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The Bottom Line:Instructional Quality

Consortia Conference Call

May 17, 2005

Regie Stites and Susan Pimentel

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One Lens – Many ObjectsSome recent questions:

• Should standards for different content areas have the same format? same author/editor?

• Is there a maximum number of standards? Should we include x,y,z content in the standards?

• Should standards for ABE, ESL, and ASE/GED be linked?

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Reality Check

What kind of standards have a realistic chance of changing and improving instruction?

Your standards should be visionary, but you need to take care to avoid the “pie in the sky” and “procrustean bed” problems.

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‘Pie in the Sky’ Problem

Standards are too numerous or too ambitious and represent a vision of educational excellence that has little in common with current practice and capacity and cannot be achieved by current systems no matter how hard they try.

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‘Procrustean Bed’ Problem

Standards cover content that doesn’t fit neatly within existing instructional programs or they leave out content that is important to learners and programs – teachers are compelled to teach things they can only teach poorly or are prevented from teaching what they teach well.

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Instructional Criteria for Standards1. Focused – essential knowledge and

skills in the content area

2. Parsimonious – attainable within constraints of instructional programs

3. Reasonable – attainable by learners with support and effort

4. Clear – easily translated into instructional goals and activities

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The Goldilocks’ Plight: How to Ensure Your Standards Are

“Just Right”

Big Idea # 1:

The standards have to be clear if we want people to use them

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Strategies to assess specificityAsk your instructors and team members!

Look at each standard… • What does it mean to you?• What might it look like in your classroom?• Is there general agreement?

Check model standards… • How do your standards compare?

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Sample

• First Draft: “Use operations and number sense to compute and solve problems.”

• Discussion and Feedback: What operations and computations are required? Need more specificity or sample problems to be measurable and understandable.

• Revision: “Calculate tips, sales tax, commissions, and percentage increases and decreases.”

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Strategy for Level Specificity

Backward Mapping: Decide what you want students to know and do at your highest level of learning and then decide on the “building blocks” or prerequisites that students need to learn to master these objectives.

Following are two examples, one from ABE/GED and one from ESOL.

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ABE/GED Example

Knows properties of/computes with rational numbers expressed in a variety of forms.

Then. . .

ABE IV Solves problems involving ratios, proportions and percents.

ABE III: Adds, subtracts, multiplies, and divides rational numbers, including fractions, mixed numbers, and decimals.

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ABE/GED Example, cont’d.

ABE II: Demonstrates meaning of multiplication and division, and uses these operations to solve problems with multi-digit whole numbers. (Others with respect to meaning and operations with simple decimals and fractions).

ABE I: Demonstrates meaning of addition and subtraction, and uses these operations to solve problems with multi-digit numbers.

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Sample EFF: ESOL Listening in Ohio

Respond appropriately to various listening sourcesLevels

6. Speeches/Presentation about complex topics

5. Questions on a variety of topics; complex directions

4.Telephone, video, recorded announcements

3. Familiar topics; 2-3 step directions

2. Limited simple information questions; 1 step directions w/o model

1. Learned questions; 1 step directions w/model

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Standards cannot do everything; they are only the first step. . .

Big Idea #2:

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Supplement the Standards

Develop and integrate teacher supports

to ensure greater clarity and understanding:

1. Prerequisite skills and concepts

2. Sample lesson plans

3. Sample activities/examples4. Textbook correlations continued

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Supplement the Standards

Develop and integrate teacher supportsto ensure greater clarity and understanding:

5. Resource Lists: Book Lists, Web Sites, Vocabulary Lists, Primary Document Lists

6. Assessment: Suggestions for classroom-based assessments; Sample items from standardized tests)

7. ?

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Big Idea #3:

Standards are “living” documents that need to be re-evaluated and updated regularly. . .

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Tips for Continuous Improvement

1. Field-test the standards in some programs and revise the standards according to the feedback.

2. Implement the standards fully and set-up a feedback process and a time certain to review and revise the standards (no less than a year).

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Discussion

Q & A