Glcc Newsletter - Winter 2009

Issue #2 • Winter 2009

Member/Sponsor Form

Y e s!

Issue #2 • Winter 2009

Benefits of MeMBership

i’d like to join the Great Lakes Constructivist Consortium.

» »

GLCC Newsletter First Thursdays: A forum provided by the Great Lakes Constructivist Consortium where colleagues and allies talk and strategize about issues that

NAME (PLEASE PrINT)

charter schools are confronting. (See Calendar of Events.) First Thursday

ADDrESS

CITy

STATE

PhoNE

Ne WS

events are reserved for GLCC mem-

EMAIL

to one event annually. After one free

»

School

»

Please indicate your GLCC

Mail this form, along with a check to

membership level:

Great Lakes Constructivist Consortium

»

event, membership fees will apply. Eligibility for GLCC Internship program for seniors Program (Co-Directors) Networking/partnerships with like-

c/o Bastante

minded educators across the Great

School/organization Membership — $100

2217 S. Kinnickinnic Ave.

Lakes region.

District Membership — $500

Milwaukee, WI 53207

Checks are made payable to the Great Lakes Constructivist Consortium, a not-for profit organization.

Who We Are The mission of The Great Lakes Constructivist Consortium is to re-think society’s understanding of learning, reconsider the educational system,

Constructivist Leadership Training

Individual Membership — $25

GLCC Sponsor $

C on S truC tivi S t C on Sor tium

bers. Guests of members are limited

ZIP

to the complex and essential issue of

editors

assessment. How educators measure

» Susan Ballje » Anne Nordholm

learning; how we provide feedback to

2008–09 GLCC Leadership Director of Communication » Leo Alvarez Director of Community Partnerships » Josh Zimmers

Sponsors will be noted in future newslet-

Director of Sustainability » David Coyle

ters and in the program for the May 2009

GLCC Facilitators

Many Faces of Constructivism Conference.

Bastante Educational Services, LLC

6

of the GLCC Newsletter is dedicated

and revive democratic principles.

Director of Membership » Kim Thiesen

sponsors

This issue…

2217 S. Kinnickinnic Ave. Milwaukee, WI 53207 414-294-3939

Manuscript Submissions

learners determines a student’s capacity to learn, adapt, communicate, and engage as a full-participating citizen in this society. Assessment practices can be daunting responsibilities laden with all sorts of ethical implications for those in a profession committed to passing on the wisdom of past generations and to helping shape future generations.

Shaunniece, a student intern from mlli, entering data.

refused to let this journey end, that we

All GLCC members are invited to submit articles to

As Paulo Freire, viewed learning, “we

did not turn back nor did we falter, and

be included in upcoming GLCC Newsletter issues.

make the road by walking it”. As a more

with eyes fixed on the horizon and God’s

recent hero, Barack Obama, espoused

grace upon us, we carried forth that

[email protected] no later

in his inaugural address, “With hope and

great gift of freedom and delivered it

than the 15th of the month prior to the newsletter

virtue, let us brave once more the icy

safely to future generations.”

Fully edited submissions of no more than 500 words must be electronically submitted to

distribution month. E.g., submissions for the March newsletter are due on April 15. Depending on the number of submissions, we reserve the right to select only those submissions

currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children’s children that when we were tested, we

What constructivist assessment practices can guide us on this journey?

that best serve the newsletter’s theme.

10 Constructivist Indicators for Assessment

Newsletter themes: Fall » Democratic Learning Environments Winter » Constructivist Assessment Spring » Constructivist School Orientation Practices Summer » School/Community Partnerships

our Partners » Technical Assistance and Leadership Center » Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation » Project-Based Learning Systems, LLC » Milwaukee Public Schools (Department of Diversified Schools) » WI Charter School Association » EdVisions

GLCC Website h t t p ://w w w. g r e a t l a k e s c c . o r g

by Anne nordholm And SuSAn bAll je

T

he GLCC has ten guiding principles about constructivist practice. Reframed as questions, each principle can inform how we design our assessment practices for students. When we understand the current reality and capacity of our students, we are able to support them to become independent and interdependent

learners in a very complex and everchanging world. How are learners assessed and provided feedback so that: 1. they are able to know that the school’s goals apply to each and every student, while the means to these CONTINuED ON NExT PAGE

Milwaukee, WI 53207 2217 S. Kinnickinnic Ave. c/o Bastante Great Lakes ConstruCtivist Consortium

Great Lakes Constructivist Consortium News

Issue #2 • Winter 2009

Digital Disruptions

b y S h a n e K r u Ko w S K i

o

Struggling with relevant assessments

n the surface, engaging students

ing and learning as well as provide the

feedback during the project process

By Sharon EBEl

in real experiences contextualized

was talking to my colleague about assessment and my struggle to come up with a “final” for the English 10 class. We are using the “Pebble Creek” curriculum, which measures progress through repetition of strategies that get more detailed throughout the units. Regular tests don’t work, because the strategies aren’t information-based. Students are required to work at higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy. The strategies are what is emphasized, not the information within individual units.

management efficiencies seen in more

rather than at the end. Likewise, the

to their learning style seems like a very

traditional models. Project Foundry®

flexible nature of how projects, seminars

benevolent, common sense approach

is an online management tool used by

and other learning activities are created

to teaching and learning. so why then is this paradigm so slow in being adopted in traditional education? in his recent book, Disrupting Class author Clayton Christianson argues one of the larger reasons the existing stand and deliver approach has lasted so long is due to its management efficiencies

and then managed allows the tool to CoNstruCtivist-miNDeD sChooLs CaN use tooLs suCh as ProjeCt FouNDry® to FaCiLitate better teaChiNG aND LearNiNG, as weLL as to ProviDe the maNaGemeNt

… the economies of scale provided by

eFFiCieNCies seeN iN more

herding students together, the nice num-

traDitioNaL moDeLs.

bers that come from Carnegie units and

more elusive and contrarian in constructivist learning environments, causing this otherwise common sense approach to be stunted in its adoption.

tate it. in combination with individualized student learning plans Project Foundry® provides a transparent, efficient way to ensure and manage student outcomes. Learn more and sign up for a free trial of Project Foundry® at www.projectfoundry.org and read Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns (C. Christensen, 2008.

the sense of autonomy that comes with subjects in silos. Such efficiencies are

support a learning model rather than dic-

students and teachers to streamline the

shane Krukowski is owner of Project

project process, report learning stan-

based solutions and primary developer

dard completion and manage individual

of Project Foundry.

learning plans. the inquiry-based features integrated within Project Foundry®

in realty, constructivist-minded schools

supplement regular student-teacher

can leverage tools such as Project

dialogue and provides opportunities for

Foundry® to both facilitate better teach-

more student voice and more teacher

I

I decided to come up with my own data set that students could categorize and then use to write a poem or essay. Using the special section of the Milwaukee Journal/Sentinel on Barack Obama, I put a data set together with all the available facts and story lines. These were all cut into strips that students put into their own catego-

ries and labeled. No right or wrong answers, but students had to explain/ defend their choices. Then students were asked to write an essay or a poem using the data sets as inspiration. They were given the scoring rubric that they used to score the final product. The rubric focused on: phrases incorporated into an original product, editing skills, phrases selected and used for the opening; phrases selected and used for description, conclusions drawn, and spelling. Using the feedback generated from the rubric, some students went back to edit to improve their scores. I was impressed that they didn’t argue about doing this. They just started working. Attached is one of the poems that a student wrote. I asked her permission to share it with all of you.

GLCC

calEn d OF EvE ar nts

• F i r s t t h u r s day E v E n t s • t h u r s day, F E b . 5 t h

Personnel Issues: Building Relationships & Sharing Leadership 5–7:30 pm at BASTANTE 2217 S. Kinickinnic Ave. Milwaukee, WI 53207 t h u r s day, M a r c h 5 t h

Systems Thinking 5–7:30 pm at BASTANTE 2217 S. Kinickinnic Ave. Milwaukee, WI 53207 t h u r s day, a p r i l 2 n d

Constructivist Debate 5–7:30 pm at BASTANTE 2217 S. Kinickinnic Ave. Milwaukee, WI 53207 t h u r s day, M ay 7 t h

Service Learning 5–7:30 pm at BASTANTE 2217 S. Kinickinnic Ave. Milwaukee, WI 53207

Continued from Page 1 • 10

goals will vary as students themselves vary? 2. they are able to participate in creating and maintaining structures that include all voices and provide opportunities for shared leadership, collaborative inquiry, and respectful advocacy? 3. they are able to help build communities grounded in trust and equity since the constructivist learning approach encourages learners (staff and students) to take learning risks and tolerate ambiguity? 4. they are able to be proficient with socio-cultural influences that can have

2

barack ObaMa ( What a strugglE!)

Constructivist indicators

an impact on educationally relevant variables, such as motivation, orientation towards learning, and mental models? 5. they are able to organize, reflect, evaluate, and generalize across experiences in linguistic and non-linguistic representational forms? 6. they are able to work well with diverse educational staffs that act in multiple functions (teacher-counselormanager)? 7. they are able to be responsible for defending, proving, justifying, and communicating their ideas and their learning to the school community and

the community at large?

By E Bon y JaC kSon , S T uDE nT aT Fo S TE R & WILLIaM S

8. they are able to demonstrate that curiosity, creativity, flexibility, and insightful thinking are major indicators of the learners’ level of engagement?

What a struggle

9. they are able to utilize, to the fullest extent, the available resources that support their learning within the internal and external (local and global) communities? 10. they are able to effectively analyze the needs and opportunities in the community and make contributions to solving problems and celebrating accomplishments?

When growing up without help. What a struggle When most of your life taking the role of father at a young age. What a struggle When parents are separated and

april 20 -21

What a struggle When the one who birthed you into this world is gone. What a struggle When you thought she would have been here through it all along.

you only have one to depend on,

What a struggle

but you wanted them to be engaged.

When you didn’t have a father, but

What a struggle When having to stay with grandparents, and wishing they were your parents.

• OthEr EvEnts •

Wisconsin Charter Schools Conference Country Springs Hotel Waukesha, WI t h u r s day, M ay 2 1 s t

The Many Faces of Constructivism Conference location & time — TBA

you have to show your children what it is like to have a father. What a struggle You’ve been through, but you made it!

5

Issue #2 • Winter 2009

Accountability requires the use of multiple forms of qualitative and quantitative evidence from both academic and nonacademic areas to arrive at judgments as to where a student or a school is doing well and where not, and to provide a basis for making improvements. No important academic decision about a student, a teacher, an administrator, a school, or a district should be made solely on one type of evidence, such as standardized test scores.” Meier, D., Kohn, A. Darling-Hammond, L. Sizer T., & Wood, G., “Many Children Left Behind” (Boston, MA, Beacon Press The Forum for Education and Democracy 2004) page 107.

E dv i s i o n s (http://www.edvisions.com)

A

The Hope Study

dolescence is a uniquely critical time in

psychology, school environments can achieve

perceptions of the learning environment

the development of young people. For

this objective by providing for students’ basic

(as measured by autonomy, belongingness,

example, a wide range of educational research

psychological needs: autonomy (choice,

and goal orientation) should be higher, and

has found declining levels of motivation,

self-management), belongingness (strong

students should respond with higher levels of

engagement, and achievement in adoles-

teacher and peer relationships) and a positive

engagement, and, over time, more hope.

cence. Developmental and clinical psycholo-

goal orientation (uniformly high expectations,

gists have discovered that psychological disor-

recognition of effort). Each of these variables

ders like depression and anxiety often emerge

leads to higher engagement. Developmental

in adolescence. As a major component of the

theory states that students in these sorts of

adolescent life experience, secondary schools

supportive environments should respond by

can provide a strong platform for future suc-

engaging more directly in their learning and,

cess or can solidify negative attitudes and

over time, gaining confidence in themselves as

self-concepts for life.

achievers.

The Hope Study is a means to assess school

In addition, The Hope Study measures student

environments using the developmental per-

behavioral and emotional engagement in

spective. Schools can now be assessed as cul-

learning and their psychological adjustment,

tures that create a set of relationships, norms

or “hope”. Hope is a construct that reflects a

of behaviors, values and commitments that

student’s perception of him or herself as a suc-

lead to the development of healthy and pro-

cess, a problem-solver, and an achiever. In a

ductive students. According to developmental

psychologically healthy environment, student

by Abbby Wil son

T

he Milwaukee Public Schools District (MPS) uses a student information system, eSIS, which is produced by AAL. eSIS can cause myriad headaches for small-school staff members, whether programmers or teachers, especially for those schools, like mine, that use projectbased learning or integrated curriculum as the primary instructional delivery models. Some of the challenges we face are: » How can eSIS accommodate our school’s different schedule(s)? » How can eSIS measure and report student proficiency in a project-

By increasing student engagement and hope, schools can realize benefits in terms of student behavior, attendance, and academic achievement, and students gain an increased confidence in themselves as achievers which benefits them throughout their life. Research now shows that higher-hope students not only set more challenging schoolrelated goals for themselves when compared to lower-hope students, but also tend to perceive that they will be more successful at attaining these goals even if they do not experience immediate success.

Flexible eSIS based model? » How can our school meet the district requirements of using eSIS without sacrificing what makes our school unique? Many schools in MPS are facing these questions, and while there are no easy answers, it is possible to make eSIS work for us. Representatives from DuBois and MLLI, along with staff from MPS Tech Services, have designed an ESIS Flexible Options Manual. This manual, based on real questions and problems, provides small school programmers and teachers with different tips and tricks that

can be used to make eSIS easier to use — think of it as the eSIS cheat sheet! Two informational training sessions will be held for GLCC school members (teachers and programmers); to obtain copies of the manual, ask questions, and learn new techniques for working with eSIS. Sessions will be held at 4:30pm on Tuesday, February 24th, and Thursday, March 12th, in Room 133B of Milwaukee Learning Laboratory and Institute (MLLI), 6506 W. Warnimount Ave. Please call Abby Wilson at MLLI (604-7850) with any questions.

3

Great Lakes Constructivist Consortium News

B y D o n M e s i b ov

Using Rubrics to Support Constructivist Assessment

T

en years ago, few teachers had ever heard of a rubric, much less used one in a classroom. Of the few who might have claimed familiarity with the word “rubric,” many were thinking of a “Rubik Cube”. Thoughts to Consider As the use of rubrics proliferates in classrooms around the world, here are a few thoughts to consider when incorporating rubrics into the learning environment: Performance expectations are clarified with all three of the following being utilized by a teacher/advisor: 1) an effective rubric; 2) a discussion of the cells in the rubric to help all concerned interpret the words in the rubric similarly; 3) a good exemplar of student performance on the task. The real significance of rubrics is that they provide a vehicle for assessing performance as it is actually occurring. This is particularly important for teachers using projects and other active-learning strategies. In the past, teachers would assess qualities like “ability with verbal expression,” and “able to demonstrate an understanding of …” with short-answer tests that assess a student’s memorization and written skills more than the student’s understanding or ability to apply those skills. We would not assess a ball player’s ability through use of a written test — we would have the player play ball. Similarly, we must have students perform the skills and demonstrate the understandings that we set as the standards for performance; allowing students to “perform” and assessing that performance through the use of a good rubric can best do this.

4

Many teachers simply use rubrics as a different format for assessing the way they’ve always assessed: E.g., a “4” is 90% of the answers correct; a “3” is 80% correct, etc. Too often, teachers lack sufficient specificity in the cells of the rubric that define the indicators or standards for student performance. For instance, words like “excellent,” “good,” “fair,” and “poor” do little to clarify the teacher’s expectations for a student (or parent). The rubric should articulate standards of quality such as what constitutes “a well-written paragraph.” If space in a rubric cell is limited, it is OK to say, “see criteria in accompanying hand-out.” The best rubrics are those that are negotiated with the students. However, this should not be attempted until you have gained experience and comfort with rubrics. How to negotiate a rubric with students can be the subject of another full article. Recommendations 1. Create a task/project (or facilitate a student creating a project) that can only be accomplished by a student who has developed the skill or understandings that become the standards for the learning. 2. Design the rubric by asking yourself, “If a student does demonstrate what I am looking for, what will be the evidence? The “evidence” is what should be articulated in the highest cell of the rubric. 3. Scaffold the other rubric cells by watching closely how well the students are able to focus on the learning objectives as they work from the

Constructivist Design Conference

Experience the World of Constructivism at the Constructivist Design Conference on Educational Improvement July 20–24, 2009 St. Lawrence University Canton, New York You’ll have to experience it to believe it, which is what constructivism is all about. Learners build on prior knowledge and experiences; learning occurs through engagement of the learner by a teacher using constructivist strategies including inquiry-based questions, group work, peer and self-evaluation, and performance-based authentic task assessment.

http://www.learnercentereded.org/ conf_info.html

rubric. Intervene when it becomes clear that the rubric is not providing as much guidance as you would like. 4. Expect that your rubric will not work as well as you would like the first time you apply it to student performance on a new activity; good rubrics are the product of trial and error. Expect frustration and less than desired results the first few years you work with rubrics. As a profession, we are in our infancy perfecting the effective use of rubrics. Don Mesibov is Director of the Institute for Learner Centered Education.