (paid service) is a college- and career-readiness platform that helps connect academic achievement to postsecondary goals. Its comprehensive college and career planning solutions optimize student success, maximize counselor effectiveness, and track results for teachers as well as school and district administrators.
“Naviance has been, by far, the best ed tech for our student-centered transition. I can journal with a student on his/her progress, I can work with them to plan on the platform, I can have private meetings, and also communicate with other stakeholders (parents, teachers, administrators).”
–Sherry, High School Counselor, Pittsfield, NH
The School Counselor Advocacy Letter was created with counselors and is addressed to teachers, school leaders and other staff. The goal of the letter is to open a conversation about the areas in which counselors can be valuable team members in the changing 21st century learning environment.
With a greater emphasis on college and career readiness, school communities can utilize a counselor’s deep expertise in the academic, personal, and social development needs of all students, potentially leading to improved student success. A letter like this can be especially useful in times of school community transition. Counselors can adapt this letter as they see fit.
Please note: The letter is written in the first person and is meant to take on the tone of an “open letter”. As noted above, adapt as needed.
Seesaw is a digital portfolio tool to support students in documenting and sharing their progress over the course of their academic careers. Students can “show what they know” using photos, videos, drawings, text, PDFs, and links.
Seesaw can give educators, counselors, and school leaders a view of what a student is learning across classes. Counselors can use SeeSaw to see a fuller picture of what the student is learning, leverage this tool to start conversations with the student about progress, and access this information to help students make postsecondary choices. Seesaw provides training materials for all types of school staff via their Seesaw for Schools Success Plan.
“Naviance has been, by far, the best ed tech for our student-centered transition. I can journal with a student on his/her progress, I can work with them to plan on the platform, I can have private meetings, and also communicate with other stakeholders (parents, teachers, administrators).”
–Sherry, High School Counselor, Pittsfield, NH
School counselor blogs are an invaluable professional development resource. Counselors share their insights, inspirations, resources, and tips, encouraging others to share as well. Below, please find a few (and contact us with your favorites).
The Helpful Counselor is a blog created by a school counselor with a “goal in creating [a] website to share ideas and strategies to promote social, emotional and behavioral development”. Offering a large set of resources, the author provides an explicit list of online professional networks for school counselors across grade levels.
Helpful post: List of Professional Development Networks for School Counselors
The Counseling Geek is a blog to help counselors use technology in their programs. The author notes that blogging “has created incredible opportunities for professional development and collaboration.”
Helpful post: Top 5 Counseling Tools for your mobile device
For a list of curated technological tools to support communication, collaboration, and professional development for support staff, visit this resource page.
This is a test of a pop-up with a link to Google.
Opinion Editorials (Op-Eds) | Talking About… | Frequently Asked Questions | Brochures and Explainers
The following op-eds appeared in newspapers and on websites across northern New England. They cover a wide range of issues but all of them incorporate the framed story of education and learning.
Champlain Valley Union High School: an op-ed about the school’s re-design efforts by Andre LaChance, English teacher and school advisor.
Theordora J. Kalikow, President, University of Southern Maine, weighs in on education reform.
David Theoharides, Superintendent, Sanford School Department in Maine shares his thoughts on proficiency-based graduation requirements.
Tammy Davis, Superintendent, Winnisquam Regional School District in New Hampshire, talks about systemic reform in the first in a series of newspaper columns.
The following documents and links reflect recommendations based on the results of research on how Americans think about education and learning. Understanding what we are up against in the public square is important if we are to overcome the entrenched ways of thinking that will undermine our efforts to move student-centered education forward.
Talking About System Redesign
A set of Talking Points created by the Shaping Our Future Together statewide campaign in Vermont.
Talking About 21st Century Skills
A summary of why the common use of the term“21st century skills” may not help your efforts to build public understanding.
Talking About the Achievement Gap
A summary of how the term “achievement gap” could inadvertently reinforce individual blame and the idea that some are simply more capable than others.
Talking About Equity and Disparities (16:08)
A video about what research has revealed on the gap between expert and public thinking about educational equity, and how to close it.
Talking About School Budgets
A summary of the problems with talking about school budgets in conventional ways and how to get out of common traps.
Talking About Common Core State Standards
One part of an extensive toolkit created by FrameWorks Institute on behalf of the Californians Dedicated to Education Foundation.
Talking About Digital Media and Learning
A set of talking points to guide conversations about digital media, and about learning more generally.
Talking About Response to Instruction (RTI)
A graphic describing the Winnisquam Regional School District’s Response to Instruction strategy, a key component of the district’s larger district re-design process.
These documents can help you create well-framed responses to questions about student-centered learning, district/school redesign, and other issues related to education and learning.
FAQs: Vermont’s Changing Education System
Questions and well-framed responses about new, student-centered legislation in Vermont.
FAQs: Digital Media and Learning
Common questions and well-framed responses about learning in general and digital media in particular.
FrameWorks Institute Education Reform Toolkit: Frequently Asked Questions
The following brochures and explainers are good models for what districts, schools and non-profit organizations might create to build public understanding of student-centered approaches to learning and system change. Please see Making Original Products for additional examples.
British Columbia’s Education Plan
A description of student-centered learning as articulated by the Ministry of Education in British Columbia, Canada.
Deering High School, Portland Maine
A document that describes the high school’s remodeling efforts and its move toward global education, including its affiliation with the International Studies Schools Network (ISSN).
Winooski Middle High School, Winooski, Vermont
A brief description of the school’s redesign efforts that went home with school progress reports.
Pittsfield Middle High School, New Hampshire
A condensed version of the Pittsfield Explainer, used by the district to build understanding of student-centered learning.
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