Instructional Shifts that Matter: How School Leaders can Support Teachers to make them happen Southern Regional Education Board Annual Leadership Forum April 21, 2017

Reflections and implications Reflections on learning from the field Considerations for the future Distributed leadership Support District enabling conditions Focus on secondary schools Partnerships with higher education

Our learning line Everything there is to know Absolute ignorance

Reflections On the past decade of reform Higher expectations for all students General agreement on common standards, rigorous assessments, and support for students most in need School turnaround models that have brought about mixed results Greater attention to the value of teachers and excellent teaching But, despite modest gains and rising high school graduation rates, these enabling conditions have not yet led to the increases in successful student outcomes or closing of the opportunity gaps that we all seek. © Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation | © Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Key Investments that Have shaped our learning since 2008 Measuring Effective Teaching Project Intensive Partnership Site Innovative Professional Development (IPD) Integration Investments © Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation |

ELA instructional shifts The Common Core English language arts standards put a complex text at the center of the lesson and move away from isolated, skills-based instruction. ELA Before ELA After Little emphasis on text complexity. Vocabulary questions often focused on prior knowledge rather than context Figurative language questions focused on literary terms rather than meaning. Text Complexity: Regular practice with complex text and its academic language Primary focus on simple recall or superficial analysis often with decontextualized tasks Little or no emphasis on using textual evidence Evidence: Reading, writing and speaking grounded in evidence from text, both literary and informational Equal representation of informational and literary text throughout the grades, Limited focus on the quality of informational texts Knowledge: Building knowledge through content-rich nonfiction © Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation |

math instructional shifts The Common Core math standards support a deeper understanding of math concepts, while balancing the need for solid foundational skills. Math Before Math After Covered a broad range of content without delving deeply into many, if any, topics All content was considered of equal importance Focus: Significant narrowing and deepening the major work of each grade Assessment was a checklist of individual standards Each topic taught in isolation each year Coherence: Coherent progressions from grade to grade and clear connections within grades Over-emphasis on procedural skill Lacked focus on building conceptual understanding Lacked authentic application of math to non-routine problems and real-world situations Rigor: Increased rigor, as represented by: Speed and accuracy in calculation Conceptual understanding of key concepts Use of math flexibly in problem-solving contexts © Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation |

Leadership practices to support the shifts: ambitious instruction Set a vision for ambitious instruction Create systems to support data-driven instruction Create systems for ongoing professional learning and collaboration Upgrade curriculum and instructional models Create opportunities for individualization and intervention Provide targeted feedback and coaching © Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation |

The journey toward strong implementation that matters Stage 1: Setting the conditions Principal is the instructional leader Focus on setting vision and critical conditions PD: Focus on setting up systems to improve instruction rather than instruction itself Stage 2: Upgrading systems and structures Principal supported by some teacher leaders Vision, curriculum, and instructional model established PD: Focus on strengthening collaborative structures to consistently enact ambitious instruction Stage 3: Consistently enacting ambitious instruction Distributed instructional leadership High degree consensus/coherence around vision PD: Robust structures exist to enact/continually refine ambitious instruction in every classroom © Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation |

Continued efforts: implications for future work Stronger examples in secondary schools Supportive district conditions for school level change Deliberate focus on strengthening distributed leadership teams in schools Strategic partnership with higher education (teacher and leader preparation) © Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation |

the foundation’s work ahead Equity A defining value of the foundation (“all lives have equal value”), but not always explicit or accomplished through a universal approach that doesn’t expressly acknowledge the impact of race and class Leadership to Drive Change Evaluation results across a wide range of initiatives and programs revealed that teachers’ experiences and successful implementation of new practices depended significantly on the quality of their leadership. Schools as the Locus of Improvement Teachers remain the most important in-school influence on student learning, but their work takes place within the context of the school. Anchor on Key Indicators of Student Success Significant advances in the evidence base around which patterns of student behavior, course-taking, and achievement in middle school and high school are predictive of long-term success enable a more context- sensitive and student-facing approach. © Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation |