8 th grade On- Level and Pre-AP/GT PLC Wednesday, October 8 th 2014

Goals and Outcomes  Review and discuss Middle School Distinction Reports focusing on how these results impact our classrooms, our campus, and our district. What are some next steps that we can create for ourselves in order to help us grow in each of these areas?  Review and discuss the data from the first 8 th gr. On- Level and Pre-AP Curriculum-Based Assessment.  Calibration of Short Answer Responses from 1 st Curriculum-Based Assessment

Celebrations and Challenges!!!  Share with a partner one celebration/ success story you’ve experienced so far this year, and one challenge you’ve been faced with this year.

Middle School Distinction Reports  4 Indexes were scored:  Attendance  Academic Achievement Distinction in ELA  Greater Than Expected Progress in Reading (based on all 3 grade levels)  Grade 7 Writing Performance on STAAR (Level III)  Grade 8 Reading Performance on STAAR (Level III)  Each campus was rated against their own group of 40 campuses that were most comparable to their population/ demographics, etc… (Medlin’s 40 schools were different than CTMS’s 40 schools.)  Each campus was given a Quartile Score within each of the 4 indexes, with Q1 being the highest and Q4 being at the bottom. * In order for a school to earn a distinction in ELA, a school needed to be Q1 for two of the four indicators.

 Step 1a. Take a few minutes to look at this report by yourself. Feel free to make notes on it about what you notice.  Step 1b. Share your findings with a partner.  Step 1c. Be ready to share these finding out with the large group.  Step 2a. Discuss in your small groups… In what ways have we been successful? In what ways can we work toward helping to make improvements?  Step 2b. Be ready to share these ideas out with the big group.  Step 3. When you are finished, feel free to take a look at the High School Distinction Reports. What do you notice, here? Middle School Distinction Reports

Curriculum- Based Assessment #1  Take a look at your data/ results from your 1 st Curriculum-Based Assessment.  What do you notice?  Strengths?  Areas of need?  How will the results of this first CBA help guide your future instruction?  In looking closely at this data, what would be a few of our next steps?

Calibration of Short Answer Responses…  Take a few minutes to take a look at the Eng. I Short Answer Response Scoring Guide as well as the rubric- both from TEA. Highlight key words and phrases as you go through each one.  What do you notice at a score point 3? Score Point 2? Score Point 1? Score point 0?

Calibration of Short Answer Responses…  Read through the Short Answer Response piece of text titled, “Hearing the Sweetest Song”, as well as the SAR prompt.  Now- go through each example at each score point provided by the state. What do you notice?

STAAR Short Answer Questions What They Require Students must generate a credible IDEA in response to a question about a text or texts.  An IDEA represents the quality and depth of the student’s thinking and understanding. Source: Victoria Young- Director of ELAR Assessment for TEA at CREST Conference

STAAR Short Answer Questions What They Require Students must use TEXT EVIDENCE to prove that their ideas are valid/credible.  TEXT EVIDENCE substantiates the student’s ideas; it reflects the degree to which the student can connect his or her own ideas with the pieces of the text that best support the analysis. Source: Victoria Young- Director of ELAR Assessment for TEA at CREST Conference

Possible Anchor Chart Showing the SAR Structure Possible Anchor Chart Idea taken from English I Teachers

NISD SAR Exemplars April Each teacher will receive a packet of our English I NISD Exemplars. (This is just a very small sampling of the Score Point 3’s that our district received. ) - Take a few minutes and read over each one of them. - As a table, be prepared to pick your top 2 exemplars out of the whole packet, and be ready to justify why these are your “best 2.” - These may be used to help guide your scoring for the rest of this afternoon, as well as for future instruction with students on SARs.

Scoring your own Short Answer Responses - The rest of the afternoon will be spent scoring your 8 th gr. SARs. - If you feel you come across a Score Point 3, let’s discuss it since we may want to use it as a district exemplar that we can write a short commentary over it stating how it meets the standards of a Score Point 3, and place it on our 8 th gr. Curriculum Netschool page.

Thank you! Many thanks for your time and participation today! We already have an amazing start to the year! It was great seeing you all this afternoon! Enjoy the rest of your week!