La Crescent-Hokah Schools an innovative educational system designed to prepare all learners to thrive in an ever-changing, global society.

Early Release for Teacher Collaboration

An Early Release for Common Teacher PLCs Big Ideas/Why What/how will the teacher collaborative framework change? Additional concerns and questions

Big Ideas/Why Change? Creating a common time for teacher PLCs across the district will lead to: An increase in student learning Improved instructional practice Enhanced opportunities for teacher collaboration

Enhanced Teacher Collaboration Equitable access/opportunity for improving student achievement Current practice variety of times and days across the district within each site. Equitable practice flexibility to schedule teacher collaborative work flexibility in providing interdisciplinary/cross-curricular work opportunities flexibility to schedule both multiple grade and site level work Addressing student achievement not limited by the “pragmatics”of building schedules

Improved Instructional Practice Greater opportunity to plan and offer project-based/interdisciplinary instruction Enhanced ability to personalize and meet the individual needs of all learners Increased ability to learn, implement, review and reinforce best practices for instruction Increased ability to monitor student growth and achievement (common, formative assessments)

Increased Student Learning The district’s PLC framework provides a direct connection and focus for teacher professional development and collaborative work with student learning needs at the forefront of all work. What do we want students to learn? How will we know when they have learned it? How do we respond when some students don’t learn? How do we respond when students have learned?

Increased Student Learning At the Elementary School: Multiple literacy and numeracy interventions have led to increased student achievement. Teachers have collaborated on vocabulary instruction (content word wall), intensive numeracy problem solving interventions, and worked towards developing interdisciplinary units focused on meeting individual student needs.

Increased Student Learning At the Middle School: Teacher collaboration has supported and led to creation of a grade 5-6 multiage language arts block. The instructional design developed during the collaborative work has led to greater flexibility to group students to differentiate and align instruction to the learning levels of each student. The team developed the curriculum and common formative assessments with which to monitor and adjust instruction to address the needs of each students.(it should be noted the pragmatics of the M.S. building schedule does not allow this type of work to take place at the other grade levels)

Increased Student Learning At the High School - Geometry/Math Plus: We currently have four classes with 3 different teachers. During their collaborative work, teachers have identified student needs, re-grouped students and customized instruction to meet individual student needs. In addition, the teachers are planning common formative assessments to ensure all students are successful regardless of the approach to instruction.

How/What Will It Look Like: Early release one day per week (Wednesday) 2:10 Dismissal at the Elementary 2:20 Dismissal at the High School/Middle School PLCs meet from 2:30 – 3:30 Will allow for PLC Grade Level work, site level content teams, Pk-12 content teams/curriculum work

How/What Will It Look Like: Teacher-Student contact time will not decrease High School will maintain current schedule (nothing changes other than busing is available for students on Wednesdays) Middle School will maintain current bell schedule and utilize the remaining days of the week for advisory and additional academic interventions Will provide greater flexibility for scheduling and covering supervision needs at the Middle School. Elementary School will maintain current schedule. Character counts/social skills will be integrated elsewhere (Responsive Classroom)

How/What Will It Look Like: Time from shortened day will be reallocated for professional development for para-professionals

Questions???