Power & Priority Standards Presented By: Alan Cabanting & Melissa (Missy) Beavers July 23, 2015 (Thursday)

What’s a Power Standard? Prioritized academic standards that educators Determine to be the most critical and essential for students to learn. Learning experiences are designed to emphasize power-standards content and ensure that Students learn the content consistent with the power standards.

Power standards do not preclude the teaching of other standards—they merely determine the highest-priority material. Power standards may be limited to only a handful of standards Standards will typically require students to acquire and demonstrate strong understanding of a complex subject or sophisticated skill. For example, understanding the scientific method and applying it in diverse scientific situations might be an example of a power standard identified by schools

What Makes a Standard a Power Standard? Larry Ainsworth and Douglas Reeves are widely considered to have coined the term “power standards.” According to Ainsworth and Reeves, there are three criteria for selecting power standards: Endurance Leverage Essentiality .

Endurance: Standards that focus on knowledge and skills that will be relevant throughout a student’s lifetime (such as learning how to read or how to interpret a map).

Leverage: Standards that focus on knowledge and skills used in multiple academic disciplines (such as writing grammatically and persuasively or interpreting and analyzing data).

Essentiality: Standards that focus on the knowledge and skills necessary for students to succeed in the next grade level or the next sequential course in an academic subject (such as understanding algebraic functions before taking geometry or calculus, which require the use of algebra).

I thought power standards were something different!

Common Understanding at Moanalua of Power & Priority Yes, over the years, “power standards” has been a term used to refer to different things. For example, that white-haired guy from Colorado referred to his school’s “Power Standard” of literacy. That’s why today, we want to make sure we all use the same vocabulary. So here goes . . . . .

Defining Priority Standards: Department Power Standards AKA Enduring Understanding, Big Ideas Power Standards that are central to a discipline and have lasting impact beyond the classroom. Course or Content Priority Standards AKA Essential Understandings Priority Standards are the most important standards in your specific course or subject. Missy – Defines what power and priority standards are. 2010 Leadership and Learning Center

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s): Is this a new thing or something that we are doing again? How does this fit with what we are doing here at Moanalua? How are we going to tackle this task? Why are we doing this? MISSY: Goes over the frequently asked questions WITHOUT giving answers. 2010 Leadership and Learning Center

1) Is it new? No, Mrs. Martin has raised the idea of prioritizing standards in prior years. Some departments have worked on their power standards already. Some departments have not (‘Cause we nevah had time to!) Alan – Goes over FAQ 1 with answer 2010 Leadership and Learning Center

So, We all are revisiting it to FOCUS our teaching

2) How does it fit with Moanalua’s Vision?: Missy – Goes Over FAQ 2 with answer. Roots (Expectation)  Trunk (Success Standards)  Branches (Dept Power Standards)  Leaves (Priority Standards)

3) How are we going to get it done? Power Standards will be worked on in your Departments. Priority Standards will be worked on in your Data Teams. MISSY: Go over FAQ # 3 with answer. 2010 Leadership and Learning Center

You Remember the Data Teams Process: 1) Establish Expectations - Unwrap the Standards 8) Determine if Goals Met Reflection & Next Steps 2) Develop a Curriculum Map 7) Administer Post CFA’s 3) Create Common Formative Assessments (CFA’s) Alan – Go over Data Teams Process VERY quickly… 6) Use Agreed Upon Instructional Strategies 4) Administer Pre CFA’s 5) Data Teams 5 Step Process

Focusing Your Data Teams: Provide a basic framework for data teams Get started on what’s most important Start Small Spend time actually talking about instruction and its effect on student performance Focus on the core Be as specific as possible Select a concept or skill that can realistically be taught and assessed over the course of a few weeks Zoom in Complete multiple cycles Adjust process in response to feedback Iterate and refine Missy: 1) we need to start small. If you go back and try to do everything you hear in a book or training on data teams, you’ll leave very little room for developing ownership around the process, and very little room for fitting the process into your existing work. 2) We need to focus on improving instruction in order to improve student learning. 3) I believe that we do this by zooming in on specific concepts and skills that we want students to master, and closely examining and refining how we teach those concepts and skills. Finally, since we’re talking about improving a process over time, and focusing on very specific teaching targets, we don’t want to spend all year on one small thing; we want to go through multiple cycles, each time refining the process so it better serves our goals as a school. Excerpt From: 2010 Leadership and Learning Center

Seriously, this is what we do 3) Why are we doing this? I said so…. Seriously, this is what we do All standards important Teach all of the standards All by the end of school year Students are unprepared for next grade & low achievement! Teachers burnt out, unhappy, and frustrated! Alan: Joke about Ms. Martin… 2013 Larry Ainsworth

Prioritizing Standards: Makes it easier for us to teach Provides depth over breadth, Increases learning retention, Students are more prepared -- increase in student achievement Teachers are less frustrated, are happier, and have a sense of accomplishment. MISSY: 2013 Larry Ainsworth

NOOO!!!!

Hakuna Matata: Exemplars of Power & Priority Standards Tomorrow Department Meeting time for Power Standards Collaborative Groups (Data Teams) to determine Priority Standards You ARE NOT alone…the PD team and Admin are here to help and support you! Alan & Missy: Alan – Go over 1, 2, & 3 Missy – You are not alone section…supported by PD Team.

Reference: www.eduleadership.org/.../Getting-Started-with-Data-Teams-WASA-2007 www.atlanta.k12.ga.us/.../data%20teams/Data%2009 Data Teams – 2010 Leadership and Learning Center CFA’s – 2008 Leadership and Learning Center http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheScream